64 C.C. NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY 



HAILES ABBEY. 



By The Rev. W. Bazeley. 



IT was in the reign of Henry III. that Hailes Abbey was first 

 built. The times were troublous ones, in 1216 John had died, 

 and there was no lover of England who was not thankful for 

 his death. His son, Henry, was only nine years old, and for 

 the next three years the royal authority passed into the hands of 

 William Marshall, and after his death Hubert de Burg and Stephen 

 Langton managed the country's affairs. But in 1227 Henry declared 

 himself of age and soon quarrelled with his advisers. There was a 

 certain refinement in Henry's temper which won him affection even 

 in the worst days of his rule. He built the Abbey-church at 

 Westminster and was a patron of artists and men of letters. 



At this period the priesthood had very great power over 

 Christendom, but its religious hold was weakening day by day. 

 Within the English Church there was need of reform, preaching was 

 becoming a thing of the past, the monks were passing into rich land 

 owners, many of the parish priests did not reside in their parishes, and 

 were ignorant, and so their spiritual hold was weakening. To win the 

 world back to the Church was the aim of two new religious orders in 

 the thirteenth century. The Dominicans and Franciscans strove to 

 carry the Gospel to the poor, and wandered about to the town and 

 the country folk as missionaries. 



It was at such a time, when the land was worried by an ill-gover- 

 ning, though in a sense religious king, and burdened by an ignorant 

 priesthood, that the Abbey of Hailes was built. The founder of the 

 Abbey was Richard, brother of Henry III. This was the Richard — 

 Earl of Cornwall — who first sided with the Barons against the king 

 and then deserted to Henry's side. But later on the Barons, under 

 Simon de VIontfort, were too much for him, and captured him in a 

 windmill at the battle of Lewes, in 1264. It was in 1251 that Richard 

 had the Abbey consecrated, and the occasion was evidently a great 



