There were fifty-two prebendaries, whose canopied oak stalls form the most striking feature of the choir of the cathedral. A prebend was sometimes a manor, more frequently a rectory, rarely a sum of money, which formed an endowment for a canon.[379] For the most part the prebendaries were supposed to reside upon their prebends, to maintain Divine service, and a school, and hospitality there. Every prebendary was required to maintain a vicar choral at the cathedral; he himself came into residence for one week in the year, and during that week took the principal position in the cathedral services. On his Sunday of duty he was expected to entertain nineteen of the under officers at dinner, and to receive others at different meals during the week. The dean was required about thirty times a year to give an "honorificus pastus" to all the choir and vicars, "to make life and work more pleasant to them."[380] One fact is enough to show that the prebendaries of Lincoln were a very distinguished body of men:--of the fifty-two stalls, all but one--some of them more than once--has given a bishop to Lincoln, and from among them every English see has been filled, and many of them twice.
One of the statutory duties of the prebendaries is very little known, and is so curious and interesting as to deserve mention here, even though it requires a few words of preface to make the spirit of it quite intelligible. Among other remarkable designs which entered into pious minds in those mediæval communities was that of maintaining a ceaseless service of praise--_laus perennis_--or a daily recitation of the whole Psalter. The former was a conventual devotion, and was done in this way: there were always two priests before the altar, night and day, relieved at regular intervals, singing the Psalms. The latter was a cathedral devotion, where it was a rule that the dean and prebendaries as a body should say the whole Psalter every day to the glory of God. The same devotion was maintained at Salisbury, Wells, and St. Paul's. The task was not a hard one, for the Psalter was divided among them; one prebend said the first, second, third, fourth Psalms, another the fifth, sixth, seventh, and so on; the 119th Psalm was divided between several of them; each made it a matter of conscience to say the Psalms allotted to him; and thus, from the time of Bishop St. Hugh, the prebendaries of Lincoln, wherever they were scattered, were brought together in spirit by this interesting observance, and said the whole Psalter daily to the glory of God. It will perhaps surprise some of our readers to learn that they keep up the observance to this day.[381]