181 



ANTIQUITIES OF THE TOWN OF OKEHAMPTON. 



Continued from page 144. 



Old Richard * lived long enough, filling the various civic offices 

 and duly recording whatever befel in his journal — long enough 

 to survive the term of the Protectorate. The part borne by the 

 celebrated General Monk (afterwards Duke of Albemarle) in the 

 Restoration is well known : a late entry notices that nobleman 

 among others on whom an honorary freedom of the borough hjad 

 been conferred ; and again a handsome benefaction from him is men- 

 tioned on occasion of a fire in the town, which broke out in 1676 

 and destroyed much property. 



The good burgesses of Okehampton seldom failed in becoming 

 devotion to their patrons. In 1681 the Lord Keeper Anglesea 

 addressed thcni a letter of which a copy has been kindly shewn 

 me ; it is a very courteous acknowledgment of attentions paid by 

 the corporate body to his grandson, the Lord Mohun, then a child 

 of four years old. 



In resuming the subject of Ecclesiastical Antiquities, I would 

 call your attention to the traces we have left of a religious house 

 once standing at Brightley near us. The spot derives additional 

 interest from its having been a mother-house to the great abbey 

 of Ford in this county. It is curious that so diligent an antiquary 

 as Risdon should have fallen into error on the original site of this 

 monastery : he assigns it to Chittlehampton, and a subsequent 

 writer has given the honor to Sampford Courtenay. But the 

 cause of the monks' emigration, the barrenness of the country 

 near them, is at variance with Risdon's statement : the other opinion 

 has been retracted in a letter to me of much courtesy by the author 

 himself, f 



The only relic time has spared of the Priory at Brightley is now 

 appropriated as a barn, or to yet viler purposes. A low door 

 with its Saxon arch, perceptible on the north side, serves to indi- 



* It had given me much pleasure, if I could have imparted some informa- 

 tion on the habits of this good old burgess. Of the clothes worn by 

 him, the ladies— and ladies, however dead to less important topics, are ever 

 alive to dress — the ladies will accept an indication from a cotemporary jour- 

 nalist : — 



" I did give my wife's brother a coat that I had by me ; a close-bodied, 

 light-coloured, cloth coat, with a gold edging in cable seam, that was the lace 

 of my wife's best petticoat." 



t The Rev. George Oliver, official in the Roman Catholic Communion, at 

 St. Nicholas' Priory, in Exeter. 



