5. INVOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS

Rates were levied for hospital maintenance on an organized system in some foreign countries. Sometimes a compulsory Hospital Sunday Fund was instituted, one penny being demanded from the richer, one halfpenny from the middle-class, and a loaf from lesser folk. In England, however, the only obligatory support was an occasional toll on produce, perhaps first ordered by the feudal lord, but afterwards granted by custom. The Bishop of Exeter (1163) confirmed to lepers their ancient right to collect food twice a week in the market, and alms on two other days,—a custom resented by the citizens. (See p. 54.) King John conferred upon Shrewsbury lazars the privilege of taking handfuls of corn and flour from sacks exposed in the market (1204). By charter of the Earls, the Chester lepers were entitled to extensive tolls—upon salt, fish, grain, malt, fruit and vegetables, to a cheese or salmon from every load, and even one horse from the horse-fair. The lepers of St. Mary Magdalene’s, Southampton, received “from time immemorial” a penny upon every tun of wine imported. The mayor and commonalty of Carlisle granted every Sunday to the lepers a pottle of ale from each brew-house of the city, and a farthing loaf from every baker who displayed his bread for sale on Saturday. Their hospital was also endowed “time out of mind” with a corn-tax known as the “thraves of St. Nicholas” from every carucate of land in Cumberland. (The _thrave_ is variously computed at twelve, twenty or twenty-four sheaves.) This county had a heavy poor-rate, for the great York hospital collected likewise from every plough working in [p185] the northern Archiepiscopate (Cumberland, Westmorland, Lancashire and Yorkshire). These “thraves of St. Leonard,” or “Petercorn,” belonged to the hospital by virtue of Athelstan’s gift, which had been originally granted to him by his northern subjects in recognition of his destruction of wolves. The lands of the Durham Bishopric contributed “thraves of St. Giles” to Kepier hospital. The collection of such tolls was a constant difficulty, for it was resented by landowners, who had also the ordinary tithes to pay. (6) VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS (a) _Donations._—At first, freewill-offerings were mainly in kind. The earliest collector whose name occurs is Alfune, Rahere’s friend. While the founder was occupied at St. Bartholomew’s, Alfune was wont “to cumpasse and go abowte the nye placys of the chirche besily to seke and prouyde necessaries to the nede of the poer men, that lay in the hospitall.” It fell on a day that as Alfune visited the meat-market, he came to a butcher whose persistent refusal of help grieved him. After working what was regarded as a miracle, Alfune won him over, and departed with flesh in his vessel: henceforth butchers were more prompt to give their alms. Almsmen used sometimes to collect in person. It was customary for some of the brothers of St. John’s House to “attend the churches in Sandwich every Sunday, with a pewter dish, soliciting money to buy meat for dinner on that day.” Another brother was deputed to travel on an ass through Kent asking alms—“and he collects sometimes ten shillings a year, sometimes a mark, above his expenses.” All save richly-endowed houses were dependent upon [p186] casual charity. In St. Mary’s, Yarmouth, it is recorded “live a multitude of poor brethren and sisters, for whose sustenance a daily quest has to be made.” One of the London statutes, enrolled in _Liber Albus_, directs that lepers shall have a common attorney to go every Sunday into the parish-churches to gather alms for their sustenance. Lest charitable offerings should diminish when lepers were removed from sight, a clause was added to the proclamation of 1348:—“it is the king’s intention that all who wish to give alms to lepers shall do so freely, and the sheriff shall incite the men of his bailiwick to give alms to those so expelled from the communion of men.” It would appear from a London will of 1369, that special chests were afterwards provided; for bequests are then made to the alms-boxes (_pixidibus_) for lepers around London. Alms-boxes were carried about by collectors, and also hung at the gate or within the hospital. The proctor of the staff went on his mission with a portable money-box; upon one occasion, a false proctor was convicted of pretending to collect for St. Mary of Bethlehem, for which fraud he was pilloried, the iron-bound box with which he had paraded the streets being tied round his neck. Boxes of this kind, sometimes having a chain attached, remain in almshouses at Canterbury, Leicester and Stamford. It was directed by the statutes of Higham Ferrers that a common box with a hole in the top should be set in the midst of the dormitory so that well-disposed people might put in their charity; at certain times also two of the poor men were to “go abroad to gather up the devotions of the brotherhood,” the contents being afterwards divided. (b) _Small Subscriptions._—Some fraternities formed [p187] associations for the maintenance of charities. That of St. John Baptist, Winchester, helped to support St. John’s hospital with the shillings contributed by its 107 members. The modern hospital of St. Leonard, Bedford, is kept up on this principle. (c) _Appeals authorized by the King._—The work of the proctor was not confined to the neighbourhood. Having first possessed himself of letters-testimonial, he journeyed in England, or even in Wales and Ireland. A “protection” or warrant was necessary, for unauthorized collectors were liable to arrest; it was in the form of a royal letter addressed to the archbishops, bishops, abbots, priors, bailiffs, lieges, etc. Henry III pleads with his subjects the cause of St. Giles’, Shrewsbury:—“that when the brethren come to you to beg alms, you will favourably admit them, and mercifully impart to them your alms of the goods conferred by God upon you.” Many letters-patent license the proctors, messengers or attorneys to collect in churches, or, as at St. Anthony’s, Lenton (1332), in towns, fairs and markets. Sometimes the collector went forth supported by Church and State; as when the king issued mandates (1317, 1331) to welcome the proctor of the Romsey lepers “authorized by John, Bishop of Winchester and other prelates.” (d) _Appeals authorized by the Church, as Briefs, Indulgences, etc._—Bishops likewise issued briefs, or letters of recommendation, on behalf of institutions in their own dioceses or beyond. The infirm of Holy Innocents’, Lincoln, received from their diocesan a mandate (1294), ordering the parochial clergy to allow their agent to solicit alms after mass on three Sundays or festivals each year; later, the stipulation was added, that the Cathedral [p188] fabric fund should not suffer thereby. A typical document is found in the Winchester Register in favour of St. Leonard’s, Bedford (1321). The mandate was addressed to the archdeacons, deans, rectors, vicars and chaplains, commanding them to receive accredited messengers of that needy hospital, to cause their business to be expounded by the priest during mass, after which the collection should be delivered without deduction. The brief was in force for two years and the clergy were bidden to help effectually by word and example at least once a year. Episcopal Registers include many such documents, some being granted on special occasions, to make good losses by murrain, to enlarge premises, or to rebuild after fire, flood or invasion. Some briefs were not unlike modern appeals, with their lists of presidents and patrons; for that on behalf of Romney hospital (1380) was signed by both archbishops and eleven bishops. It was a recognized source of raising funds. John de Plumptre in making arrangements for his almshouse at Nottingham (1414), provided that the widows, for the bettering of their sustenance, should “have and hold an episcopal bull and indulgence . . . procured from the archbishops and bishops of England, Wales and Ireland.”[112] It is curious to watch the increase of the privileges offered. The earlier bishops remitted penance for seven or thirteen days, those of a later period, for forty days. Roman indulgences knew no such limits. The form of a papal brief (1392) was as follows:— “Relaxation of seven years and seven _quadragene_ to penitents who on the principal feasts of the year and those of [p189] St. James in the month of July and the dedication, the usual octaves and six days; and of a hundred days to those who during the said octaves and days visit and give alms for the sustentation and recreation of the chapel of St. James’ poor hospital without the walls, London.” William, Lord Berkeley directed the executors of his will (1492):— “to purchase a pardon from the court of Rome, as large as may be had, for this Chapple [Longbridge], from evensonge to evensonge, in the feast of Trinity for ever, for pleyne remission to them that will be confessed and contrite.” Offerings stimulated by such pardons were in money or in kind. A deed belonging to the Bridport Corporation sets forth that the writer has seen letters from famous ecclesiastics—including St. Thomas and St. Edmund of Canterbury—in favour of Allington leper-house, one being an indulgence of Alexander IV:— “Item, to alle thos that gevyn broche, rynge, boke, belle, candell, vestimente, bordclothe, towelle, pygge, lambe, wolle, peny, or penyworthe, be whiche the sayde hows and hospitale is amended and mentaynde, the sayd Pope grauntethe the remission of the vijth parte of penance injunct[ed].” Thus the questionable trade of the pardoner[113] was often carried on by the hospital proctor; moreover, spurious bulls were circulated. The abuses to which the practice gave rise were recognized by Bishop Grandisson, who announced that questors collecting alms in the diocese of Exeter were forbidden to preach, or to sell fictitious privileges, or unauthorized pardons. A papal exhortation [p190] on behalf of St. Anne’s, Colchester (1402), forbids these presents to be sent by pardoners (_questuarii_). Those who bought a pardon from the proctor of St. John’s, Canterbury, were informed that the benefit of 30,000 _Paternosters_ and _Ave Marias_ was freely imparted to them. But although indulgences were liable to abuse, it must be remembered that authorized pardons extended to penitents only—to those who, being contrite, had already confessed and received absolution and penance. Upon the indulgenced feast of St. Michael, so many people flocked to St. Mary’s, Leicester, that a special staff of confessors became necessary.