By W. W. Ravenhill, Esq. 



53 



Attorney-General (1649). It is situated amongst pleasant grass 

 fields, in the valley of the Axe, which runs hard by. 



Prior to the purgation of King Henry VIII. it had been for some 

 400 j^ears a Cistercian Monastery, with an Abbot and twelve white- 

 f rocked monks. The story of its foundation is highly characteristic, 

 bathed in benevolence, and not uninteresting. The monastic 

 society of Brightley, near Okehampton, in Devon, a branch of 

 Waverley Abbey, Sussex, had been formed at the desire of Richard de 

 Brioniis, Lord of Devon, A.D. 1136. The brothers, men of piety 

 and apparently of sagacity, finding, after a five years' residence, at 

 that place that the Lord Richard's grant was too barren a spot for 

 duty, if not for existence, determined to return to the bosom of 

 their mother church. In solemn procession they marched out, 

 and passed through the land. By accident, or otherwise, their 

 road lay through the meadows of Ford, near to which the Lady 

 Adeliza, sister of their late patron, the Lord Richard, and in con- 

 sequence of his death, now Viscountess of Devon, had a residence. 

 Looking from her window, she chanced to see the holy men as 

 they retreated, slow of step, sad of countenance, with a cross up- 

 raised before them. She inquired who they were, and on hearing 

 their melancholy story, was moved with compassion. She bade 

 them stay, for that there in that valley she would build them a 

 house, such as her brother's and her own soul's desire would wish 

 them to dwell in. The pastures were green, the stream looked 

 rich, the lady was evidently in earnest, the monks remained ; and 

 in course of time, chapel cell and cloister rose for them, together 

 with a refectory and kitchen. 'Tis well to find the good fathers 

 were not dreamers or drones. It became an abbey of repute, and 

 many a scholar went forth thence — some to fame. On its roll of 

 distinguished men was the Archbishop Baldwin, who shared the 

 perils and the squabbles of King Richard's Crusade, and sealed a 

 fame for sanctity, with his life, at Tyre. In those early days of its 

 existence, when learning was dim, here were schooled the pious 

 Roger the Cistercian, the chronicler of the miracle-working Elizabeth 

 of Flanders, and men of letters, Maurice Somerset, sometime Abbot 

 of Wells, and John Devonius, Chaplain of King John. Fuller says 



