ST. Michael's mount. 239. 



Borlase, wlio, like most of his contemporaries, always stated his 

 facts without worrying as to whether there was any evidence to 

 support them, in his description of the ruin of the Mount in 

 1720, says "I find the Nuns here as early as the E-eign of 

 Eichard the first," but, more suo, gives no reference to any 

 authority. I have no doubt he gets it from Prince, merely 

 improving on the story by omitting his author's words " most 

 likely." Not content with this, he proceeds to identify the very 

 cells they occupied, and the Chapel dedicated to St. Mary, and 

 set apart for their use. I hope that I am not unjust to the 

 memory of a great Cornishman like Dr. Borlase. He may- 

 be correct, and there may be an authority to support his 

 statements about the nuns ; but, if I am wrong, then it is the 

 Doctor's own fault. I only further say in my defence (and when 

 one differs from Dr. Borlase in Cornwall, one is expected to do it 

 with bated breath and whispering humbleness), that if there wm 

 a nunnery here it is certainly strange that it should have escaped 

 the notice of "William of Worcester, of Leland, and of Carew, 

 that Hals and Tonkin should know nothing of it, that the State 

 Papers and Episcopal Registers (at any rate as far as I can find) 

 avoid all mention of it, and that it should have been left for Dr. 

 Borlase and the credulous and erratic author of the "Ancient 

 Cathedral of Cornwall," not only to discover the nuns but to be 

 able to locate the rooms in which they slept and worshipped. 



As already stated, the Mount seems never to have had a 

 Prior after its suppression as an alien priory by Henry V. At 

 the time of the dissolution of monasteries by Henry VIII it was 

 let to farm, and in 1539 that monarch gave its revenues, 

 amounting to £110 12s. Id. to Humphry Arundell, who held 

 them and the office of Grovernor until 1547. But troublous times 

 were in store for him. King Edward VI (or rather his Council 

 in his name), were pushing the doctrine of the Eoyal supremacy 

 to an extreme, and every year saw some change in religious 

 matters, which the people were expected to accept at once. The 

 altered Prayer-book of 1549 (to be itself again altered by the 

 Book of 1552 — which, however, never received the sanction of 

 the Church) was ordered to be used in all churches. At once 

 discontent sprang up in all directions and not least in Cornwall 

 and Devon, where, tinder the leadership of Humphry Arundell, 



