by the people, but by the monarch. Edward I. and Henry VI. gave their
patronage to the custom, and the latter is said to have followed the
example of his progenitors in so doing.

However, in 1542, Henry VIII. "by the advys of his Highness' counsel,"
saw fit to order its abolition, which he did in the following terms:

"Whereas heretofore dyuers and many superstitions and chyldysh
obseruances haue been used, and yet to this day are obserued and kept,
in many and sundry partes of this realm, as vpon St. Nicholas, Saint
Catherine, Saint Clement, the holie Innocents, and such-like holie
daies, children be strangelie decked and apparayled to counterfeit
Priests, Bishopes, and Women, and so be ledde with Songes and dances
from house to house, blessing the people and gathering of money; and
boyes do singe masse and preache in the pulpitt, with other such
onfittinge and inconuenient vsages which tend rather to derysyon than
enie true glorie of God, or honour of his Sayntes: the Kynges maiestie,
therefore, myndynge nothinge so muche as to aduance the true glory of
God without vain superstition, wylleth and commandeth that from
henceforth all such superstitious obseruations be left and clerely
extinguished throu'out all his realme and dominions for as moche as the
same doth resemble rather the vnlawfull superstition of gentilitie than
the pure and sincere religion of Christ."

The allegation that boys dressed up as women is confirmed by a Compotus
roll of St. Swithin's Priory at Winchester (1441), from which it appears
that the boys of the monastery, along with the choristers of St.
Elizabeth's Collegiate Chapel, near the city, played before the Abbess
and Nuns of St. Mary's Abbey--attired "like girls."

The custom was restored by an edict of Bishop Bonner on November 13,
1554, much to the satisfaction of the populace; and the spectacle of the
Boy-Bishop riding _in pontificalibus_--this was in 1556--all about the
Metropolis gave currency to the saying--"St. Nicholas yet goeth about
the city." Foxe tells us that at Ipswich the Master of the Grammar
School led the Boy-Bishop through the streets for "apples and
belly-cheer; and whoso would not receive him he made heretics, and such
also as would not give his faggot for Queen Mary's child." (By this
expression, which was common during this reign, was intended the
Boy-Bishop; the Queen had, of course, no child of her own.) Amidst the
sundry and manifold changes that marked the acc