Thus, monk, and friar, and hermit, and recluse, and rector, and chantry priest, played their several parts in mediæval society, until the Reformation came and swept away the religious orders and their houses, the chantry priests and their superstitions, and the colleges of seculars, with all their good and evil, and left only the parish churches and the parish priests remaining, stripped of half their tithe, and insufficient in number, in learning, and in social _status_ to fulfil the office of the ministry of God among the people. Since then, for three centuries the people have multiplied, and the insufficiency of the ministry has been proportionately aggravated. It has been left to our day to complete the work of the Reformation by multiplying bishops and priests, and creating an order of deacons, re-distributing the ancient revenues and supplying what more is needed, and by effecting a general reorganization of the ecclesiastical establishment to adapt it to the actual spiritual needs of the people. CHAPTER IV. CLERICAL COSTUME. We proceed to give some notes on the costume of the secular clergy; first the official costume which they wore when performing the public functions of their order, and next the ordinary costume in which they walked about their parishes and took part in the daily affairs of the mediæval society of which they formed so large and important a part. The first branch of this subject is one of considerable magnitude; it can hardly be altogether omitted in such a series of papers as this, but our limited space requires that we should deal with it as briefly as may be.