In the time of Amalare (circa 830) the ferial office had taken a well-defined form, Matins having twelve psalms and six antiphons. In Lauds of every _feria_ were recited the psalms, _Miserere; Deus, Deus meus; Deus misereatur nostri_; a canticle drawn from a prophet and varying each day of the week (_e.g., Confitebor_, Isaias xii., for Monday's Lauds; _Ego dixi_, Isaias xxxviii., for Tuesday's Lauds, etc., and the two psalms _Laudate_ (148, 150) and the _Cantate_, psalm 149). In the small hours the Sunday psalms without antiphons were recited. Vespers had daily, fixed psalms. At each hour the _Kyrie Eleison_ and ferial _prayers_ were said on bended knees and the hours terminated--as do the hours of Holy Week still--with _Pater Noster and Miserere_. Ferias are divided into three classes, major ferias, privileged ferias and non-privileged. Ash Wednesday and the three last days of Holy Week are the major ferias which are privileged and exclude all feasts (_vide_ Tit. II., sec. 2). Non-privileged feriae are the feriae of Lent and Advent, Quarter Tense or Ember days and Rogation Monday. They take precedence of simple feasts only. In the ferial office nine psalms are said, and not twelve, as in the old order of the Breviary. The psalms found arranged in the new Breviary for three nocturns are to be said with nine antiphons up to the versicle of third nocturn--the versicle of the first and second being omitted (Tit. I., sec. 7). Hence the psalms are to be said straight through (_sine interuptione_) omitting in the first two nocturns, the versicle and response, Pater Noster, absolutions and all pertaining to the lessons. This simplifies things and makes the ferial office shorter than the office of feasts. TITLE VI.--THE OFFICE OF VIGILS. _Etymology, nature and synonyms_. The word _vigil_ is from the Latin _vigilare, to keep awake, to watch_, because in old times the night before any great event, religious or worldly, was spent in watching. Thus, the night prior to ordination to the priesthood, the night prior to a great battle, was spent in watching before the altar. Hence, the word vigil came to mean the prayers said during the time of watching or waking, preparatory to the great event. It signified, too, the fast accompanying the watching, and lastly it came to mean the liturgical office of Mass and Breviary fixed for the time of vigilance. In the Roman Church it was sometimes called the nocturn or night office. The Greeks call the vigil _profesta_, the time before the feast.