OF SELBORNE. 369 



and other spacious apartments belonging to so large a foun- 

 dation. The roofs neglected, would soon become the posses- 

 sion of daws and owls ; and, being rotted and decayed by the 

 weather, would fall in upon the floors ; so that all parts must 

 have hastened to speedy dilapidation and a scene of broken 

 ruins. Three full centuries have now passed since the dis- 

 solution ; a series of years that would craze the stoutest 

 edifices. But, besides the slow hand of time, many circum- 

 stances have contributed to level this venerable structure with 

 the ground ; of which nothing now remains but one piece of 

 a wall of about ten feet long, and as many feet high, which 

 probably was part of an out-house. As early as the latter end 

 of the reign of Hen. VII. we find that a farm-house and two 

 barns were built to the south of the Priory, and undoubtedly 

 out of it's materials. Avarice again has much contributed to 

 the overthrow of this stately pile, as long as the tenants could 

 make money of it's stones or timbers. Wantonness, no 

 doubt, has had a share in the demolition; for boys love to 

 destroy what men venerate and admire. A remarkable in- 

 stance of this propensity the writer can give from his own 

 knowledge. When a schoolboy, more than fifty years ago, he 

 was eye-witness, perhaps a party concerned, in the under- 

 mining a portion of that fine old ruin at the north end of 

 Basingstoke town, well known by the name of Holy Ghost 

 Chapel. Very providentially the vast fragment, which these 

 thoughtless little engineers endeavoured to sap, did not give 

 way so soon as might have been expected; but it fell the 

 night following, and with such violence that it shook the very 

 ground, and, awakening the inhabitants of the neighbouring 

 cottages, made them start up in their beds as if they had felt 

 an earthquake. The motive for this dangerous attempt does 

 not so readily appear : perhaps the more danger the more 

 honour thought the boys; and the notion of doing some 

 mischief gave a zest to the enterprize. As Dryden says upon 

 an other occasion, 



" It look'd so like a sin it pleas'd the more." 



Had the Priory been only levelled to the surface of the 



2s 



