ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 385 



rem, whom the canons had taken to direct them they all and 

 every one " dixerunt et affirmarunt se nolle ad aliquam viam 

 procedere:" but, for this turn only, renounced their right, and 

 unanimously transferred their power to the bishop, the ordinary 

 of the place, promising to receive whom he should provide ; and 

 appointed a proctor to present the instrument to the bishop under 

 their seal ; and required their notary to draw it up in due form, 

 &c. subscribed by the notary. 



After the visitor had fully deliberated on the matter, he pro- 

 ceeded to the choice of a prior, and elected, by the following 

 instrument, John Sharp, alias Glastenbury. 



Fol. 56. PROVISIO PRIORIS per EPM. 



Willmus, &c. to our beloved brother in CHRIST, John Sharp, 

 alias Glastenbury, Ecclesie conventualis de Bruton, of the order 

 of St. Austin, in the diocese of Bath and Wells, canon-regular 

 salutem, &c. " De tue circumspectionis industria plurimum con- 

 fidentes, te virum providum et discretum, literarum scientia, et 

 moribus merito commendandum," &c. do appoint you prior 

 under our seal. " Dat. in manerio nostro de Suthwaltham, May 

 20, 1478, et nostre Consec. 31." 



Thus did the bishop, three times out of the four that he was 

 at liberty to nominate, appoint a prior from a distance, a stran- 

 ger to the place, to govern the convent of Selborne, hoping by 

 this method to have broken the cabal, and to have interrupted 

 that habit of mismanagement that had pervaded the society : but 

 he acknowledges, in an evidence lying before us, that he never 

 did succeed to his wishes with respect to those late governors, 

 " quos tamen male se habuisse, et inutiliter administrare, et ad- 

 ministrasse usque ad presentia tempora post debitam investiga- 

 tionem, &c. invenit." The only time that he appointed from 

 among the canons, he made choice of Peter Berne, for whom he 

 had conceived the greatest esteem and regard. 



When prior Berne first relinquished his priorship, he returned 

 again to his former condition of canon, in which he continued 

 for some years : but when he was re-chosen, and had abdicated 

 a second time, we find him in a forlorn state, and in danger of 

 being reduced to beggary, had not 1 the bishop of Winchester in- 

 terposed in his favour, and with great humanity insisted on a 

 provision for him for life. The reason for this difference seems 



2 c 



