JB's new curate apparently has a sonorous voice - discussion of what goes towards a good sermon, and the views of the fictional Sir Roger de Coverley (in The Spectator). Old schoolfellow Thomas Feilde has died. People fleeing Ireland are bringing disease with them - London has responded by starting to clear slums - Pie Street (Old Pye Street?) has disappeared, and the government is contemplating throwing open Tothill Street to create a wide road form Buckingham Palace to Parliament. He would very much like to possess a very old map of London which used to be in the shop of the one-eyed baker Jackson on the corner of the Bowling Alley (now Tufton Street). Has JB heard anything of Pulteney (see 8, 20 and 21)?

On the rising price of potatoes in London, and the unjustness of the response to the Irish Famine. Public indifference to important questions - so, no disapprobation has been expressed at the House of Commons voting to remove some disabilities experienced by Catholics. HMC says that some (not all) Catholics can buy absolution at confession and then return to their criminality.

JB has found a curate - these are surprisingly rare, either because the exams have become harder or because new churches and chapels are springing up everywhere. The curate is the grandson of Bishop Robert Lowth - quotes part of the latter's epitaph on his deceased daughter. The curate's father was a little wild in his earlier years. Refers to Robert Lowth's verses (son of the bishop, father of the curate) on the Billesdon Copley Hunt. Again mentions the breakfast teapot (see 2).

Quote from the Vulgate (Book of Job, re the illnesses of old age). Alarmed by report that the school had been destroyed by fire, but in fact it was confined to Queen Anne's Bounty Office, between the boarding houses Clapham's and Geary's (NW corner of Dean's Yard). Has received 2 letters from Pulteney, who must have inherited immensely from Lady Bath (wife of Sir James Murray-Pultenay, OW). On the recent discovery by a Boston dentist of ether as an anaesthetic. How the pedantic and erudite use of the original meanings of words in book titles may put many people off buying them (A Catholic History of England, An Apology for the Bible).

Returns a letter from Pulteney (see 8) to JB - asks for the former's address in Italy. Wonders whether late life illnesses are the Protestant equivalent of Purgatory - and then bemoans the influence of Cardinal Newman.

Doubts whether his grandson (up at Balliol) would be able to perform the duties of curate (see 15), since he is not yet quite in holy orders. A Westminster boy was with him yesterday; numbers, at present 90, will rise by 30 after Christmas, the old KS dormitory is now used only for sleeping, rooms have been constructed on the ground floor for use during the day, and School is being heated by hot water pipes. More time is being devoted to study, whole play days have been abolished, and Lily's Latin Grammar now being used. All these changes have been brought about by Dr Buckland, the Dean. More musings on John Fawcett (see 13).

Cross-written. JB is looking for a curate - John Ollivier, booksellers of Pall Mall, keep a register of clergymen in want of a position. Thinks of 'fumum et opes strepitumque Romae (Hor.C.3.29.12 - first read before he was 12) whenever he enters London. Ill discipline at the military academy in Woolwich, where 8 or 9 have been expelled - as with those expelled from university, they will never be able to hold a government post. A few tears ago the Duke of Wellington prevented his son from being expelled by Christ Church - he had got drunk on champagne, piled all his furniture in the middle of the quad and set fire to it.

This collection contains orders of service for funerals and memorial services for Old Westminsters, former Westminster school teachers, former Head Masters, and a small number of other individuals. The majority of the services took place in Westminster Abbey, but orders of service have been included in this collection where the service happened elsewhere as the individuals have associations to Westminster School.

This series contains material held by the school on events at Westminster Abbey which do not feature the school in any prominent fashion, although representatives from the School often attended and this is how such material came to be in the Westminster School collections.
A more extensive Westminster Abbey collective is held at the Abbey itself: https://www.westminster-abbey.org/about-the-abbey/library-research