Sometimes the clerks ventured to apply the verses of the Psalms to their own private needs and requirements, so as to convey gentle hints and suggestions to the ears of those who could supply their needs.  Canon Ridgeway tells of the old clerk of the Church of King Charles the Martyr at Tunbridge Wells.  His name was Jenner.  He was a well-known character; he used to have a pipe and pitch the tune, and also select the hymns.  It was commonly said that the congregation always knew when the lodgings in his house on Mount Sion were unlet; for when this was the case he was wont to give out the Psalm: 

     “Mount Sion is a pleasant place to dwell.”

At Great Yarmouth, until about the year 1850, the parish clerk was always invited to the banquets or “feasts” given by the corporation of the borough; and he was honoured annually with a card of invitation to the “mayor’s feast” on Michaelmas Day.  On one occasion the mayor-elect had omitted to send a card to the clerk, Mr. David Absolon, who was clerk from 1811 to 1831, and had been a member of the corporation and common councillor previous to his appointment to his ecclesiastical office.  On the following Sunday, Master David Absolon reminded his worship of his remissness by giving out the following verse, directing his voice at the same time to the mayor-elect: 

     Let David his accustomed place
       In thy remembrance find.”

The words in Tate and Brady’s metrical version of Psalm cxxxii. run thus: 

     “Let David, Lord, a constant place
       In Thy remembrance find[73].”

[Footnote 73:  History of St. Nicholas’ Church, Great Yarmouth, by the present Clerk, Mr. Edward J. Lupson, p. 24.]

In the same town great excitement used to attend the election of the mayor on 29 August in each year.  Before the election the corporation attended service in the parish church, and the clerk on these occasions gave out for singing “the first two staves of the fifteenth Psalm: 

     “Lord, who’s the happy man,” etc.

The passing of the Municipal Act changed the manner and time of the election, but it did not take away the interest felt in the event.  As long as Tate and Brady’s version of the Psalms was used in the church, that is until the year 1840, these “two staves” were annually sung on the Sunday preceding the election[74].

[Footnote 74:  Ibid., p. 23.]

In these days of reverent worship it seems hardly possible that the beautiful expressions in the psalms of praise to Almighty God should ever have been prostituted to the baser purposes of private gain or municipal elections.