The fact that, amidst all the changes which have passed over the face of our country, the primitive names of the grander features of nature still remain unaltered, is beautifully expressed by a great poet recently lost to us:
"Mark! how all things swerve From their known course, or vanish like a dream; Another language spreads from coast to coast; Only, perchance, some melancholy stream, And some indignant hills old names preserve, When laws, and creeds, and people all are lost!" Wordsworth's _Eccles. Sonnets_, xii.
The mention of the distinction between the broad and narrow scarf, alluded to by me (Vol. vii., p. 215.), was made above thirty years ago, and in Ireland. I have a distinct recollection of the statement as to what _had_ been the practice, then going out of use. I am sorry that I cannot, in answer to C.'s inquiry, recollect who the person was who made it. Nor am I able to specify instances of the partial observance of the distinction, as I had not till long after learned the wisdom of "making a note:" but I had occasion to remark that dignitaries, &c. frequently wore wider scarfs than other clergymen (not however that the narrower one was ever that slender strip so improperly and servilely adopted of late from the corrupt custom of Rome, which has curtailed all ecclesiastical vestments); so that when the discussion upon this subject was revived by others some years ago, it was one to which my mind had been long familiar, independently of any ritual authority.
I hope C. will understand my real object in interfering in this subject. It is solely that I may do a little (what others, I hope, can do more effectually) towards correcting the very injurious, and, I repeat, inadequate statement of the _Quart. Review_ for June, 1851, p. 222. However trifling the matter may be in itself, it is no trifling matter to involve a considerable portion of the clergy, and among them many who are most desirous to uphold both the letter and the spirit of the Church of England, and to resist all real innovation, in a charge of lawlessness. Before the episcopal authority, there so confidently invoked, be interposed, let it be _proved_ that this is not a badge of the clerical order, common to all the churches of Christendom, and actually recognised by the rules, in every respect so truly Catholic, of our own Church. The matter does not, I apprehend, admit of demonstration one way or the other, at least till we have fresh evidence. But to me, as to many others, analogies seem all in favour of the scarf being such a badge; and not only this, but the very regulation of our royal ecclesiastical authorities. The injunctions of Queen Elizabeth, in 1564, seem to mark the tippet as a distinction between clergymen and laymen, who otherwise, in colleges and choirs at least, would have none. I also am strongly of opinion that the tippets mentioned in the 58th and 74th English canons are the two scarfs referred to: the silken tippet (or broad scarf) being for such priests or deacons as hold certain offices, or are M.A., LL.B., or of superior degree; the plain tippet (or narrow scarf) being for all ministers who are non-graduates (Bachelors of Arts were not anciently considered as graduates, but rather as candidates for a degree, as they are still styled in many places abroad); so that _all_ in orders may have tippets. This notion is confirmed by the fact, that the scarf was frequently called a _tippet_ in Ireland within memory. And in a letter, discussing this very subject, in the _Gentleman's Mag._ (for 1818, part ii. p. 218.[7]), the testimony of one is given who had for upwards of fifty years considered the two words as identical, and had heard them in his youth used indiscriminately by aged clergymen. It is notorious that in Ireland, time out of mind, _tippets_ have been more generally worn than _hoods_ in parish churches there. I am not sure (though I lay no stress on the conjecture) whether this may not have been in { 337} consequence of the option apparently given by the Canons of wearing _either_ hood or tippet.