ten then wore
coats of mail as well as cassocks, and daggers in addition to their
girdles; and this old church being collegiate, had for one of its deans
Rivallis, who forged the charter and seal of Henry III., by which the
Irish possessions of the Earl of Pembroke were invaded, and that nobleman
cruelly treated and killed. The more distinguished William of Wykeham,
who held the Great Seal in the reign of Edward III., and exercised
considerable influence in his day, both in church and state, was also a
dean of St. Mary's.

St. Leonard's occupies a position at the opposite extremity of the town.
Its crumbling tower, shattered by the cannon of Charles' army, remains,
but the nave and side aisles have recently been restored--that on the
south side at the sole expense of John Pritchard, Esq., M.P., in memory
of his brother. The celebrated divine, Richard Baxter, began his
ministry at St. Leonard's, apparently with little success, as he is said
to have shook the dust from his feet upon leaving, declaring the hearts
of the inhabitants to have been harder than the rock on which their town
was built. Nevertheless, he afterwards dedicated his well-known book,
"The Saint's Rest," to them. Adjoining the churchyard is a hospital for
ten poor widows, built and endowed, as a brass plate over the entrance
informs us, by a relative of Colonel Billingsly, who fell in the service
of "King Charles ye First," and whose sword is said now to be in the
possession of a descendant of the family, in the parish of Astley Abbots.

[Old House, Bridgnorth: 22.jpg]

Like other ancient towns, Bridgnorth had places founded for the relief of
the poor, the destitute, and the diseased. The house of the monks of the
"Friars of the Order Grey," stands near where a dilapidated sign of the
Preaching Friar still swings over the entrance of a public-house. It
forms part of the carpet works of Mr. Martin Southwell, who uses its oak
panelled hall, and a number of cells carved out of the solid rock, as
storerooms. In making some alterations recently the little cemetery was
disturbed, and skeletons of several of the monks, embedded in spaces cut
out of the rock, in the form of a sarcophagus, were exposed. In the
Cartway is the "Old House" in which Bishop Percy, author of the "Relics
of Ancient English Poetry," was born, a fine specimen of the domestic
architecture of the 16th century; and in the entrance-hall of which are
the following words in large lett