Note 172 — THE CITY GALLANT.

"Dole was the term for the allowance of provision given to the poor in great families" (Mr Steevens's note to "The Winter's Tale," act i. sc. 1). See also the notes of Sir John Hawkins and Mr Steevens to "The First Part of King Henry IV.," act ii. sc. 2. Of this kind of charity we have yet some remains, particularly, as Dr Ducarel observes, "at Lambeth Palace, where thirty poor persons are relieved by an alms called the DOLE, which is given three times a week to ten persons at a time, alternately; each person then receiving upwards of two pounds weight of beef, a pitcher of broth, a half quartern loaf, and twopence in money. Besides this dole, there are always, on the days it is given at least thirty other pitchers, called by-pitchers, brought by other neighbouring poor, who partake of the remaining broth, and the broken victuals that is at that time distributed. Likewise at Queen's College in Oxford, provisions are to this day frequently distributed to the poor at the door of their hall, under the denomination of a DOLE."—[Ducarel's] "Anglo-Norman Antiquities, considered in a Tour through part of Normandy," p. 81.