[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.]
Sur,—Has Janus, who voices in your Notebook last week his sympathy with the " desire " of the " average Englishman " to attend Matins at t t o'clock on a Sunday morning, been asleep or in some foreign country for the past 25 years ?
One would like him to count or to compute the number of average Englishmen under thirty who today are to be found voluntarily (i.e., independently of and apart from their em- ployers, parents or schools) attending an 1 t o'clock Matins on a Sunday morning.
The present generation of the English worshipping laity, I think, find that their duty or desire of worship on the Lord's Day is best fulfilled by taking part in our Lord's own service which Janus refers to as Choral Eucharist—commonly called the Mass in our first English Prayer Book of 1549• He is also at sea in thinking that only intending communicants normally attend this service. Apart from the priest-celebrant, those adults taking, part in an is o'clock Eucharist who are confirmed will generally have made their Communion at an earlier celebration at, say, 6, 7- or 8.
My wife and I find that our small children, who are not yet . old enough. for Confirmation, prefer and understand more readily worship at the service of Holy Communion, Eucharist or Mass—whichever name is used—rather than Matins to which they are sometimes taken at school.
I sympathise with Janus who, at the end of a drive, to a country church on a Sunday morning, was disappointed of his Matins at I I ; but I feel sure that, whatever district he was in, his host or some neighbour on Saturday night would have been able to tell him that Matins would have been said at 9 o'clock at that particular church.
I myself—a member of a Pedestrian Club—have found myself on a Saturday night in very out-of-the-way places and have never yet in England failed to be told of a church within driving distance which would provide me with the services I required or enquired about, viz., Holy Communion some- where about 8 o'clock.—Yours faithfully, 6 Edward Street, Werneth, Oldham. A. F. RouNTREE.
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