founder of Magdalen college already occupied a post not consistent with the duties of a remote vicarage, and on which, as on its basis, the fabric of his future fortune was about to be raised.

Bishop Waynflete has been likewise mentioned as a memberf or canons of the church of Wells from the year 1433; and the register then supplies a William Waynflete presbyter, presented by Theobald Gorges", knight, to the church of Wroxhale. But this was a different person, as Wroxhale was given in 1436 to one of the canons on his death. Moreover, Master William Waynflete was presented to Cheddesey in Somersetshire, by a duchess of Suffolk', in 1469; and it has been remarked as not so clear, how he came to hold that living after his advancement to the prelacy. But this person soon resigned, and was plainly not the bishop, whose style was no longer Master W. W.;

Godwin ad fin. Joh. de Whethamstede, p. 689.

8 H. Wharton Anglia S. vol. i. p. 318. An. 1433.

h 17th May, 1433, is the date of the first institution; 18th November, 1436, of the second.

i Registr. Stafford, presented June 2d.

* Sepulchral Mon

C

nor

nor does it appear that bishop Waynflete was ever preferred in that diocese.

SECT. III. THE bishop of Winchester was now Henry Beaufort, uncle and some time preceptor of king Henry VI., who had been translated from Lincoln to this see on the vacancy made in 1404 by bishop Wykeham'. From him Waynflete received the only ecclesiastical preferment he ever enjoyed, or that has been hitherto discovered with certainty, excepting Skendleby, if he was indeed vicar there, and his bishopric.

Upon the hill about a mile east of the city of Winchester were lately to be seen the ruins of an hospital dedicated to the blessed Mary Magdalen, the patroness of lepers, and of the numerous buildings in England once appropriated, as this was principally, to their reception. By whom it was erected and endowed is not known, but it subsisted before the time of king Edward I. It was designed for one priest, who was master or governor, and for nine poor men and women, called the brethren and sisters, " to remain there

1

Anglia S. vol.i. p. 318. Budden, p. 59.

"and

"and continue for ever to pray for the souls "of the founders, and all chrysten souls m It had a chapel, with a chantry. One of the masters, who held a prebend in the cathedral, is mentioned as living in the hospital ". It was valued, in the 26th of Hen. VIII., at forty-two pounds sixteen shillings the whole, and at sixteen pounds sixteen shillings and two pence the clear produce. The stipend annexed to the mastership and chantry consisted of four of the larger portions in the hospital, which we have been recently told P would amount at that æra to nine pounds twelve shillings, that is at least to one hundred pounds now.

m Hist. and Antiq. of Winton, vol. ii. p. 164, 167, 171. Tanner Notit. Mon. p. 168.

n Registr. Stratford, p. 13.

Bishop Beaufort collated to it in 1409. In the instrument in his Register it is called "Domus eleemosynaria sive Hospitalis "S. M. Magd. et Cantaria in eodem.' "Custodiam sive regi"men hospitalis, et cantariam in eodem, cum quatuor de porcio"nibus majoribus in hospitali predicto, committimus."

P Hist. of Winton, vol. ii. p. 171. Bishop Fleetwood (Chronicon Pretiosum) has proved 40s. in the reign of Henry VI. to have been equal to 12 in that of queen Anne. The value of money has continued to fall since his time. It has been calculated that what was equivalent to 12 then, was about sixty years after he wrote become equivalent to £20; and this proportion must be now increased. See Blackstone Comment.

A freehold of forty shillings a-year would furnish with proper industry all the necessaries of life, 8 Hen. VI.

It happens that only one volume of bishop Beaufort's Register, comprising the first eight years of his presidency over this diocese, is extant at Winchester; so that we are unable to fix the time when the mastership and chantry of St. Mary Magdalen were conferred on Waynflete; but it appears, from other evidence, that he was in possession in 1438. He continued, it seems, to hold it until his own advancement to that see; for he collated to it soon after (Feb. 12, 1447), and gave the new warden, when he had taken an oath to observe the statutes, canonical institution at his palace of Southwarks.

It has been surmised, and not without probability, that Waynflete was led to adopt Mary Magdalen as his patron saint in consequence of his preferment; and that the name of his future hall and now flourishing college at Oxford was the produce of his connexion with this her humble hospital near Winchestert.

q It commences in 1405. At the end is written, in a contem"Prima pars. iida cum Dão Rege."

porary

hand,

r Hist. and Antiq. of Winton, vol. ii. p. 177, 178.

t Hist, and Antiq. of Winton, vol. ii. p. 178.

SECT. IV. AMONG the early and principal friends of Waynflete is reckoned Thomas Bekyngton, Bekenton, or De Bekinton. He was of Wallingford in Berkshire"; had been educated at Winchester while Wykeham was living, and proceeded to his college in Oxford in 1403, the year before he died, and there became doctor of laws. When his knowledge of Waynflete commenced, whether at the university, or not until after his settlement at Winchester, we are ignorant; nor have I been able to trace with certainty any particular instance of his patronage. It was, however, "by "the means and assistance of this most be"neficent prelate that he, springing up like a flourishing scyon from the root of so great

66

66

a foundation as Wykeham's, increased as "it were into a mighty cedar, and, as a tree planted by the water-side, brought forth "fruit in abundance ".'

66

u

وو

Dr. Thomas Chaundler, from whom we

Registr. Coll. Winton. He was only fellow, not warden. A. Wood.

w" Quamobrem ex tantæ fundationis pullulans radice, florescens quasi virgula, ope et adjutorio Thomæ Beckingtonii, beneficentis"simi domini, et Vellensis ecclesiæ præsulis lectissimi, ferme in ce"drum crevit magnam, quasique lignum plantatum secus decursus aquarum, uberrimos fructus protulit."

Chaundeler, Chaundler, or Chawndeler, in V. Wykeham, p. 119.

have