WIVES OF ECCLESIASTICS

In reply to your correspondent's query as to the "wives of ecclesiastics," I find amongst my notes one to this effect:— ERROR, to assume in ancient genealogies that a branch is necessarily extinct, simply because the last known representative is described as "Clericus," and *ergo*, must have died S.P.L. It will be obvious to many of your readers that Clericus is nomen generale for all such as were learned in the arts of reading and writing, and whom the old law deemed capable of claiming benefit of clergy, —a benefit not confined to those in orders, if the ordinary's deputy standing by could s…