522 Tlte Bean of W>stminster [April 29, 



was the making of liis chaplain Land, for whom lie obtained the 

 promise of a prebend in the year that he ceased to be Dean. The 

 tu'o men had both risen from the ranks, and the son of the tallow- 

 chandler of Westminster was the steadfast patron and the lifelong 

 friend of the son of the cloth-merchant of Eeading. The next Dean 

 was George Montaigne (or Mountain), who came to us at the end of 

 1610. He left us for the Bisphoric of Lincoln in 1617, but his affec- 

 tion for the neighbourhood of the Court seems to have led him to 

 rent a prebendal house and spend a large sum of money upon it, as 

 we shall see later on. This feature of his somewhat unattractive 

 character reappears in the story by which he is best remembered. 

 He had come back to be Bishop of London in 1620. Eight years 

 later King Charles wished to transfer him to Durham, in order to 

 bring Laud to Loudon. But the luountain refused to be moved, and 

 yielded at last only on the understanding that the utmost of his re- 

 moval should be 'from London House in the City to Durham House 

 in the Strand.' As a matter of fact, the death of the Archbishop of 

 York i^rovided him with a yet more honourable and less remote see. 



When Dr. Mountain left us in 1617, that curious adventurer the 

 Archbishop of Spalato hoped to have got his place, but it was given 

 to Dr. Tolson (or Tounson).* In those days the Dean was accus- 

 tomed to grant dispensations to parishioners of St. Margaret's, which 

 was then under his exclusive jurisdiction. Dr. Tounson used to hand 

 the fees received for these dispensations to the parish overseers for 

 distribution to the poor. Their receipts for 16 IS include such items 

 as this : — 



Of the right worll. Mr, Dctr. Tounson. Dearie of Westm., for license by him 

 made to eate Fleshe in tlie Lent season, videlicet : 



Of the Right honorable Lord Pagett for a license . . . xxvi* viii'^' . 

 [Knights and Ladies paid los. 4fZ. and commoners 68. 8r7. — Westm. Becords, p. 94.] 



One of his latest exploits as Dean was to forbid ' ladies in yellow 

 ruffs to be admitted into his Church.' It appears that he had mis- 

 understood a wish expressed by King James in this regard. A 

 fortnight later he left us for the Bishopric of Salisbury ; but he died 

 the next year, and the case of Mrs. Tounson and her fifteen children 

 was so piteous that her brother, Dr. Davenant, was appointed to the 

 vacant see. Yet Mrs. Tounson cannot have been penniless, for in 

 1624 I tind a lease granted to ' Margaret Tounson of Sarum, widow,' 

 of the Ancre's House, called after the old anchorite of Westminster, 

 which abutted on the south side of St. Margaret's chancel. There is 

 a Chapter Order, however, which forbids her to eject the curate, the 

 famous Dr. Isaac Bargrave, afterwards Dean of Canterbury. 



,For the next twenty years Westminster xVbhey was to play a 

 notable part in English history, for John \\ illiams came as Dean in 



♦ The uncertainty of the name is explained when we discover that his father's 

 name was Toulnesonn (Chester 'Registers,' p. 117). 



