in Hertfordshire; nine in Cambridgeshire; seven in Northamptonshire, and the same number in Middlesex; five in Berkshire; three in Oxfordshire; two in Warwickshire, and three in Surrey: he was, moreover, made Constable of the Tower of London by the Conqueror. In fact, our Benefactor was in clover. So that altogether his bounty to Hurley, as a feudal lord, is much discounted, when we come to total up his newly-acquired possessions. We must gather from the Hurley Charter that Geoffrey had a sincere and lasting affection for the memory of his first wife Athelais ("matris filiorum meorum jam defunctæ "). *He buried her in cloisters at Westminster Abbey, and mentions his intention of being buried there himself. Leceline, his second wife, was evidently a lady of much piety and, as the Charter relates to us, it was at her instance that her husband's gifts to Hurley were made. His gifts were conscience money. I am obliged to those antiquarians who have been good enough to assist me and to offer criticisms in connection with the Charter and its translation, which I now print. It has been done into English with great care and research from the abbreviated Latin, and the endeavour to make a faithful translation has led to much interesting enquiry on all sides. If the edition which I offer for the Journal is not accurate, it is certainly not owing to want of criticism from those competent to offer it; and I have no doubt as to the correctness of the results as they now appear.

The original manuscript from which the translation of the Hurley Charter was made (from a transcript taken last February) is in the Muniment Tower of Westminster Abbey, and it is to the courtesy of the Dean that I am indebted for permission to transcribe it.

The Hurley Charter also appears in the Walden Cartulary, which was very clearly copied for Abbot Pentelow in A.D. 1387. It contains seven other Charters to do with Hurley. Dugdale used the Walden M.S. for his Monasticon (ed. 1682, vol. I., p. 363; ed. 1846, vol. III., p. 433) when he printed his edition of Geoffrey the elder's Charter (and very badly he has done it, too).

Some philological difficulties are said to exist in the text of the Charter, but they do not appear to me as very great when they come to be investigated thoroughly. In the Westminster original, for example, words occur reciting our founder's careful thought of a yearly dole for the Hurley Convent (from the Isle of Ely and

*See Cotton MS., Faustina III., 281 verso. [Grant to Eye] "Ego Geoffridus de Magnâ villâ pro animâ meâ et pro animâ Athelays conjugis meæ in Claustro Sancti Petri sepulto, qui etiam juxta eam sepeliendus sum, &c."

from the hamlet of Mose, in Essex) as follows, viz.: "His enim addidi adhuc in insulâ de Hely, unam piscariam quæ reddit unum millearium et dimidium siccarum anguillarum et unum presentum anguillarum quadraginta videlicet grossas anguillas, &c." To this reading it has been objected that whereas Dugdale has printed "sticarum anguillarum," and whereas the expression "stiche anguillarum" occurs frequently in Doomsday, this word ("sticarum ") is probably the correct rendering. A "stiche" of eels consisted of a lot of 25 (Halliwell's Dictionary). However, the Walden M.S. in the Harleian collection has "siccarum" plainly enough, so that Dugdale must have misread the word. If it be objected that "dried eels" are remarkable as articles for food, the answer is that undoubtedly the common eel and the lamprey are often kept dried or smoked for winter consumption even now-a-days. Block, in his Natural History of Fishes, speaks of smoked eels; and Couch, in his work on British Fishes, speaks of dried conger-eels prepared in France. In the transcript which I have secured from the Westminster Manuscript-and which has been most carefully executed and certified by Messrs. Hardy and Page, Record Agents-the words are unquestionably "siccarum anguillarum" and "siccorum allecium." But the words which have provoked more criticism than any others in our Foundation Charter, from a philological point of view, are those which immediately follow the "dried eels!" viz., "et unum presentum anguillarum quadraginta videlicet grossas anguillas." It is objected that the word "presentum" is nonsense, and that in the Walden M.S. no "et" occurs before "unum"; and moreover that in the last-named M.S. "valet " occurs instead of "videlicet"; and so it has been suggested—whereas Dugdale, as a fact, reads "pesentum " (although both the Walden and Westminster M.S.S. have "presentum "), he having only seen the Walden M.S. (without the "et," and with "valet" instead of "videlicet ")-that this historian imagined that the clause was nothing more than a "note," and that the word in the original might have been pesñt (?), and so connected it with pensa pensum (cf. the French "peser,"―or how the pondus becomes poids, and then drops) and so means a weight-equalling one hundredweight but varying as to pounds (ours being as high as 112 avoirdupois), but which perhaps may be found as low as 72, seldom the exact 100, &c., and 40 large eels-which would weigh probably (it is argued) 21⁄2 lbs. on the average-was to be the regulation-equivalent, i.e., "valet." However, for my own part, I have quite come to the conclusion that 66 et presentum videlicet " is the correct reading, and I can see no real difficulty at all in translat

as

ing the Westminster M.S. When one bears in mind the extraordinary Latin which appears in these old Charters, such as (e.g.) 66 we will warrant,"warantizabimus," for -or "in Parco meo "" the equivalent for "in my Park,"-it is easy to imagine a notary of the period resigning himself to "et presentum, &c." as a not unsuitable expression for "and a present, &c." These "40 eels, that is to say (videlicet), fat eels were no doubt kept in a fish stew as dainty bits for red-letter days-Foundation Day and the rest-in the Hurley Monastery. The definition of "presentum," as given by Ducange, is "præstationis species quæ muneris nomine." (Ducange's definition of "stiche," be it noted, is "certus numerus anguillarum Anglis estike," and he quotes the Hurley Charter; but he is wrong in giving this as an illustration, I am convinced). In the Cottonian Library is a Charter purporting to be by William the Conqueror himself, which confirms the charter of the elder Geoffrey to Hurley. This William the Conqueror Charter has "et presentem" in the eely passage, which is, of course, shocking nonsense.

:

A few words on the Church fabric and Monastery. The Monastic Square, now known as "Paradise," still exists on the north side of the Church; and, so far as the chief portion of its northern side is concerned, the old buildings are still in situ with traces of fresco in them. These constitute the Refectory, which, though turned into stables in later times, is substantially intact. Along the north wall of the Church the ends of sawn-off beams, flush with the old Saxon wall, which used to form the rafters of the roof of the corridor along which the Prior walked into S. Mary's through the grand old north door still existing (though now blocked up), carry us back to the days of old. Fragments of Norman work in chalk are still dug up from time to time around the Church and a really beautiful chalk Norman capital (with the dint of an old flint axe cut in it) is in the Vicarage hall, discovered probably when the Church was undergoing restoration in 1852. The extreme west end is of considerably later date than the Saxon portion of the Church; and it is interesting to notice in the fine old western doorway how the axe is superseded by the chisel in the execution of the archessome part of the work being done with one and some with the other. This doorway and the still more beautiful west window are carved out of fine Caen freestone. The southern door, in chalk is a beautiful piece of later Norman work, of the twelfth century. The rough north wall of indigenous chalk and flint has been, happily, left untouched by the restorer. Its rude masonry, with four

rounded Saxon windows let in at a considerable height from the ground, is clearly Saxon throughout the greater part of its length. The Western end is probably of a later (Norman) period. "We strenuously maintain," says a writer* in 1838, "that this part, at least, is older than that era (the Norman), and, though rude, as genuine a specimen of Saxon building as any existing Church hitherto so denominated,"-such, for example, as at Worth, Sussex, or at Bradford-on-Avon. The lead-covered cross now surmounting the bell turret is said to date from the time of Edward the Confessor, and probably stood originally in the centre of a burial yard. Appended is a translation of the original Westminster M.S. :

The Dedication and Endowment of S. Mary's Church and Foundation of the Benedictine Monastery at Hurley, Berks, in the Reign of William the Conqueror (A.D. 1066-1087).

A TRANSLATION OF THE ORIGINAL CHARTER IN THE CUSTODY OF THE DEAN AND CHAPTER OF WESTMINSTER.

ET the Faithful and Sons of the Catholic Holy Mother Church, now and hereafter, know-That I, Geoffrey of Mandeville, have granted, and of my bounty have given, to God and to S. Peter and to the Church of Westminster, as also to S. Mary of Hurley for the salvation and redemption of my own soul, and for that of my wife Leceline, at whose counsel by the Providence of Divine Grace I began this good work; and for the soul of Athalais my first wife and the mother, now deceased, of my children; as also for that of all my heirs and successors

The said Church of S. Mary of Hurley in Berkshire, together with the whole of the aforesaid vill of Hurley, and with all the surrounding wood appertaining to the said vill, without any share or portion being taken by any man, whether a resident in the said Parish or holding any property therein, except the land of Edric the bailiff, and except the lands of the ceorls at Little Waltham, which I have kept in my own hands for providing me with entertainment [when there].

* See Gentleman's Magazine, March, 1838, p. 262.

I have granted this, I say, and have given it in perpetuity to the said Church of Hurley together with all my demesne, free and without hindrance, whether in fields, or woods, meads, meadows, pastures, mills, waters, fisheries, fishing-rights, and with all their appurtenances,—that is to say-the Church of Waltham together with a hide and a half of land which belongs to it, and the soke of the chapel of Remenham.† And [I have granted it] together with all other things with tythes and property in live and dead stock without partition or division, together with all customs and liberties of old belonging thereto, as free and as clear of disturbance or exaction from all men as when my Lord the King gave and granted the same to me.

I have also, together with the above-named, given to the aforesaid Church, on the day on which I caused it to be Dedicated by Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury, in the presence of many other men and persons of great authority, the land of Edward of Watcombe as Endowment free and without hindrance, with all belonging to the

same.

On that day, moreover, the aforesaid venerable Bishop, of his Pontificial authority, with the assistance of the persons of high influence and dignity who were with him, confirmed all my grants which I made of my free will to the said holy place for the eternal salvation of my own soul and for that of all my heirs,—that is to say, in all the manors which at that time were in my demesne, the third part of the tythe of all my corn and two-thirds of the tythe of all the stock both live and dead in all my manors, without partition ; and the whole of the tythe of my pannages, in hogs and payments, without partition; and the whole tythe of cheese, without partition; and the whole tythe of flax and wool, without partition; and the whole tythe of fowls, horses, and calves; and of orchards and vineyards without partition; and the whole tythe of all my other goods from whatsoever the tythe ought rightly and justly to be given to God.

In addition forsooth [to the above] I have, in every manor of all my demesne, given to my aforesaid Church of Hurley one ceorl who shall hold eight acres of land, free and clear from all custom, and in my Park one hog-run with land for the swine-herd.

† Remenham is in Berkshire, next parish but one west of Hurley. A farm called Watcombe still exists at Fawley, Berks.