vi. WESTMINSTER SCHOOL

_Head Masters_:--John Adams (1540); Alexander Nowell (1543–53); Nicholas Udall (1555–6); John Passey (1557–8, with Richard Spencer as usher); John Randall (1563); Thomas Browne (1564–9); Francis Howlyn (1570–1); Edward Graunte (1572–92); William Camden (1593–8, Undermaster 1575–93); Richard Ireland (1599–1610); John Wilson (1610–22).

_Choir Masters_ (?):--William Cornish (1480); John Taylor (1561–7); John Billingsley (1572); William Elderton (1574).

[_Bibliographical Note._--The best sources of information are: R. Widmore, _History of Westminster Abbey_ (1751); J. Welch [--C. B. Phillimore], _Alumni Westmonasterienses_, ed. 2 (1852); _Appendix to First Report of the Cathedral Commissioners_ (1854); F. H. Forshall, _Westminster School, Past and Present_ (1884); J. Sargeaunt, _Annals of Westminster School_ (1898); A. F. Leach, _The Origin of Westminster School in Journal of Education_, n. s. xxvii (1905), 79. Some valuable records have been printed by E. J. L. Scott in the _Athenaeum_, and extracts from others are given in the _Observer_ for 7 Dec. 1919. A. F. Leach has fixed the dates of Udall’s life in _Encycl. Brit._ s.v.]

There is no trace of any grammar school in the abbey of Westminster until the fourteenth century. The _Customary_ of 1259–83 (ed. E. M. Thompson for _Henry Bradshaw Soc._) only contemplates education for the novices, and in the earliest almoner’s accounts, which begin with 1282, entries of 1317 ‘in maintaining Nigel at school for the love of God’ (Leach, 80) and 1339–40, ‘pro scholaribus inueniendis ad scolas’ (E. H. Pearce, _The Monks of Westminster Abbey_, 79), need only refer to the support of scholars at a University. But from 1354–5 there were almonry boys (_pueri Elemosinariae_) under the charge of the Sub-Almoner, and these are traceable up to the dissolution. To them we may assign the _ludus_ of the Boy Bishop on St. Nicholas’ day, mentions of which have been noted in 1369, 1388, 1413, and 1540 (_Mediaeval Stage_, i. 360; Leach, 80). They had a school house near ‘le Millebank’, and from 1367 the Almoner paid a _Magister Puerorum_. From 1387 he is often called _Magister Scolarum_ and in the fifteenth century _Magister Scolarium_. From 1510 the boys under the _Magister_ become _pueri grammatici_, and may be distinct from certain _pueri cantantes_ for whom since 1479–80 the Almoner had paid a separate teacher of singing. The first of these song-masters was William Cornish, doubtless of the family so closely connected with the Chapel Royal (q.v.). In 1540 the _pueri grammatici_ were reorganized as the still existing College of St. Peter, Westminster, which is therefore generally regarded as owing its origin to Henry VIII, who on the surrender of the abbey in 1540 turned it into a college of secular canons, and provided for a school of forty scholars. This endured in some form through the reactionary reign of Mary, whose favourite dramatist Nicholas Udall became its Head Master, although the date of his appointment on 16 December 1555 (A. F. Leach in _Encycl. Brit._, s.v. Udall) makes it probable that, if he wrote his _Ralph Roister Doister_ for a school at all, it was for Eton (q.v.) rather than Westminster. His predecessor Alexander Nowell is said by Strype to have ‘brought in the reading of Terence for the better learning the pure Roman style’, and, as the Sub-Almoner paid ‘xvi_d._ for wryting of a play for the chyldren’ as early as 1521 (_Observer_), the performance of Latin comedies by the boys may have been pre-Elizabethan. It is provided for in the statutes drafted by Dean Bill (_c._ 1560) after the restoration of her father’s foundation by Elizabeth. These statutes also contemplate a good deal of interrelation between the choir school and the grammar school. They are printed in the _Report of the Cathedral Commission_ (App. I, 80). The personnel of the foundation was to include (a) ‘_clerici duodecim_’, of whom ‘_unus sit choristarum doctor_’, (b) ‘_decem pueri symphoniaci sive choristae_’, presumably in continuation of the former singing boys, (c) ‘_praeceptores duo ad erudiendam iuventutem_’, (d) ‘_discipuli grammatici quadraginta_’. The ‘_praeceptores_’ are distinguished later in the document as ‘_archididascalus_’ and ‘_hypodidascalus_’, and the former is also called ‘_ludimagister_’. By c. 5 the choristers are to have a preference in elections to the grammar school. The following section ‘_De Choristis et Choristarum Magistro_’ forms part of c. 9:

‘Statuimus et ordinamus ut in ecclesia nostra praedicta sint decem choristae, pueri tenerae aetatis et vocibus sonoris ad cantandum, et ad artem musicam discendam, et etiam ad musica instrumenta pulsanda apti, qui choro inserviant, ministrent, et cantent. Ad hos praeclare instituendos, unus eligatur qui sit honestae famae, vitae probae, religionis sincerae, artis musicae peritus, et ad cantandum et musica instrumenta pulsanda exercitatus, qui pueris in praedictis scientiis et exercitiis docendis aliisque muniis [? muneribus] in choro obeundis studiose vacabit. Hunc magistrum choristarum appellari volumus. Cui muneri doctores et baccalaureos musices aliis praeferendos censemus. Volumus etiam quoties eum ab ecclesia nostra abesse contingat, alterum substituat a decano vel eo absente prodecano approbandum. Prospiciat item puerorum saluti, quorum et in literis (donec ut in scholam nostram admittantur apti censebuntur) et in morum modestia et in convictu educationem et liberalem institutionem illius fidei et industriae committimus. Quod si negligens et in docendo desidiosus, aut in salute puerorum et recta eorum educatione minime providus et circumspectus, et ideo non tolerandus inveniatur, post trinam admonitionem (si se non emendaverit) ab officio deponatur. Qui quidem choristarum magister ad officium suum per se fideliter obeundum iuramento etiam adigetur. Choristae postquam octo orationis partes memoriter didicerint et scribere mediocriter noverint, ad scholam nostram ut melius in grammatica proficiant singulis diebus profestis accedant, ibique duabus minimum horis maneant, et a praeceptoribus instituantur.’

The following section ‘_De Comoediis et Ludis in Natali Domini exhibendis_’ comes in c. 10:

‘Quo iuventus maiore cum fructu tempus Natalis Christi terat, et tum actioni tum pronunciationi decenti melius se assuescat: statuimus ut singulis annis intra 12^m post festum Natalis Christi dies [? diem], vel postea arbitrio decani, ludimagister et praeceptor simul Latine unam, magister choristarum Anglice alteram comoediam aut tragoediam a discipulis et choristis suis in aula privatim vel publice agendam, curent. Quod si non prestiterint singuli quorum negligentia omittuntur decem solidis mulctentur.’

The statutes appear never to have been confirmed by the Crown, and their practical adoption was subject to certain exceptions. Thus, it is stated in the report of the Public Schools Commission in 1864 (i. 159) that there is no reason to believe that the provision giving a preference to choristers in elections for the grammar school was ever attended to.

Of plays and the like, however, there are various records. The first since 1521 is at the Lord Mayor’s Day of 1561, when the Merchant Taylors’ expenses for their pageant included items ‘to John Tayllour, master of the Children of the late monastere of Westminster, for his children that sung and played in the pageant’, and ‘to John Holt momer in reward for attendance given of the children in the pageant’. Similar payments were made to Taylor as ‘M^r of the quirysters’ for the services of the children on the Ironmongers’ pageant of 1566.[208] In 1562 the choristers of Westminster Abbey performed a goodly play before the Society of Parish Clerks after their annual dinner.[209] In 1564–5 comes the first of a series of Court performances, which received assistance from the Revels office. To this occasion belongs a memorandum of ‘Thexpenses of twoo playes viz. Heautontimoroumenos Terentii and Miles Gloriosus Plauti plaied by the children of the grammer schoole in the colledge of Westminster and before the Quenes maiestie anno 1564’.[210] The items include, ‘At ye rehersing before Sir Thomas Benger for pinnes and suger candee vj_d._’, ‘For a lynke to bring thapparell from the reuells iiij_d._’, ‘At the playing of Miles Glor: in M^r. Deanes howse for pinnes half a thousand vj_d._’, ‘Geuen to M^r. Holte yeoman of the reuells x_s._’, ‘To M^r. Taylor his man’, ‘For one Plautus geven to ye Queenes maiestie and fowre other vnto the nobilitie xj_s._’ It is not quite clear whether the _Heautontimorumenus_, as well as the _Miles Gloriosus_, was given before the Queen, but I think not. In 1565–6 Elizabeth was again present at the play of _Sapientia Solomonis_, and there were payments ‘For drawing the city and temple of Jerusalem and paynting towers’, ‘To a woman that brawght her childe to the stadge and there attended uppon it’, and for a copy of the play bound ‘in vellum with the Queenes Ma^{tie} hir armes and sylke ribben strings’, almost certainly that still extant as _Addl. MS._ 20061 (cf. App. K), which shows that Elizabeth was accompanied by Cecilia of Sweden.[211] Whether these plays were at the school or at Court is not quite clear. I should, on the whole, infer the latter, but no rewards were paid for them by the Treasurer of the Chamber. John Taylor was, however, paid for plays by the Children of Westminster during the Shrovetide of 1566–7 and the Christmas of 1567–8; John Billingesley for their _Paris and Vienna_ on 19 February 1572; and William Elderton for their _Truth, Faithfulness, and Mercy_ on 1 January 1574. In 1567 also the boys are recorded (_Observer_) to have played at Putney before Bishop Grindal. I suppose that Billingesley and Elderton succeeded Taylor as _Magistri Choristarum_. Taylor himself is probably the same who on 8 September 1557 was Master of the singing children at the hospital of St. Mary Woolnoth. Elderton is presumably the same who brought the Eton boys to Court in 1573. Whether he is also the bibulous balladist of the pamphleteers (cf. ch. xv) is more doubtful. The absence of a payment for _Miles Gloriosus_ may suggest that this was given by the grammar school who, like the Inns of Court, did not expect a reward, and that the English plays were given by the choristers, who were on the same footing as the choristers of Paul’s. I am not sure, however, that the wording of the statutes quite implies such a sharp distinction between the two sets of boys, and it will be noticed that Taylor, or his man, was in some way concerned with the Latin play. Very possibly grammar boys and choristers acted together. With 1574 the Court performances end, but expenses of plays are traceable in the college accounts in 1604–5, 1605–6, 1606–7, and 1609–10, and up to about 1640, when they stop for sixty-four years.[212]