A HISTORY OF LONDON they could secure a decent and regular performance of Morning Prayer and Evensong.'" But though celebrations of the Holy Communion were not frequent even in the reign of Queen Anne, it was otherwise with the ordinary services. In 1692 there was daily service in seventy London churches and chapels/" all well attended, and it was by no means extraordinary for men of leisure, such as Clarendon or Ralph Thoresby, to attend service once or twice each day. At St. Paul's Covent Garden daily prayers at 10 and 3 o'clock were maintained by ' the gentry and better sort of people,' while the bequest of Thomas Willis '" provided prayers at 6 a.m. and 7 p.m. for tradesmen and servants, who attended in considerable numbers.^" Prayers were also said four times a day at St. James's Westminster until as late as 1753,"^ Arch- bishop Seeker maintaining them at his own expense while rector. Daily prayer at 11 and 7 o'clock was said at St. Botolph Aldgate from 1677 to 1732,'*' and the musical service^" held at 3 o'clock at St. Laurence Jewry in 1692 continued at least until 1732. In 1714"° there was daily service in about sixty-six of the 150 London churches; in 1728*" and 1746'" the number had decreased to about sixty, and the churches numbered 135."' There were a few instances in the middle of the century of the revival of week-day services among the Evangelicals ; Thomas Scott, when joint chaplain of the Lock Chapel, started a Friday evening lecture, and was accused of Arminianism ; "* Thomas Jones, chaplain of St. Mary Overy, found his efforts frustrated '" in the spirit which had made Bishop Gibson determine ' to prevent his clergy burdening them- selves with more than two services on Sunday.'"' There was daily evensong at St. Swithin's in 1744, and at St. Clement Danes there seems to have been daily service in 1779.'" The custom still survived about 1801 in some churches, including St. Vedast alias Foster ; "* while at St. John's Bedford Row evensong was read daily until the closing of the chapel in 1856 ; "* but all these services were sparsely attended.'*" In nearly all London churches in which service was not read daily there w^ere services on Wednesdays, Fridays, and holy days ; the number increased from twenty-three in 1692'" to sixty-six in 1714,'*^ when St. Mary Mag- dalen Old Fish Street, where service was said on holy days, and the chapels in Knightsbridge, Noble Street, Spring Gardens, and Petticoat Lane, were the only churches closed from Sunday to Sunday. The custom of holding services on the 'Litany days' was still universal in 1732.'*' Good Friday was regarded as a day especially suitable for the celebration of the Holy '" Blomfield, Charge, 1834, p. 30. '" B.M. Broadsheet, Pre5sm.irk 491, k, 4 (ll) ; Exhortation to Piety, 3 ; Hyde Corresp. ii, 180, &c. ; Thoresby, Z)/<77y, 23 May 17 12, etc. '" Overton, Life in Engl. Ch. 112. ^ Patrick, Autohiog. 90. ^ Stole's Surv. (ed. 1720), pt. vi, 82. '^ Paterson, Pietas Land. 48 ; Bodl. Lib. Tanner MS. 142, fol. 149 ; Netv Remarks on Lond. "^ Thoresby, Diary, 8 Jan. 1 709. "" Paterson, Pietas Lond. '" Rules for our more devout Behaviour in the time of Divine Sen-ice in the Ch. of Engl. (ed. 1728). '" William Best, Jn Essay upon the Service of the Ch. of Engl. (ed. 1 746). "' St. Pauis Ecclesiohgical Soc. Trans, vi, 1 8. "* John Scott, Life ofT. Scott, 233-4. ' ' Thomas Jones, If 'oris, p. xxi. '"' Gibson, Charge, 1727. '" St. Paul's Ecclesiological Soc. Trans, vi, 22. '" Churton, Mem. of Joshua IVatson, , 30. '" Bateman, Life of Daniel Wilson, 172. '^ Park, Mem. of William Stevens, 55. '*' B.M. Pressmark 491 k, 4 (11). **' Paterson, Pietas Lond. ^" AVtf Remarks on Lond. 362
