uters").
Abbey Parish Acc'ts, _s.a._ 1600, _Shrop. Arch. Soc_., i. 65 ("paid to
Cleaton, the Chauncelor's man for keeping us from Lichfield"). Great
Witchingham Acc'ts, _Norfolk and Norwich Arch. Soc_., xiii, 207 ("Simp
the sumner for his fees for excusing us from Norwich"). _St. Mary
Woolchurch Haw_, London, _Acc'ts, s.a_. 1594 ("more unto the paratour
and Doctor Stanhopes man for their favours"). Hale, _Crim. Prec_., 202
("_Fassus est_ that he gave xs. to ... the apparitor to thend that he
might not be called into this corte." 1590). For examples of fees paid
for absolution from an unjust excommunication see _Minchinhampton
Acc'ts, s.a_. 1606 ("layd out [at] Gloucester when we wer
excommunicated for our not appearinge when wee were not warned to
appeere, vj s. viij d"). St. Clement's, Ipswich, Acc'ts, _East
Anglian_, in (1890), 304 ("Payed for owr Absolution to the Commissary,
being reprimanded for that we did not give in our Verdict, where as we
nether had warning nor notice given us of his Corte houlden, ij[s.]
x[d.]:" and: "Payed more ffor the discharg of his boocke, viijd."
1610). Churchwardens accounts are pretty reliable evidence, for they
were subject to the scrutiny of those who had to foot the bills.

[184] See Mr. Andrew Clark's _Shirburn Ballads_ (Oxon. 1907), 306 ff.
Mr. Clark's notes and illustrations drawn from other contemporary
sources are most valuable.

[185] A number of broadsides and pamphlets were published in 1641 upon
the abolition of the spiritual courts. Consult Mr. Stephen's
_Catalogue_ (1870) for those in the British Museum. One of them is
entitled _The Proctor and Parator their Mourning ... Beinge a true
Dialogue, Relating the fearfull abuses and exorbitances of those
spirituall Courts, under the names of Sponge the Proctor and Hunter
the Parator_. In the spirited dialogue between the two _Hunter_ tells
of his ways of extorting money from recusants, seminary priests and
neophytes, "whose starting holes I knew as well as themselves"; also,
he adds, "I got no small trading by the Brownists, Anabaptists and
Familists who love a Barne better than a Church." "Poor Curates,
Lecturers and Schoolmasters ... that have been willing to officiate
their places without licences" are also his special prey. As for minor
offenders "against our terrible Canons and Jurisdiction ... had I but
given them a severe looke, I could ... have made them draw their
purses ..." "I tell you," he concludes, "the name of