By the Rev. J. E. Jackson. 



37 



been fetched all the way from a fine spring at Newnton, by under- 

 ground pipes. 



Dante says of a desecrated monastery in his own country : — 



" Rich were the returns 

 And fertile, which that cloister once was us'd 

 To render to those Heavens ; now, t'is fall'n 



Into an empty waste 



The walls for Abbey reared, turned into dens : 

 The cowls, to sacks choked up with musty meal." 



Paradise xxi. and xxii. 



The cloisters of Malmesbury were in like manner turned into an 

 empty waste, and the Abbey into dens for weavers' looms, 



The library was not quite dispersed in Leland's time, for he has 

 left us a list of some of the manuscripts ; chiefly, as might be 

 supposed, the works of old theologians and schoolmen. The rest 

 had probably been scattered. There was at the breaking up of the 

 monasteries a very unnecessary and barbarous destruction of many 

 things that were curious, and would now have been extremely 

 valuable. Particularly was this the case at Malmesbury. Volumes 

 beautifully illuminated were sold by weight at the Monastery gates, 

 as so much waste paper, and were used for all sorts of purposes, for 

 covering books, wrapping up goods, stopping ale barrels, scouring 

 guns, and the like. The glovers of Malmesbury in particular made 

 great havoc of them. Manuscripts of this sort are at this moment 

 fetching at sales in London £100 and £200 a piece. 



The tourist, who visited the town in 1634, saw some portions of 

 the Monastery still standing on the N. side of the church ; and 

 about 1650 John Aubrey mentions the remains of the kitchen, on 

 four strong freestone pillars, standing N.W. 



The house now called the Abbey House, standing N.E. of the 

 church, (excepting the lowest floor, which is much older,) was 

 built in Edward VI. or Elizabeth's time, after the Dissolution, 

 perhaps by Sir James Stumpe, (son of the purchaser of the Abbey,) 

 his arms and those of his wife, a Baynton, being on an arch over 

 a door. In one of the upper rooms is the shield of arms of the 

 Ivye family, of Hullavington and West Kington, who were after- 

 wards its owners. 



