150 St. Nicholas’ Hospital, Salisbury. 
Also during the same visit he was introduced by some person 
unknown to the Privy Seal, Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton, 
who received him favourably ; and to him, perhaps first, he broached 
his idea of getting a new foundation. At all events he writes after 
his return to his anonymous friend deprecating an intention to put 
the hospital under the dean and chapter instead of under a master, 
excusing himself for putting the hospital under Lord Pembroke’s 
protection, and complaining that he had spent more than £140 in 
this business. 
And so in 1610 King James I. granted a fresh constitution to 
the hospital, which has never been superseded. By this a master, a 
chaplain, and six poor and infirm of either sex, were constituted a 
corporation, and authorized to use a common seal. The Earl of 
Pembroke has the appointment of the master for his life, and after 
his death his executors for forty years: but after that time the 
appointment is to revert to the bishop, or to the dean and chapter 
in case of a vacancy of the see. The master is to swear to observe 
the statutes either of Bishop Bingham, the founder, or Bishop 
Beauchamp, the patron of the hospital: and to nominate and admit 
brethren and sisters within one month of the vacancy to which they 
succeed. One brother, however, is always to be appointed by the 
dean and chapter. 
Thus ended the long controversy: and this favourable event was 
secured by the long-continued and patient exertions of one man, 
Geoffrey Bigge, the master. 
Mr. Bigge also made sundry alterations about the premises. Thus 
he put an end to the lease of the St. Nicholas’ farm, one Thomas 
Hancock surrendering his lease to him in 1617, The tenement he 
seems to have pulled down: thus demolishing what had once 
probably been the original hospital of St. Nicholas. For this he 
substituted two sets of rooms on either side of the old west porch of 
the hospital, which were old at this time: the northern half being (as 
was said before) made out of the relics of the old north wing of the 
hospital, which had been destroyed in 1498 ; and the southern half 
being the old kitchen of the establishment, from which the meat 
used to be passed through to the refectory by a private door. These 
