There was an interesting belief which Spenser has recorded in connection with the inauguration stone on which the chief stood during the ceremony. He says that on some of the stones he has seen "formed and ingraven a foot, which they say was the mesure of their first Captain's foot, whereon hee (the chief-elect) standing, receives an oath to preserve all the ancient former customes of the countrey inviolable . . ."[1] This seems to point to the existence in ancient Ireland of some belief similar to those described by Mr. Crombie on pp. 278-9 of his most interesting paper. Probably the Irish believed that the new-made chief, by standing in the footprints of the founder of his house, would become endowed with the virtues of his predecessor.
In Mr. Crombie's interesting article he quotes Ben Jonson's lines—
"Would I had Kemp's shoes
To throw after you,"
and his note thereon leaves it evident that he does not see the force and meaning of this quotation. William Kempe, the actor, performed in 1599 the extraordinary feat of dancing a "Morris" from London to Norwich in the space of nine days. He published an account of this entitled, "Kempe's Nine Daies Wonder," in which he tells us that the buskins that he then wore and danced in from London were nailed to the wall of the Guildhall in Norwich. They were no doubt an object of interest, and the fact was so well known that Jonson's reference was obvious.
66, Morehampton Road, Dublin.
- ↑ View of the State of Ireland, ed. 1809, p 11.
