March 10.]

Oxfordshire.

William Handy, by will dated the 10th of March, 1622, bequeathed to the parish of St. Giles’, Oxford, £40, upon condition that, upon the 10th of March for ever, in the morning, about 5 o’clock, they should ring one peal with all the bells, and about 8 or 9 o’clock should go to service, and read all the service, with the Litany and the Communion, as it is commanded to be read in the cathedral church, and after that to have a sermon, and in it to give God thanks for His great blessings in delivering and bringing the giver from Papistry and idolatry to the light and truth of the blessed Gospel; and he desired that the preacher might have 10s. for his sermon, and the minister 5s. for leading service, and the poor to have given them in bread or money 10s.

This sum, with other money, was laid out in 1633, in purchasing a tenement, garden, and one acre of pasture ground, situated in Corn Street, Witney, to the uses of the donor’s will; of the rent, 15s. a year was accordingly commanded to be paid to the minister for reading prayers and preaching a sermon on the 10th of March, 5s. to the clerk, 5s. to the ringer, and 15s. to be distributed at the church, with other money in small sums to the poor.[23]—Old English Customs and Charities, 1842, p. 249.