212 ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 



1596, William Inkforbye, vicar. 



May 1606, Thomas Phippes, vicar. 

 ^ June 1031, Ealph Austine, vicar. 



July 1632, John Longworth. This unfortunate gentleman, living in 

 the time of Cromwell's usurpation, was deprived of his preferment for 

 many years, probably because he would not take the league and 

 covenant; for I observe that his father-in-law, the Reverend Jethro 

 Beal, rector of Faringdon, which is the next parish, enjoyed his benefice 

 during the whole of that unhappy period. Longworth, after he was 

 dispossessed, retired to a little tenement about one hundred and fifty 

 yards from the church, where he earned a small pittance .by the practice 

 of physic. During those dismal times it was not uncommon for the 

 deposed clergy to take up a medical character; as was the case in 

 particular, I know, with the Reverend Mr. Yalden, rector of Compton, 

 near Guildford, in the county of Surrey. Yicar Longworth used 

 frequently to mention to his sons, who told it to my relations, that, 

 the Sunday after his deprivation, his puritanical successor stepped into 

 the pulpit with no small petulance and exultation : and began his 

 sermon from Psalm xx. 8, " They are brought down and fallen ; but we 

 are risen and stand upright." This person lived to be restored in 1660, 

 and continued vicar for eighteen years ; but was so impoverished by 

 his misfortunes, that he left the vicarage-house and premises in a very 

 abject and dilapidated state. 



July 1678. Richard Byfield, who left eighty pounds by will, the 

 interest to be applied to apprentice out poor children ; but this money, 

 lent on private security, was in danger of being lost, and the bequest 

 remained in an unsettled state for near twenty years, till 1700 ; so that 

 little or no advantage was derived from it. About the year 1759 it 

 was again in the utmost danger by the failure of a borrower ; but, by 

 prudent management, has since been raised to one hundred pounds 

 stock in the three per cents reduced. The trustees are the vicar and 

 the renters or owners of Temple, Priory, Grange, Blackmore, and 

 Oakhanger-house, for the time being. This gentleman seemed inclined 

 to have put the vicarial premises in a comfortable state ; and began 

 by building a solid stone wall round the front court, and another in the 

 lower yard, between that and the neighbouring garden ; but was 

 interrupted by death from fulfilling his laudable intentions. 



April, 1680, Barnabas Long became vicar. 



June, 1681. This living was now in such low estimation in Magdalen 

 College that it descended to a junior fellow, Gilbert White, M. A. who 

 was instituted to it in the thirty-first year of his age. At his first 

 coming he ceiled the chancel, and also floored and wainscoted the 

 parlour and hall, which before were paved with stone, and had naked 

 walls ; he enlarged the kitchen and brewhouse, and dug a cellar and 

 well ; he also built a large new barn in the lower yard, removed the 

 hovels in the front court, which he laid out in walks and borders ; and 

 entirely planned the back garden, before a rude field with a stone-pit in 

 the midst of it. By his will he gave and bequeathed " the sum of forty 

 pounds to be laid out in the most necessary repairs of the church ; that 

 is, in strengthening and securing such parts as seem decaying and 



