We find that one music master was accustomed to have his gentleman pupils so constantly "in his company" that they would practise their singing while "walking in the fields."
Finally—that part-singing from written notes, and also the extempore singing of a second part (descant) to a written plainsong, was a diversion of such young University gentlemen, and was looked on as a proper form of recreation after hard reading.
In the 16th century music was considered an essential part of a clergyman's education. A letter from Sir John Harrington to Prince Henry (brother of Charles I.) about Dr John Still, Bishop of Bath and Wells in 1592, says that no one "could be admitted to primam tonsuram, except he could first bene le bene con bene can, as they called it, which is to read well, to conster [construe] well, and to sing well, in which last he hath good judgment." [The three bene's are of course le-gere, con-struere, can-tare.]
Also, according to Hawkins (History of Music, p. 367), the statutes of Trinity College, Cambridge, founded by Henry VIII., make part of the Examination of Candidates for Fellowships to be in "Quid in
