"Anno MDXCI. 34 Eliz. 'Payde for an houre-glasse for the pulpit,' 4d."--See Hone's _Table-Book_, vol. i. p. 482. Among the accounts of Christ Church, St. Catherine's, Aldgate, under the year 1564, this entry occurs: "Paid for an hour-glass that hangeth by the pulpitt when the preacher doth make a sermon that he may know how the hour passeth away."--Malcolm's _Londinium_, vol. iii. p. 309., cited Southey's _Common-Place Book_, 4th Series, p. 471. In Fosbrooke (_Br. Mon._, p. 286.) I find the following passage: "A stand for an hour-glass still remains in many pulpits. A rector of Bibury (in Gloucestershire) used to preach two hours, regularly turning the glass. After the text the esquire of the parish withdrew, smoaked his pipe, and returned to the blessing." The authority for this, which Fosbrooke cites, is Rudder's _Gloucestershire_, in "Bibury." It is added that lecturers' pulpits have also hour-glasses The woodcuts in Hawkins's _Music_, ii. 332., are referred to in support of this statement. I regret that I have no means of consulting the two last-mentioned authorities. In 1681 some poor crazy people at Edinburgh called themselves the Sweet Singers of Israel. Among other things, they renounced the limiting the Lord's mind by _glasses_. This is no doubt in allusion to the hour-glass, which Mr. Water, the editor of the fourth series of Southey's _Common-Place Book_, informs us is still to be found, or at least its iron frame, in many churches, adding that the custom of preaching by the hour-glass commenced about the end of the sixteenth century. I cannot help thinking that an earlier date must be assigned to this singular practice. (See Southey's _Common-Place Book_, 4th series, p. 379.) Mr. Water states that one of these iron frames still exists at Ferring in Sussex. The iron extinguishers still to be found on the railing opposite large houses in London, are a similar memorial of an obsolete custom. I trust some contributor to the "N. & Q." will be able to supply farther illustrations of this custom. Should it be revived in our own times, I fear most parishes would supply only a _half_-hour glass for the pulpit of their church, however unanimous antiquity may be in favour of sermons of an hour's duration. One advantage presented by this ancient and precise practice was, that the squire of the parish knew exactly when it was time to put out his pipe and return for the blessing, which he cannot ascertain under the present uncertain and indefinite mode of preaching. Fosbrooke (_Br. Mon._, p. 286.) states that the priest had sometimes a watch found for him by the parish. The authority cited for this is the following entry in the accounts of the Chantrey Wardens of the parish of Shire in Surrey: "Received for the priest's watch after he was dead, 13s. 4d."--Manning's _Surrey_, vol. i. p. 531.