107 



Leland says " This (i.e. the Cross Bath) is much frequentid of 

 people diseased of lepre."* 



And in 1804 it is said one John Palmer, the surveyor and agent 

 for improving the streets and ways in the city of Bath, did (with- 

 out any notice to or permission of the Magdalene Hospital) pull 

 down an old ruinous tenement or dweUiug-house at the Cross Jiath 

 in the city of Bath, in the year of our Lord, 1804, and that the 

 master of the said Hospital then received £200 as a compensation 

 for the same." t 



Britton in Bath and Bristol, with the counties of Somerset 

 and Gloucester," by Sheppard, says on the Cross Bath : — " The 

 antient Cross from which this spring derives its name seems 

 to ascertain the fact ' that the Bath waters were known and used 

 by our Saxon ancestors.' It was erected here as an evidence of 

 the waters being reclaimed from heathen superstition to the service 

 of Christ, in conformity to the instruction given by Gregory the 

 Great to St. Augustine and his associates, which directed that all 

 the well-built temjjles and places dedicated to idols in Britain 

 should be converted from the worship of the devil to the worship 

 of the true God by a solemn consecration, sealed with an image of 

 the Cross of Christ, as the Theodosian law directs. This cross 

 remained in the bath till Nov., 1745." " The antient erection 

 which has given the name of Gregory's Cross to the place so called 

 near Bath is believed to have had a similar origin." 



In 1532 the Chapel is thus mentioned by Leland, " Or ever I 

 came to the bridge at Bathe that is over the Avon, I came down a 

 rokky hill fuUe of springes of water, and on this rokky hill is sette 

 a long streate as a suburb to the cyte of Bathe, and in this streate 

 is a chapeUe of St. Mary Magdalene."! 



In 1539, the Bath Monastery was dissolved. Hitherto the priors 

 of Bath either were themselves, or had the appointment of, the 

 Masters of the Hospital, but from an inquisition, made in the 2nd 

 year of Queen Elizabeth, before Thomas Turner, then Mayor, and 



* Leland' 8 Itinerary. 



t Appendix to further report of Commission for inquiring concerning 



Charities, 1820, p. 736 ; evidenco of Mr. H. Salmon. 



I Leland's Itinerary. 



