A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE 



On promise of amendment before the minister of the parish of St. Paul, James was given 

 another chance. 



What his amendment hath been appears from what I have written. The children would cry, 

 run away and endure anything rather than come to him. . . . For his sake the schoole itself was in 

 hatred ; most of the towne determining not to send any thither as long as hee was usher. But as 

 soone as it was heard that hee was removed . . . there seemed to be a general ioy. I had thancices 

 publikely and privately . . . and the schoole began as it were immediately to become frequent which 

 before was desolate. 



Gardner then proceeded to point out that not a single Bedford minister had signed James' 

 testimonial, that Mr. Smyth had said he would remove him from his ' vicariage,' worth ;^30 a year, 

 if Gardner did not remove him from being usher, that James was a rich man and threatened to 

 undo Gardner with suits. 'As for the young man . , . receaved to succeed him, I find him 

 diligent, mild, tractable.' 



The corporation also wrote a letter of protest supporting Gardner. The warden accordingly 

 on 17 July wrote that the college letter 



intended prmcipallie the preservation of our own right, and next the relieving of Mr. James so far forth 

 as . . . hee had been wronged. Nowe wee see to our greife that your schoole and children have 

 had all the wrong ... for suffering of which without giving us anie manner of intimation of it, wee 

 have just cause to charge you with somewhat worse than unkindnesse. At hering such crueltie and . . . 

 retchelesse negligence 



the college pronoimced that James ' deserved a removall ' and allowed of it. So ended this episode. 

 Seven years after Gardner gave the warden notice that he was leaving at Michaelmas for the 

 vicarage of Godmanchester, * I know not whether any of the fellows will leave his hopes in the 

 college for so meane a place as I rashly did ; if not ' he recommended Mr. Gifl&rd. On 10 October 

 the warden answered 



It seems you have taken little in that place, which hath discouraged divers of our societie from so 

 much as the making of any triall of it, yet the bearer hereof Mr. William Varney, bredd first in 

 Thame Schoole, then childe of Wynchester coUedge, and ever since chaplaine of the Colledge, hath 

 taken the courage to adventure himselfe upon it and I hope not unadvisedlie. For what Free Schoole 

 is there in any sheire towne in the kingdome in which the Schoolemaster, if he be his art's master 

 thrives not in purse and credit. 



William Varney *' was no doubt one of the Buckinghamshire Verneys, successive generations of 

 whom were at Winchester, He was admitted 'child "" there in 1621. He took his B.A. degree 

 25 June, 1631, and M.A. 22 April, 1634. He became also rector of St. Peter's, Bedford. The 

 only thing we hear of him as master is his sending George, son of Thomas Reeve of Weston 

 Hertfordshire, to St. John's College, Cambridge, 20 April, 1640. Reeve was a boarder, and 

 probably due to the Wykehamical connexion, as the Reeves were a Wykehamical family. On 

 5 March, 1648-9, the Common Council, because 



Mr. William Vemey master of the Free Grammar School . . . and Mr. Robert Faldo " usher de facto " 

 of the same, have of a long tyme past neglected and still do neglect the dutie of their said place, 

 whereby the same schoole is in a manner quite desolate, parents and other guardians of children daily 

 withdrawing them thence . . . and the inhabitants of the said towne to theire great charge enforced to 

 send theire children to other schooles abroad, so that the mayne and chief intention of the Founder 

 (the ease and benefit of ye towne inhabitants) is frustrated, 



resolved to send letters of request to New College ' to take a course concerning the premisses and 

 remedie the said defects, four, an equal number of each bodie,' i.e. burgesses and freemen ' to go on the 

 said message at the charge of the corporacion.' The upshot of the visit to New College does not 

 appear. New College itself had but recently undergone purgation, seventeen contumacious fellows 

 who refused to submit to Parliament having been expelled on 7 July, 1648, and the warden on 



" In Mr. Kirby's Winchester Scholars he is concealed by an unfortunate misprint as Derney. The original 

 Register has ' Vemey.' 



" Child-scholar. The Warden's child and the Head master's child, &c., were terms in use as late as 1 86? 

 to mean the scholars nominated by the warden and other electors respectively, and used at election time to 

 receive a douceur of one or two guineas and other privileges, though after the introduction of competitive 

 examination in 1850 the terms had lost their old meaning. 



" The mayor's name was John Faldo. There were several of the name at Bedford during the seventeenth 

 century as in earlier times. 



" Not dejure, because not appointed by New College. 



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