At the degradation of a bishop in former times, the reasons were given in a solemn assembly, and judgment pronounced, the mitre was removed from his head, and the pontifical ring drawn off his finger, as having outraged the Church. With regard to the finger on which the episcopal ring is worn, a correspondent of ‘Notes and Queries’ (vol. v., first series, p. 114), remarks that ‘all who wear rings, _ex officio_, wear them on the third finger of the right hand. Cardinals, bishops, abbots, doctors, &c., do this for the reason that it is the first vacant finger. The thumb and the first two fingers have always been reserved as symbols of the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity. When a bishop gives his blessing he blesses with the thumb and two first fingers. Our brasses, with sepulchral slabs, bear witness to this fact.’ A French writer observes that formerly the episcopal ring was worn on the fore-finger, but as, for the celebration of the holy mysteries, bishops were obliged to place it on the _fourth_ finger, the custom prevailed of carrying it thus. Mr. E. Waterton gives his explanation thus, and there could be no better authority: ‘It appears that bishops formerly wore their rings on the index of their right hand, being the middle one of the three fingers which they extend when they are giving their blessing, but when celebrating mass they passed the ring on to the annular. They wore it on the index as the fore-finger was indicative of silence, that they ought to communicate the divine mysteries only to the worthy. Gregory IV., in 827, ordered that the episcopal ring should not be worn on the left, but on the right hand, as it was more distinguished (_nobile_) and was the hand with which the blessing was imparted.’[52] [Illustration: Episcopal Thumb-ring.] The episcopal ring is now always worn on the annular finger of the right hand, and bishops never wear more than one. In the pictures of the early Italian masters, however, and on sepulchral effigies, bishops are represented with many rings, some of which are not unfrequently on the second joint of the fingers. A thumb-ring is often seen; one is represented (p. 219) belonging to a late Dean of St. Patrick’s, the sketch of which was made by the late Mr. Fairholt, when it was in the possession of Mr. Huxtable, F.S.A., in 1847. It is of bronze, thickly gilt, and set with a crystal. In Raffaelle’s portrait of Julius II. the Pope is represented as wearing six rings. Certain it is, as late as the year 1516, the Popes occasionally wore two or more rings. As the large pontifical ring was of a size sufficient to enable the bishop to pass it over the silk glove which he wears when pontificating, a smaller, or guard ring, was used to keep it on the finger.