CHAPTER XXIII.

THE CATHEDRAL.

In order to give a complete view of the position and work of the parochial clergy in town and country, it is necessary to indicate, however briefly, both their connection with the cathedral and their relations with the monasteries. In this chapter we attempt the former subject; the latter in a following chapter.

We must glance back at our history and recall the time when the cathedral was the mother church of the diocese, and the bishop and his clergy lived together as one family. Some of them remained always at head-quarters to keep up the Divine service with as full a choir as their circumstances permitted, and to carry on the schools, which formed so important a branch of their work of Christian civilization; while others were itinerating hither and thither through the diocese preaching the gospel to the people. Then, we remember, came the gradual organization of the parochial system, by which the great majority of the clergy were scattered over the diocese, each residing permanently in his own rectory-house, and ministering constantly to his own people.

The bishop, however, still retained a strong staff about him at the cathedral, for the honour of the Divine service and for general diocesan work; and the old tradition of an ascetic common life would naturally be maintained there, when it was no longer practicable in the scattered rectories. This staff would need organization. One man would be put in general command during the absences of the bishop on his visitations of the diocese; another would be in permanent charge of the schools; another would have special charge of the services; another would be the treasurer of the bishop’s common fund; and thus naturally arose the four dignities of all the old cathedrals--the dean, the chancellor, the precentor, and the treasurer. Chrodegang, Bishop of Metz, the great chancellor of Charles Martel, organized the clergy of his cathedral into a community, adapting the rule of St. Benedict (which was then being pressed upon all the monasteries) to the circumstances of a body of secular clergy. After the Norman Conquest some of our bishops attempted to introduce the same organization into England, at Exeter, and Wells, and, with some modifications, at York; but the innovation did not flourish here.

The development of a more settled constitution of our English cathedral bodies of secular canons took the course of giving the cathedral clergy a more independent corporate life. The first great step towards it was the division of the common property into two portions, one at the disposal of the bishop, the other the endowment of the chapter. The property allotted to the canons was then subdivided, estates being attached to the four great dignities; and, lastly, distinct endowments, called prebends, were assigned to the individual members of the general corporate body; still retaining a common dean and chapter fund divisible annually among the canons, or some of them. The concession to the chapter of the privilege of electing its own dean, completed the work, and made the dean and chapter an independent ecclesiastical corporation. The chapter thus definitely constituted soon acquired new rights and privileges. Already in the eighth century they had obtained the right of being the bishop’s council; then they gained the right, to the exclusion of the rest of the clergy, of electing the bishop; then, that of representing the bishop’s authority during a vacancy. Lastly, the dean, originally intended to represent the bishop during his absence, asserted his independence of the bishop as ruler of the chapter; and it cost Grostete, Bishop of Lincoln, a long and bitter contest to establish his right to “visit” the chapter of his cathedral, a contest in which he said that he was contending for the dropped rights of all the bishops of England.

We have been speaking of the cathedrals which were served by bodies of secular clergy. But some of the cathedral bodies had adopted the Benedictine rule, and were monasteries in which the bishop occupied in some respects, the place of abbot, but the prior was the actual ruler. These were Canterbury, Durham, Norwich, Rochester, Winchester, and Worcester, and the two post-Norman sees, one placed in the great Benedictine House of Ely, the other in the House of Austin Canons at Carlisle.

The bishops soon found it desirable to secure the services of one or more archdeacons to help them in maintaining an oversight of their scattered clergy; soon after the Conquest, the archdeacons had their courts of jurisdiction, in which most of the minor cases of ecclesiastical discipline were dealt with.

The practical oversight of the parochial clergy was maintained partly by synods, partly by visitations. The bishop held an annual synod, to which all the clergy of the diocese were bound to come in person or by proxy. The bishop also went the round of his diocese at intervals, usually of three years. He could not visit every parish, but the clergy met him at several convenient centres, with some of their chief parishioners, and the synodsmen gave in written replies to a set of questions--with which we have already dealt--which constituted a very searching--not to say inquisitorial--scrutiny into the life and conduct not only of the clergy, but of the laity also.

A Constitution of Archbishop Boniface, 1260, directed every bishop to have in his diocese one or two prisons for confining clerics flagitious in crime, or convicted by canonical censure, and “we decree that any cleric who shall be incorrigible in his wickedness and habituated to committing crime to such a degree that if he were a layman he would, according to the secular law, suffer the extreme penalty, such cleric shall be adjudged to perpetual imprisonment.”

The archdeacons held their visitations, making inquiry specially into the state of the fabrics and furniture of the churches and parsonage houses; the rural deans also played a minor part in extending this oversight into every corner of the land.

After this general introduction, it will best serve our purpose of giving a popular idea of the part which a cathedral took in the religious life of the clergy and people, to select an individual example, and treat it a little more in detail.

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When Remigius, anticipating the policy of the Council of London, transferred his see from Sidnacester (Stowe) to Lincoln, he found the king’s new castle already occupying the south-west quarter of the area within the Roman walls of the old Colonia; and purchased the south-east quarter for the site of his new cathedral; a wide open space only separated the castle-gate from the humbler gate of the cathedral close. The old inhabitants, reinforced by the new military and ecclesiastical populations, found the northern half of the city too strait for them, and a new walled town sprang up at the foot of the hill, and soon stretched out a long, narrow suburb southward, along the high-road, defended by parallel dykes. The situation was a fine one. The long tableland to the north here falls steeply to the level of the river Witham, and overlooks another long level stretching southward. From the north, the castle keep and the minster towers (when they were built) could be seen from every yard of the twelve miles of perfectly straight Roman road which ran northwards towards the Humber. Seen from the south, the view of the city was a glorious one. The new buildings of the castle and minster extended in a long line on the brow of the hill; an irregular line of steep street connected the old city with the new town at its feet; the river, enlarged and made navigable by the Romans, protected the approach from the south, and wound through low ground past the monastery of Bardney, and, in later days, the castle and collegiate church of Tatteshall, to the port of Boston at its embouchere. Durham only of English cathedrals occupies so advantageous a site, and, together with its palatine castle, presents as noble an architectural effect. The church grew century after century, after the manner of cathedrals. A portion of the west front of Remigius still remains surrounded by the later work of Alexander; St. Hugh of Avalon added the magnificent choir; Grostete added the central tower and the parts adjacent; and so at last the Church attained the magnificent proportions which still excite our admiration. The bishop’s palace was built on a levelled space of the hillside south of the cathedral; the ruins of the “early English” halls and towers founded by St. Hugh, finished by Hugh of Wells, and the chapel added by Alnwick, still remain; and the pleasant hanging gardens above and below the buildings. The cathedral close was inclosed[349] by a wall, and its entrances at the north-east, south-east, and west were defended by gates; the “exchequer gate” at the west had a gate-house with a large chamber in the upper story. The principal residentiary buildings of a monastery were grouped in a customary order round the cloister court; but the houses of the dignitaries of a cathedral were arranged as convenience suggested. The deanery[350] stands north, and the sub-deanery south of the church; on the east side of the close still remain two old stone houses with picturesque oriels, which were--and are--the official residences of the chancellor and the precentor; the chancery has a private chapel in it.

In the fourteenth century it became the custom, for their greater convenience and better discipline, to incorporate the[351] vicars choral, and to place them in a court of their own. The vicar’s court remains at Wells, Hereford, Chichester, and York. That at Wells, for fourteen priests, is a long inclosure with a row of seven small stone houses on each side, a chapel, with a library over it at the further end, and a hall over the entrance gate, from which there is a picturesque covered way over the public road into the north transept of the church, by which the vicars could go in comfort to their daily duties--like the pope’s covered way from the Vatican to the Castle of St. Angelo. There are only some remains of the vicar’s court at Lincoln, on the east side of the palace grounds, the old Roman wall dividing them. Every cathedral had a number of chantries, one of the very earliest was that to Bishop Hugh of Wells, in this cathedral. The Burghersh chantry, founded by Bartholomew Burghersh, had five priests, who, with the six choristers and their schoolmaster, formed a corporate body, and all lived together in the chantry-house, which still remains in very perfect condition on the south side of the close. Among the interesting features of Lincoln, the treasurer had charge of a dispensary, which contained his stock of medicines; walls of an apartment in the cathedral are still surrounded by the niches.[352]

The chapter-house of a cathedral, served by seculars, was a very important feature. In monasteries it was always quadrangular, but in secular cathedrals, for some unknown reason, it was always polygonal.[353] It had always a central pillar, from which the groining spread on all sides, like the leaves of a palm-tree; externally it was covered with a tall conical roof. Here the dean and chapter met for the transaction of their capitular affairs, and here the bishop held his synods.

The _camera communis_ (common room) of the canons intervened between the north transept and the chapter-house; over the vestibule was the office of the master of the works. Near by, north-east of the chapter-house, is a well, covered with a little stone octagonal building with conical roof. When we call to mind that there are wells within several cathedral churches--at York, in which King Edwin was baptized by Paulinus, at Winchester, and elsewhere--we are led to conjecture that the water of these wells may have been used for various ritual purposes.

The date of the incorporation of the Dean and Chapter of Lincoln is 1086, and the bishop gave it statutes which seem to have been derived from Rouen.[354] The historian, Henry of Huntingdon, gives a charming description of the members of the original chapter, who were personally known to him, for he was the son of one of them.[355]

“Ralph the Dean, a venerable priest. Rayner the Treasurer, full of religion, had prepared a tomb against the day of his death, and oft sate by it singing of psalms and praying long whiles, to use himself to his eternal home. Hugh the Chancellor, worthy of all memory, the mainstay and, as it were, the foundation of the Church. Osbert, Archdeacon of Bedford, afterward Chancellor, a man wholly sweet and loveable. William, a young Canon of great genius. Albin (my own tutor) and Albin’s brothers, most honourable men, my dearest friends, men of profoundest science, brightest purity, utter innocence, and yet by God’s inscrutable judgement they were smitten with leprosy; but death hath made them clean. Nicolas, Archdeacon of Cambridge, Huntingdon, and Hertford--none more beautiful in person, in character beautiful no less, ‘Stella Cleri,’ so styled in his Epitaph [Henry’s father]. Walter, prince of orators. Gislebert, elegant in prose, in verse, in dress. With many other honoured names with which I may not tax your patience.”[356]

One of the reasons which Bishop Alnwick gave for assigning large salaries to the holders of stalls was the way in which they “devote themselves to the public service, in self-imposed tasks over and above their daily expositions and constant toils and numerous burdens.”[357]

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With the help of the “Valor Ecclesiasticus” of Henry VIII., we are able to people the cathedral, and palace, and residentiary houses, and vicar’s court, and chantries, with the men who lived and served there at the time of the Reformation, and even to pry into their account-books and tell their several incomes, to the third part of a farthing.

The Right Rev. John Longland,[358] who was the bishop in those troublous times, lived in St. Hugh’s stately halls and towers on the sunny slope under the shelter of the minster; and to maintain his dignity, and household, and hospitalities, and various expenses, the annual value of “all the domains, manors, castles, parks, rectories, lands, tenements, and other temporal possessions,” of this see was £Mccclxxviij, viij, vq’, _i.e._ to say, £1378 8_s._ 5¼_d._; and “all the spiritualities of the said Lord John” amounted, one year with another, to Diiij{xx}iiij, viij, xjq’, _i.e._ £584 8_s._ 11¼_d._; making together an income of mdcccclxij, xvij, iiijob, or £1962 17_s._ 4½_d._, equivalent in our money to about £23,554 8_s._ 6_d._[359]

If the reader does not know what the “spiritualities” here mentioned are, he is not more ignorant than some great statesmen have been. For, on one occasion, the late Earl Russell asserted that the bishops received their spiritual authority from the Crown, on the ground that by one of the documents issued from a Crown office to a newly-elected bishop, restored the “spiritualities” as well as the “temporalities” to the new occupant of the see. The “Valor” tells us of what these spiritualities consisted: Portions and pensions from benefices, fees for procurations and synodals, institutions and inductions, faculties, probate of wills, and such-like. Temporalities, in short, are real property, and spiritualities are fees and perquisites.

The dean and chapter had, as a common fund, the profits of twenty appropriate rectories; and from these and other sources they derived an annual income; for part of which they were only trustees, and had to pay out of it for the maintenance of the choristers, and the stipends of various chantry priests and others; leaving a balance of £Dvj xiij iiij ob’q di q’, which means £506 13_s._ 4½_d._ ¼ and half ¼. This balance was divided among the six residentiary canons, making £83 11_s._ 1_d._ to each, with a remainder of ij ob’ di’q’, or 2½_d._ and half a farthing. The residentiary canons in question were the dignitaries, Mr. George Hennage, the Dean; James Mallet, the precentor; Christopher Massingberd, the chancellor; John Pryn, the sub-dean; and the others were, John Talbot[360] and Simon Green, _alias_ Foderby.

The dean and chapter were also trustees of a fabric fund derived from land and rents; out of which they had first to pay the stipends of several chantry priests, three and a chapel clerk serving the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and one each at the Welburn and Crosby Chantries; then they had to pay certain workmen constantly retained, a carpenter, “lathonius,”[361] plumber, glazier, smith, cleaner of brass vessels and candelabra, surveyor of the fabric, organist[362] at the mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and lastly the bailiff of lands and tenements. The balance after these payments was £575 7_s._ 2½_d._ ¼ and half ¼; and this balance was divided among the six residentiary canons aforesaid, giving £95 17_s._ 10½_d._ to each; it must be borne in mind that they were liable for occasional heavy expenditure on the repairs of fabric, which had to come out of their purses. Each dignity had its own special endowments; the separate estates of the deanery[363] produced an income of £196 10_s._ 8_d._; of the precentory £8 2_s._ 4_d._, of the chancery £54 1_s._ 5_d._, of the treasury £10 13_s._ 4_d._; of the sub-deanery £35 8_s._

Then, again, every dignitary held a prebend of more or less value, which shall be set forth presently in a general statement.

A little research reveals the fact that each of the dignitaries also held one or more parochial benefices; for example, Mr. George Hennage[364] was Master of the Collegiate Church of Tatteshall; he was also Rector of Gedney, Washingburghe, Howby, Benningworth, and Flyxburgh.

The precentor also held the Rectory of Longleddenham. The chancellor was also Vicar of Byker, Rector of Highkame, and Rector of Foletby. Mr. Pryn, the sub-dean, seems to have held nothing besides his dignity and his prebendal stall, except the Singing Schools (under the precentor). There were Prebendal Schools under the oversight of the prebendaries themselves, and others “which are maintained by local managers for the instruction of their parishioners in faith and letters.”

It may seem a little invidious, perhaps, to add these several sums together and bring out the totals; but it is a part of the work which we have undertaken, and we do not feel at liberty to decline it; it will, at least, remind us that we have in modern times made some economic changes in the administration of cathedral affairs; not altogether satisfactory ones, for, with the usual want of moderation in the minds of reformers, instead of judicious pruning, the cruel knife has left little beyond a bare stem.

To sum up, then--

Mr. George Hennage, the dean, had £196 10_s._ 8_d._ of his deanery; £83 11_s._ 1_d._ of the Dean and Chapter Fund; £95 17_s._ 10_d._ of the Fabric Fund; £42 7_s._ 4_d._ of his Prebend of Biggleswade;[365] £20 as Master of Tatteshall College;[366] £23 11_s._ as Rector of Gedney;[367] £27 3_s._ 4_d._ as Rector of Washingborough;[368] £22 8_s._ 5¼_d._ as Rector of Howby;[369] £23 8_s._ 6_d._ as Rector of Benningworth;[370] and £13 10_s._ as Rector of Flyxboro’;[371] making a total of £548 8_s._ 3_d._

Mr. James Mallett, the precentor, had only £8 2_s._ 4_d._ of his precentory; £83 11_s._ 1_d._ his share of the Dean and Chapter Fund; £95 17_s._ 10_d._ of the Fabric Fund; he was Prebendary of Empyngham,[372] which brought him £35 6_s._ 5_d._, and Rector of Longleddenham,[373] £29 12_s._ 8_d._ Total, £252 10_s._ 4_d._

Mr. Christopher Massingberd, the chancellor, had £54 1_s._ 5_d._ of his chancellorship; £83 11_s._ 1_d._ of the Dean and Chapter Fund; and £95 17_s._ 10_d._ of the Fabric Fund; as Vicar of Byker,[374] £15; as Rector of High Kame,[375] £19 16_s._ 2_d._; as Rector of Foletby,[376] £21 2_s._ 8_d._ Total, £289 9_s._ 2_d._

The treasurership, vacant at that moment, was worth £10 13_s._ 4_d._; with £83 11_s._ 1_d._ of the Dean and Chapter Fund, and £95 17_s._ 10_d._ of the Fabric Fund. Total, £190 2_s._ 3_d._

Mr. John Pryn, the sub-dean, had £35 8_s._ of his dignity; £83 11_s._ 1_d._ of the Dean and Chapter Fund; £95 17_s._ 10_d._ of the Fabric Fund; and of his Prebend of Keton,[377] £29 10_s._ 2_d._ Total, £244 7_s._ 1_d._

It must be borne in mind that these were great dignitaries of one of the greatest and wealthiest dioceses, and had to maintain a certain degree of state in their household and expenditure. Each dignitary had also to find at his own cost everything which belonged to his office; the precentor everything which belonged to Divine services, vestments, service books, etc. The chancellor had to maintain the divinity school of the cathedral--at one time a very famous one, the cathedral grammar school, and was responsible for all the schools in the city and county.

Should any reader have recognized among these dignitaries of Lincoln Cathedral the names of well-known families of the diocese, he must not be satisfied with a passing thought on the effect of family influence in the distribution of Church patronage, which may be true enough; he must add the reflection that in those times it was thought fitting not only to give the grandest architecture, the most costly material, and the best art to the material church, but also to dedicate the best blood of the people to its ministry; much as in old times the greatest and proudest nobles held domestic offices--dapifer and the like--at the court of the king, and no one who was not of gentle birth was thought worthy to attend him.

We shall entirely fail to understand the whole spirit and meaning of a mediæval cathedral if we have not fully grasped the idea that it was not intended to be merely a centre of busy diocesan work; the magnificent building and its sumptuous furniture, the numerous and complex organization of its staff of ministers richly endowed, were all directed to the honour and worship of Almighty God. It was the embodiment in this dispensation of the ideal of worship which God Himself sanctioned in the old dispensation, when His Temple at Jerusalem was “exceeding magnifical,”[378] and the high priest wore jewels of untold price on his mystic breastplate, and a whole tribe--a twelfth of the people--were set apart for the ministry, and the well-endowed priests came up in the turn of their twenty-four courses to the honour of officiating for a fortnight in a year before the Presence in the Holy of Holies.

There were fifty-two prebendaries, whose canopied oak stalls form the most striking feature of the choir of the cathedral. A prebend was sometimes a manor, more frequently a rectory, rarely a sum of money, which formed an endowment for a canon.[379] For the most part the prebendaries were supposed to reside upon their prebends, to maintain Divine service, and a school, and hospitality there. Every prebendary was required to maintain a vicar choral at the cathedral; he himself came into residence for one week in the year, and during that week took the principal position in the cathedral services. On his Sunday of duty he was expected to entertain nineteen of the under officers at dinner, and to receive others at different meals during the week. The dean was required about thirty times a year to give an “honorificus pastus” to all the choir and vicars, “to make life and work more pleasant to them.”[380] One fact is enough to show that the prebendaries of Lincoln were a very distinguished body of men:--of the fifty-two stalls, all but one--some of them more than once--has given a bishop to Lincoln, and from among them every English see has been filled, and many of them twice.

One of the statutory duties of the prebendaries is very little known, and is so curious and interesting as to deserve mention here, even though it requires a few words of preface to make the spirit of it quite intelligible. Among other remarkable designs which entered into pious minds in those mediæval communities was that of maintaining a ceaseless service of praise--_laus perennis_--or a daily recitation of the whole Psalter. The former was a conventual devotion, and was done in this way: there were always two priests before the altar, night and day, relieved at regular intervals, singing the Psalms. The latter was a cathedral devotion, where it was a rule that the dean and prebendaries as a body should say the whole Psalter every day to the glory of God. The same devotion was maintained at Salisbury, Wells, and St. Paul’s. The task was not a hard one, for the Psalter was divided among them; one prebend said the first, second, third, fourth Psalms, another the fifth, sixth, seventh, and so on; the 119th Psalm was divided between several of them; each made it a matter of conscience to say the Psalms allotted to him; and thus, from the time of Bishop St. Hugh, the prebendaries of Lincoln, wherever they were scattered, were brought together in spirit by this interesting observance, and said the whole Psalter daily to the glory of God. It will perhaps surprise some of our readers to learn that they keep up the observance to this day.[381]

We shall not trouble the reader with more than a few notes on the value of the fifty-two prebends. Some of them were very valuable, _e.g._ Leighton Manor, Leighton Buzzard, Cropredy, and Sutton, each brought in to their fortunate holders £40, but the majority were between £5 and £10. There are several noticeable ones--the Prebend Sexaginta Solidorum, and the Prebend Centum Solidorum, and the Prebend Decem Librarum, _i.e._ the prebends of Sixty Shillings, a Hundred Shillings, and Ten Pounds. The custos of St. Peter’s altar received for commons and wine[382] as a canon £20 a year.

Some of these prebends, as we have seen, were held by the dignitaries; some, as we shall presently see, by the archdeacons. Some of them afforded a comfortable maintenance alone. It is to be hoped that the holders of others--especially of one whose value is returned as “nihil”--had other benefices to help out their incomes. They were not by any means all given to priests in the diocese. A prebend was a very comfortable benefice, which might be held by anybody, and they were given to all sorts of people; _e.g._ two of them seem to have been held by the Dean and Precentor of Chichester.[383]

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To assist the bishop in the spiritual oversight of this vast diocese, which embraced 8 counties, and extended from the Humber to the Thames, the bishop had 8 archdeacons, whose incomes and the sources of them are reported in the “Valor.”[384]

The Archdeacon of Lincoln received for procurations, £171 17_s._ 10_d._, for synodals at Pentecost, £29 14_s._ 3_d._, and at Michaelmas, £16 14_s._ 3_d._, and pensions, £5 17_s._, making a total of £234 2_s._ 4_d._ But out of that he had to pay the Prebendary of Ten Pounds £10, and 50_s._ to the Prebendary of Carleton, to his Receiver-General £8 13_s._ 4_d._, and 58_s._ to the three vergers of the Cathedral, leaving him a net income from this source of £179 19_s._ Archdeacon Richard Pate was also Prebendary of Sutton and Buckingham, from which he received £110 3_s._ 6_d._; he was also Rector of Kybworth, which was worth £39 14_s._ 11_d._; so that his total income was £329 17_s._ 5_d._

The Archdeaconry of Stow was worth £24 2_s._ 8½_d._, and Archdeacon Darley does not appear to have held other preferment, at least in Lincoln Diocese.

The Archdeaconry of Huntingdon was worth £57 4_s._ 2_d._, and Archdeacon Knight was also Prebendary of Farundon, worth £30 11_s._ 2_d._

The Archdeaconry of Bedford was worth £57 2_s._ 3_d._, and Dr. Chamber the Archdeacon was Prebendary of Leighton Buzzard, worth £40, Rector of Leighton, worth £6 17_s._ 7¼_d._, and of Bowden Magna, worth £53 8_s._ 10½_d._

The Archdeaconry of Leicester was worth £80 12_s._ 4_d._ Dr. Foxe[385] was the archdeacon.

The Archdeaconry of Northampton was worth £107 7_s._ Gilbert Smith, the Archdeacon, was Prebendary of Leighton Bromeswold, worth £57 15_s._ 1_d._[386]

The Archdeaconry of Buckingham was worth £82 14_s._ 5_d._, and Richard Leighton the archdeacon seems to have had no other preferment in the Diocese of Lincoln.

The Archdeaconry of Oxford was worth £71 6_s._ Richard Coren, the archdeacon, held also the Prebendary of Welton Paynshall, worth £5 11_s._ 11_d._

There were--or should have been--twenty-five _Vicars Choral_, who were paid a stipend, each by his own Prebendary, of £2. The Corporate Body of Vicars also had property which yielded a net annual income of £145 11_s._ 2_d._, which divided between the twenty-five vicars gave to each £5 16_s._ 5_d._, “leaving a remainder of 9_d._ to be divided into twenty-five parts;” and fifteen of them had chantries assigned to them.

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At the time of the “Taxatio” there appears to have been only one chantry in the cathedral, for the soul of Bishop Hugh of Wells; by the time of the “Valor” the chantries had grown in number to thirty-six.

One vicar was cantarist of the Chantry of William Winchcome, which, after giving 20_s._ to the poor and other payments, was worth £6 5_s._ 4_d._ The same vicar received £2 for playing the organ at the Mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and also £1 6_s._ 8_d._ for playing at the Jesus Mass. Other vicars served the following chantries: of Hervey de Luda, worth 9_s._ 4_d._; of Simon Barton, 9_s._; of William Thornake, £4. 2_s._ 4_d._; of Henry Benyngworth, 8_s._ 8_d._; of Robert and John Lacy, 8_s._; of William Hemyngburge and others, 8_s._; of William FitzFulke, £4; of King Edward II., 12_s._, and the same clerk filled the office of succentor, for which he received from the precentor 50_s._, and 6_s._ 6_d._ for wines at the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and from the Chapter, 7_s._ 6_d._; for wines at the end of the year _p’pastu chori_, 18_s._ 9_d._; making £4 12_s._ 9_d._ The cantarist of Roger Benetson received £5 12_s._; of Walter Stanreth, £4; of Oliver Sutton, 8_s._; of Geoffrey Pollard and others, 9_s._ 4_d._; of Gilbert Umfraville, £4 6_s._ 8_d._, the same clerk occupied the office called Clerk of the Hospital, for which he received from the Prior and Convent of St. Katharine juxta Lincoln, 24_s._ 2_d._; and from the Chapter for a gown, 9_s._, and other sums amounting to £1 14_s._ 10_d._; of Hugh of Wells, after paying for 2 vicar chaplains, and to the vicars of the second form, and to the servants of the Church, and in alms at the obit of the founder, received £6, the same clerk filled the office of sacrist, for which he received from the Treasurer and in perquisites, £6 17_s._ 6_d._ The 6 clerks who said the daily mass at the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary received each 13_s._ 5_d._ There were 4 vacancies in the body of vicars choral, and the 4 shares were divided among the remaining 21 vicars.

Besides the chantries in the presentation of the dean and chapter, and divided by them among the vicars choral, there were other chantries, of which a separate account is given. Some of them with more than one chaplain. The chantry of Nicholas de Cantelupe had 2 cantarists, who received £19 10_s._ 2_d._ between them; that of Bishop Henry Lexington had 2 cantarists, each of whom received 8_s._ 8_d._; 14 other chantries were worth various sums, from 8_s._ 4_d._ to £13. The chantry of Bartholomew Burghersh had 5 chaplains, who received £7 9_s._ 0½¼_d._ each, it also maintained 6 poor boys and their master at a cost of £12 7_s._ 4_d._

The choristers had a special fund in the trusteeship of the dean and chapter, out of which were entirely maintained twelve boys and the master who instructed them in singing, playing the organ, and grammar, at an annual cost of £34 13_s._ 5½_d._

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To these ministers of the church must be added a number of officials of another kind, the bailiffs, receivers, and auditors of the various properties; the inferior servants of the church; the constable of the close; the porters of the gates of the close; the searchers of the church or night watch, who had a timber chamber in the choir transept; and the domestic servants of the residents.

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Let the reader, who has perhaps wandered through the empty cathedral to admire its wonderful proportions and beautiful architecture, and who has, while so doing, felt the moral chill of its emptiness, try to refurnish it with the shrines, chapels, and tombs, the loft for the nightly watchers of the shrine, the cell of the recluse priest, all inclosed within the vast ground plan and towering height of the main building, reminding us of the many mansions in the House of the Heavenly Father. Or let him place himself in imagination in the choir on the day on which the mediæval bishop was holding his synod. The stalls at the west end are occupied by the dean and the four dignitaries in their copes, who face eastward and overlook the whole assembly. The canopied stalls on the sides are filled by their prebendaries in surplice and furred cope; the vicars choral and the choristers are in their places in the subsellæ on each side; the long rows of benches in front of the stalls are filled by the clergy of the diocese, so many as can find room; the bishop in cope and mitre occupies his lofty canopied throne at the east end of the south line of stalls; the great nave beyond is crowded with the rest of the clergy and their synodsmen, and the citizens, and the people from the country round, attracted to the imposing spectacle. It is the whole people of a diocese stretching from the Humber to the Thames, which by representation has assembled in the mother church to listen to their bishop’s fatherly exhortations, and to join with him in a united service of worship of Almighty God.

Let us adjourn to the chapter-house, which seems so empty and so useless to the modern visitor. See it filled now, with the bishop on the stone throne opposite the entrance, and the dignitaries of the cathedral and the archdeacons seated to right and left of him, and the whole area crowded with the clergy and synodsmen; it is the people of his diocese--the clergy in person, the laity by their representatives--come to report themselves to their bishop, to submit themselves to his jurisdiction, to receive his admonitions and counsels. The House of Lords is a rather depressing spectacle to the visitor who gazes on its empty grandeur; but see it filled on some great day, _e.g._ when the Sovereign opens Parliament in person, and it is not too grand for the meeting-place of the Sovereign and Peers of Britain and for the transaction of the business of an Empire. In the chapter-house it was the spiritual business of the King of kings which was transacted--business which concerned the eternal interests of those present; so the grand and beautiful building, with its soaring central pillar and its overshadowing groining, was not too grand for the spiritual significance of the multitude which its walls encircled.

So the broad lawns which surround the building were not left only to enable the spectator to obtain a good view of the building. Their use was seen on St. Hugh’s Day, when the people of the town and villages came trooping in at every gate, with crosses and banners and painted wands, and needed space in which to arrange the long procession which wound slowly round the close and entered by the western door.

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The magnitude and importance of the dioceses differed greatly, and so did the emoluments of the bishops and of the cathedral establishments. We have given Lincoln as an example of the greater dioceses; we may take the Diocese of the South Saxons, with its See at Chichester, as an example of the smaller.

When the bishop-stool of the South Saxons was removed after the Norman Conquest from Selsey to Chichester, Earl Roger of Montgomery gave the south-west quarter of the city, including a portion of the old Roman walls which protected it, for a site for the cathedral. A nunnery with a church dedicated to St. Peter already existed on the site; the nuns were transferred elsewhere, and the church used as the germ of the cathedral church.[387] Bishop Stigand built a new church of timber, which was soon replaced. The able and energetic Bishop Ralph Luffa was the real founder of the present cathedral. His church was of the normal Norman plan, a cross church with a low central tower and two west towers, all of massive construction, plain almost to sternness. It was in the thirteenth century that, among other great additions to the church, the central tower was raised by the addition of another story; and not till the fifteenth century that the lofty and graceful spire was added which was the peculiar glory of Chichester.

The constitution of the cathedral was in the main the same as at Lincoln, the bishop, dean, precentor, chancellor, and treasurer, with twenty-eight prebendaries, twelve vicars choral, etc., and two archdeacons.

The information given us in the “Taxatio” of the finances of the diocese in 1291 is scanty:--

The temporalities[388] of the bishop were valued at £462 4_s._ 6¾_d._

The dean and chapter had estates, appropriate rectories, portions, pensions, etc., which brought in a clear income of £310 14_s._ 6½_d._

The dignities of the cathedral are given as follows:--

The deanery with a prebend, £53 6_s._ 8_d._

The chantry, £53 6_s._ 8_d._

The chancellor with the Rectory of Chiddingly, £53 6_s._ 8_d._

The treasurer, _per se_ £46 13_s._ 4_d._

Then came twenty-eight other prebends, ranging from £4 13_s._ 4_d._ to £40, making up the total income of the dignitaries and prebendaries to £706 13_s._ 4_d._

When we turn to the “Valor” (vol. i. p. 293), we find fuller details of the condition of things at the end of the fifteenth century. “The annual value of all and singular, the houses, castles, domains, manors, lands, and tenements, and other temporal possessions whatsoever, and also of the tithes, oblations, pensions, portions, and other spiritual profits whatsoever, of the Reverend Father in Christ, Robert, Bishop of Chichester,” amounted to spiritualities, £138 17_s._ 9_d._; temporalities,[389] £589 10_s._ 2_d._; or, after certain allowed deductions, to a clear total of £677 1_s._ 3_d._

The income of the dean and chapter has grown to £310 14_s._ 6½_d._; we have no note of the way in which it was disposed of.

The income of the dean, William Fleshmonger, was £58 9_s._ 4_d._ We have no reason to doubt that he was identical with the William Fleshmonger who was Rector of Selsey,[390] worth £11 3_s._ 4_d._; with the Dr. William Fleshmonger who was Rector of Storyngton,[391] £18; and with the William Fleshmonger who was Rector of Hertfield,[392] £7. No doubt it was the dean who was the tenant by indenture for a term of years from Battle Abbey, at a rent of £15 6_s._ 8_d._, of the Manor of Apultram[393] near Chichester, and in all probability he is identical with the William Fleshmonger who held the Prebend of Carlton cum Dalby[394] of the Church of Lincoln.

The Dignity of the Precentory had endowment to the amount of £35 0_s._ 5½_d._, and Charles William Horsey seems to have had no other preferment in Chichester Diocese. But among the Prebendaries of Lincoln there is also a William Horsey, Prebendary of Scamelsby,[395] who may very possibly have been identical with our Precentor.

The Dignity of Chancellor was endowed with a clear £27 7_s._, and we find that Mr. George Croft was also Prebendary of Middleton,[396] worth £2 3_s._ 4_d._ There was also a George Croft, Rector of Wynford,[397] £21 12_s._ 10_d._, in the diocese of Bath and Wells, who may have been our chancellor.

The treasurer, Hugho Rolfe, after paying two servants and other dues, had a clear £62 6_s._ 8_d._ from the dignity, and held besides the Prebend of Braklesham,[398] £11 17_s._ 3½_d._, and apparently the vicarage of Henfield,[399] £16 9_s._ 9½_d._

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The dignity of the Archdeaconry of Chichester was worth £38 3_s._ 4_d._, and the Archdeacon John Worthial also held the Prebend of Huve Town,[400] £10; he seems also to have held the benefice of Sutton, £15 0_s._ 6_d._;[401] but we hesitate to identify the venerable archdeacon with the William Worthiall who held the two Chantries of Eastangmering and Fyrring,[402] though no doubt his friends would often jestingly assure him that if he had half a dozen more sinecures he would still have been “worthy all.” The Archdeaconry of Lewes was worth £39 14_s._ 10_d._, and Archdeacon More was also Prebendary of Coleworth,[403] £18 13_s._ 4_d._, and is probably identical with the Edward More who was Vicar of Bexhill,[404] worth £23 10_s._ 2_d._ There were altogether thirty-one prebends ranging in value from £10 to £20; four of these were added by Bishop Sherborne a little before the Reformation, restricted to men of Winchester and New Colleges, who were required to serve in their own persons without deputies.

Residentiaries on first appointment to office were bound to attend every service without a single omission for a year, and in case of an omission to recommence their course.

There were twelve vicars choral who received £2 12_s._ 8_d._ each, and fourteen chantries which were served by the vicars choral, the profits of each ranging between £3 and £13. There were also eight choristers and four thuribulers.[405]

“Bishop Sherborne, just before the Reformation, having ruled magnificently, laid down his staff and mitre weary with the weight of ninety years and more, and left his statutes chained to his throne; begging the kindly thoughts of all sorts and conditions of men; with a bequest of crown soleil, and bread and good wine to be offered to the bishop at his ‘jocund coming’ on a visitation; ypocras and choice fruits for the crowned king and primate; wine to be drunk round the city cross for the young; ample doles for the aged; marriage portions out of the annual residue for poor girls; egg flip with milk and sugar, coloured with saffron, for the choristers; and a dinner to the chapter on his anniversary.”[406]

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There are some examples in England of that annexation of temporal rule to certain episcopal sees, of which the independent prince bishops of Germany are instances still more illustrious, and the Bishop of Rome the most remarkable. The _Bishops of Durham_ were the temporal rulers of the district of country between the Tees and the Tyne, and almost independent of the king; while the men of “the bishopric,” as it was called in a special sense, were the servants of St. Cuthbert, and subject to none but Cuthbert’s successor. This privilege arose from a gift of the district to St. Cuthbert and his successors by King Guthred in the year 883. The _Bishops of Winchester_ were anciently reputed to be Earls of Southampton, and possessed a certain temporal authority, the origin of which is not known to the writer. The _Bishop of Ely_ was in ancient times supreme in the Isle, which was, if not a county palatine, at least a royal franchise, with courts and exclusive jurisdiction of its own; of which traces remain in the existing arrangements, in that it has no Lord-Lieutenant, and is in every way distinct from the rest of the county in which it is situated. It is reasonable to suppose that the bishop (created in 1108) derived this authority as the successor of the abbots, who received it as the representatives of Queen Etheldreda, the founder, in continuance of privileges conferred on the queen when King Tondbert gave the Isle to her in dower.