From a remote period, in the cathe- drals and greater churches of Christendom, it was the cus- tom on St Nicholas day (Dec. 6) to select a child, usually one of the choir, and to invest him with the robes and other insignia of the episcopal office; and from the time of his elec- tion until the feast of the Holy Innocents (Dec. 28), the boy-bishop continued to practise a kind of mimicry of the ceremonies of the church, for the amusement of the people. This custom, which was countenanced by the great eccle- siastics themselves, continued to exist till the year 1542, when it was finally suppressed by royal proclamation. (See Ellis's edition of Brand's Popular Antiquities, vol. i.)