By the Rev. Canon Moherly. 125 



dwelling's or eells in the aisles, they were true houses of God : the 

 poor, the houseless, and the wanderer found a home there. . . . 

 The government was vested in a master; brethren aided by sisters 

 carried on the duties of nursing, prescribing', cooking, &c, while 

 the spiritual care of the hospital was entrusted to priest-chaplains." 



This quotation will be serviceable to us in more ways than one : 

 but now I ask attention to the last sentence only, which says that 

 (under a master) " brethren aided by sisters carried on the duties 

 of nursing, prescribing, cooking, &c," and that in a "hospital for 

 the sick and aged," where " the poor, the houseless, and the wanderer 

 found a home." The Domus Dei at Portsmouth was founded in 

 1212: and its objects were precisely similar to those which I suppose 

 were the objects of our St. Nicholas. 



Look, also, at St. Mary's, Chichester, which was referred to by 

 Archdeacon Wright. This was founded, says Dr. Swainson, its 

 late custos, about 1220 — 1240: grants to it were made te to the 

 House of St. Mary and the brethren and sisters serving God there, 

 for the purpose of sustaining the poor and infirm people lying in the 

 same house .... There was a marked difference between 

 f the brothers and sisters who served God in the hospital 3 and 

 'the poor and sick people who were lying there/ . . . The 

 hospital was intended to be a temporary home for the sick and 

 infirm : the brethren and sisters who dwelt within its walls were 

 intended to act as nurses. It was also intended to act as a refuge 

 for the night to the wandering poor — the easnah of the modem 

 day." 1 



Now the following are the descriptions of the inmates of St. 

 Nicholas, gathered from its deeds in the register. In 1227 they 

 are " poor and passengers or resorters to the same house." In 1245 

 they are " Christ's poor and weak and infirm [to be kept] as long 

 as their weakness does not suffer them to go out and wander." 

 About 1250 they are "the brethren whole and infirm of the said 

 hospital, there serving God." This points clearly to a distinction 

 between the brethren : some nursed, some were nursed. About 1340 



1 Swainson's "Hospital of St. Mary in Chichester" from Sussex Archaeo- 

 logical Society's Collections, toL xxiv. 



