An Ebullient Clergyman of Yesteryear

(During the late 19th & early 20th centuries, many Anglican clergy reigned supreme – or so it was said! Geoffrey Dunstan tells of one such.)

St Sabina's Church, somewhere near Mayfair, was justly famous for its beauty of structure, the excellence of its singing, the splendour of its vestments, and the magnificence of its rector, the Reverend and Honourable Mr. Spendacre, who was of expansive proportions. While endowed with a remarkable girth, his brother, the Lord of Ross and Cromarty, was a simple man with simple tastes; while another, a retired bishop from Mashonaland and a friend of Mr Spendacre, possessed a sumptuous income as a prince of the Church.

Mr Spendacre's ecclesiastical politics, as exhibited in the services at St Sabina's, were distinctly 'high’. But they were also 'broad’, since for those of his parishioners who preferred it, there was an early celebration at 8 a.m., conducted by two of his curates. Matins, sung in plain-song by an admirable choir, was followed by a service at 10 a.m., usually attended by a packed congregation. At 11 o'clock, which was the hour for the sermon, there wasn't a seat to be had in the church, as Mr. Spendacre invariably preached himself, and from Pimlico and South Kensington, from Bayswater and Regent's Park, eager listeners flocked to hear him.

He seldom preached less than fifty minutes, and often the large clock below the organ loft, with its nude bronze figures of Apollo and Daphne, chimed noon before he had finished. A short pause succeeded the conclusion of the sermon, and choir entered the church again in magnificent procession, followed by the clergy in full vestments. Clouds of the most expensive incense befogged the chancel, and if what was enacted wasn't the Mass, it was an uncommonly good imitation of it.

There was a robust joyousness that suited the Reverend and Honourable Mr Spendacre's congregation well, for most of the inhabitants of his parish, the owners of the nice houses in Curzon Street and Park Lane and other comfortably-situated homes, had a great deal to be jolly about. And Mr Spendacre has often informed his parishioners of their splendid houses that they were among the kindliest of people, and he often took the opportunity of telling them so from the pulpit. His unbounded popularity with his congregation was amply accounted for by the offertories at St Sabina's, which continually rained down on him.

(To be continued next month)