and literaturc, rendered this society so flourishing, that it was equal to a little university. In the year 1500, he travelled to Rome, and became afterwards a celebrated preacher. On the privileges of the clergy being attacked in 1515 he preached a remarkable sermon to prove that it was against the law of God, who, by his prophet David, says, "touch not mine anointed, "and do my prophets no harm." He wrote a valuable history of the foundation of his monas'tery, and another of the lives of the abbots, beginning with Germanus, in the seventh year of king Edgar, A. D. 988, and continued it to his own times. These important documents, after the dissolution of religious houses, fell into the hands of Judge Moreton, and were consumed by the fire of London, at his house in Serjeant's Inn. A fair copy of them is however, said to have been in the possession of bishop Fell about 1630. It is possible that this may have been preserved, and it would he highly gratifying to know where records so valuable are deposited. Pennant mentions several other registers of this house, which probably exist to this day. Richard Kederminster beautified the abbey church, and inclosed it with a wall towards the town, and there he was buried in 1531.

LETTER OF ARCHBISHOP

CHICHELE ΤΟ

HENRY THE FIFTH.

Mss. Cotton. vesp. f. xiii. fol. 29. Ellis's Letters, vol. I.

From this letter it will appear that the piety of Henry the Fifth was scarcely less ardent than his love of war. Two circumstances noticed in it, the siege of Falaise, and the death of the King's confessor, fix its date to the beginning of the year 1418.

The Confessor, says Mr. Ellis, was Stephen Patrington, a Carmelite, whom Walsingham calls, "vir eruditus in trivio et quadrivio." He became bishop of St. David's in 1415. In December 1417 he was appointed to the see of Chichester, but died before his translation could be perfected: and Mr. Ellis adds that, some of the Sermons which he preached before the King in the quality of confessor, are still extant in manuscript.

"Sovereyn Lord, after moost humble recom "mendacion with hele bothe of body and of "sowle, as zour selfe and alle zour liege men de"sire, lyke zow to wyte that the firsts Soneday "of Lenton the dwk of Excester zour huncle sent "for me to the Frer Prechours, wer I fond with "him zour preest and bedeman Thomas Fysh

"born, and ther he tok to me zour Lettre wry"ten with zour owne hond in zour hoost be fore "zour town of Faleys, be the wich I undirstood, "as I have at alle tymes, blessed be Almyzty "God, understonde, that a mong alle zour moost "wordly occupacions that any Prince may have "in herthe, ze desire principaly vertuous lyvyng "and zour sowle heele; and for as myche as my brother of Seint David as was zour confes

866

sour is in his best tyme go to God, ze desire "that I shold be the avys of your uncle a forseyd send zou in his stede a gode man and a clerk "of divinite to occupie that offis til zour comyng "into zour lond of ynglond. And whan I hadde "red zour honurable letter zour uncle a forseyd

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seyd to me that he hadde communyd with Sir "Thomas Fyschborn a forseyd be zour comaun"dement of this same matier, and whow it "semed to hym, if it lyked me, that Thomas "Dyss a frer prechour, mayster of divinite of the 'scole of Caumbrygge, wer a good man and a "sufficient ther to, and whow thei hadde com"munid with him ther offe and al so with frere "John Tylle the provincial of the same ordre "ther offe; and considereng his good name and “fame as wel in good and honest lyvyng as in "clergie, I assentyd in to the same persone, and "so communed with himther offe, and toold

"him owre comun avis; and he hath ziven his "assent ther to and ordeyneth hym in alle hast "to come to zour presence, so that I hop he "schal be with zou at the same tyme that zour "chapel schal come: and be the grace of God "ze schol fynde hym a good man and a spirituel, "and pleyn to zu with owte feyntese. Forther"more towchyng that ze dosire to have licence "to chese zou a confessor &c. I send zu a letter "ther offe a seelyd undir my seel, with sufficient "power to do in that caas al that I'myzt do my "self in zour roial presence. Towchyng al ordr 'things, I wot wel my lord your brother sendyth

.

66#

66.

to zu pleynlych: and ther fore undir zour "Grace it seemeth to me no more to vexe zour Hygnesse with myche redyng: praying ever almyzty God suych speed to graunt zou on "zour moest ryal Journe that may be to his plesaunce, and hasty perfourmeng of zour blessud "entent, and pees to cristen pepul. Amen.' Wryten at Lambyth xvj day of Febr. 1418. zour preest bedeman

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4

H. C."

NOLO EPISCOPARI.

We believe it to be a vulgar error, that every bishop before he accepts a bishopric which is offered him, affects a maiden coyishness, and answers nolo episcopari.

HUNTING DON.

When Mr. Hunt, from a collier, became, as he expresses it, "a vessel of the Lord, he instantly lengthened his name to Huntingdon, and so signed it,, with the adjunct of S. S. (Sinner Saved!)

RUM RELIGION.

Dr. Johnson, in his Tour to the Hebrides, gives the following instance of compulsory conversion-we wish that none were ever more › violent. The inhabitants of the isle of Rum, "in the Highlands," says he, "are fifty-eight "families, who continued papists for some time "after the laird became a protestant. Their "adherence to their old religion was strengthen. "ed by the countenance of the laird's sister, a "zealous Romanist; till one Sunday, as they were going to mass under the conduct of their patroness, Maclean, the laird, met them on "the way, gave one of them a blow on the head "with a yellow stick, I suppose a cane, and "drove them to the kirk, from which they "had never since departed. Since the use of "this method of conversion, the inhabitants of "Egg and Canna, who continue papists, call "the protestantism of Rum, the religion of the

yellow stick." After this, we may note, some