236 
ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 
and liberality, discharged the whole debts of the prior and convent of 
Selborne, to the amount of one hundred and ten marks eleven shillings 
and sixpence ; * and, a few years before he died, he made a free gift of 
one hundred marks to the same priory : on which account the prior and 
convent voluntarily engaged for the celebration of two masses a day by 
two canons of the convent for ten years, for the bishop's welfare, if he 
should live so long ; and for his soul if he should die before the 
expiration of this term." f 
At this distance of time it seems matter of great wonder to us how 
these societies, so nobly endowed, and whose members were exempt 
by their very institution from every means of personal and family 
expense, could possibly run in debt without squandering their revenues 
in a manner incompatible with their function. 
Eeligious houses might sometimes be distressed in their revenues 
by fires among their buildings, or large dilapidations from storms, &c. ; 
but no such accident appears to have befallen the priory at Selborne. 
Those situate on public roads, or in great towns where there were 
shrines of saints, were liable to be intruded on by travellers, devotees, 
and pilgrims; and were subject to the importunity of the poor, who 
swarmed at their gates to partake of doles and broken victuals. Of 
these disadvantages some convents used to complain, and especially 
those at Canterbury ; but this priory, from its sequestered situation, 
could seldom be subject to either of these inconveniences, and therefore 
we must attribute its frequent debts and embarrassments, well endowed 
as it was, to the bad conduct of its members, and a general inattention 
to the interests of the institution. 
LETTEE XVL 
Beaufort was bishop of Winchester from 1405 to 1447 ; and yet, 
notwithstanding this long episcopate, only tom. i. of " Beaufort's 
Eegister " is to be found. This loss is much to be regretted, as it must 
unavoidably make a gap in the history of Selborne Priory, and perhaps 
in the list of its priors. 
In 1410 there was an election for a prior, and again in 1411. 
In vol. i., p. 24, of " Beaufort's Eegister," is the instrument of the 
election of John Wynchestre to be prior — the substance as follows : — 
Eichard Elstede, senior canon, signifies to the bishop that brother 
Thomas Weston, the late prior, died October 18th, 1410, and was 
buried November 11th. That the bishop's license to elect having been 
obtained he and the whole convent met in the chapter-house, on the 
same day about the hour of vespers, to consider of the election ; that 
brother John Wynchestre, then sub-prior, with the general consent, 
appointed the 12th of November, ad horam ejusdem diei capitularerrif 
for the business ; when they met in the chapter-house, 2^ost missam de 
* Yet in ten years time we find, by the "Notabilis Visitatio," that all th^eir 
relics, plate, vestments, title-deeds, &c., were in pawn, 
t Lowth's Life of Wykeham. 
