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    330 FACTS AND SCRAPS.

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  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    The Boke Of Seynt Albons.

    that it did as good service to the heathen Uter Pendragon its stanching his wounds , as to these holy sisters in softening their

    crust . However , be that as it may , the fame of these recluses soon penetrated the walls of St . Albans' monastery , and Geoffrey , the

    sixteenth abbot , built them a residence and received them into the order of St . Benedict . He assigned the rent of some lands for their

    maintenance , and , moreover , directed that they should conform to certain rules and observances : their number -was to be limited to thirteen ,

    presided over by a prioress . The convent was surrounded by a gardenpart of which was devoted to a burial-place , the whole

    en-, closed by a high wall ; and affixed on every gate and door was the impress of the seal of St . Albans . But few relics now remain

    of the edifice—some shapeless lumps of crumbled walls alone mark the site—certain underground passages , locally termed Monks *

    Holes , but pronounced by antiquarians to be nothing more nor less than drains made by the Komans , proved to be such hy the

    peculiarity of their construction and the materials employed . Though the early chroniclers , Bale and Holinshed , both celebrate

    the learning of the Prioress of Sopwell , we can glean but little more respecting her than what has been stated . She is universally

    spoken of as descended from the noble family of Berners , and her birth is assigned to the early part of the fifteenth century . She

    was still alive in the year 1460 , and a tradition , resting upon somewhat apocryphal testimony , affirms that Queen Margaret spent

    the night before the eventful battle of St . Albans in Sopwell Priory . The Lady Berners is also celebrated for her great beauty . The

    book on which her fame depends consists of three tracts or treatises , the subject being" HuntingHawkingand Heraldry ; " part is written

    in prose , part in , verse . D , oubts are , entertained as to whether her writings are original or a compilation from the French : that she

    was well versed in the subjects on which she wrote is shown by the century estimation or in so which after her her death book . was ( C The regarded Gentleman by our ' s forefathers Recreation , for " as a

    it was sometimes termed , was the oracle known and consulted by all who would fly a hawkhunt a stagor dabble in the mysteries

    , , of fields , tinctures , and armorial bearings . Whether the prioress lived to see her book printed is uncertain ; most probably not ; and

    that before the wondrous art of multiplying letters was introduced into St . Albans' monastery , her narrow grave added yet another

    mound As to to the the convent date of ' s the burial first -ground edition . of this daintbookit is

    y , generally supposed that printing was first practised in St . _Albaiis _' monasteryabout the 1480 under the prior ate of William

    Willingford , ; that a monk year first exercised , the art ; and learned bookworms have given him the name of John Insomuch , for the

    whimsical reason that the prologue to the St . Albans' Chronicle , of 1483 , commences with the words "In so myche ! " Of the edition of

    1486 believed to be the earliestbut two or three copies exist ,. , ,

    330 Facts And Scraps.

    330 FACTS AND SCRAPS .

• Citation
  • English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Jan. 1, 1862, page 330, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01011862/page/42/