taking rest for six days and nights, and tiring out three horses in twenty-four hours. His efforts were successful; and a safe conduct was procured from the barons to enable sixteen of the principal men of Holderness to meet them at Beverley, where satisfactory terms of pacification were agreed upon. The whole country of Holderness, as our chronicler justly reflects, was for ever held under obligation to the house of Meaux for its conduct on this occasion."

There is nothing of moment to which to direct our attention during the rule of the tenth and eleventh abbots (1269-1280), save that at one period in the latter's term of office, the sheep pertaining to the abbey are estimated at 11,000, and the cattle at 1,000. Richard of Barton, the twelfth abbot, held office for six years. His tenure of office is only remarkable for the introduction of a mischievous plan of raising money by heavy fines on the grant of fee-farms at a very low rental. Abbot Richard let the manor of Skyrne for a term of fifteen years, and the grange of Wassand for seven years.

Roger of Driffield, the thirteenth ruler, 1286-1310, brought much more spirit into his administration. In 1292, Edward I. entered into negotiation with the abbey for the exchange of their lands which lay on the Hull for an equivalent, in order to form magazine at a port convenient for embarkation to Scotland. The process of the exchange is given with much tedious detail by the chronicler; as an after result, when they pleaded the insufficiency of the exchange effected, the monks obtained from the king the advowsons of Easington, Kayingham, and Skipsea, and eventually procured the appropriation of these benefices.

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An importantly endowed chantry in Ottringham was, at the king's suggestion, assigned to Meaux. endowment consisted of large estates, chiefly in Ottringham. It was to be served by seven monks

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devation would be mated and much additional craits secured to the monastery. Ther therefore procured authority im the accet of Meaux to allow access to the areix of betà men and women of honest character. with the cautious proviso that the latter were not to enter the cicister, or dormitory, or other offices. The chronicler thinks, however, that the admission of females proved itself an evil, and a cause of loss to the monastery; for many came

without feeling of devotion, that is to say, without making any offering, but merely to look over the church, and put the convent to expense in entertaining them."

Hugh died in the terrible Black Death of 1349. Its ravages among the monks of Meaux are a further confirmation of the truth of the old chroniclers, that in many parts of the kingdom two-thirds of the population succumbed to its fury. The abbot and five of his monks all died on August 12th. Seventeen other monks and six of the converts died during the same month. In all, out of a total of fifty monks and converts within the monastic precincts, only ten survived. It is needless to state that this awful visitation, which carried off the abbot, prior, cellarer, bursar, and other of the old officials, paralysed the finances of the monastery, which became further involved through the sudden death of so large a number of their tenants. According to the chronicle, warning of the coming scourge had been given by an earthquake shock. On the Friday before Passion Sunday, on March 27th, when the choir of Meaux were at vespers, and chanting the verse deposuit potentes in the gospel hymn, the sudden earthquake flung the monks with violence from their stalls prostrate on the ground.

To this impoverished and disordered condition of things, William Dringhoe (one of the ten surviving monks) succeeded as fifteenth abbot, 1349-1353. He obtained some temporary relief by obtaining from Thomas Fishlake, a burgess of Kingston-upon-Hull, a sum of £60, in exchange for the grant of a liberal corrody to him and his servant for the term of his life, and for the ordination of a daily mass for the souls of himself and his brother. Two other corrodies he sold for £50. Far more questionable were his engagements pledging the revenues of the abbey, in both wool and corn, for some years in exchange for ready money.

from Meaux, and was established at a place to which it gave the name of Monkgarth, in Ottringham Forest. The rules for the chantry monks, drawn up by abbot Roger, are pious, elaborate, and stringent, especially as to a devout attention to all the offices. They are warned against wandering about in pairs, or keeping idle company. Punishments for quarrelling are specially named, and they are strictly prohibited from entering a tavern, or being present at any public show. The chantry was opened on the vigil of St. Lawrence, 1293, but after thirty-one years experience, the chantry of six monks was transferred to the chapel without the gates of the monastery, and one secular chaplain maintained at Ottringham.

During Roger's rule, the abbey obtained the advowson of Nafferton from Sir Henry Percy, in exchange for the manor of Pocklington, which they had held for six years. Shortly afterwards, the archbishop sanctioned the appropriation of the living, coupled with the ordination of a vicarage, and annual payments out of the tithes to the college of Beverley and to the abbey of Whitby.

The well-known taxation of Pope Nicholas took place under this abbot, with the result that the temporalities of the monastery were valued at £380 5s.

On the resignation of abbot Roger, Adam of Skyrne succeeded as fourteenth abbot. The removal of the monks from the chantry at Ottringham, owing to scandals, was accomplished in his time by licence of the Archbishop of York. His rule was marked by occasional litigation, including an unsuccessful effort to prevent the foundation of a chapel in Wandsforth, within their parish of Nafferton. He materially reduced the debt.

I have now to mention two incidents connected with the abbey whilst under the government of Adam de Skyrne, which I recently copied from the Close Rolls, and which are not mentioned (strange to say)

When

by the official chronicler of the monks. Edward II. was proceeding north to Scotland, with Gaveston, in the summer of 1310, the abbot of Meaux (together with other leading ecclesiastics) received a letter, dated June 25th, requesting an aid for the king by way of loan, with victuals, for his Scotch expedition. The demand was for definite quantities of wheat, barley, beans and pease, and oats, together with beeves and sheep, to be delivered to the sheriff of York on the Gule of August.* The king undertook to be bound to him in the price of these victuals to be repaid to the abbot at the ensuing Candlemas.

In the year 1312, which was fatal to Gaveston, the king and his favourite were much in Yorkshire, and on one occasion they made a brief sojourn at the abbey of Meaux. On June 26th, when the court was at York, the king made an order on Edmund de Mauley, keeper of the manor of Brustwick, to deliver twenty quarters of wheat out of the issues of the manor, to the abbot of Meaux, for the twenty quarters that the king caused to be taken from him when at the abbey, for the expenses of his household.

The next abbot, Hugh of Leven, held office for ten years, 1339-1349. It was a time of great anxiety for the monks. The terribly destructive innundations of the sea and the Humber resulted in the submerging of their property at Saltagh, Tharlesthorpe, Frysmerk, Wythfleet, Dymelton, and Ravenserodd, valued at £250 a year. The size and importance of the town of Ravenserodd, where the monks had half an acre covered with decent buildings, may be judged from the fact that the township contributed £50 to the rectory of the mother church of Easington. A great

part of it was swept away in Hugh's days. Το counterbalance their loss of income from this source, abbot Hugh obtained, after much trouble and

* Lammas Day, or August 1st.