In the reign of Henry II. nine Benedictine, eight Cistercian, twenty-seven of Austin, three of Præmonstratensian Canons, one Carthusian, one Gilbertine, and three preceptories were built. The various friars, Dominican, Carmelite, and Austin, and other denominations appeared in England.

In the reign of Edward I. the Franciscans and some other orders came to this country. With the arrival of the friars came a fresh movement among the people. Popular, as Chaucer draws them, and keen politicians, they soon undermined the monastic system. The preaching friar exchanged the cloister for the open-air pulpit; his mendicant brother living upon alms threw discredit on the wealthy endowments of those who did not live constantly in the eyes of the people. The Franciscan became eminent as a scholastic lecturer at Oxford; and the Dominicans taught divinity in their churches and chapter-houses, and philosophy in the cloister. There is a beautiful description of their London house in Piers Plowman.' Four Cistercian houses, five of Austin, one of Gilbertine Canons, and one Cluniac only, were founded. The mendicant friars in 1256 numbered 1242 inmates of forty-nine houses. The alien priories were seized by the Crown in war time. Edward III. said that they did more harm to England than all the Jews and Saracens in the world. In the reign of Edward II. one Benedictine house and one of Austin Canons were founded; the preceptories of the Knights Templars were bestowed on the Hospitallers or Knights of St. John of Jerusalem.

In the reign of Edward III. four houses of Austin, one of Gilbertine Canons, one Cistercian, and two Carthusian were built. Four more Carthusian monasteries were built in the reign of Richard II., and one in that of Henry VI.

[9. Geographical Distribution; Choice of Sites.

The conventual settled on the spot assigned by founder or benefactor. 'Give these monks,' said Girald du Barri, ' a naked moor or a wild wood, then let a few years pass away, and you will find not only beautiful churches, but dwellings of men

built around them.' This is the true history of the roofless walls, ruined towers and ivied arches hidden and withdrawn by kindly Nature in her pitying mood among dense picturesque woods, in the midst of rich lawn and green pasture, by the side of the musical flow of winding rivers or the silvery spray of rushing streams. It is true that there are exceptional instances of migration, owing to natural dissatisfaction with a site; the neighbourhood of formidable enemies, an unhealthy climate, the clashing of church bells, or some calamity, occasionally induced the translation of a minster to some new place; but there is only one case on record where a Yorkshire monk insisted on the patron's surrender of his intended huntingground for a conventual domain. The lights of Whithy and Tynemouth on their wind-swept sea-cliffs pointed out to the seaman the perils of the deep and rock, showing to him afar off a harbour of safety. Among the fens, where the aguestricken people appeared to the first settlers as the imps and dwarfs and uncouth beings of an unfamiliar world, rose the bevy of some of the finest abbeys held by the Benedictines. Of these Ramsey and Croyland were only accessible by boats, or as the local proverb picturesquely explained the fact that no wheeled carriage was possible, every wain that came thither was shod with silver. In the 'terrible place called Thorney,' often flooded by the tides which Canute in after days rebuked, Mellitus built the West Minster while he erected the 'minster of St. Paul's.' At another Thorney, in Cambridgeshire, where the dull silent battle was fought between nature and cultivation till a paradise of orchards and vineyards overspread the marshes, the very servants stipulated to keep their holiday on festivals out of sight of the loneliness. King John bade Bishop de Roche found Halesowen where they could neither see nor be seen two miles off; unfortunately he caught sight of the abbey from Ramesley hill, and it forfeited his royal favour.

It must indeed have been a long bow, from which, according to the old tale, the stalwart archer from the keep of Old Sarum sped the shaft which fell on the Maryfield beside the

sparkling Avon, and determined where the first stone of Poore's new cathedral should be laid. Edward II. bestowed Beaumont palace on the Carmelites of Oxford in fulfilment of a vow made in the wars with Robert Bruce. The two founders of Roche gave the monks the choice of a site on either side of the river. The burial place of a holy servant of God, a grief, a rescue, or the scene of a crowning victory was frequently the recommendation which led to the foundation of a minster. Rievaulx, Bolton and Kirkham were erected near the scene of a parent's lifelong sorrow, being bereaved of a child; Bath Cathedral and Dieulacres Abbey, as the fulfilment of a dream of angels; in other situations the fervid devotee had seen forms of heavenly visitants gliding in light amid the gloom of the forest glade, just as afterwards he seemed to be present at services sung by no earthly voice. Many of the monasteries lay far away from the ordinary tracks, amid pathless woods, so that a fugitive monk of Rievaulx wandered from dawn round and among the deep woods all through the long day, until weary and footsore he found himself once more standing a humbled postulant before the gates, whilst the abbey-bell was ringing out its call to compline.

The choice of sites was sometimes made from love of identifying them with some spot in Holy Land, and it was said that eyes which had seen Durham had no need of a map of Mount Zion; the crusader chose Hulne from its resemblance to Mount Carmel; or raising up sacred memories, when the nuns of Gracedieu laid out their pleasaunce like the garden of Gethsemane, or the abbot of Burton called a waste high hill overlooking the abbey by the name of Mount Sinai; or the Cluniacs of Lewes raised a tall crucifix upon the round green hill of their Calvary. Battle was the memorial of worldly warfare and a crowning victory; St. Mary of Graces and Ford were erected in pursuance of a vow made in storms at sea.

The Cistercians made choice of no fat pastures or rich lowlands; they reared their lonely home in undrained valleys, unreclaimed wastes, and amid dense forests, full of unhealthy influences, in order that, as St. Bernard says, they might have the