THE MONKS OF MARMOUTIER, 
BY THE 
Rev. J. SOLLOWAY, B.D., 
Rector of Holy Trinity , York; Secretary of the Yorkshire 
Architectural and York Archecological Society. 
TN this utilitarian age it is difficult to realise the life that 
was lived in England in mediaeval times ; and in a city 
like York, where such radical changes have taken place 
in consequence of men’s views on religious questions and also 
because of the advent of steam power as applied to locomotion, 
it is impossible to imagine what the York of the olden davs 
was like. There have, of course, been several Yorks : there 
was the York that the Romans found, the Eboracum that they 
created, the wondrous ecclesiastical city of the middle ages, 
and the modern mixed city, such a wonderful conglomeration 
of ancient mutilated fragments and modern innovations. 
The York of mediaeval times is particularly difficult to 
realise, especially from an ecclesiastical standpoint. There was 
such an array of Churches and Religious Houses as, I believe, 
was not to be found in any other city in the kingdom, London 
alone excepted. There was the glorious Minster, the magnifi¬ 
cent Abbey in whose grounds we are now assembled, with its 
Church that must have run the Minster very close for loveli¬ 
ness ; and, counting all kinds of religious houses,—Abbeys, 
E 
