n alteration of voice, that it was little more than plain
speaking, like the reading of psalms in our cathedrals, &c. at this day;
but in process of time, instrumental music was introduced first amongst
the Greeks.

Pope Gregory the Great refined upon the church music and made it more
exact and harmonious; and that it might be general, he established
singing schools at Rome, wherein persons were educated to be sent to the
distant churches, and where it has remained ever since; only among the
reformed there are various ways of performing, and even in the same
church, particularly that of England, in which parish churches differ
much from cathedrals; but most dissenters comply with this part of
worship in some form or other.

HALBERT H.

* * * * *

SKIMINGTON RIDING.

(_To the Editor of the Mirror_.)

Having noticed a description of an exhibition called "Skimington
Riding," in the present volume of the MIRROR, and your correspondent
being at a loss for the origin of such a title, allow me to observe,
that it appears to me that it originated from a skimmer being always
used (as I have heard from very good authority it is) as the leading
instrument towards making the various sounds usual on such occasions. I
think it, therefore, very probable it took its rise from the utensil
skimmer, and would be more properly called Skimmerting Riding.

_Dorset_

FELIX.

* * * * *

RECONCILIATION.

At Lynn Regis, Norfolk, on every first Monday of the month, the mayor,
aldermen, magistrates, and preachers, meet to hear and determine
controversies between the inhabitants in an amicable manner, to prevent
lawsuits. This custom was first established in 1583, and is called the
Feast of Reconciliation.

HALBERT H.

* * * * *

ANCIENT SUPERSTITION RESPECTING FELLING OAKS.

In the _Magna Britannia_, the author in his _Account of the Hundred of
Croydon_, says, "Our historians take notice of two things in this
parish, which may not be convenient to us to omit, viz. a great wood
called Norwood, belonging to the archbishops, wherein was anciently a
tree called the vicar's oak, where four parishes met, as it were in a
point. It is said to have consisted wholly of oaks, and among them was
one that bore mistletoe, which some persons were so hardy as to cut for
the gain of selling it to the apothecaries of London, leaving a branch