8 The Seventeenth General Meeting. 
opposed this measure they were soundly cudgelled into submission. 
All this caused a great deal of bad blood, and legal enquiries were 
made into the matter of this contest between Wilton and New 
Sarum. Nearly a century elapsed before it was put an end to by 
the issue of a proclamation, which defined the days on which the 
inhabitants of both places were to hold their markets. But the 
trade of Wilton from this time began to decline, and later on, in 
1349, a frightful pestilence fell on the town, and destroyed at least 
one-third of the inhabitants. In the fifteenth century, curiously 
enough, there appears to have been a good trade in beer, and we 
find the brewers quarrelling for priority to supply the public wants. 
Indeed, in 1464, the then Mayor of Wilton was obliged to step in 
and effect a reconciliation of the fractious brewers, by ordering that 
five should brew on Monday, five on Wednesday, and four on Friday, 
weekly. During the Wars of the Roses, Wilton apparently re- 
mained indifferent and apathetic, though stirring events were taking 
place in England, and levies of men and materials were made in 
Wiltshire. Come we now to the reign of Henry VIII., by whose 
orders the religious edifices of Wilton were dissolved. The monas- 
tery of Wilton accepted its dissolution quietly, and gave no trouble 
whatever, but surrendered on the 25th March, 1539. Pensions 
were provided for the abbess, prioress, nuns, and officers of the 
establishment. The abbess retired to Fovant, a village through 
which we shall pass in our excursion to-morrow, and we read of one 
of the dispossessed nuns, whose name was Alice Langton, passing 
the remainder of her days at Ugford, near this town, at the residence 
of the Reve’s motherless daughter, Laura Wodeland, who had been 
a pupil of the grateful nun. I believe that the house can be pointed 
out to this day. Incidents like this are small, but they give an 
interest to persons and places, which time is unable to efface. Upon 
the site of the ancient church of St. Edith has risen the noble ; 
edifice of the Pembroke family, completed in the reign of Edward 
VI., under the conduct of Hans Holbein. In 1551 Wilton was 
honoured by a visit from the then youthful monarch, who was 
travelling in the western counties for a change of air, as we should 
say in modern parlance. England’s virgin Queen paid a visit to 
——— ae 
