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 ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY Bishop Montaigne issued in 1621 'a precept for putting off hats at service-time ' ; '" and six years later he gave further orders concerning irreverent behaviour in church. ^^^ Like Bancroft, he insisted strongly on the duty of kneeling to receive the Sacrament, and on the keeping of holy ■days.'''^ He was also careful to obey Bancroft's injunctions about ex- communicate recusants,'^* refusing to grant burial in consecrated ground even to some ninety-five persons who were killed by the falling of a house in Blackfriars in which they had assembled to hear a sermon by Drury the Jesuit.'^^ The king in 1624 gave a special charge to the lord mayor to look to the repair of St. Paul's Cathedral, and to see that the order given two years previously, by which catechizing was to be substituted for lectures on Sunday afternoons, was carried out.^*' This latter charge does not seem to have been obeyed ; the question was one on which Londoners felt very strongly,-" and in 1629 quite half the churches still retained their Sunday afternoon lecture.^^* The year 1625 was marked by a terrible outbreak of plague in London. The churchwardens' accounts of that year contain entries of the purchase, in obedience to an order from the lord mayor, of pitch, frankincense, and coarse myrrh to burn in the streets ; and of expenses in connexion with the visiting of smitten families, the removal of the sick to pest-houses, and the burial of the dead.^*' Syon College was founded in the following year by Thomas White.*'" In 1628 Laud became Bishop of London. Less than nine months after his consecration he received an abusive document, which proved to be the first of a long series of bitter libels ; ^'^ but though, in accordance with the wishes of his clergy, he aimed at the suppression of non-conformity, he seems to have set about his task with moderation, courtesy, and patience."'^ He busied himself with the duties of his office and with social reforms, and was active in the restoration of St. Paul's.^" He was, however, an object of intense hatred to the Puritan party,*'* as much probably on account of his political views as because of his churchmanship. Shortly after he became Archbishop of Canterbury the king, in 1633, gave him instructions with regard to certain orders to be observed by the bishops of his province. These orders were aimed chiefiy at lecturers ; steps were to be taken to en- sure their conformity, and catechizing instead of a lecture on Sunday afternoon was again insisted upon. Each bishop was to send in an annual report of the state of his diocese.*'^ The first report from London (1634) was con- sidered by Laud to be satisfactory, the cases of non-conformity being very '" St. Bartholomew Exchange Chwdns.' Accts. 162 i ; St. Bcnet Paul's Wharf Chwdns.' Accts. 162 I. '" S.P. Dom. Chas. I, xliii, 20 ; Ixxv, 87 ; St. Benet Fink Chwdns.' Accts. 1628. '*' Visitation Articles, 1627. '" Lamb. Lib. Wharton MS. 595, p. 126 ; see Visitation Articles, 1627. "' Stow, Surv. (ed. Dyson, 1633), 380-7 ; S.P. Dom. Jas. I, cliv, 2. In the Par. Reg. of St. George Southwark, 1623, is mentioned 'a Browning (ik) or Anabaptist,' who, dying excommunicate, was buried by some of his own sect in St. George's Fields. ''" Corp. Rec. Rememb. vi, 44. »" B.M. Tracts 499 (2), 62. "* Lamb. Lib. Gibson MS. 942, fol. 14-16. '™ Chwdns.' Accts. St. Stephen Wal brook, 1625 ; St. George Southwark, 1625. '" Hutton, Hist^o/Engl. Ch. 1625-1714. p. 32. "^ Ibid. "* Laud, Diary, 28 Feb. 1632-3 ; Troubles and Trial, cap. v. '" Rymer, Foedera, xix, 470-2. 327
 * ° Pat. I Chas. I, pt. vii, no. 10. '" Laud, Dwry, 29 Mar. 1629.