ANTiaUITIES OF SELBORNE. 
367 
ocreis seu botis/' according to the regular usage of their ancient 
order. 
Item 29th. He here again, but with less earnestness, forbids 
them foppish ornaments, and the afFectation of appearing like 
beaux with garments edged with costly furs, with fringed gloves, 
and silken girdles trimmed with gold and silver. It is remark- 
able that no punishment is annexed to this injunction. 
Item 31st. He here singly and severally forbids each canon 
not admitted to a cure of souls to administer extreme unction, or 
the sacrament, to clergy or laity ; or to perform the service of 
matrimony, till he has taken out the license of the parish priest. 
Item 3 2d. The bishop says in this item that he had observed 
and found, in his several visitations, that the sacramental plate 
and cloths of the altar, surplices, &c. were sometimes left in such 
an uncleanly and disgusting condition as to make the beholders 
shudder with horror; — "quod aliquibus sunt horrori;"* he there- 
fore enjoins them for the future to see that the plate, cloths, and 
vestments, be kept bright, clean, and in decent order: and, 
what must surprise the reader, adds— that he expects for the 
future that the sacrist should pro\dde for the sacrament good 
wine, pure and unadulterated; and not, as had often been the 
practice, that which was sour, and tending to decay , — he says 
further, that it seems quite preposterous to omit in sacred matters 
that attention to decent cleanliness, the neglect of which would 
disgrace a common convivial meeting.f 
Item 33d says that, though the relics of saints, the plate, 
holy vestments, and books of religious houses, are forbidden by 
canonical institutes to be pledged or lent out upon pawn ; yet, 
as the visitor finds this to be the case in his several visitations, 
he therefore strictly enjoins the prior forthwith to recal those 
pledges, and to restore them to the convent ; and orders that all 
the papers and title deeds thereto belonging should be safely 
deposited, and kept under three locks and keys. 
• <* Men abhorred the oflFerin^ of the Lord." 1 Sam. chap. ii. v. 17. Sfrrange ar this account 
may appear to modern delicacy, the aathor, when first in orders, twice met with similar circum- 
stances attending the sacramen- at two churches belonging to two obscure villages. In the first 
he found the inside of the chalice covered with birds' diiHg; and in the other the communion- 
cloth soiled with cabbage and the greasy drippings of a gammon of bacon. The good dame at the 
great farm-house, who was to furnish the cloth, being h notable woman, thought it best to s.^te 
her clean linen, and so sent a foul cloth that had covered her own table for two or three Sundays 
before. 
t " ne turpe toral, ne sordida mappa 
Corruget nares ; ne non et cantharus, et lanx 
Ostendat tibi te " 
