West, in which they were variously known as _geruli_, _cursores_,
_diplomates_, and _bajuli_. We may picture them speeding from one church
or one abbey to another, bearing their mournful missive, and when
England had been traversed, crossing the narrow seas to resume their
melancholy task on the Continent. At whatever place he halted, the
messenger might count on a sympathetic reception; and in every monastery
the roll, having been detached from his neck, was read to the assembled
brethren, who proceeded to render the solemn chant and requiem for the
dead in compliance with their engagements. On the following day the
messenger took his leave, lavishly supplied with provisions for the next
stage.

Monasteries often embraced the opportunity afforded by these visits to
insert the name of some brother lately deceased, in order to avoid
waiting for the dispatch of their own annual encyclical, and so to
notify, sooner than would otherwise have been possible, the death of
members for whom they desired the prayers of the association.

Mortuary rolls, many examples of which have been found in national
collections--some of them as much as fifty or sixty feet in
length--contain strict injunctions specifying that the house and day of
arrival be inscribed on the roll in each monastery, together with the
name of the superior, the purpose being to preclude any failure on the
part of the messenger worn out with the fatigue, or daunted by the
hardships and perils, of the journey. The circuit having been completed,
the parchment returned to the monastery from which it had issued,
whereupon a scrutiny was made to ascertain, by means of the dates,
whether the errand had been duly performed. "After many months'
absence," says Dr. Rock, "the messenger would reach his own cloister,
carrying back with him the illuminated death-bill, now filled to its
fullest length with dates and elegies, for his abbot to see that the
behest of the chapter had been duly done, and the library of the house
enriched with another document."

One of the Durham rolls is thirteen yards in length and nine inches in
breadth. Consisting of nineteen sheets of parchment, it was executed on
the death of John Burnby, a Prior of Durham, in 1464. His successor,
Richard Bell, who was afterwards Bishop of Durham, and the convent,
caused this roll, commemorating the virtues of the late Prior and
William of Ebchester, another predecessor, to be circulated through the
religious