Page:VCH Leicestershire 1.djvu/434

 A HISTORY OF LEICESTERSHIRE hood." Vicarages had to be regularly arranged at Aylestone, Leire, Whit- wick, Bottesford, and elsewhere, so that non-resident rectors might be com- pelled to make proper provision for the priests who really served their parishes. 48 Another practice which had to be kept in check was the farming of rectories, not infrequently to religious houses. Oliver Sutton seems to have been especially watchful and diligent in this respect.* 3 The work of this great bishop has been somewhat cast into the shade by the more striking personality of Grossetete, of whom he was a worthy successor ; quite as un- compromising in matters of principle, and quite as free from all self-interest, he knew no respect of persons where his duty was concerned, and his hand was heavy on all transgressors against the order of the church.** In his time an age of strong lights and shadows, as all who study it know well cases of violence done to clerks had become much too common ; * 5 it was the bishop's duty to make an example. It chanced that Thomas Bassett, lord of Welham, had roughly assaulted a clerk named Hugh Pepyn in his own parish church. The church itself had first to be ' reconciled,' after this act of sacrilege ; and it was appointed that on the following day the offender should appear at the introit of the mass, barefoot, bare-headed, ungirt, holding in each hand a lighted candle, under the great rood cross. There he should stand until the time of the oblation, when he was to offer the candles at the high altar. Hugh Pepyn, who had evidently not been blameless in the matter, was to do his penance also. He was suspended from his sacred functions for a time, and after the reading of the gospel at mass was to receive a stroke of the discipline in the sight of all men, on his uncovered shoulders. The whole scene must have been an impressive illustration of the Church's teaching on the subject of sacrilege. 46 It was in the time of Bishop Sutton that the Taxation of Pope Nicholas was compiled. In the case of many counties of England this is the first clear list of parish churches that can be obtained ; but in Leicestershire, as we have seen, there is an earlier and better record in existence. The Taxatio adds very little to the statistics already given. Eleven parish churches are alto- gether omitted," only three being named in the town of Leicester, which had " The first, Nicholas de Luvetot, was presented under the canonical age, and actually refused to be ordained, though the bishop urged him several times. He was deprived finally; but the second, Robert of St. Albans, who was also rector of Essendon, Herts, obtained a dispensation for his irregularities from Pope Nicholas IV, in consideration of his having taken the vow of a Crusader. Stocks and Bragg, Parish Rec. of Market Harborough, 21, 22, from the Memoranda of Bishop Sutton. * 2 See Rolls of Hugh of Wells. 13 The rector of Kirkby Mallory farmed his church to Leicester Abbey for five years on condition that the farm should be given up if the bishop disapproved, but neither party thought it necessary to find out the bishop's opinion till four years after the arrangement was made. Line. Epis. Reg. Memo. Sutton, ill. d. " See account of Dunstable Priory, V.C.H. Beds. i. late to ring the bells. Rec. of Son. ofLeic. i, 369. 415 Line. Epis. Reg. Memo. Sutton, iii. There is a case between the vicar of Melton Mowbray and hi* patron, the prior of Lewes, about this time (1294), which reads unpleasantly. The vicar complained that he had to serve four parochial chapels as well as his church, that he had not a sufficient share of the tithes, and that if a parishioner died leaving only one live beast, the rector claimed it. He finally resigned his claims, in consideration of being allowed to appoint his own holy-water clerk. Cal. of Anct. D. A. 7935. " Catthorpe (Thorp Thomas), Swinford, Dalby on the Wolds, Congerstone, and Withcote, besides the six Leicester churches, are found in the Matriculus but not in the Taxatio. The church of Weston, which in 1220 had neither parson nor patron, and was served three times a week by the monks of Merevale, was probably already abandoned in 1291. The church of Aldeby on Soar, of which we are told by Chary te that it was in the thirteenth century disused and pulled down, and Enderby made the parish church in its place, is not mentioned at all in the Matriculus. Nichols, Leic. iv, 159. 360
 * ' Compare a case of extraordinary lack of self-restraint in 1306 a vicar who killed his clerk for coming