ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY One of the gravest disorders was the number of Hvings simoniacally disposed of, and the great number unsuppHed.' The archbishop writes to Lady Bacon how the lay gentry fleece the benefices : ' the best of the country, not under the degree of knights, were infected with this sore, so far, that some one knight had four or five, others seven or eight benefices clouted together' ; and 'that my lord bishop hath set a serving-man, not ordered, a mere lay-body, in the face of the whole city, to be a prebendary of this church. And that he hath at home at his house another prebendary, and bearing them great under my lord's authority, despised mine to be at the church's visitation.' ' One prebendary named Smith, finding the dean and chapter charged not to pay the rent of his prebend till he had shown good cause to the archbishop for his non-appearance, appeared before the primate, who persuaded him to resign his prebend, some pension being reserved to him, after having failed to induce him to take orders (the man gave as his reason that he had no know- ledge of Scripture, though in profane learning he had) ; ^ ' which the bishop of Norwich hindered, because Smith was bound to him to pay 5// pension out of his prebend to a sister's son of the bishop's at Cambridge.' * These descriptions of the prebendaries explain the possibility of their riotous be- haviour indicated by the queen's instructions to the bishop, 25 September, 1570, 'to inquire into certain innovations attempted by some prebendaries of the church, who have entered the choir of the church, broken down the organs and committed other outrages.' ^ In any case, the difficulties of the bishop's task at Norwich must have sometimes seemed insuperable ; with every shade of nonconformity to deal with on the one hand, and Roman Catholics* on the other, it can hardly be wondered at that he inclined to a policy of inaction ; whatever course he ' In 1563 the bishop received a writ requiring him to return an account of the state of his diocese to the queen, and returned answer as follows : — 'The diocese of Norwich contains the two counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, and il churches in Cambridgeshire. In Norfolk there are two archdeaconries, those of Norfolk and Norwich, and 2^ deaneries, l 2 of which belong to Norwich archdeaconry and 1 2 to Norfolk. There are other churches exempt in the dean and chapter of Norwich, excepting at an ordinary visitation, viz. in Norwich : St. Paul, St. James, St. Mary-in-the-Marsh, and St. Helen's, and the churches of Trows, Amering- hall, Lakenham, Eaton, Sedgeforth, Hilderston, Hemesbye, Martham and Catton ; and though the inhabitants of Windham will not be called out of their town by process, according to the ancient composition of my predecessors, yet they refuse not to be subject to my ordinary jurisdiction. At my last visitation there appeared to be 289 parish churches in the archdeaconry of Norwich, and 402 in Norfolk archdeaconry. At la<t Easter there were in Norwich archdeaconry 168 rectories full, with incumbents, and 41 vicamges full, and the rest of the parish churches, i.e. 80, were void ; but some served with curates, which being not obliged to appear, I cannot certifie. There is no parish so large as to have a chapel of ease except Wintcrton, which hath East Somerton chapel, and Wroxham which hath Salhouse. In Norfolk archdeaconry there are 1 84 rectories and 36 vicarages full, and the other 182 void, but some served with curates which cannot be returned. Redenhall hath a chapel of ease called Harleston, Derham another called Hoe. Pulham also hath one, and so hath Titshall. Some of the churches void in all the archdeaconries are donatives, and heretofore belonged to religious houses ; not being presentative, I can give no account of them.' (Blomefield, iii, 556.) ' Strype, Life of Parker, i, 495. ^ Ibid. 496. ' Ibid. 497. ' Cal. S.P. Dom. 1547-80, 393. George Gardiner, appointed dean in 1573, was also one of this band ; the actual dean, John Salisbury, kept out of the affair. Dr. Salisbury had been accused of favouring the old religion, and for a sermon he preached I Dec. 1 569, was for a time removed, but was afterwards reinstated, and in I 571 made bishop of Sodor and Man, which he held with his deanery until 1573, when he died. The bishop expressed great grief at his sermon. Public Library, Cambridge, EE. 2, 34, fol. 53 v.
- Certain priests apprehended in London on Palm Sunday, 1574, boasted that there were 500 masses
said in England that day. Dr. George Gardiner in reporting this to Bishop Parkhurst, adds ' It stands your Lordship in hand to look about. The xth part of these masses were said in your diocese (if there were so many) : good conjectures saith so : and I pray God none of your officers be culpable in consenting to them. . . . The greatest diligence is too little, and the least speck of careless negligence is too much ' (Gorham, Reformation Cleanings, 487). 267
