the servants who lived in the house, as well as for those who lived outside, and for the strangers who not unfrequently stayed as guests at the monastery." It is pleasant to note that in all their arrangements, both of kitchen, cellar, and treasury, there was a desire to live sensibly and soberly, neither despising the good things of this life nor yet abusing them; and in all these were the care and refinement suitable to those who list of the live-stock belonging to the sisterhood. (See p. 50.) THE OLD STABLES AT SION HOUSE. did not cease to be English ladies when they The duties of the cellaress, however, would appear not to have been limited to the cellar of the house. She acted as purveyor-general, and not only bought and purveyed very many of the stores necessary for her fifty-nine sisters, but sold much of the produce of the estate. In the แ accompte" of Dame Agnes Merett, cellaress in the year before the Dissolution, occur entries of "calve - skynnes" and "felles solde," besides "woode "-which seems to have fetched a good price. This account, which may still be seen in the Public Record Office, is interesting as giving a "cover-lettes," sack-cloth, "cord," and "candill rushes." The general superintendence of the sisters was in the hands of the prioress and four assistants, called "serchers," who are ordered to "have a good eye about" the house, and to see that order and silence are kept. The sisters of Syon, like those of most other religious orders, used to administer the discipline, not only to offenders against the rules of the house, but to, each other at stated times, for their spiritual good. "Such exercises of those who live a cloistered life," remarks Mr. Blunt, "must not be criticised too closely by those whose life moves in a less narrow circle." "The arrangement of the sisters' meals was that of a high table and side tables, such as were then and long after common in the halls of bishops and great houses in the country, and such as may still be observed in colleges and public schools and inns of court. They were waited on by lay-sisters, or servitors, and there was a care and refinement about the arrangement of meals, such as befitted those who had not ceased to be ladies when they became nuns." The viands consisted of soups or "potages," sundry "metes, of flesche and of fysche, one fresche, another powdred boyled, or rosted, or otherwise dyghte after her discrecion, and after the day, tyme and nede requyreth, as the market and purse wyll stretche." Their drink was on some days water, on others ale, and the dinner was garnished with "two maner of froytes (fruits) at leste, yf it may be, that is to say, apples, peres, or nuttes, plummes, chiryes, benes, peson, or any such other." Some few trifling luxuries were allowed to those in weak health; and the Rules of the Saviour and of St. Austin were read aloud during meals by one of the sisters who acted as legister. It was the practice of the house-though its inmates were women—to keep silence, except at specified times, in every part of it. A munificent endowment was provided for the monastery of Sion, the king, its founder, granting for its sustentation a thousand marks out of the revenues of the Exchequer, until other revenues should be provided; and at the dissolution the income of Sion amounted to the then considerable sum of £1,731 per annum. the house and its immediate domain were retained as the property of the sovereign. The subsequent history of the sisterhood is touching and sad. They retired at first to a Bridgetine convent at Dermond, in Flanders. For two short years, at the end of Queen Mary's reign, they returned to their ancient home; but on the accession of Elizabeth, their sufferings recommenced. They again had to fly for refuge abroad, and found again a home with their Flemish sisters. After many changes of residence, and after undergoing great poverty, they were at last established in a new Sion, on the banks of the Tagus, at Lisbon, in the year 1594. Here they still remain after the lapse of nearly three centuries, restricting their membership entirely to English sisters, and still retaining the keys of their old home in the hope, never yet abandoned by them, of eventually returning to it. It is said that some half century or more ago, when they were visited at Lisbon by the then Duke of Northumberland, they told his Grace the story of having carried their keys with them through all their changes of fortune and abode, and that they were still in hopes of seeing their English home again. "But," quietly remarked his Grace, “the locks have been altered since those keys were in use." A full account of the wanderings of the sisters from Flanders to Rouen, and from thence to Lisbon, and their subsequent history, will be found in Aungier's "History and Antiquities of Isleworth." It may be said, however, that though several ineffectual attempts have been made to revive the life of the Bridgetines in England—as at Peckham, in Surrey; at Newcastle, in Staffordshire; and at Spettisbury, in Dorsetshire -the "Sion" of Lisbon remains the real and legitimate representation of the "Sion" of Isleworth. The nuns reckoned among their most remarkable treasures the original Martyrologium of Sion; the Deed of Restoration, signed by Queen Mary in 1557, and endorsed by Cardinal Pole; some curious seals and a silver bell; and a manuscript account of their wanderings in Flanders and Portugal. Thomas Stanley, the second Earl of Derby, was buried within its precincts in 1521, a few years before its dissolution, which happened in 1532. Sion was one of the first of the larger monasteries that was suppressed, the convent having been accused of harbouring the king's enemies, and of being in collusion with Elizabeth Barton, the "Holy Maid of Kent." Henry VIII., indeed, is said to have selected this convent as an object of especial vengeance, as it was accused of affording an asylum to his "enemies." It was through the confessor of the convent at Sion that the monks of the Charterhouse in London were led No general view and but very few details of the to subscribe to the supremacy of Henry VIII., original monastic buildings of "Sion" have been many of them having for a time refused to sub-handed down to us; nor has its successor-the scribe to the King's supremacy. Be this as it immediate predecessor of the present Sion House may, however, one of the monks of Sion, and fared much better. That it was a large and also the Vicar of Isleworth, suffered at Tyburn along with Houghton, the prior of the Charterhouse. After the dissolution the lands of the Sion sisterhood were sold or granted away by the Crown, but imposing structure there can be no doubt, considering the date of its erection. A doorway, of the Perpendicular period, highly ornamented, figures on the title-page of Aungier's work above quoted. The old stables, probably as old as the early Tudors, were mostly taken down about 1790. There is a view of them in Aungier's book (p. 136); where will be also seen a map of the domain. 51 From the following extract from a letter of Thomas Bedyll, one of the "visitors" of the monasteries at the time of the dissolution, to Secretary Cromwell, under date of July 28th, 1534, it will be seen how the nuns of Sion were forced to acknowledge the king's supremacy. Bedyll writes:-"I have also been at Syon sith your departing with my lord of London, where we have found the lady abbas and susters as conformable in everything as myght be devised. And as towching the father confessor and father Cursone (whiche be the saddest men ther and best learned), they shewed thaimselfes like honest men ; and I think the confessor wol now on Sonday next in his sermon make due mension of the kinges title of supreme hed, acording as he is commaunded. What towardnes or intowardnes we have seen in som other of the brethern there, I wol informe you at youre retorne to Londone, and omitte it now bicause I have som hope that by the wisdome of the father confessor and father Cursone the residue shal shortly be brought to good conformite. And if not, there be two of the brethern must be weded out, whiche be somewhat sediciose, and have labored busily to infect thair felowes with obstinacy against the kinges said title.” The convent was probably renowned not only for its buildings, but for its furniture and fittings, and even for the vestments of its priests. In 1861 there was exhibited, under the auspices of the Archæological Institute, a magnificent cope from Sion, probably of the second half of the thirteenth century, which had been carried abroad by the sisters at the dissolution, and was presented by their successors to the Earl of Shrewsbury, who had given them a home in Staffordshire. It is described as " quite a storied vestment." On the higher part of the back is the Assumption and Crowning of the Virgin Mary; beneath is the Crucifixion; lower down is the Archangel Michael overcoming the dragon; high up on the right are the death of the Virgin, the doubting of St. Thomas, St. James the Less holding a club, another apostle with book and spear, St. Paul, St. James the Greater, the burial of the Virgin Mary, St. Mary Magdalen and our Lord, St. Philip, St. Bartholomew, St. Andrew, ten cherubim winged, and figures of religious persons holding scrolls. The hood, which was hung by three loops, is lost; the Later on, under date of 17th December, Bedyll orphreys are two broad bands, bearing shields thus writes to Cromwell, touching a visitation to charged with the armorial bearings of several noble Sion :-" As for the brethern, they stand stif in English houses; and the whole is surrounded by thair obstinacy as you left thaim. Here wer on a narrower rim or fringe of shields, of somewhat Tuesday Doctor Buttes and the quenys amner later date than the rest. The dimensions of the to convert Wytford and Litell; and on Wensday cope are ten feet by four feet eight inches. The here wer Doctor Aldrigge, Doctour Curven, Doctor heraldic portions, about sixty in number, are pro- Bawghe, and Doctor Morgan, sent by the kinges bably woven, but the figures are all worked by the grace for that purpose, but they nothing proficted. ncedle. I handled Whitford after that in the garden, bothe with faire wordes and with foule, and shewed him that throughe his obstinacy he shuld be brought to the greate shame of the world for his irreligious life, and for his using of badd wordes to diverse ladys at the tymes of thair confession, whereby (I seyed) he myght be the occasion that shrift shalbe layed downe throughe England. But he hath a brasyn forehed, whiche shameth at nothing. One Mathew, a lay brother, upon hope of liberte, is reformed. We wolde fanye know your advise what we shal do with Whitford and Litell, and a lay brother, one Turnyngton, whiche is very sturdy against the kinges title. We have sequesterd Whitford and Litell from hering of the ladys confessions, and we think it best that the place wher thes frires have been wont to hire uttward confessions of al commers at certen tymes of the yere be walled up, and that use to be fordoen for ever, ffor that hering of utward confessions hath Another article of great value exhibited was a Mariola, or wax image of the Virgin Mary with the Saviour in her arms, probably the work of an English artist towards the close of the thirteenth century. This, too, was one of the Lares and Penates which the sisters carried with them abroad, and was also presented to John, Earl of Shrewsbury. Both of these in all probability were gifts to the convent at its first foundation. Another article exhibited at the rooms of the Archæological Institute in 1862 was a fine pectoral cross of solid gold of the sixteenth century, very probably a gift to the convent on its re-establishment by Queen Mary; and also a manuscript "Processionale ad usum Ecclesiæ de Syon," differing considerably from that in use at Salisbury. This was inscribed with the name of a sister named Slight, one of the inmates scattered by King Henry VIII., and brought back again by Queen Mary. been the cause of muche evyl, and of muche treson whiche hath been sowed abrode in this mater of the kinges title, and also in the kinges graces mater of his succession and mariage. On Wensday my Lord Wyndesore came hither, sent for by Maister Leighton and me, and labored muche that day for the converting of his suster and som other of his kynneswomen here; and yesterday we had my Lord of London here in the chapiter house of women, and the confessor also, whiche bothe toke it upon thair consciences and upon the perill of thair soulys that the ladys owght by Gode's law to consent to the kinges title, wherewith they wer muche comforted; and when we wylled al suche as consented to the kinges title to syt styll, and a suche as wold not consent therunto to depart out of the chapter house, there was found none emong thaim whiche departed. Albeit I was informed this nyght that one Agnes Smyth, a sturdy dame and a wylful, hath labored diverse of her susters to stop that we shuld not have thair convent seal; but we trust we shal have it this mornyng, with the subscription of thabbes for her self and al her susters, whiche is the best fassion that we can bring it to. The persone whiche ye spak with at the grate, covyteth very muche to speke with you, seyng she hath suche thinges whiche she wold utter to no man but to you, and what they be I cannot conject. We purpose this after none, or els tomorow mornyng, to awaite on the king grace, to know his pleasir in everything, and specially towching the muring up of the howses of utterward confessions. Maister Leyghton hath wreten certen compertes unto you, and therefor I forber to speke anything therof. The ladys of Sion besecheth you to be good maister unto thaim, and to thair house, as thair special trust is in you, and that they all run not into obloquy and slander for the mysbehavor of one person. A greate number of the ladys desired me to speke unto you that Bisshope and Parkere myght be discharged from the house of Sion, and Bisshope and Parker desire the same. I mervaile that they desire not likewise to be discharged of the person with whom ye talked at the grate, seing Bisshope's caus and that is one."* After the suppression of this religious house the conventual buildings were retained in the possession of the Crown during the remainder of the reign of Henry VIII., and in 1541 its gloomy walls were selected as the prison-house of the illfated Katharine Howard, while the sentence was being prepared which was to consign her to the "Letters Relating to the Suppression of Monasteries." Edited by T. Wright, Esq., for the Camden Society. scaffold. Seven years later the body of the king himself rested here for a night on its way towards Windsor Castle. The story was long current that the swollen corpse burst and bled profusely, and that the dogs licked up the blood of the wicked monarch here, as other dogs in their day had licked up the blood of Ahab in Samaria. In the first year of the reign of Edward VI., the monastery of Sion was granted to the Lord Protector, Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, who had already rented some premises at Isleworth under the Abbess and convent; and it was this nobleman who founded, on the ruins of the monastic building, the magnificent edifice which ultimately became the seat of the Northumberland family, and the shell of which, though in part considerably altered, still remains. The works carried out here by the Duke of Somerset were very extensive, and executed at great cost, and the grounds appear to have been laid out in a manner rather superior to the fashion which then usually prevailed. Here he had a botanical garden, formed under the superintendence of Dr. Turner, who has been often spoken of as "the father of British botany;" and here were planted some of the earliest, if not the very earliest, mulberry trees introduced into England, many of which are still green and flourishing. Here the Duke of Somerset was living when Allen, the conjuror and astrologer, was brought before him, charged with practising his art to the injury of the king, and was committed to the Tower. On the attainder of the Duke of Somerset for high treason, the mansion reverted to the Crown, and was shortly afterwards granted to John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, but became the residence of Lord Guilford Dudley, the son of that nobleman, who married Lady Jane Grey. It was from this house that Lady Jane went forth on her way to the Tower, to claim the throne of England, on the death of Edward VI. The estate was again forfeited to the Crown by the attainder of the Duke of Northumberland, and Queen Mary retained it in her possession till 1557, when, as stated above, she was prevailed upon to restore the convent of Sion. She endowed it with the manor and demesnes of Isleworth, and with sundry other lands; but its restoration was but short-lived, for on the accession of Elizabeth this monastery was again dissolved, and the queen held the estate of Sion House in her own hands until 1604, when it was granted, together with the manor of Isleworth, to Henry Percy, ninth Earl of Northumberland. This nobleman expended large sums in the repairs and improvement of the mansion, the |