ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 371 



dissolution a series of years that would craze the stoutest edifices. 

 But, besides the slow hand of time, many circumstances have con- 

 tributed to level this venerable structure with the ground ; of which 

 nothing now remains but one piece of wall of about ten feet long, 

 and as many feet high, which probably was a part of an outhouse. 

 As early as the" latter end of the reign of Hen. VII., we find that a 

 farmhouse and two barns were built to the south of the Priory, and 

 undoubtedly out of its materials. Avarice again has much contri- 

 buted to the overthrow of this stately pile, as long as the tenants 

 could make money of its 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 instance of this pro- 

 pensity 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 undermining 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 cot- 

 tages, 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 enterprise. As Dryden says upon another occasion 



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



Had the Priory been only levelled to the surface of the ground, 

 the discerning eye of an antiquary might have ascertained its 

 ichnography, and some judicious hand might have developed its 

 dimensions. But, besides other ravages, the very foundations have 

 been torn up for the repair of the highways ; so that the site of this 

 convent is now become a rough, rugged pasture-field, full of hillocks 

 and pits, choaked with nettles, and dwarf-elder, and trampled by 

 the feet of the ox and the heifer. 



As the tenant at the priory was lately digging among the 

 foundations, for materials to mend the highways, his labourers dis- 

 covered two large stones, with which the farmer was so pleased 

 that he ordered them to be taken out whole. One of these proved 

 to be a large Doric capital, worked in good taste ; and the other a 



