latter half of the
ninth century a powerful monastery close to Rome had not yet adopted it.
Compare with this fact the presence of the Ambrosian chant in the
province of Capua in the middle of the eleventh century (Kienle, in
_Studien und Mittheilungen des Benedictiner und Cistercienser-Orden_,
1884, _p._ 346), and the Ambrosian rubrics of various books copied a
little later for churches at Rome itself (_Tomasi, Opp. vol._ vii., _pp._
9 _&_ 10), and it will be seen how gradually the Gregorian books attained
their universal supremacy.

III.--Hildemar (between 833 and 850), author of a commentary on the
Rule of St. Bennet, speaks of St. Gregory as the composer of the "Roman
Office": "Beatus Gregorius qui dicitur Romanum Officium fecisse."
(_Expositio Regula ab Hildemaro tradita_, _p._ 311, _Ratisbon_, 1880.)

IV.--Walafrid Strabo (807-849). _De Ecclesiasticarum rerum exordiis et
incrementis_ (composed about 840). "The tradition is that St. Gregory,
just as he regulated the order of the masses and of consecrations
[_i.e._, the Sacramentary and the Pontifical Rituale] so also had the
greatest part in the arrangement of the liturgical chants, following
the order which is observed to this day as the most fitting: as is
commemorated at the head of the Antiphoner." (_Op. cit. c._ xxi.,
_Patr. Lat._, cxiv., 948.)

[Illustration: St. Gregory, from MS. of Coronation Services]

This refers, strictly speaking, to the Antiphonale Missarum. But the
following extract treats directly of the chants of the office contained
in the _Liber Responsorialis_, or corresponding volume for the hour
services.

"As for the chants for use at the different hours, whether of the day
or of the night, it is believed that it was St. Gregory who assigned to
them their complete arrangement, just as he had already done, as we
have said, for the Sacramentary." (_c._ xxv., 958.)

These two passages establish the fact that there was a tradition in the
middle of the ninth century that St. Gregory set in order the
ecclesiastical music. It seems also that there was an inscription at the
beginning of the Antiphoner stating as a fact that he had done this. The
following extract helps us to identify what this inscription was.

V.--Agobard of Lyons (779-840). _Liber de Correctione Antiphonarii_,
_c._ xv., _Patr. Lat._ civ., 336. "But because the inscription serving
for title to the book in question [_i.e._, the Antiph