In the case of these large remote anchorholds, the recluse must have had a chaplain to come and say mass for her every day in the chapel of her hermitage.[130]But in the vast majority of cases, anchorholds were attached to a church either of a religious house, or of a town, or of a village; and in these situations they appear to have been much more numerous than is at all suspected by those who have not inquired into this little-known portion of our mediæval antiquities. Very many of our village churches had a recluse living within or beside them, and it will, perhaps, especially surprise the majority of our readers to learn that these recluses were specially numerous in the mediæval towns.[131]The proofs of this fact are abundant; here are some. Henry, Lord Scrope, of Masham, by will, dated 23rd June, 1415, bequeathed to every anchoret[132]and recluse dwelling in London or its suburbs 6s.8d.; also to every anchoret and recluse dwelling in York and its suburbs 6s.8d.From other sources we learn more aboutthese York anchorets and recluses. The will of Adam Wigan, rector of St. Saviour, York (April 20, 1433,A.D.)[133], leaves 3s.4d.to Dan John, who dwelt in the Chapel of St. Martin, within the parish of St. Saviour. The female recluses of York were three in number in the year 1433, as we learn from the will of Margaret, relict of Nicholas Blackburne:[134]“Lego tribus reclusis Ebor.,” ijs.Where their cells were situated we learn from the will of Richard Rupell (A.D.1435[135]), who bequeaths to the recluse in the cemetery of the Church of St. Margaret, York, five marks; and to the recluse in the cemetery of St. Helen, in Fishergate, five marks; and to the recluse in the cemetery of All Saints, in North Street, York, five marks. They are also all three mentioned in the will of Adam Wigan, who leaves to the anchorite enclosed in Fishergate 2s.; to her enclosed near the church of St. Margaret 2s.; to her enclosed in North Street, near the Church of All Saints, 2s.The will of Lady Margaret Stapelton, 1465A.D.,[136]mentions anchorites in Watergate and Fishergate, in the suburbs of York, and in another place the anchorite of the nunnery of St. Clement, York. At Lincoln, also, we are able to trace a similar succession of anchoresses. In 1383A.D., William de Belay, of Lincoln, left to an anchoress named Isabella, who dwelt in the Church of the Holy Trinity, in Wigford, within the city of Lincoln, 13s.4d.In 1391, John de Sutton left her 20s.; in 1374, John de Ramsay left her 12d.Besides these she had numerous other legacies from citizens. In 1453, an anchoress named Matilda supplied the place of Isabella, who we may suppose had long since gone to her reward. In that year John Tilney—one of the Tilneys of Boston—left “Domine Matilde incluse infra ecclesiam sanctæ Trinitatis ad gressus in civitate Lincoln, vjs.viijd.” In 1502, Master John Watson, a chaplain in Master Robert Flemyng’s chantry, left xijd.to the “ankers” at the Greese foot. This Church of the Holy Trinity “ad gressus” seems to have been for a long period the abode of a female recluse.[137]The will of Roger Eston, rector of Richmond, Yorkshire,A.D.1446, also mentions the recluses in the city of York and its suburbs. Thewill of Adam Wilson also mentions Lady Agnes, enclosed at (apud) the parish church of Thorganby, and anchorites (female) at Beston and Pontefract. Sir Hugh Willoughby, of Wollaton, in 1463 bequeathed 6s.5d.to the anchoress of Nottingham.[138]The will of Lady Joan Wombewell,A.D.1454,[139]also mentions the anchoress of Beyston. The will of John Brompton, of Beverley,A.D.1444,[140]bequeaths 3s.4d.to the recluse by the Church of St. Giles, and 1s.6d.to anchorite at the friary of St. Nicholas of Beverley. Roger Eston also leaves a bequest to the anchorite of his parish of Richmond, respecting whom the editor gives a note whose substance is given elsewhere. In a will of the fifteenth century[141]we have a bequest “to the ancher in the wall beside Bishopsgate, London.”[142]In the will of St. Richard, Bishop of Chichester,[143]we have bequests to Friar Humphrey, the recluse of Pageham, to the recluse of Hogton, to the recluse of Stopeham, to the recluse of Herringham; and in the will of Walter de Suffield, Bishop of Norwich, bequests to “anchers” and recluses in his diocese, and especially to his niece Ela,in reclusorioat Massingham.[144]
Among the other notices which we have of solitaries living in towns, Lydgate mentions one in the town of Wakefield. Morant says there was one in Holy Trinity churchyard, Colchester. The episcopal registers of Lichfield show that there was an anchorage for several female recluses in the churchyard of St. George’s Chapel, Shrewsbury. The will of Henry, Lord Scrope, already quoted, leaves 100s.and the pair of beads which the testator was accustomed to use to the anchorite of Westminster: it was his predecessor, doubtless, who is mentioned in the time of Richard II.: when the young king was going to meet Wat Tyler in Smithfield, he went to Westminster Abbey, “then to the church, and so to the high altar, where he devoutedly prayed and offered; after which he spake with theanchore, to whom he confessed himself.”[145]Lord Scrope’s will goes on to bequeath 40s.to Robert, the recluse of Beverley; 13s.4d.each to the anchorets of Stafford, of Kurkebeck, of Wath, of Peasholme, near York, of Kirby, Thorganby, near Colingworth, of Leek, near Upsale, of Gainsburgh, of Kneesall, near South Well, of Dartford, of Stamford, living in the parish church there; to Thomas, the chaplain dwelling continually in the church of St. Nicholas, Gloucester; to Elizabeth, late servant to the anchoret of Hamphole; and to the recluse in the house of the Dominicans at Newcastle; and also 6s.8d.to every other anchorite and anchoritess that could be easily found within three months of his decease.
We have already had occasion to mention that there were several female recluses, in addition to the male solitaries, in the churchyards of the then great city of Norwich. The particulars which that laborious antiquary, Blomfield, has collected together respecting several of them will throw a little additional light upon our subject, and fill up still further the outlines of the picture which we are engaged in painting.
There was a hermitage in the churchyard of St. Julian, Norwich, which was inhabited by a succession of anchoresses, some of whose names Blomfield records:—Dame Agnes, in 1472; Dame Elizabeth Scot, in 1481; Lady Elizabeth, in 1510; Dame Agnes Edrigge, in 1524. The Lady Julian, who was the anchoress in 1393, is said to have had two servants to attend her in her old age. “She was esteemed of great holiness. Mr. Francis Peck had a vellum MS. containing an account of her visions.” Blomfield says that the foundations of the anchorage might still be seen in his time, on the east side of St. Julian’s churchyard. There was also an anchorage in St. Ethelred’s churchyard, which was rebuilt in 1305, and an anchor continually dwelt there till the Reformation, when it was pulled down, and the grange, or tithe-barn, at Brakendale was built with its timber; so that it must have been a timber house of some magnitude. Also in St. Edward’s churchyard, joining to the church on the north side, was a cell, whose ruins were still visible in Blomfield’s time, and most persons who died in Norwich left small sums towards its maintenance. In1428 Lady Joan was anchoress here, to whom Walter Ledman left 20s., and 40d.to each of her servants. In 1458, Dame Anneys Kite was the recluse here; in 1516, Margaret Norman, widow, was buried here, and gave a legacy to the lady anchoress by the church. St. John the Evangelist’s Church, in Southgate, was, aboutA.D.1300, annexed to the parish of St. Peter per Montergate, and the Grey Friars bought the site; they pulled down the whole building, except a small part left for an anchorage, in which they placed an anchor, to whom they assigned part of the churchyard for his garden. Also there used anciently to be a recluse dwelling in a little cell joining to the north side of the tower of St. John the Baptist’s Church, Timber Hill, but it was down before the Dissolution. Also there was an anchor, or hermit, who had an anchorage in or adjoining to All Saints’ Church. Also in Henry III.’s time a recluse dwelt in the churchyard of St. John the Baptist, and the Holy Sepulchre, in Ber Street. In the monastery of the Carmelites, or White Friars, at Norwich, there were two anchorages—one for a man, who was admitted brother of the house, and another for a woman, who was admitted sister thereof. The latter was under the chapel of the Holy Cross, which was still standing in Blomfield’s time, though converted into dwelling-houses. The former stood by St. Martin’s Bridge, on the east side of the street, and had a small garden to it, which ran down to the river. In 1442, December 2nd, the Lady Emma, recluse, or anchoress, and religious sister of the Carmelite order, was buried in their church. In 1443, Thomas Scroope was anchorite in this house. In 1465, Brother John Castleacre, a priest, was anchorite. In 1494 there were legacies given to the anchor of the White Friars. This Thomas Scroope was originally a Benedictine monk; in 1430 he became anchorite here (being received a brother of the Carmelite order), and led an anchorite’s life for many years, seldom going out of his cell but when he preached; about 1446 Pope Eugenius made him Bishop of Down, which see he afterwards resigned, and came again to his convent, and became suffragan to the Bishop of Norwich. He died, and was buried at Lowestoft, being near a hundred years old.
The document which we are about to quote from Whittaker’s “History of Whalley” (pp. 72 and 77), illustrates many points in the history of theiranchorholds. The anchorage therein mentioned was built in a parish churchyard, it depended upon a monastery, and was endowed with an allowance in money and kind from the monastery; it was founded for two recluses; they had a chaplain and servants; and the patronage was retained by the founder. The document will also give us some very curious and minute details of the domestic economy of the recluse life; and, lastly, it will give us an historical proof that the assertions of the contemporary satirists, of the laxity[146]with which the vows were sometimes kept, were not without foundation.
“In 1349, Henry, Duke of Lancaster, granted in trust to the abbot and convent of Whalley rather large endowments to support two recluses (women) in a certain place within the churchyard of the parish church of Whalley, and two women servants to attend them, there to pray for the soul of the duke, &c.; to find them seventeen ordinary loaves, and seven inferior loaves, eight gallons of better beer, and 3d.per week; and yearly ten large stock-fish, one bushel of oatmeal, one of rye, two gallons of oil for lamps, one pound of tallow for candles, six loads of turf, and one load of faggots; also to repair their habitations; and to find a chaplain to say mass in the chapel of these recluses daily; their successors to be nominated by the duke and his heirs. On July 6, 15th Henry VI., the king nominated Isole de Heton, widow, to be ananachoritafor life,in loco ad hoc ordinato juxta ecclesiam parochialem de Whalley. Isole, however, grew tired of the solitary life, and quitted it; for afterwards a representation was made to the king that ‘divers that had been anchores and recluses in the seyd place aforetyme, have broken oute of the seyd place wherein they were reclusyd, and departyd therefrom wythout any reconsilyation;’ and that Isole de Heton had broken out two years before, and was not willing to return; and that divers of the women that had been servants there had been with child. So Henry VI. dissolved the hermitage, and appointed instead two chaplains to say mass daily, &c.” Whittaker thinks that the hermitage occupied the site of some cottages on the west side of the churchyard,which opened into the churchyard until he had the doors walled up.
There was a similar hermitage for several female recluses in the churchyard of St. Romauld, Shrewsbury, as we learn from a document among the Bishop of Lichfield’s registers,[147]in which he directs the Dean of St. Chadd, or his procurator, to enclose Isolda de Hungerford an anchorite in the houses of the churchyard of St. Romauld, where the other anchorites dwell. Also in the same registry there is a precept, dated Feb. 1, 1310, from Walter de Langton, Bishop, to Emma Sprenghose, admitting her an anchorite in the houses of the churchyard of St. George’s Chapel, Salop, and he appoints the archdeacon to enclose her. Another license from Roger, Bishop of Lichfield, dated 1362, to Robert de Worthin, permitting him, on the nomination of Queen Isabella, to serve God in the reclusorium built adjoining (juxta) the chapel of St. John Baptist in the city of Coventry, has been publishedin extensoby Dugdale, and we transcribe it for the benefit of the curious.[148]Thomas Hearne has printed an Episcopal Commission, dated 1402, for enclosing John Cherde, a monk of Ford Abbey. Burnett’s “History of Bristol” mentions a commission opened by Bishop William of Wykham, in August, 1403, for enclosing Lucy de Newchurch, an anchoritess in the hermitage of St. Brendon in Bristol. Richard Francis, an ankret, is spoken of asinter quatuor parietes pro christi inclususin Langtoft’s “Chronicle,” ij. 625.
ANCHORAGES.
Just as in a monastery, though it might be large or small in magnitude, simple or gorgeous in style, with more or fewer offices and appendages, according to the number and wealth of the establishment, yet there was always a certain suite of conventual buildings, church, chapter refectory, dormitory, &c., arranged in a certain order, which formed the cloister; and this cloister was the nucleus of all the rest of the buildings of the establishment; so, in a reclusorium, or anchorhold, there was always a “cell” of a certain construction, to which all things else, parlours or chapels, apartments for servants and guests, yards and gardens, were accidental appendages. Bader’s rule for recluses in Bavaria[149]describes the dimensions and plan of the cell minutely; thedomus inclusiwas to be 12 feet long by as many broad, and was to have three windows—one towards the choir (of the church to which it was attached), through which he might receive the Holy Sacrament; another on the opposite side, through which he might receive his victuals; and a third to give light, which last ought always to be closed with glass or horn.
The reader will have already gathered from the preceding extracts that the reclusorium was sometimes a house of timber or stone within the churchyard, and most usually adjoining the church itself. At the west end of Laindon Church, Essex, there is a unique erection of timber, of which we here give a representation. It has been modernised in appearance bythe insertion of windows and doors; and there are no architectural details of a character to reveal with certainty its date, but in its mode of construction—the massive timbers being placed close together—and in its general appearance, there is an air of considerable antiquity. It is improbable that a house would be erected in such a situation after the Reformation, and it accords generally with the descriptions of a recluse house. Probably, however, many of the anchorholds attached to churches were of smaller dimensions; sometimes, perhaps, only a single little timber apartment on the ground floor, or sometimes probably raised upon an under croft, according to a common custom in mediæval domestic buildings. Very probably some of those little windows which occur in many of our churches, in various situations, at various heights, and which, under the name of “low side windows,” have formed the subject of so much discussion among ecclesiologists, may have been the windows of such anchorholds. The peculiarity of these windows is that they are sometimes merely a square opening, which originally was not glazed, but closed with ashutter; sometimes a small glazed window, in a position where it was clearly not intended to light the church generally; sometimes a window has a stone transom across, and the upper part is glazed, while the lower part is closed only by a shutter. It is clear that some of these may have served to enable the anchorite, living in a celloutsidethe church, to see the altar. It seems to have been such a window which is alluded to in the following incident from Mallory’s “Prince Arthur:”—“Then Sir Launcelot armed him and took his horse, and as he rode that way he saw a chapel where was a recluse, which had a window that she might see up to the altar; and all aloud she called Sir Launcelot, because he seemed a knight arrant.... And (after a long conversation) she commanded Launcelot to dinner.” In the late thirteenth-century MS., Royal 10 E. IV. at f. 181, is a representation of a recluse-house, in which, besides two two-light arched windows high up in the wall, there is a smaller square “low side window” very distinctly shown. Others of these low side windows may have been for the use of wooden anchorholds builtwithinthe church, combining two of the usual three windows of the cell, viz., the one to give light, and the one through which to receivefood and communicate with the outer world. There is an anchorhold still remaining in a tolerably unmutilated state at Rettenden, Essex. It is a stone building of fifteenth-century date, of two stories, adjoining the north side of the chancel. It is entered by a rather elaborately moulded doorway from the chancel. The lower story is now used as a vestry, and is lighted by a modern window broken through its east wall; but it is described as having been a dark room, and there is no trace of any original window. In the north wall, and towards the east, is a bracket, such as would hold a small statue or a lamp. In the west side of this room, on the left immediately on entering it from the chancel, is the door of a stone winding stair (built up in the nave aisle, but now screened towards the aisle by a very large monument), which gives access to the upper story. This story consists of a room which very exactly agrees with the description of a recluse’s cell (see opposite woodcut). On the south side are two arched niches, in which are stone benches, and the back of the easternmost of these niches is pierced by a small arched window, now blocked up, which looked down upon the altar. On the north side is a chimney, now filled with a modern fireplace, but the chimney is a part of the original building; and westward of the chimney is a small square opening, now filled with modern glazing, but the hook upon which the original shutter hung still remains. This window is not splayed in the usual mediæval manner, but is recessed in such a way as to allow the head of a person to look out, and especially down, with facility. On the exterior this window is about 10 feet from the ground. In this respect it resembles the situation of a low side window in Prior Crawden’s Chapel, Ely Cathedral,[150]which is on the first floor, having a room, lighted only by narrow slits, beneath it; and at the Sainte Chapelle, in Paris, which also has an undercroft, there is a similar example of a side window, at a still greater height from the ground. The east side of the Rettenden reclusorium has now a modern window, probably occupying the place of the original window which gave light to the cell. The stair-turret at the top of the winding staircase, seems to have been intended to servefor a little closet: it obtained some light through a small loop which looked out into the north aisle of the church; the wall on the north side of it is recessed so as to form a shelf, and a square slab of stone, which looks like a portion of a thirteenth-century coffin-stone, is laid upon the top of the newel, and fitted into the wall, so as to form another shelf or little table.
Laindon Church, Essex.
Reclusorium, or Anchorhold, at Rettenden, Essex.
At East Horndon Church, Essex, there are two transept-like projections from the nave. In the one on the south there is a monumental niche in the south wall, upon the back of which are the indents of the brasses of a man and wife and several children; and there is a tradition, with which these indents are altogether inconsistent, that the heart of the unfortunate Queen Anne Bullen is interred therein. Over this is a chamber, open to the nave, and now used as a gallery, approached by a modern wooden stair; and there is a projection outside which looks like a chimney, carried out from this floor upwards. The transeptal projection on the north side is very similar in plan. On the ground floor there is a wide, shallow, cinque-foil headed niche (partly blocked) in the east wall; and there is a wainscot ceiling, very neatly divided into rectangular panels by moulded ribs of the date of about Henry VIII. The existence of the chamber above was unknown until the present rector discovered a doorway in the east wall of the ground floor, which, on being opened, gave access to a stone staircase behind the east wall, which led up into a first-floor chamber, about 12 feet from east to west, and 8 feet from north to south: the birds had had access to it through an unglazed window in the north wall for an unknown period, and it was half filled with their nests; the floor planks were quite decayed. There is no trace of a chimney here. It is now opened out to the nave to form a gallery. Though we do not find in these two first-floor chambers the arrangements which could satisfy us that they were recluse cells, yet it is very probable that they were habitable chambers, inhabited, if not by recluses, perhaps by chantry priests, serving chantry chapels of the Tyrrells.
Mr. M. H. Bloxam, in an interesting paper in the Transactions of the Lincoln Diocesan Architectural Society, mentions several other anchorholds:—“Adjoining the little mountain church of S. Patricio, about five miles from Crickhowel, South Wales, is an attached building or cell. Itcontains on the east side a stone altar, above which is a small window, now blocked up, which looked towards the altar of the church; but there was no other internal communication between this cell and the church, to the west end of which it is annexed; it appears as if destined for a recluse who was also a priest.” Mr. Bloxam mentions some other examples, very much resembling the one described at Rettenden. The north transept of Clifton Campville Church, Staffordshire, a structure of the fourteenth century, is vaulted and groined with stone; it measures 17 feet from north to south, and 12 feet from east to west. Over this is a loft or chamber, apparently an anchorhold ordomus inclusi, access to which is obtained by means of a newell staircase in the south-east angle, from a doorway at the north-east angle of the chancel. A small window on the south side of this chamber, now blocked up, afforded a view into the interior of the church. The roof of this chamber has been lowered, and all the windows blocked up.
“On the north side of the chancel of Chipping Norton Church, Oxfordshire, is a revestry which still contains an ancient stone altar, with its appurtenances, viz., a piscina in the wall on the north side, and a bracket for an image projecting from the east wall, north of the altar. Over this revestry is a loft or chamber, to which access is obtained by means of a staircase in the north-west angle. Apertures in the wall enabled the recluse, probably a priest, here dwelling, to overlook the chancel and north aisle of the church.
“Adjoining the north side of the chancel of Warmington Church, Warwickshire, is a revestry, entered through an ogee-headed doorway in the north wall of the chancel, down a descent of three steps. This revestry contains an ancient stone altar, projecting from a square-headed window in the east wall, and near the altar, in the same wall, is a piscina. In the south-west angle of this revestry is a flight of stone steps, leading up to a chamber or loft. This chamber contains, in the west wall, a fire-place, in the north-west angle a retiring-closet, or jakes, and in the south wall a small pointed window, of decorated character, through which the high-altar in the chancel might be viewed. In the north wall there appears to have been a pointed window, filled with decorated tracery, and in the east wallis another decorated window. This is one of the most interesting and complete specimens of thedomus inclusiI have met with.”[151]
The chamber which is so frequently found over the porch of our churches, often with a fireplace, and sometimes with a closet within it, may probably have sometimes been inhabited by a recluse. Chambers are also sometimes found in the towers of churches.[152]Mr. Bloxam mentions a room, with a fire-place, in the tower of Upton Church, Nottinghamshire. Again, at Boyton Church, Wiltshire, the tower is on the north side of the church, “and adjoining the tower on the west side, and communicating with it, is a room which appears to have been once permanently inhabited, and in the north-east angle of this room is a fire-place.” At Newport, Salop, the first floor of the tower seems to have been a habitable chamber, and has a little inner chamber corbelled out at the north-west angle of the tower.
We have already hinted that it is not improbable that timber anchorholds were sometimes erected inside our churches. Or perhaps the recluse lived in the church itself, or, more definitely, in a par-closed chantry chapel, without any chamber being purposely built for him. The indications which lead us to this supposition are these: there is sometimes an ordinary domestic fire-place to be found inside the church. For instance, in the north aisle of Layer Marney Church, Essex, the western part of the aisle is screened off for the chantry of Lord Marney, whose tomb has the chantry altar still remaining, set crosswise at the west end of the tomb; in the eastern division of the aisle there is an ordinary domestic fire-place in the north wall. There is a similar fire-place, of about the same date, in Sir Thomas Bullen’s church of Hever, in Kent.
Again, we sometimes find beside the low side-windows already spoken of, an arrangement which shows that it was intended for some onehabitually to sit there. Thus, at Somerton, Oxfordshire, on the north side of the chancel, is a long and narrow window, with decorated tracery in the head; the lower part is divided by a thick transom, and does not appear to have been glazed. In the interior the wall is recessed beside the window, with a sort of shoulder, exactly adapted to give room for a seat, in such a position that its occupant would get the full benefit of the light through the glazed upper part of the little window, and would be in a convenient position for conversing through the unglazed lower portion of it.
At Elsfield Church, Oxfordshire, there is an early English lancet window, similarly divided by a transom, the lower part, now blocked up, having been originally unglazed, and the sill of the window in the interior has been formed into a stone seat and desk. We reproduce here a view of the latter from the “Oxford Architectural Society’s Guide to the Neighbourhood of Oxford.” Perhaps in such instances as these, the recluse may have been a priest serving a chantry altar, and licensed, perhaps, to hear confessions,[153]for which the seat beside the little open window would be a convenient arrangement. Lord Scrope’s will has already told us of a chaplain dwelling continually (commoranti continuo) in the Church of St. Nicholas, Gloucester, and of an anchorite living in the parish church of Stamford. There is a low side-window at Mawgan Church, Cornwall. In the south-east angle between the south transept and the chancel, the inner angle at the junction of the transept and chancel walls is cut away, from the floor upwards, to theheight of six feet, and laterally about five feet in south and east directions from the angle. A short octagonal pillar, six feet high, supports all that remains of the angle of these walls, whilst the walls themselves rest on two flat segmental arches of three feet span. A low diagonal wall is built across the angle thus exposed, and a small lean-to roof is run up from it into the external angle enclosing a triangular space within. In this wall the low side-window is inserted. The sill of the window is four feet from the pavement. Further eastward a priest’s door seems to have formed part of the arrangement. The west jamb of the doorway is cut away so that from this triangular space and from the transept beyond a view is obtained of the east window.
Window, Elsfield Church.
The position of the low side-windows at Grade, Cury, and Landewednack is the same as that of Mawgan, but the window itself is different in form, those at Grade and at Cury being small oblong openings, the former 1 ft. 9 in. by 1 ft. 4 in., the sill only 1 ft. 9 in. from the ground; the latter is 1 ft. by 11 in., the sill 3 ft. 4 in. from ground. At Landewednack the window has two lights, square headed, 2 ft. 6 in. by 1 ft. 4 in., sill 4 ft. 3½ in. from ground. A large block of serpentine rock is fixed in the ground beneath the window in a position convenient for a person standing but not kneeling at the window.[154]
Knighton gives us some particulars of a recluse priest who lived at Leicester. “There was,” he says, “in those days at Leicester, a certain priest, hight William of Swynderby, whom they commonly called William the Hermit, because, for a long time, he had lived the hermitical life there; they received him into a certain chamber within the church, because of the holiness they believed to be in him, and they procured for him victuals and a pension, after the manner of other priests.”[155]
In the “Test. Ebor.,” p. 244, we find a testator leaving “to the chantry chapel of Kenby my red vestment, ... also the great missal and the great portifer, which I bought of Dominus Thomas Cope, priest and anchorite in that chapel.” Blomfield also (ii. 75) tells us of a hermit, wholived in St. Cuthbert’s Church, Thetford, and performed divine service therein.
Who has not, at some time, been deeply impressed by the solemn stillness, the holy calm, of an empty church? Earthly passions, and cares, and ambitions, seemed to have died away; one’s soul was filled with a spiritual peace. One stood and listened to the wind surging against the walls outside, as the waves of the sea may beat against the walls of an ingulfed temple; and one felt as effectually secluded from the surge and roar of the worldly life outside the sacred walls, as if in such a temple at the bottom of the sea. One gazed upon the monumental effigies, with their hands clasped in an endless prayer, and their passionless marble faces turned for ages heavenward, and read their mouldering epitaphs, and moralized on the royal preacher’s text—“All is vanity and vexation of spirit.” And then one felt the disposition—and, perhaps, indulged it—to kneel before the altar, all alone with God, in that still and solemn church, and pour out one’s high-wrought thoughts before Him. At such times one has probably tasted something of the transcendental charm of the life of a recluse priest. One could not sustain the tension long. Perhaps the old recluse, with his experience and his aids, could maintain it for a longer period. But to him, too, the natural reaction must have come in time; and then he had his mechanical occupations to fell back upon—trimming the lamps before the shrines, copying his manuscript, or illuminating its initial letters; perhaps, for health’s sake, he took a daily walk up and down the aisle of the church, whose walls re-echoed his measured footfalls; then he had his oft-recurring “hours” to sing, and his books to read; and, to prevent the long hours which were still left him in his little par-closed chapel from growing too wearily monotonous, there came, now and then, a tap at the shutter of his “parlour” window, which heralded the visit of some poor soul, seeking counsel or comfort in his difficulties of this world or the next, or some pilgrim bringing news of distant lands, or some errant knight seeking news of adventures, or some parishioner come honestly to have a dish of gossip with the holy man, about the good and evil doings of his neighbours.
There is a pathetic anecdote in Blomfield’s “Norfolk,” which will showthat the spirit and the tradition of the old recluse priests survived the Reformation. The Rev. Mr. John Gibbs, formerly rector of Gessing, in that county, was ejected from his rectory in 1690 as a non-juror. “He was an odd but harmless man, both in life and conversation. After his ejection he dwelt in the north porch chamber, and laid on the stairs that led up to the rood-loft, between the church and chancel, having a window at his head, so that he could lie in his couch, and see the altar. He lived to be very old, and was buried at Frenze.”
Let us turn again to the female recluse, in her anchor-house outside the church. How was her cell furnished? It had always a little altar at the east end, before which the recluse paid her frequent devotions, hearing, besides, the daily mass in church through her window, and receiving the Holy Sacrament at stated times. Bishop Poore advises his recluses to receive it only fifteen times a year. The little square unglazed window was closed with a shutter, and a black curtain with a white cross upon it also hung before the opening, through which the recluse could converse without being seen. The walls appear to have been sometimes painted—of course with devotional subjects. To complete the scene add a comfortable carved oak chair, and a little table, an embroidery frame, and such like appliances for needlework; a book of prayers, and another of saintly legends, not forgetting Bishop Poore’s “Ancren Riewle;” a fire on the hearth in cold weather, and the cat, which Bishop Poore expressly allows, purring beside it; and lastly paint in the recluse, in her black habit and veil, seated in her chair; or prostrate before her little altar; or on her knees beside her church window listening to the chanted mass; or receiving her basket of food from her servant, through the open parlour window; or standing before its black curtain, conversing with a stray knight-errant; or putting her white hand through it, to give an alms to some village crone or wandering beggar.
A few extracts from Bishop Poore’s “Ancren Riewle,” already several times alluded to, will give life to the picture we have painted. Though intended for the general use of recluses, it seems to have been specially addressed, in the first instance, to three sisters, who, in the bloom of youth,forsook the world, and became the tenants of a reclusorium. It would seem that in such cases each recluse had a separate cell, and did not communicate, except on rare occasions, with her fellow inmates; and each had her own separate servant to wait upon her. Here are some particulars as to their communication with the outer world. “Hold no conversation with any man out of a church window, but respect it for the sake of the Holy Sacrament which ye see there through;[156]and at other times (other whiles) take your women to the window of the house (huses thurle), other men and women to the parlour-window to speak when necessary; nor ought ye (to converse) but at these two windows.” Here we have three windows; we have no difficulty in understanding which was the church-window, and the parlour-window—the windowpour parler; but what was the house-window, through which the recluse might speak to her servant? Was it merely the third glazed window, through which she might, if it were convenient, talk with her maid, but not with strangers, because she would be seen through it? or was it a window in the larger anchorholds, between the recluse cell, and the other apartment in which her maid lived, and in which, perhaps, guests were entertained? The latter seems the more probable explanation, and will receive further confirmation when we come to the directions about the entertainment of guests. The recluse was not to give way to the very natural temptation to put her head out of the open window, to get sometimes a wider view of the world about her. “A peering anchoress, who is always thrusting her head outward,” he compares to “an untamed bird in a cage”—poor human bird! In another place he gives a more serious exhortation on the same subject “Is not she too forward and foolhardy who holds her head boldly forth on the open battlements while men with crossbow bolts without assail the castle? Surely our foe, the warrior of hell, shoots, as I ween, more bolts at one anchoress than at seventy and seven secular ladies. The battlements of the castle are the windows of their houses; let her not look out at them, lest shehave the devil’s bolts between her eyes before she even thinks of it.” Here are directions how to carry on her “parlements”:—“First of all, when you have to go to your parlour-window, learn from your maid who it is that is come; ... and when you must needs go forth, go forth in the fear of God to a priest, ... and sit and listen, and not cackle.” They were to be on their guard even with religious men, and not even confess, except in presence of a witness. “If any man requests to see you (i.e.to have the black curtain drawn aside), ask him what good might come of it.... If any one become so mad and unreasonable that he puts forth his hand toward the window-cloth (curtain), shut the window (i.e.close the shutter) quickly, and leave him; ... and as soon as any man falls into evil discourse, close the window, and go away with this verse, that he may hear it, ‘The wicked have told me foolish tales, but not according to thy law;’ and go forth before your altar, and say the ‘Miserere.’” Again, “Keep your hands within your windows, for handling or touching between a man and an anchoress is a thing unnatural, shameful, wicked,” &c.
The bishop adds a characteristic piece of detail to our picture when he speaks of the fair complexions of the recluses because not sunburnt, and their white hands through not working, both set in strong relief by the black colour of the habit and veil. He says, indeed, that “since no man seeth you, nor ye see any man, ye may be content with your clothes white or black.” But in practice they seem usually to have worn black habits, unless, when attached to the church of any monastery, they may have worn the habit of the order. They were not to wear rings, brooches, ornamented girdles, or gloves. “An anchoress,” he says, “ought to take sparingly (of alms), only that which is necessary (i.e.she ought not to take alms to give away again). If she can spare any fragments of her food, let her send them away (to some poor person) privately out of her dwelling. For the devil,” he says elsewhere, “tempts anchoresses, through their charity, to collect to give to the poor, then to a friend, then to make a feast.” “There are anchoresses,” he says, “who make their meals with their friends without; that is too much friendship.” The editor thinks this to mean that some anchoresses left their cells, and went to dine at the houses of their friends; but the word isgistes(guests), and, more probably,it only means that the recluse ate her dinner in her cell while a guest ate hers in the guest-room of the reclusorium, with an open window between, so that they could see and converse with one another. For we find in another place that she was to maintain “silence always at meals; ... and if any one hath a guest whom she holds dear, she may cause her maid, as in her stead, to entertain her friend with glad cheer, and she shall have leave to open her window once or twice, and make signs to her of gladness.” But “let nomaneat in your presence, except he be in great need.” The narrative already given at p. 109, of the visit of St. Richard the hermit to Dame Margaret the recluse of Anderby, also shows that in exceptional cases a recluse ate with men. The incident of the head of the recluse, in her convulsive sleep, falling at the window at which the hermit was reclining, and leaning partly upon him,[157]is explained by the theory that they were sitting in separate apartments, each close by this house window, which was open between them. As we have already seen, in the case of Sir Percival, a man might even sleep in the reclusorium; and so the Rule says, “let no man sleep within your walls” as a general rule; “if, however, great necessity should cause your house to be used” by travellers, “see that ye have a woman of unspotted life with you day and night.”
As to their occupations, he advises them to make “no purses and blodbendes of silk, but shape and sew and mend church vestments, and poor people’s clothes, and help to clothe yourselves and your domestics.” “An anchoress must not become a school-mistress, nor turn her house into a school for children. Her maiden may, however, teach any little girl concerning whom it might be doubtful whether she should learn among the boys.”[158]
Doubtless, we are right in inferring from the bishop’s advice not to do certain things, that anchoresses were in the habit of doing them. From this kind of evidence we glean still further traits. He suggests to them that in confession they will perhaps have to mention such faults as these,“I played or spoke thus in the church; went to the play in the churchyard;[159]looked on at this, or at the wrestling, or other foolish sports; spoke thus, or played, in the presence of secular men, or of religious men, in a house of anchorites, and at a different window than I ought; or, being alone in the church, I thought thus.” Again he mentions, “Sitting too long at the parlour-window, spilling ale, dropping crumbs.” Again we find, “Make no banquetings, nor encourage any strange vagabonds about the gate.” But of all their failings, gossiping seems to have been the besetting sin of anchoresses. “People say of anchoresses that almost every one hath an old woman to feed her ears, a prating gossip, who tells her all the tales of the land, a magpie that chatters to her of everything that she sees or hears; so that it is a common saying, from mill and from market, from smithy and from anchor-house, men bring tidings.”
Let us add the sketch drawn of them by the unfavourable hand of Bilney the Reformer, in his “Reliques of Rome,” published in 1563, and we have done:—“As touching the monastical sect of recluses, and such as be shutte up within walls, there unto death continuall to remayne, giving themselves to the mortification of carnal effects, to the contemplation of heavenly and spirituall thinges, to abstinence, to prayer, and to such other ghostly exercises, as men dead to the world, and havyng their lyfe hidden with Christ, I have not to write. Forasmuch as I cannot fynde probably in any author whence the profession of anckers and anckresses had the beginning and foundation, although in this behalf I have talked with men of that profession which could very little or nothing say of the matter. Notwithstanding, as the Whyte Fryers father that order on Helias the prophet (but falsely), so likewise do the ankers and ankresses make that holy and virtuous matrone Judith their patroness and foundress; but how unaptly who seeth not? Their profession and religion differeth as farfrom the manners of Judith as light from darknesse, or God from the devill, as shall manifestly appere to them that will diligentlye conferre the history of Judith with their life and conversation. Judith made herself a privy chamber where she dwelt (sayth the scripture), being closed in with her maydens. Our recluses also close themselves within the walls, but they suffer no man to be there with them. Judith ware a smoche of heare, but our recluses are both softly and finely apparalled. Judith fasted all the days of her lyfe, few excepted. Our recluses eate and drinke at all tymes of the beste, being of the number of themqui curios simulant et Bacchanalia vivunt. Judith was a woman of a very good report. Our recluses are reported to be superstitious and idolatrous persons, and such as all good men flye their company. Judith feared the Lord greatly, and lyved according to His holy word. Our recluses fear the pope, and gladly doe what his pleasure is to command them. Judith lyved of her own substance and goods, putting no man to charge. Our recluses, as persons only borne to consume the good fruits of the erth, lyve idely of the labour of other men’s handes. Judith, when tyme required, came out of her closet, to do good unto other. Our recluses never come out of their lobbies, sincke or swimme the people. Judith put herself in jeopardy for to do good to the common countrye. Our recluses are unprofitable clods of the earth, doing good to no man. Who seeth not how farre our ankers and ankresses differe from the manners and life of this vertuous and godly woman Judith, so that they cannot justly claime her to be their patronesse? Of some idle and superstitious heremite borrowed they their idle and superstitious religion. For who knoweth not that our recluses have grates of yron in theyr spelunckes, and dennes out of the which they looke, as owles out of an yvye todde, when they will vouchsafe to speake with any man at whose hand they hope for advantage? So reade we in ‘Vitis Patrum,’ that John the Heremite so enclosed himself in his hermitage that no person came in unto him; to them that came to visite him he spoke through a window onely. Our ankers and ankresses professe nothing but a solitary lyfe in their hallowed house, wherein they are inclosed wyth the vowe of obedience to the pope, and to their ordinary bishop. Their apparel is indifferent, so it be dissonant from the laity. No kind of meatesthey are forbidden to eat. At midnight they are bound to say certain prayers. Their profession is counted to be among other professions so hardye and so streight that they may by no means be suffered to come out of their houses except it be to take on them an harder and streighter, which is to be made a bishop.”
It is not to be expected that mediæval paintings should give illustrations of persons who were thus never visible in the world. In the pictures of the hermits of the Egyptian desert, on the walls of the Campo Santo at Pisa, we see a representation of St. Anthony holding a conversation with St. John the Hermit, who is just visible through his grated window, “like an owl in an ivy tod,” as Bilney says; and we have already given a picture of Sir Percival knocking at the door of a female recluse. Bilney says, that they wore any costume, “so it were dissonant from the laity;” but in all probability they commonly wore a costume similar in colour to that of the male hermits. The picture which we here give of an anchoress, is taken from a figure of St. Paula, one of the anchorite saints of the desert, in the same picture of St. Jerome, which has already supplied us, in the figure of St. Damasus, with our best picture of the hermit’s costume.
St. Paula.
The service for enclosing a recluse[160]may be found in some of the old Service Books. We derive the following account of it from an old black-letterManuale ad usum percelebris ecclesie Sarisburiensis(London, 1554), in the British Museum. The rubric before the service orders that noone shall be enclosed without the bishop’s leave; that the candidate shall be closely questioned as to his motives; that he shall be taught not to entertain proud thoughts, as if he merited to be set apart from intercourse with common men, but rather on account of his own infirmity it was good that he should be removed from contact with others, that he might be kept out of sin himself, and not contaminate them. So that the recluse should esteem himself to be condemned for his sins, and shut up in his solitary cell as in a prison, and unworthy, for his sins, of the society of men. There is a note, that this office shall serve for both sexes. On the day before the ceremony of inclusion, theIncludendus—the person about to be inclosed—was to confess, and to fast that day on bread and water; and all that night he was to watch and pray, having his wax taper burning, in the monastery,[161]near his inclusorium. On the morrow, all being assembled in church, the bishop, or priest appointed by him, first addressed an exhortation to the people who had come to see the ceremony, and to the includendus himself, and then began the service with a response, and several appropriate psalms and collects. After that, the priest put on his chasuble, and began mass, a special prayer being introduced for the includendus. After the reading of the gospel, the includendus stood before the altar, and offered his taper, which was to remain burning on the altar throughout the mass; and then, standing before the altar-step, he read his profession, or if he were a layman (and unable to read), one of the chorister boys read it for him. And this was the form of his profession:—“I, brother (or sister) N, offer and present myself to serve the Divine Goodness in the order of Anchorites, and I promise to remain, according to the rule of that order, in the service of God, from henceforth, by the grace of God, and the counsel of the Church.” Then he signed the document in which his profession was written with the sign of the cross, and laid it upon the altar on bended knees. Then the bishop or priest said a prayer, and asperged with holy water the habit of the includendus; and he put on the habit, and prostrated himself before the altar, and so remained, while thepriest and choir sang over him the hymnVeni Creator Spiritus, and then proceeded with the mass. First the priest communicated, then the includendus, and then the rest of the congregation; and the mass was concluded. Next his wax taper, which had all this time been burning on the altar, was given to the includendus, and a procession was formed; first the choir; then the includendus, clad in his proper habit, and carrying his lighted taper; then the bishop or priest, in his mass robes; and then the people following; and so they proceeded, singing a solemn litany, to the cell. And first the priest entered alone into the cell, and asperged it with holy water, saying appropriate sentences; then he consecrated and blessed the cell, with prayers offered before the altar of its chapel. The third of these short prayers may be transcribed: “Benedic domine domum istam et locum istum, ut sit in eo sanitas, sanctitas, castitas, virtus, victoria, sanctimonia, humilitas, lenitas, mansuetudo, plenitudo, legis et obedientæ Deo Patre et Filio et Spiritui Sancto et sit super locum istum et super omnes habitantes in eo tua larga benedictio, ut in his manufactis habitaculis cum solemtate manentes ipsi tuum sit semper habitaculum. Per dominum,” &c. Then the bishop or priest came out, and led in the includendus, still carrying his lighted taper, and solemnly blessed him. And then—a mere change in the tense of the rubric has an effect which is quite pathetic; it is no longer theincludendus, the person to be enclosed, but theinclusus, the enclosed one, he or she upon whom the doors of the cell have closed for ever in this life—then the enclosed is to maintain total and solemn silence throughout, while the doors are securely closed, the choir chanting appropriate psalms. Then the celebrant causes all the people to pray for the inclusus privately, in solemn silence, to God, for whose love he has left the world, and caused himself to be inclosed in that strait prison. And after some concluding prayers, the procession left the inclusus to his solitary life, and returned, chanting, to the church, finishing at the step of the choir.
One cannot read this solemn—albeit superstitious—service, in the quaint old mediæval character, out of the very book which has, perhaps, been used in the actual enclosing of some recluse, without being moved. Was it some frail woman, with all the affections of her heart and the hopes of her earthly life shattered, who sought the refuge of this living tomb? wasit some man of strong passions, wild and fierce in his crimes, as wild and fierce in his penitence? or was it some enthusiast, with the over-excited religious sensibility, of which we have instances enough in these days? We can see them still, in imagination, prostrate, “in total and solemn silence,” before the wax taper placed upon the altar of the little chapel, and listening while the chant of the returning procession grows fainter and fainter in the distance. Ah! we may scornfully smile at it all as a wild superstition, or treat it coldly as a question of mere antiquarian interest; but what broken hearts, what burning passions, have been shrouded under that recluse’s robe, and what wild cries of human agony have been stifled under that “total and solemn silence!” When the processional chant had died away in the distance, and the recluse’s taper had burnt out on his little altar, was that the end of the tragedy, or only the end of the first act? Did the broken heart find repose? Did the wild spirit grow tame? Or did the one pine away and die like a flower in a dungeon, and the other beat itself to death against the bars of its self-made cage?
CONSECRATED WIDOWS OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
Besides all other religious people living under vows, in community in monasteries, or as solitaries in their anchorages, there were also a number of Widows vowed to that life and devoted to the service of God, who lived at home in their own houses or with their families. This was manifestly a continuation, or imitation, of the primitive Order of Widows, of whom St. Paul speaks in his first Epistle to Timothy (ch. v.). For although religious women, from an early period (fourth century), were usually nuns, the primitive Orders of Deaconesses and Widows did not altogether cease to exist in the Church. The Service Books[162]contain offices for their benediction; and though it is probable that in fact a deaconess was very rarely consecrated in the Western Church, yet the number of allusions to widows throughout the Middle Ages leads us to suspect that there may have been no inconsiderable number of them. A common form of commission[163]to a suffragan bishop includes the consecrating of widows. From the Pontifical of Edmund Lacey, Bishop of Exeter, of the fourteenth century, we give a sketch of the service.[164]It is the same in substance as those in the earlier books. First, a rubric states that though a widow may be blessed on any day, it is more fitting that she be blessed on a holy day, and especially on the Lord’s day. Between theEpistle and the Gospel, the bishop sitting on a faldstool facing the people, the widow kneeling before the bishop is to be interrogated if she desires, putting away all carnal affections, to be joined as a spouse to Christ. Then she shall publicly in the vulgar tongue profess herself, in the bishop’s hands, resolved to observe perpetual continence. Then the bishop blesses her habit (clamidem), saying a collect. Then the bishop, genuflecting, begins the hymnVeni Creator Spiritus; the widow puts on the habit and veil, and the bishop blesses and gives her the ring; and with a final prayer for appropriate virtues and blessings, the ordinary service of Holy Communion is resumed, special mention of the widow being made therein.
These collects are of venerable age, and have much beauty of thought and expression. The reader may be glad to see one of them as an example, and as an indication of the spirit in which people entered into these religious vows: “O God, the gracious inhabiter of chaste bodies and lover of uncorrupt souls, look we pray Thee, O Lord, upon this Thy servant, who humbly offers her devotion to Thee. May there be in her, O Lord, the gift of Thy spirit, a prudent modesty, a wise graciousness, a grave gentleness, a chaste freedom; may she be fervent in charity and love nothing beside Thee (extra te); may she live praiseworthy and not desire praise; may she fear Thee and serve Thee with a chaste love; be Thou to her, O Lord, honour, Thou delight; be Thou in sorrow her comfort, in doubt her counsellor; be Thou to her defence in injury, in tribulation patience, in poverty abundance, in fasting food, in sickness medicine. By Thee, whom she desires to love above all things, may she keep what she has vowed; so that by Thy help she may conquer the old enemy, and cast out the defilements of sin; that she may be decorated with the gift of fruit sixty fold,[165]and adorned with the lamps of all virtues, and by Thy grace may be worthy to join the company of the elect widows. This we humbly ask through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
In a paper in the “Surrey Transactions,” vol. iii. p. 208, Mr. Baigent, the writer of it, finds two, and only two, entries of the consecration of widows in the Episcopal Registers of Winchester, which go back to the early part of the reign of Edward I. The first of these is on May 4, 1348, of the Lady Aleanor Giffard, probably, says Mr. Baigent, the widow of John Giffard, of Bowers Giffard, in Essex. The other entry, on October 18, 1379, is of the Benediction of Isabella Burgh, the widow of a citizen of London (whose will is given by Mr. Baigent), and of Isabella Golafre, widow of Sir John Golafre.
The profession of the widow is given in old French, and a translation of it in old English, as follows: “In ye name of God, Fader and Sone and Holy Ghost. Iche Isabelle Burghe, that was sometyme wyfe of Thomas Burghe, wyche that is God be taught helpynge the grace of God [the parallel French is, Quest à Dieu commande ottriaunte la grace de Dieu] behote [promise] conversione of myn maners, and make myn avows to God, and to is swete moder Seynte Marie and to alle seintz, into youre handes leve [dear] fader in God, William be ye grace of God Bisshope of Wynchestre, that fro this day forward I schal ben chaste of myn body and in holy chastite kepe me treweliche and devouteliche all ye dayes of myn life.” Another form of profession is written on the lower margin of the Exeter Pontifical, and probably in the handwriting of Bishop Lacy: “I, N., wedowe, avowe to God perpetuall chastite of my body from henceforward, and in the presence of the honorable fadyr in God, my Lord N., by the grace of God, Bishop of N., I promyth sabilly to leve in the Church, a wedowe. And this to do, of myne own hand I subscribe this writing:Et postea faciat signum crucis.”
Another example of a widow in the Winchester registers is that of Elizabeth de Julien, widow of John Plantagenet, Earl of Kent, who made that vow to Bishop William de Edyndon, but afterwards married Sir Eustache Dabrichecourt, September 29, 1360, whereupon proceedings were commenced against her by the Archbishop of Canterbury, who imposed on her a severe and life-long penance. She survived her second husband many years, and dying in 1411, was buried in the choir of the Friars Minor at Winchester, near the tomb of her first husband.
The epitaph on the monumental brass of Joanna Braham,A.D.1519, at Frenze, in Norfolk, describes her as “Vidua ac Deo devota.”
In the Book of the Knight of La Tour-Landry is a description of a lady who, if she had not actually taken the vows of widowhood, lived the life we should suppose to be that of a vowess. “It is of a good lady whiche longe tyme was in wydowhode. She was of a holy lyf, and moste humble and honourable, as the whiche every yere kepte and held a feste upon Crystemasse-day of her neyghbours bothe farre and nere, tyll her halle was ful of them. She served and honoured eche one after his degree, and specially she bare grete reverence to the good and trewe wymmen, and to them whiche has deservyd to be worshipped. Also she was of suche customme that yf she knewe any poure gentyll woman that shold be wedded she arayed her with her jewels. Also she wente to the obsequye of the poure gentyll wymmen, and gaf there torches, and all such other lumynary as it neded thereto. Her dayly ordenaunce was that she rose erly ynough, and had ever freres, and two or three chappellayns whiche sayd matyns before her within her oratorye; and after she herd a hyhe masse and two lowe, and sayd her servyse full devoutely; and after this she wente and arayed herself, and walked in her gardyn, or else aboute her plase, sayenge her other devocions and prayers. And as tyme was she wente to dyner; and after dyner, if she wyste and knewe ony seke folke or wymmen in theyr childbedde, she went to see and vysited them, and made to be brought to them of her best mete. And then, as she myght not go herself, she had a servant propyer therefore, whiche rode upon a lytell hors, and bare with him grete plente of good mete and drynke for to gyve to the poure and seke folk there as they were. And after she had herd evensonge she went to her souper, yf she fasted not. And tymely she wente to bedde; made her styward to come to her to wete what mete sholde be had the next daye, and lyved by good ordenaunce, and wold be purveyed byfore of alle such thynge that was nedefull for her household. She made grete abstynence, and wered the hayre[166]upon the Wednesday and upon the Fryday.... And she roseeverye night thre tymes, and kneled downe to the ground by her bedde, and redryd thankynges to God, and prayd for al Crysten soules, and dyd grete almes to the poure. This good lady, that wel is worthy to be named and preysed, had to name my lady Cecyle of Ballavylle.... She was the most good and curtoys lady that ever I knewe or wyste in ony countrey, and that lesse was envious, and never she wold here say ony evyll of no body, but excused them, and prayd to God that they myght amende them, and that none was that knewe what to hym shold happe.... She had a ryhte noble ende, and as I wene ryht agreable to God; and as men say commonely, of honest and good lyf cometh ever a good ende.”
In post-Reformation times there are biographies of holy women which show that the idea of consecrated widowhood was still living in the minds of the people. Probably the dress commonly worn by widows throughout their widowhood is a remnant of the mediæval custom.
THE PILGRIMS OF THE MIDDLE AGES.