of church singers in the 15th and 16th centuries, who
would sing the by no means respectable words of popular comic ditties
to the solemn strains of the mass 'l'homme arme,' or whatever
well-known melody the music happened to be constructed on.

An example of a threemansong will be found in the Appendix, 'We be
soldiers three.'

Shakespeare also alludes to _sacred_ part-music. Falstaff, by his own
account, was a notable singer of Anthems, in which holy service he had
lost his voice; he was familiar with members of the celebrated choir
of St George's Chapel at Windsor; and was not above practising the
metrical Psalmody in his sadder moments.

_H. 4. B._ I, ii, 182.

_Chief Justice._ Is not your _voice broken_, your wind
short, your chin double, your wit single, and every part
about you blasted with antiquity, and will you yet call
yourself young? Fie, fie, fie, Sir John!

_Falstaff._ My lord.... For my _voice_, I have _lost it
with_ hollaing, and _singing of anthems_.

_H. 4. B._ II, i, 88.

_Hostess._ Thou didst swear to me ... upon Wednesday in
Wheeson week, when the prince broke thy head for liking his
father to a _singing-man of Windsor_.

_Hen. 4. A._ II, iv, 137. Falstaff laments the degeneracy of the
times.

_Fal._ There live not three good men unhanged in England,
and one of them is fat, and grows old; God help the while! a
bad world, I say. _I would I were a weaver; I could sing
psalms or anything._

This last sentence connects curiously with Sir John Oldcastle, the
leader of the Lollards, who were noted for their psalm singing, which
indeed gave them the name. These Flemish Protestants, who had fled
from the persecutions in their own country, were mostly _woollen_
manufacturers, and were distinguished for their love of Psalmody,
throughout the western counties, where they settled. Hence the
allusion to 'weavers' and 'Psalms.' But according to the Epilogue of
_Hen. 4. B._, 'Oldcastle died a martyr, and _this is not the man_.'

Falstaff knew well what a Ballad was too--as the following shews:--

_Hen. 4. A._ II, ii, 43.

_Fal._ (to Hal.). Go hang thyself in thine own heir-apparent
garters! If I be ta'en, I'll peach for this. An I have not
_ballads made on you all_, and _sung to filthy tunes_, let a
cup of sack be my poison.

Two other worthy knights claim our attention in the next quotation,
which contains ma