A HISTORY OF HERTFORDSHIRE 



the tuning should the churchwardens refuse to do so. Further endowment 

 was provided under the will of Mistress Dyonisia Battell, perhaps sister of 

 Mary, who died in 1730/"' At Bishop's Stortford the organ was perhaps 

 a little later, though there had been one here in the time of Henry VII " 

 The organ was given by a Mr. Pape, and, says Salmon, ' the expencc 

 of so fine an Instrument is great, but chearfully contributed to by the 

 Inhabitants, as well as by other Gentlemen.''' By 181 5 Watford had also 

 obtained an organ which stood on the gallery built at the east end of the 

 nave in 1766." Here as elsewhere the school children were the only trained 

 singers," but the music was strictly limited in character, being confined by 

 Bishop Gibson in 1724 to the Psalms in 'five or six usual tunes.'" Where 

 there was a school the children would form the choir, and at Hertford the 

 boys of the Green Coat School were required to be taught to sing the 

 psalms and responses in and during divine service.'" Singing, however, seems 

 to have fallen into disuse in many village churches, and when John Jones 

 went to Shephall in 1767 he found that there had been none for many 

 years." His ambition was to establish the singing of Psalms v, xxiv, Ixxiv, c 

 and civ, and he added that he ' would be contented with these few, being 

 plain and proper tunes, and the words suitable.' " Singing seems to have been 

 revived towards the close of the century,'' and in 1790 Bishop Porteus feelingly 

 described how in most country churches the music was ' generally engrossed 

 by a select band of singers, who have been taught by some itinerant master to 

 sing in the worst manner, a most wretched set of psalm-tunes in three or four 

 parts, so complex, so difficult and so totally void of all true harmony that it 

 is altogether impossible for any of the congregation to take part with them."" 

 Religious education was not neglected by the Church at this time. The 

 injunctions of 1550 provided that every curate should teach the catechism, 

 whensoever just occasion was offered on Sunday or holy day, and at least 

 once every six weeks should call upon his parishioners and present himself 

 ready to instruct and examine the youth.'^ Queen Mary required that every 

 parson, vicar or curate upon every holy day and every second Sunday in the 

 year should hear and instruct all the youth of the parish ' for halfe an houre 

 at the leaste, before Evenynge prayer, in the ten commaundementes, the 

 Artycles of the belyefe, and in the Lordes prayer, and dylygentlye examync 

 them, and teache the Cathechisme, sette forth in the booke of publike 

 prayer.'" Articles of 1571 instructed the curate to catechize on Sundays 

 and holy days, and the duty was constantly being urged." The early Puritans 

 found here an excellent opportunity for expounding their views'* ; in 1603 

 John Rudd, minister of Shephall, preached every Sunday at least twice, ' in 

 the afternoon referring all his exercises unto catechising, handling either 



"" Clutterbuck, op. cit. ii, 175-6. " Glasscock, op. cit. 28. "« Salmon, op. cit. 272. 



" Clutterbuck, op. cit. i, 258. ^ Charge of Edmund Bishop of Lincoln . . . 1717. 



59 Gibson, Directions riven to the Clergy of the Diocese of London {\1%\), i H-i 5- .„ , . , 



60 Clutterbuck, op. cit. li, 1 74- '' J°°^ ^S. (Dr. Williams's Lib.), B 16 «^ Ib,d. 



63 A pitch pipe once used at Aldbury and a hautboy belonging to the church band at Aldenham '.^cre 

 shown at the English Church History Exhibition at St. Albans, 1905. 

 6< Porteus, Charge to the Clergy of the Diocese of London, 20. 



65 Injunctions geven in the Visitation of . . . Nycolas byshopfe of London, 1550, § 9. 



66 Injunctions geven by the Quenes Maiestie, 1 5 59, § 44. 



6' Articles to be enquired of . . . in the Visitation of the Dioces of London, 1571, 5 9. 

 68 Rec. of the Old Archd. of St. Albans, 45', 54. 



348 



