SCHOOLS 



the one to syng in Houghton, and the other to syng in a chapell at Sewell in the said paryshe of 

 Houghton, and to kepe yerely % obites for the sayd William, and also to pay yerely to a prest to teche 

 6 of the poore men's children of Houghton aforesaid, and the sayd prest to haue for his syngyng in 

 the said Churche of Houghton, [fi a yere ouer and besydes 26/. %d. for the teachyng of the sayd 6 

 poore children, vnto the end and terme of 99 yeres. And if the said feoffees could obtayn the 

 Kynges letters patentes of lycence to mortmayn the sayd landes and tenementes, that then to contynue 

 for euer ; if not, that then within six or seuen yere of the end of the sayd 99 yeres the sayd feoffees 

 to make sale of the said landes and tenementes, and the money therof comyng, to be bestowed as her- 

 after is declared ; that is to say, the third parte therof to be bestowed by the churchwardens of 

 Houghton aforsayd and by the said FeofFes, vppon Ornamentes most necessary for the sayd churche 

 of Houghton and reparacyons of the same. One other parte to be bestowed by the said Wardens and 

 Feoffees vpon mendyng of a certen high way called Pynder's Hill, and of poore folke and poore May- 

 dens' marriages wythin the sayd parishe of Houghton, And the other parte to be delyuered to the 

 Abbesse and Generall confessors of Syon, as in the sayd last wyll remaynyng at large doth apere. 



Also John Couper is incumbent there, of the age of 40 yeres, but meanely lerned, and teacheth 

 six poore children, and hath for his stipend 26/. %d. as is aforesayd. 



A third certificate^ finds the lands to be worth net £^\'i \\s. 8^^., and that John Couper 'of 

 the age of 50 yeres ' is • lerned ' and ' hath no other lyving but for teaching of 6 pore children . . • 

 26i. %d. and his stipend of the sayd chauntry which is by yere ;^6.' It adds 'continuatur schola 

 with the wages of 0> quousque.' 



Accordingly, a warrant by Sir Walter Mildmay and Robert Kelway, 20 July, 1548, to the 

 auditor and receiver of the revenues of the court of Augmentations in Bedfordshire, finding that ' A 

 grammar scole hath been contynnuallie kept in Howghton with the revenues of landes and tene- 

 mentes geven and appoynted to the fyndyng of a chauntrie priest there and that the scole master 

 there hath had for his wages yerelie £b^ directed that * The saide grammar scole in Houghton afore- 

 saide shall contynue and that John Cowper, scolemaster there, shall have and enjoye the rome of 

 scholemaster there and shall have for his wages yerelie ^^6,' and the receiver and auditor were 

 required to pay the same accordingly. 



The Ministers' Accounts,' however, show that instead of continuing the payments as wages of 

 the schoolmaster, qua schoolmaster, and so continuing the school as directed by the warrant, the 

 payment was put under the head of pensions, and was treated like the ordinary pensions of chantry 

 priests whose chantries were abolished, and the amount paid was not as directed by the warrant, £^(3 

 a year as master, but the whole sum of £j bs. ^d. was paid ' in annual pension to the late incum- 

 bent of the chantry of Houghton Regis and schoolmaster there to the same assigned by warrant of 

 Walter Myldmay, Knight, for the continuance of the allowance of the same pension until it shall have 

 been otherwise decreed by the Council of the Court.' 



The result was that the pension was duly paid down to 2-3 Philip and Mary, 1555, and after 

 that year ceased altogether. It is possible that Cowper died, though it may be that the payment 

 was simply stopped, as most of the other payments to schoolmasters were, on the fusion of the Court 

 of Augmentations with the Court of Exchequer under Mary. But in other cases, when such orders 

 were made for the continuance of schools, and the payment was made under the heading of annui- 

 ties to schoolmasters, &c., it was continued to the recipient's successor in ofSce, and if stopped on 

 the abolition of the Court of Augmentations, was revived by decree of the Exchequer Court, some- 

 times under Mary herself, more generally under Elizabeth. In this case the finding was no doubt 

 unduly favourable to the school, as the actual school stipend was only £^1 6s. 8d., and the rest was 

 chantry stipend. But the eiFect of going back on the warrant was that Houghton School ceased to 

 exist in 1555, after a short life of forty years, and was never revived. A later foundation at Hough- 

 ton Regis by Thomas Whitehead, a native of the place, head master of Repton School in 1621, 

 seems to have been elementary only. 



At Tempsford,^" as the result of an arbitration in a dispute about lands given for a chantry, it 

 was settled 20 June, 1 5 1 7, that the chantry-priest should be appointed by the heirs of Thomas 

 Bulle and the churchwardens, and should keep a free grammar school, taking nothing for his 

 teaching. This school ceased on the dissolution of chantries, the school not being part of the 

 original foundation of the chantry. 



From 1555 there was only one, or perhaps two, other secondary schools in Bedfordshire 

 besides that of Bedford, and these disappeared or were degraded, so that, after the Reformation, the 

 school supply was worse than it had been in the twelfth century ; a startling result, truly, of the 

 action of the Tudor sovereigns, with their loud professions of zeal for education and their reputation 

 as school founders. 



" Leach, Eng/. Schools at the Reformation, 21 from Chant. Cert. 2, fol. 3. 

 » Land Rev. Rec. Accts. (P.R.O.), bdle. 96, 2-3 Edw. VI, m. 61. 

 '" Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. viii, App. 262. 



151 



