By the Rev. Canon Moberly. 139 
number, the nearest contemporary evidence is Leland; who sixty 
years later describes them as “eight poor women and four poor 
men.” If this were so, they still keep to the total number of 
twelve. 
2. But the statutes also contemplate hospitality upon a larger 
seale, and desiring to restrain this within limits, enact that only 
considerable benefactors shall be received. It was then the custom 
to receive such benefactors to lodge within the hospital—and such 
hospitality had been unwarrantably extended. 
8. The master in 1478 was as a rule resident, and it was the 
exception when he did not officiate in the canonical hours himself; 
in fact he was bound by Bingham’s charter, and so was to serve 
the chapel of St. Nicholas next the hospital with the same ritual as 
in the Cathedral. He was probably still assisted by a chaplain, who 
was one of the three priests of St. Nicholas, the other two officiating 
in St. John’s Chapel. MWdere the chapel where the master officiated 
was, is another point of doubt: for the present chapel was not 
consecrated till 1501. 
In 1494 Warden Sutton resigned; and Bishop Blyth appointed 
his brother, Geoffrey Blyth, who the same year was made treasurer 
of the Cathedral, and in 1503 bishop of Lichfield. And in 1496_ 
we find transcribed in the bishop’s register a copy of the agreement 
of 1260, whereby the dean and chapter gave up the patronage of 
the wardenship of St. Nicholas’ to Bishop Bridport. This looks as 
if the controversy about the patronage had been renewed. The 
dean of the time was Edward Cheyne; and considering the low 
ebb to which Church matters had been reduced at this period, it is 
noteworthy to find Dean Cheyne presiding at a convocation of 
canons called in 1490, to promote measures “for extending the 
usefulness of the Church of Sarum.” The dean and chapter perhaps 
asserted their right to appoint, urging Bingham’s Ordination, when 
Sutton resigned in 1494; and the controversy, perhaps, was only 
set at rest by Bishop Blyth’s promulgating again the settlement of 
two hundred and thirty years before. 
But in 1498 ° something happened which led to the demolition of 
1 The exact date is given by Hickman’ s MS. 
