6 A FARMER'S YEAR 



on at Bedingham Hall till within the memory of folk still alive. At 

 last they died out, and the old Hall was pulled down, and with it 

 departed such glory as Bedingham possessed, for now, with the 

 exception of that of the clergyman (who is expected to exist on 

 about i4o/. a year), no gentle family lives in the parish. 



Of all these faint and far-off ghosts that once were men and 

 women (and owned or cultivated my farm) the one who interests 

 me most is that member of the Bruce or Brews family who died 

 ' beyond sea ' and caused his heart to be sent back to Bedingham 

 for burial. The heart still lies in the chancel, enclosed, so says 

 tradition, in a casket of silver. Tradition tells us also that its 

 owner fell in the Crusades, but I can find no confirmation of the 

 report. Perhaps the story has become mixed with that of the 

 heart of a more famous Bruce, and its adventures in the Crusades. 



There was another Brews also, the merry Margery, who writes 

 from Topcroft by Bedingham in February 1477 to her ' Voluntyn' 

 (valentine), John Paston (see the Paston Letters). ' No more to 

 yowe at this tyme, but the Holy Trinitie have yowe in kepyng. 

 And I besech yowe that this bill be not seyn of none erthely 

 creatur save only your selffe. And thys letter was indyte at 

 Topcroft with full hevy herte, By your own Margery Brews.' 



Poor dead Margery ! she did not anticipate the art of printing 

 or foreknow the eyes that would read her sweet love-laden valentine. 



There was a priory at Bedingham, for Sir John de Udedale 

 granted the manor to the Canons of Walsingham in 1318. So 

 the priory must have existed for something more than two 

 centuries when Henry VIII. seized it and gave it to one 

 Thomas Gawdy. All that is left of the monks to-day is an ancient 

 building, said to have been part of the monastery, which is now 

 used as a farmhouse. It stands close to the church, a long and 

 beautiful building, which used to be called the ' Mother ' church 

 of this district, probably built, or rebuilt, by the monks. If so, this 

 is the only monument they have left behind them ; but I often 

 wonder what their life was like in the grey old priory, and, when 

 they were not praying in the church, what they did with their time 



