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divers socours of streamelettes breking out of the thre principalle partes of Luyeryver.” The ruins of one Of tfjese little 33rQjges may still be seen over a“streamelette,” about two hundred yards to the north-east of the Abbey, formingan extremely picturesque feature in the landscape. It consists of an ellipticalarch, supported or strengthened by three strong ribs, and appears to be a workof considerable antiquity.
The beauty of the scenery and the richness of the soil seem to have beenthe chief delight of these pampered canons. They were accused (how justlyit is now difficult to decide) of luxurious living and great relaxation of disci-pline; and their last dean, Guido Rufus, was suspended from his office byRichard, Archbishop of Canterbury , the immediate successor of Thomas Becket .The king was at this time seeking opportunities of appeasing the church of Rome for the murder of Becket , and, influenced by the persuasions of thearchbishop, he went to Waltham on the eve of Pentecost , in the year 1177, andhaving expelled the secular canons, he established in their place sixteen regularcanons of the order of St. Augustin , taken out of three of the older English monasteries, namely, six from Cirencester , six from Oseney, and four fromChiche. Walter de Gaunt, a canon of Oseney, was elected the first Abbot ofWaltham . The Abbey itself was declared, as formerly, free from all episcopaljurisdiction; and a few years afterwards the abbot was allowed the use of thepontificals, and Waltham was raised to the rank of a mitred abbey. King Henry , judging, as he states in the charter, that the church thus reformed, “ asa new spouse of Christ, ought to have a new dower,”* added to its formerpossessions the manors of Siwardston and Epping.
From this period the Abbey of Waltham was, dinring several reigns, afavourite resort of the English monarchs; and, separated by its woods fromthe “busy hum” of the world around, it seems to have escaped the troublesand turmoils of baronial strife. Henry ’s son and successor, the lion-heartedRichard, gave the monks a new charter, confirming all their possessions andprivileges; and by a separate charter he bestowed on the church the whole ofhis manor of Waltham , with the great wood, and the park called Harold’sPark, three hundred acres of assart land, the market of Waltham , and thevillage of Nasing (a member of Waltham ), with three hundred and sixty acresof assart land there, for all which they were to pay yearly to the king’sexchequer sixty pounds. King Richard also gave them the manor ofCopt Hall, which afterwards became a favourite residence of the abbots.Henry III. , who frequently visited Waltham , was also a munificent bene-
* Hanc insuper ecclesiam, quasi novam Christi sponsam nova dote, sicut decebat, dignum duximus esseditandam.—The alliteration in tbis passage is remarkable.