By the Rev. Canon Molerly. 



133 



hear of any such ; but there must always have been the difference 

 between the two that the College de Vaux was founded to support 

 the older views in theology, which the Cathedral students may well 

 have thought reactionary and old-fashioned. 



In the foundation deed of the college in 1261 1 Bishop Giles says 

 that he founds, to the honour of Christ, the Virgin, and St. Nicholas, 

 a house for the use and property of scholars, to be called " the College 

 of the Valley Scholars of St. Nicholas," by consent of Robert the 

 dean and the chapter of Sarum, the master and brethren of the 

 hospital of St. Nicholas, in the meadow hard by the Cathedral, 

 and the highway in front of the said hospital, for the support 

 of a warden, two chaplains, and twenty poor, needy, well- 

 born, and teachable scholars, serving the Lord and St. Nicholas 

 in that place, and living therein and studying and making progress 

 in the Holy Scriptures and the liberal arts. He ordains that on 

 the cession or decease of Sir John Holtby, Canon of Salisbury, now 

 warden of the house, the new warden should be elected by the dean 

 and chapter, out of the number of the canons, or at least with their 

 consent, and should have full right of correction within the circuit 

 of the said house. The deed was sealed with the seal of the dean 

 and chapter, and with that of the master and brethren of St. 

 Nicholas; and witnessed by the chancellor, the archdeacon of Wilts, 

 the sub-dean, and two canons ; Reginald Wych, the Mayor of 

 Salisbury, besides many other laymen. 



This introduces us at once to a large question, on which we get 

 singularly little light from either side, namely, what were the 

 relations subsisting between the hospital of St Nicholas and the 

 Valley College? 



St. Nicholas' hospital was by this time a rich institution. Land 

 had been literally showered upon it : and if it be true that Bingham 

 had ever built to the full extent of his apparent design, it was a 

 spacious as well as a rich foundation. At this very time we hear 

 in one of the deeds 2 of a " street in new Salisbury called St. 



1 This deed is not in the cartulary : but Hatcher and Benson give it from the 

 Liber Evidentiarum in the Cathedral. 



2 Reg. Sarum, 12. 



