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for searching only. The second of these series between Christmas and Easter can be broken up very accurately into weeks (87r-ro7v). The series of forty-two exercises is broken into two divisions by a reference to Monday (104r), the first containing thirty-four exercises, the second eight. Evidently the second division contains the work of two weeks. Also, Johnson gave the boys a Shrovetide lecture (ioor), followed by a sequence of nine exercises, thus clearly the work of three weeks. So Shrove week and the two following probably had each a holiday, the next two weeks had none, and the boys had no exercises the full week before Easter. At the other end, between Christmas and Shrove week, we have probably twenty-five exercises. Our possible multiples are three, eleven, eleven; or four, ten, eleven. In either case, the boys had seven weeks of exercises between Christmas and Shrove week.
Since Badger has been very careless in marking the third series, we need to view the landmarks with some care. A Shrovetide lecture (149v,b) is followed by a sequence of fourteen exercises, evidently the work of four weeks, at the end of which is a blank page 0540. Presumably this blank page marks the break at Easter, though, as we have seen, there should have been the work of five weeks before Easter instead of four. It is also possible because of its nature to locate the first dictate following the preceding Christmas, which is marked as having occurred on Monday (142r). Between this and Shrove week, there were nineteen exercises, but one of them covers four and one-half pages, so that it probably represents several days. These exercises, therefore, represent the work of at least five weeks, but more likely six, and possibly even seven.
The fourth series is again fairly well marked. Johnson this time refers directly to quadragesima (197r,a), marking for us the beginning of Lent. This gives a group of six exercises, the work of two weeks, before a Monday is marked (198r). The new series thus marked contains eleven exercises, the work of three weeks. So the boys have worked five weeks including Shrove week, and have received no dictates the week before Easter, as was usual. Between Christmas and Shrove week there were seventeen exercises (18gvig6v). The groups would be eleven and six, representing the work of five weeks.
Now to sum up, in the first year the boys received dictates for four weeks between Christmas and Shrove week; in the second seven; in the third, at least five, more likely six, but possibly seven; in the fourth five weeks. Easter in the second year is thus three weeks later than in the first. Within our limits this was true only between 1564, when Easter was April 2, and
1565, when it was upon April 2z. So the first of these years was 1564, the second 1565. In 1566, Easter was April 14, a week earlier than in 1565, so that there should have been one week less work. This was the probability we found for the third year, though we could not be certain. In 1567, Easter was March 30, being the same number of school weeks from Christmas as in x564. This was true of the number of weeks worked, as we have seen. So again, we have established the same series of years for these exercises, as we had by our other indications.
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