lab REVOLT OF THE CURATES.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.']
Sin,—I am surprised no one noticed your article on the assistant clergy in the Spectator of August 24th. I scarcely think that your article on assistant curates adequately states the difficulties of the case. I write away from books of reference, but should say roughly that there are as many assistant as beneficed curates. The position of the assistant curate is entirely anomolous, and has grown up with the need of meeting the tremendous growth of populations in towns. Surely it might be possible to give to assistant curates of a certain standing a quasi-freehold. It is not found that such a freehold creates a deadlock in the case of parish clerks, or in the working of cathedral chapters. It should not be possible for a senior man who has done good work to be ousted at the will of a young vicar without any prospect of other work. Curiously enough, the same need that drove the Church to the system of assistant curacies has created the system of suffragan bishoprics,—it is a shame that they have no sort of freehold, and are not admitted on equal terms to the con- ferences of Diocesan Bishops. The Suffragan Bishops are wanted, the assistant curates are wanted, and the good they do is manifest ; but surely an effort should be made to give them a status in the organisation of the Church equivalent to their unquestioned spiritual status ? But after all, this is just one of the questions that could be settled by the repre- sentative body of the Church if only it were constituted. An ennobling Bill for self-government is the first reform we
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