Thus she bestowed her wealth on venerable temples and on

the poor,

Sending her good works to heaven that she might follow. For merits so great, give to her blessed realms;

Let not purgatory detain her, but let the palace (court) of God bless her."

It is interesting to note that from reverence the Holy Name in line three is not scanned, but omitted. The arms of the Besfords, three pears, and Cloptons, an angel with a scroll, an eagle with another scroll, and two beasts with scrolls, adorn the four corners of the tomb.

Dame Joan Clopton was an heiress and the daughter of Alexander Besford, or Pearsford, of Besford in Worcestershire. She married Sir William Clopton, knight of Quinton, and had two children; a son who was sixteen at the time of his father's death, but appears to have died soon after, for the other child, a daughter, inherited her parents' estates. Sir William, who as we learn from the inscription was an officer, died in 1419, and it was after his death that Dame Clopton became an anchoress at Quinton, where she was buried in 1430 in the Lady-chapel.

It is considered probable that Sir William Clopton, who was both charitable and religious, built this chapel, and that the cell in which his widow was enclosed adjoined it. There is no squint in the church, and a careful examination of it leads to the conclusion that although no trace remains of a cell with a pent-roof, one was probably attached to this chapel for the holy anchoress's accommodation, and perhaps the small window next the sedilia opened into it, and has been bricked up since. The church has been restored less cruelly than many, but all remains of Dame Clopton's cell have disappeared; there still remains a small piece of colored glass, with a figure of a woman in prayer, in a window behind the organ, which may represent the recluse. Curious to say, it has survived all the

other old glass in the window.

The brass, which is a very beautiful one and in fine preservation, represents the recluse in a habit, with a veil and wimple and a long cloak. She has no girdle, but the cloak is fastened with two cords with tassels at the ends, which reach below the waist; the sleeves of the habit are quite tight, and have

with a jewel. As this ring is on the right hand, it is evidently that of her heavenly espousals.

Anchoresses were allowed more liberty in external matters, such as dress, than nuns. When they were members of a religious order, naturally they wore the habit of their order. The ordinary dress of other anchoresses was a black habit and veil, such as Dame Clopton is represented as wearing. Her brass effigy is valuable as giving a picture of an anchoress's habit.

Richard Poore, the author of that beautiful book Ancren Riwle, written for three sisters of high birth who were anchoresses at Tarrant-Keynston in Dorsetshire in the thirteenth century, told them their clothes might be either black or white, only they must be plain, warm, and well made; they were to wear warm capes if they had no wimples, and black veils; rings, brooches, and ornamented girdles were forbidden them.

St. Elred, who wrote a rule for his sister, a Cistercian nun who was also a recluse, ordered her to wear a black habit, both summer and winter, over some other mysterious garments specified by him; her veil was to be of "mean black," not of any "precious cloth." This prescription of a black habit for Cistercian nun, whose habit is of course white, shows it was not an invariable rule for the recluse to retain her habit if a member of any religious order.

Warmth is especially insisted on in these old rules for anchoresses; no doubt very wisely, as many of them had no fireplaces in their cells nor means of warming them, so they must have suffered from the cold very much in England. The fancy picture drawn by a Protestant writer on recluses of an choress sitting comfortably over a fire in an arm chair, with a cat purring by her side, is singularly unlike the reality.

The cells of anchoresses and the furniture varied very much according to the dispositions of the inmates. Some anchoresses, though enclosed in a cell, lived in a house, attended by two maids; one window of the anchoress's cell in that case looked into the church, the other into her parlor in the house, where visitors came to see her, and through this parlor window her food was passed; there was a third window to give light and

air.

Others lived in a cell attached to some church, either in

a window into the church which commanded a view of the altar, so that the recluse could see the Blessed Sacrament and hear Mass from this window; there was a second window at which she received visitors, and usually a third for air and light.

As to the furniture of the cells, this appears to have been very simple. Many cells contained a stone seat, within a recess; some of the women had a chair or a stool to sit upon; some slept on the ground, which in many cases was the bare earth, with a stone for a pillow; others had straw or rugs, some a mattress, while others had a bed, though of a very simple description.

Their windows had a grating and shutters, and the parlor window had a curtain of black cloth with a white cross on it. The window was a source of temptation to the anchoress; the author of Ancren Riwle specially warns his anchoresses against looking out of the window: "It is evil above evil to look out, for the young especially." "Love your windows as little as possible, and see that they be small, the parlor's smallest and narrowest," he says in another place.

Gossip was another temptation to which anchoresses were subject; the anchoress's, and for that matter the anchorite's window also, was often the emporium of village gossip if the recluse was at all lax, and those authors who wrote for recluses, like those above mentioned, or Walter Hilton, the author of the Scale of Perfection, written for a recluse, specially warn their readers against this vice. Anchoresses as a rule took three vows-chastity, obedience, and, instead of poverty, a vow of constancy of abode; they were bound to remain in their cell till they died, unless sickness, compulsion, or obedience to their superiors obliged them to leave it; and there are instances of some who have been burnt in their cells rather than leave them. They were generally buried in their cells. Indeed, the life of these prisoners of love-" prisoners of Chirst," as the Germans call them-was a living death. They were walled up in their cells when enclosed by the bishop; hence, probably, the ghastly tales of "walled-up nuns" which have been circulated by Protestants, ignoring the fact that the immuring was voluntary on the part of the immured.

The ceremony of enclosure, which is a very beautiful one,

by some one delegated by him to do it. It has been said that the sacrament of Extreme Unction was administered; but this does not seem possible, since the recluse was not in danger of death. What probably happened was this: the service was read without the holy oils being applied, just as the Carthusian monk says a "dry Mass" (missa sicca) before he says Mass to stimulate his devotion.

After the service of Extreme Unction had been read the recluse prostrated him or herself, and the officiating minister read the burial service, after which he and the acolytes retired; the entrance of the cell was then walled in, or if a door, was securely fastened and sealed by the bishop with his seal.

Some anchoresses were rich women. They usually gave their fortune to the church or the poor, reserving enough for their own maintenance. Others were poor and dependent on the alms of the faithful; others lived in a cell which was perpetually endowed; others were dependent on some patron, perhaps the lord or squire of the parish in which they lived, who sent them their food daily.

In an old German rule for recluses, the recluse was bidden to put his pitcher and platter outside his window every morning after tierce and take them in again after none, when the recluse might eat and drink what was in them; if they were empty, he was to say his grace and wait patiently till the next day.

The chief occupation of the anchoress was, of course, prayer, particularly mental prayer. Most of those who became recluses had left the world to spend their lives in contemplation. Manual labor is enjoined on them also, and church embroidery appears to have been one of their occupations; sometimes they had the care of the vestments belonging to the church, and made and mended them; sometimes they made clothes for the poor; they also made their own clothes; but they were forbidden to teach children by St. Elred and Richard Poore, who says the anchor house was not to be turned into a school nor the anchoress into a school-mistress. Many of them said the Divine Office, and those who could read also employed a good deal of time in reading spiritual books. They were allowed a good deal more liberty in prayer and in other things than nuns, but then, on the other hand, they were confined and

Indeed, it was the strictest and highest form of asceticism, and in these days, when pleasure and amusement seem to be the end and aim and object of most people's lives, it is difficult to understand how so many holy men and women were found, not only in England but in all parts of Europe, to embrace this strange, and to some terrible, life. Faith must have been stronger in those days than it is now to have enabled not only strong and talented men, but weak and delicate women, to live day and night walled up alone in a cell sometimes attached to a lonely church.