LONDON UNDER THE MONASTIC ORDERS.

A SKETCH.

BY MISS EDITH BRADLEY.

(Read February 17th, 1897.)

ONDON, like all great cities, has been the silent witness of many changes within and without its walls.

Few contrasts could well be more remarkable than that presented by London of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, and London of to-day. It is true that the configuration of the City is little altered, standing as it has always done on the north bank of the Thames, intersected by the same main thoroughfares; but a comparison of the two maps1 will show how great the difference is.

The black line traces the ancient City walls, which were entered by Ludgate and Newgate on the west, Aldersgate and Cripplegate on the south, Moorgate and Bishopsgate on the north, Aldgate and the Tower, with its postern, on the east. Within the walls, churches and monasteries met the eye in every direction; the City was literally permeated with the outward semblance of religious life; and even this area was too confined, for on the south side of the Thames stood the noble Augustine priory of St. Mary Overie, and the monastery of Bermondsey. On the west, beyond the Fleet river, stretched the Whitefriars or Carmelites, almost to the boundary of the Knights Templars. Another Augustine priory stood on the north of the wall, St. Bartholomew's, Smithfield, built on a great open waste by Rahere, minstrel or jester to King Henry I. Farther north still was the

1 The Plate here with and a modern map of London.

Carthusian priory of the Salutation, better known as the Charter House, having as close neighbour the priory of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, and the Benedictine nunnery of Clerkenwell, both founded by Jordan de Brisset, a wealthy Norman baron, at the beginning of the twelfth century.

Coming eastward, we find another celebrated nunnery of Franciscans, dedicated to St. Clare, and built for the Minoresses, 1293, by Edmund, Earl of Lancaster, brother to King Edward I, at the instigation of his wife, Blanche, Queen of Navarre, who brought the nuns to England. They became extremely popular amongst the citizens of London.

Close to the Tower arose the great Eastminster, or Abbey of St. Mary Graces, founded by Edward III, of which there will be more to say later.

St. Katherine's Hospital, founded by Stephen's queen, Matilda, was situated in that part now called Wapping; and, as it could boast of two subsequent queens as foundresses, viz., Elinor and Philippa, wives of the first and third Edwards, it became a very well-known religious house. Even Henry VIII and Queen Katherine were numbered among its patrons. It survived the Dissolution, but surrendered to Edward VI. In 1825 this venerable institution was destroyed for the construction of St. Katherine's Dock.

With this brief survey of the abbeys and priories outside the walls, I propose next to notice in detail those both within and without the City proper, arranging them in groups under the Order to which they belonged.

These are:-Benedictine, with its Cistercian secession; Carthusians; Augustinian Canons. Friars: Dominicans, black; Franciscans, gray; Carmelites, white.

Though Westminster was not included in London between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, no sketch of religious life would be complete without mention of this great Abbey, which was the dominating influence over all other metropolitan foundations. In its beauty, its wealth, its power, its associations with English sovereigns and English government, the sepulchre of our kings,

Westminster stands unrivalled in the hearts of Englishmen as the evidence of what Gothic architecture has produced from the eleventh to the nineteenth centuries. The story of its foundation is legendary, but it is attributed to Sebert, King of the East Saxons, in the seventh century. No doubt, however, exists about the work of Edward the Confessor; his abbey and church were dedicated to St. Peter on Holy Innocents' Day, 1066, with most gorgeous ceremonial, and placed under Benedictine rule. Thus this first and greatest of all the religious Orders found a home in England. The worthies it has produced since its foundation in 529 are thus enumerated by its annalists:-" Forty popes, two hundred cardinals, fifty patriarchs, one thousand six hundred archbishops, four thousand six hundred bishops, and three thousand six hundred canonical saints"; but, says Mrs. Jameson, "It is a more legitimate source of pride that by their Order were either laid or preserved the foundations of all the eminent schools of learning of modern Europe".

But to return to Westminster: very little of the Confessor's Abbey remains, because Henry III, as a mark of piety, pulled it nearly all down, in order to erect the magnificent structure which still remains to us, and which was finished at subsequent periods. It is a curious touch of irony that, in the fifteenth century, Henry VII should have destroyed the then existing Lady Chapel to build his own splendid mausoleum.

It is stated on authority that again Westminster Abbey narrowly escaped destruction by the Protestant vandal, Protector Somerset, in the reign of Edward VI, to furnish stone for his great palace in the Strand. He, however, obtained the necessary material by demolishing, instead, the Priory of St. John's, Clerkenwell.

The other Benedictine foundations in London were two nunneries, St. Helen's, Bishopsgate, and St. Mary's, Clerkenwell. The former is said to have been founded by Constantine the Great, and dedicated to his mother, the Empress Helena, but Stow claims the honour for one William Basing, a goldsmith, and Dean of St. Paul's, 1212. Crosby Square, originally part of the nunnery,