the year 1366. The bells of the Abbey are ringing a merry peal. The
Faithful are flocking in to witness the Archbishop receive the
Pallium, the symbol of jurisdiction, and the sign that all spiritual
authority emanates from St. Peter, who alone has received the keys,
and from his rightful successors in the Petrine See of Rome.

It is a grand ceremony, and we have even to-day, in the old Latin
records, a full account of what took place. Anything more truly Roman
Catholic, or less like the Anglican Church of the "Reformation," it
would be difficult to imagine.

It was directed by the rubrics, that the Cathedral clergy should be
called together, at an early hour, and that Prime and the rest of the
Divine Office should be recited, up to the High Mass. Then the
cross-bearers and torch-bearers and thurifers, and the attendants
carrying the Book of the Gospels and other articles of the sanctuary,
are drawn up in processional order in the chancel. Two and two,
followed by priests and other ecclesiastical dignitaries, they walk
down the nave. Then comes the Archbishop himself, robed in full
pontificals, though, out of respect to the Pallium, with bare feet.
The rubric on this point is explicit, _viz._, "nudis pedibus". Behind
the Archbishop come the Prior and the monks wearing copes. In this
order they all pass through the streets of London to the gate of the
city to meet the Papal Commissioner who bears the Pallium. He is
dressed in an alb and choir-cope, and solemnly carries the Pallium
enclosed in a costly vessel either of gold or of silver. As soon as
the procession meets the Pallium-bearer it turns round, and those who
issued forth retrace their steps towards the Abbey. Last but one walks
the Archbishop, and last of all follows the bearer of the Pallium. On
reaching the church the Pallium is reverently laid on the high altar.