OF SELBORNE. .581 



treacherous memories, and that no one may pretend 

 ignorance of them; enjoins and orders that these injunc- 

 tions and the before-mentioned decrees shall be written 

 in a volume, and all and singular of them "be read fully 

 in the presence of the whole convent twice in every 

 year. Requires observance of all of them under penal- 

 ties. Finally, reserves to himself the power of altering 

 in any way either the injunctions or the penalties.] 



In the course of the Visitatio Notabilis the constitu- 

 tions of Legate Ottobonus are frequently referred to. 

 Ottobonus was afterwards Pope Adrian V. and died in 

 1276. His constitutions are in Lyndewood's Provin- 

 ciale, and were drawn up in the 52nd of Henry III. 



In the Visitatio Notabilis the usual punishment is 

 fasting on bread and beer; and in cases of repeated 

 delinquency on bread and water. On these occasions 

 quarto, feria, et sexta feria, are mentioned often, and are 

 to be understood of the days of the week numerically 

 on which such punishment is to be inflicted. 



LETTER XV. 



THOUGH Bishop Wykeham appears somewhat stern 

 and rigid in his visitatorial character towards the 

 Priory of Selborne, yet he was on the whole a liberal 

 friend and benefactor to that convent, which, like every 

 society or individual that fell in his way, partook of the 

 generosity and benevolence of that munificent prelate. 



" In the year 1377 William of Wykeham, out of his 

 mere good will and liberality, discharged the whole 

 debts of the prior and convent of Selborne, to the 

 amount of one hundred and ten marks eleven shillings 

 and sixpence 1 ; and, a few years before he died, he 

 made a free gift of one hundred marks to the same 

 Priory : on which account the prior and convent volun- 



1 Yet in ten years time we find, by the Notabilis Visitatio, that all 

 their relics, plate, vestments, title deeds, &c. were in pawn. 



