52 



Malmesbury Abbey in its Best Days. 



pearls and sapphires, to stand upon the altar and about the churches. 

 In all that long list, there is not one article that was used to set 

 forth domestic luxury, but the whole of them referred to the glorifi- 

 cation of Religion, To that list, and every page of it, King Henry 

 affixed his sign manual. This, methinks, might suggest a pretty 

 subject for an Artist ; viz., a crowned King of England at a desk like 

 a pawnbroker ticking off church valuables : and in the back-ground 

 the poor Abbot of Glastonbury hanging on a gallows at the top of 

 Tor Hill. 



Would that the King had taken half as much care about the 

 Libraries as he did about the Plate. Their fate was sad. The 

 dealers and land-jobbers who mostly bought the abbies were allowed 

 to take MSS. and all. To them such things were useless, excepting 

 only such volumes as Registers of Title Deeds, Chartularies and the 

 like, which were important to prove their right as the new owners. 

 For the rest they cared not. 1 



Fuller the Church Historian breaks out furiously on this subject. 

 "\ Alas/'' he says, " those abbeys were sold to such chapmen as it was 

 questionable whether their ignorance or avarice were greater : and 

 they made havoc and destruction of all. As brokers in Long-lane, 

 when they buy an old suit, buy the linings together with the outside, 

 so it was conceived meet, that such as purchased the building should, 

 in the same grant, have the libraries (the stuffing thereof) conveyed 

 unto them. And now these ignorant owners, so long as they might 

 keep a ledger-book or terrier, by a direction whereof to find such 



1 The monastic records that have come down to us, it must be confessed, 

 are generally of very dry composition : and contain little that is in any way, 

 enlivening or of interest to ordinary readers. The documents transcribed into 

 them are, for the most part, mere copies of title deeds, conveyances of land, grants 

 of privileges, &c, in short, matters of business concerning the rights and property 

 of the Religious House itself. Seldom is there any account of what may be 

 called the life of the monastery : no description of what passed, was said or done : 

 no anecdotes, biographical or social of the Brethren : nothing about visitors, 

 great ceremonials, eminent preachers : none of the current events or changes in 

 the Town or neighbourhood. Now and then we have a chronicle, touching very 

 briefly upon the contemporary events of national history : but generally speaking, j 

 a monastic register relates simply to the legal and pecuniary matters of the J 

 monastery itself. 



