Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/391

 9* s. ii. NOV. 12, '98.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

383

" In these days of American organs, mixed choirs, and syndicate hymn-books, the leader of psalmody, or precentor, in Scottish churches, whose duty it was to read from his desk in front of the pulpit the successive lines for congregational singing, has well-nigh totally disappeared. This official was quaintly called the 'letter-gae,' because his function was to ' let-gae,' or give out, the words and tune of the psalms sung in public worship ; while his desk, from which he let go, or started the praise, was commonly known as the ' letteron.' Pitching his voice to the first note of each line, this functionary, who in country parishes generally officiated as schoolmaster or village cobbler during the week, would proceed to chant the words in a slow, draw- ling monotone, prolonging the last syllable for a little, and then breaking, at the head of the con- gregation, into the music set to the words thus delivered. The position, of course, tested not only the musical qualifications, but also the literary attainments of the leader, and there are passages in the metrical version of the Psalms as used in Scotland which must have put rural precentors on their mettle. In some of the more advanced country churches, however, the words of the psalm were given outj verse by verse, by the minister ; the precentor's office being confined to 'raising' the tune, the name ' Martyrs of Dundee' [me], &c., as the case might be having been previously notified to the congregation by a board, or placard, hung outside his little pulpit."

At p. 258 of 'N. & Q.,' 8 th S. vii., W. C. B. wrote with reference to the "Letter-gae": " John Evelyn, in his ' Diary,' records having seen hymns marked up on a slate"; and SIR OSWALD HUNTER BLAIR (at p. 189), after referring to the board or placard, continued :

"It was not until years later that I smiled over George Eliot's inimitable picture of Shepperton Church, and the ' process, as mysterious and un- traceable as the opening of the flowers or the breaking out of the stars,' by which a slate ap- peared in front of the gallery, advertising the hymn about to be sung."

These two extracts enable the writer in Household Words to complete the first para- graph of his learned disquisition. Continuing without break after the sentence last quoted from him, he thus proceeds with graceful allusiveness, throwing in, it will be noticed, a well-directed touch about the date of Evelyn :

" Not that the latter custom was one peculiar to Scotch churches alone. John Evelyn, in his ' Diary,' records having seen hymns and hymn-tunes marked up on a slate, and that was in the seventeenth cen- tury; while there is George Eliot's inimitable picture of Shepperton Church, and the ' process, as mysterious and untraceable as the opening of the flowers or the breaking out of the stars,' by which a slate appeared in front of the gallery, advertising the hymn about to be sung."

For his second paragraph the ingenious and confiding essayist draws exclusively from my contribution ('N. & Q.,' 8 th S. vii. 190). Basing my statements on Ramsay and his contemporaries, I said :

" The ' letter-gae ' stood forth amid his surround- ings as an individual of note ; he was a man of weight and influence in the congregation and the community. He was a social force, and at a festive gathering would occupy the president's chair in the absence of the laird, and prove himself an arbiter bibendi whose word was law."

This was illustrated by the lines from Ram- say's supplementary canto ii. to ' Christ's Kirk on the Green,' which the essayist in Household Words places at the head of his eclectic pro- duction. Further on I said :

"If the parish were suburban, the schoolmaster, in his declining years, might engage a town-bred precentor, who walked the distance on Sundays. If sudden illness or stormy weather detained the precentor, local talent had to face the duties, and the schoolmaster or the beadle would take the desk. One such case recurs to memory."

Then followed an illustrative anecdote, to which the essayist is kind enough, before quoting it, to make a complimentary refer- ence. Why he should have gone out of his way to make this one solitary acknowledgment is a baffling reflection. But be that as it may, in his second paragraph thus does he indite :

" As a picturesque figure in old Scottish ecclesi- astical life, the 'letter-gae' stood forth amid his surroundings as an individual of note ; he was a man of weight and influence in the congregation and the community at large [no italics in the ori- ginal]. He was a social force, and at a festive gathering would occupy the president's chair in the absence of the laird. In suburban parishes it was sometimes the custom to engage a town-bred pre- centor, who walked the distance on Sundays. But if sudden indisposition or stormy weather detained this worthy, local talent had to face the duties, and the schoolmaster or the beadle would take the desk. In discussing the origin of the word ' letter-gae,' a few years ago [the indifferent ease and vagueness here are admirable], a correspondent of Notes and Queries furnished a delightful little anecdote illus- trating the humorous side of just such a case."

Anecdote, given in full, completes the second paragraph of this learned author's discourse. In the concluding paragraph SIR OSWALD HUNTER BLAIR, MR. PICKFORD, and FATHER ANGUS are the unacknowledged authorities. The reader will notice how gracefully and suggestively the essayist makes occasional divergences from his originals, and how in his very last clause he gives expression to a quite daring novelty. SIR OSWALD HUNTER BLAIR had said :

"Nowadays, I fancy, the preliminary reading of the words formerly an essential part of the ' letting gae,' and dating- from those days when psalm-books were few and far between, and people had to trust to memory for both words and tune has pretty

well fallen into desuetude By the way, it has

often occurred to me that the Scottish precentor the title has a distinctly liturgical, not to say- Popish, ring about it is a survival, or a revival, of Catholic usage. What does FATHER ANGUS