ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



and persons hearing mass were subjected to fine and imprisonment. 

 Further penalties were laid upon those who neglected to attend the 

 church service. The necessity for this oppressive legislation was ascribed 

 to the efforts that were being made at that time to withdraw English 

 subjects from their natural allegiance to the Queen. From this date the 

 conflict between England and Rome became acute. The local authori- 

 ties were on the alert for the presence of strangers ; domiciliary visits 

 were made to the houses of persons suspected of harbouring seminarists ; 

 the boundaries of the diocese of Carlisle were watched and notes taken 

 of the personal appearance of suspicious characters who passed in or out ; 

 the clergy and justices of the peace were obliged to inform the bishop 1 

 or the lord warden of what was taking place in the country ; the eyes 

 of Walsingham's spies looked into every corner of the two counties. 

 Lord Scrope could report in February 1583-4, that privy search had 

 been made in all suspected places for writings and letters touching 'the 

 present state of religion.' Andrew Hilton, ' a wicked piller of papistrie,' 

 was in the sheriffs close ward ; so was Lancelot Bost, brother of the 

 notorious seminarist ; and Richard Kirkbride of Ellerton was also safe 

 under good bond. A few days later, in answer to letters from the privy 

 council, Lord Scrope and the Bishop of Carlisle stated that they had 

 failed to apprehend Richard Cliburne and ' one Mouneforde a seminarie 

 Scottes preist,' though diligent search had been made throughout the 

 two counties by Humfrey Musgrave, Thomas Hamonde, chancellor of 

 the diocese of Carlisle, Richard Dudley and Henry Leighe. Damning 

 evidence against Hilton as the associate of Bost and a retailer of news 

 from Scotland to foreign intriguers was transmitted ; Richard Kirkbride 

 of Ellerton, brother-in-law of Cliburne, had been apprehended, but they 

 had admitted him to bail as he was an honest conformable man, and 

 although he was a brother of Percival Kirkbride, 'a verie notable papiste,' 

 yet the said Richard was one of the jury that indicted his said brother 

 for not coming to church. Lancelot Bost had also been taken into 

 custody at his mother's house, and by the letters found there it appeared 

 that he was the associate of his brother, the seminarist, who had recently 

 paid him a visit, and of other seminarists like William Hart lately 

 executed at York for high treason. 3 So far nonconformity had made but 

 little progress in the diocese of Carlisle, its chief stronghold being in 

 Westmorland among the kinsfolk of John Bost. 



From the letters and papers taken on the persons of Hilton and 

 Lancelot Bost some knowledge is obtained of the tactics of the seminarists 

 in their attempts to promote discontent against the established religion. 

 Bost the priest was very shy of appearing often in his native district, but 

 he had intermediaries through whom his books and writings were dis- 

 tributed among the faithful. The chief scene of his labours was in 

 Yorkshire, where he ' ridd with a cloth bag behinde him, apparelled in a 

 cloake of rattes color, a white frise jerkin laide with blewe lace, and in a 

 paire of buffe lether hose.' 3 For the thirteen years of his mission he 



1 S.P. Dom. Eliz. cclxxviii. 7. " S.P. Dom. Eliz. Add. xxviii. 57, 58. Ibid, xxviii. 58 (i). 



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