Congleton is not the only place reproached for selling the church Bible for enabling the inhabitants to enjoy the pastime of bear-baiting. Two miles distant from Rugby is the village of Clifton, and, says a couplet, "Clifton-upon-Dunsmore, in Warwickshire, Sold the church Bible to buy a bear." Another version of the old rhyme is as follows:-- "The People of Clifton-super-Dunsmore Sold ye Church Byble to buy a bayre." There is a tradition that in the days of old the Bible was removed from the Parish Church of Ecclesfield and pawned by the churchwardens to provide the means of a bear-baiting. Some accounts state this occurred at Bradfield, and not at Ecclesfield. The "bull-and-bear stake" at the latter Yorkshire village was near the churchyard. Under the Commonwealth this pastime was not permitted, but when the Stuarts were once more on the throne bear-baiting and other sports became popular. Hockley-in-the-Hole, near Clerkenwell, in the days of Addison, was a favourite place for the amusement. There is a reference to the subject in the _Spectator_ of August 11th, 1731, wherein it is suggested that those who go to the theatres for a laugh should "seek their diversion at the bear garden, where reason and good manners have no right to disturb them." Gay, in his "Trivia," devotes some lines to this subject. He says:-- "Experienced men inured to city ways Need not the calendar to count their days, When through the town, with slow and solemn air, Led by the nostril walks the muzzled bear; Behind him moves, majestically dull, The pride of Hockley Hole, the surly bull, Learn hence the periods of the week to name-- Mondays and Thursdays are the days of game." Towards the close of the last century the pastime, once the pleasure of king's and queens and the highest nobles in the land, was mainly upheld by the working classes. A bill, in 1802, was introduced into the House of Commons to abolish baiting animals. The measure received the support of Courtenay, Sheridan, and Wilberforce, men of power in Parliament, but Mr. Windham, who led the opposition, won the day. He pronounced it "as the first result of a conspiracy of the Jacobins and Methodists to render the people grave and serious, preparatory to obtaining their assistance in the furtherance of other anti-national schemes." The bill was lost by thirteen votes. In 1835, baiting animals was finally stopped by Act of Parliament. Morris-Dancers.