370 
ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 
— J ohn Wynchestre, senior, the sub-prior, in his own behalf and 
that of all the canons, and by their mandate, quasdam moni- 
cionem et protestacionem in scriptis redactas fecit, legit, et inter- 
posuit ''—that all persons disqualified, or not having right to be 
present, should immediately withdraw; and protesting against 
their voting, &c. — that then having read the constitution of the 
general council " Quia propter," and explained the modes of 
proceeding to election, they agreed unanimously to proceed " per 
viam seu formam simplicis compromissi when John Wyn- 
chestre, sub-prior, and all the others (the commissaries under- 
named excepted) named and chose brothers Richard Elstede, 
Thomas Halyborne, John Lemyngton the sacrist, John Stepe, 
chantor, and Richard Putworth, canons, to be commissaries, who 
were sworn each to nominate and elect a fit person to be prior : 
and empowered by letters patent under the common seal, to he 
in force only until the darkness of the night of the same day ; — 
that they, or the greater part of them, should elect for the whole 
convent, within the limited time, from their own number, or from 
the rest of the convent ; — that one of them should publish their 
consent in common before the clergy and people : — they then all 
promised to receive as prior the person these five canons should 
fix on. These commissaries seceded from the chapter-house [to 
the refectory of the Priory, and w^re shut in with master J ohn 
Penkester, bachelor of laws ; and John Couke and John Lynne, 
perpetual vicars of the parish churches of Newton and Selborne ; 
and with Sampson Maycock, a public notary ; where they treated 
of the election ; when they unanimously agreed on John Wyn- 
chestre, and appointed Thomas Halyborne, to choose him in 
common for all, and to publish the election, as customary ; and 
returned long before it was dark to the chapter-house, where 
Thomas Halyborne read publicly the instrument of election; 
when all the brothers, the new prior excepted, singing solemnly 
the hymn "Te Deum laudamus,'' fecerunt deportari novum 
electum, by some of the brothers, from the chapter-house to the 
high altar of the church ;* and the hymn being sung, dictisque 
versiculoet oratione consuetis in hac parte, Thomas Halyborne, 
mox tunc ibidem, before the clergy and people of both sexes 
solemnly pubhshed the election in vulgari. Then Richard El- 
stede, and the whole convent by their proctors and nuncios ap- 
* It seems here as if the canons used to chair their new-elected prior from the chapter-house 
to the high altar of their convent-church. In letter XXI., on the same occasion, it is said — " et 
sic canentes dictum electum ad majus altare ecclesie deduximus, ut apud nos moris est." 
