121. EVENING PRAYER. Some fifty years ago this was the only, or almost the only, prayer used by village children. It was said or chanted far more extensively than the Lord's Prayer. The children had, however, cut down the hymn to one verse. The complete song, as "Prayer of the Week," was obtained from an old woman in the workhouse at Tavistock. Where the passage occurs purporting to come from the Epistles of St. Peter it would be hard to say. The tune, as it stands, is in the Major mode, and is so harmonised. But if the last note were G instead of E[flat]--as, indeed, it is in the two previous repetitions of the same phrase--the melody would then be in the Phrygian mode. The termination in E[flat] is probably a modern corruption. Something very much like this prayer is found throughout Europe. Here is the Quercy version, sung also in Poitou, Gascony, and Brittany-- "Father of habit, our Lord salutes you. He is at the head, He is at the feet; He is now, He is hereafter. On the bed, when I lie, Five angels are me by, Two to head and two to feet, The Mother of God in the midst, whilst I sleep. I need not fear fire and flame and sudden death," etc. Daymard, "Chansons Populaires," Cahors, 1889. It is probably the "White Paternoster" referred to in "The Miller's Tale," by Chaucer-- "Lord Jhesu Crist, and Seynte Benedight, Bless this hous from every wikkede wight, Fro nyghtesmare werye the witte (white) Pater-noster." White, in his "Way to the True Church," 1624, insists on "the prodigious ignorance" which he found among his parishioners when he entered on his ministrations. He gives what he calls "The White Paternoster":-- "White Paternoster, Saint Peter's brother, What hast i' th' one hand? White book leaves. What hast i' th' t'other hand? Heaven yate keyes. Open heaven yates, and streike hell yates: And let every crysome child creep to its own mother, White Paternoster, Amen." This, however, is not the same. But in the Magical Treatise, "Enchiridion Papæ Leonis," Rome, 1660, it runs-- "Petit Pate nôtre blanche que Dieu fit, que Dieu dit, que Dieu mit en Paradis. Au soir me allant coucher je trouve trois anges à mon lit couchés, un aux pieds, deux au chevet, la bonne Vierge Marie au milieu, qui me dit que je me arrette, que rien ne doute." This was to be recited thrice at eve, thrice in the morning, and it would secure Paradise. The White Paternoster was proscribed by the Church as superstitious: "Le Tableau de la vida del parfet Crestia," by P. Amilha, 1703, p. 234. See Victor Hugo, "Les Miserables," iv. p. 117. A form used on the Cornish moors, and repeated by a boy at Alternon, runs--