To the gallant Fulk Basset succeeded HENRY DE WENGHAM, who was, or aspired to be, the most magnificent pluralist, till the days of Wolsey, on record in the English Church. He was Lord High Chancellor when the see of London became vacant. He was obliged to take priest's orders to qualify himself for the bishopric. De Wengham had no jealousy of, or thought himself safer under, Papal dispensation. His licence is extant, to hold the deanery of S. Martin's-le-Grand in London, the chancellorship of Exeter, a prebend of Salisbury, and all his other parsonages, even other benefices. A month after he obtained this decree, De Wengham, as Bishop of London, petitioned to hold all these preferments with London for five years. He retained the Chancellorship for more than a year after his election.

But death did not respect either the civil or sacerdotal dignities of the Chancellor-Bishop. He died long before the five years elapsed. He was Bishop hardly three years, 1259-1262.

The actual successor of De Wengham, HENRY DE SANDWICH, was elected November 13, 1262. Before Sandwich, Richard Talbot, Dean of S. Paul's, had been elected Bishop, but died the day after his confirmation, Sept. 20, 1262.4 Sandwich was obliged to seek the King in France, and the Archbishop in Savoy. He was confirmed by Boniface, and consecrated in May, 1263. Already, during the vacancy, the Bull of the Pope (Urban IV.) had been read at Paul's Cross, absolving the King from his oaths, taken to observe the provisions of the Parliament of Oxford, called in derision by the King's friends, the mad Parliament.

I presume that it was Richard Talbot who, as Dean, excommunicated the Prior of Bermondsey, because he did not pay fifteen marks annually assigned by the Pope, Alexander IV.

The case, appealed against, was decided in favour of the Dean. It must have been on the vacancy in the Deanery caused by Talbot's promotion, that the opportunity occurred of bringing the Deanery into the hands of the Pope. Orders came for provision to be made for John de Ebulo in some English cathedral. He laid claim to the Deanery of S. Paul's. The Chapter resisted. The Cardinal of SS. Cosmo e Damiano was commissioned to hear the cause. The Italian resigned the deanery, and accepted a canonry instead: until a canonry should be vacant, certain pensions were to be paid to Ebulo.

Paul's Cross is historically part, and an important part, of the Cathedral. As preaching grew more popular, and Began more and more to influence the public mind, the Cross (it will be described hereafter) became the pulpit, not only of the Cathedral, but almost of the Church in England. A collection of Paul's Cross sermons would indeed be a history of the Anglican Church. But even before this it was the place for the publication of edicts not only ecclesiastical, but civil also, and of assemblage for the citizens of London on their own affairs. It was often the scene of the popular folksmotes.

During the present reign (in 1257), a roll was discovered in the King's wardrobe at Windsor, sealed with green wax. From whence it came no one knew; but it was found to contain divers articles of complaint against the rulers of the city of London, that the commonalty was grievously taxed and vexed. The roll was laid before the King. John Mansell, one of the King's Justices, appeared in the King's name at Paul's Cross, on the - day of the conversion of S. Paul, and summoned a folksmote.

Richard de Clare, Earl of Gloucester, and others of the King's Council were present. Mansell ordered the roll to be read, and declared that it was the King's pleasure that the citizens should be 'ruled with virtue;' that the liberties of the city should be maintained; that if the persons should be found who 'vexed' the citizens, they should be grievously punished for the example of others.

In 1259 another folksmote was summoned at Paul's Cross. The King himself was present, with his brother Richard, King of Almayne, and the Archbishop of Canterbury. An oath of allegiance was administered even to striplings of twelve years of age, to be true to the King and his heirs. On that occasion, the gates of the city were kept by the King's guard.

Notwithstanding all this, when the crisis came, the citizens of London, with Lord Mayor Fitz Thomas, were ardently, resolutely on the side of the Barons, with Simon de Montfort and the liberties of England. The Bishop, Henry de Sandwich, threw himself boldly into the same party. Whether by his orders, with his connivance, least with no opposition from the Bishop, the great bell of S. Paul's was the tocsin which summoned the citizens to arms. When the Queen, who was left in the Tower, endeavoured to join the King, her husband, in the Castle at Windsor, as she would have passed the bridge, her barge was arrested, and her passage stopped by the populace. She was only rescued by the Bishop of London, who conveyed her respectfully and in safety to his episcopal palace.

Ugo Fulcodi, the Papal Legate, who was on his way to England to settle these affairs with a high hand, and authoritatively to annul the Provisions of Oxford, was arrested at Boulogne, and forbidden to land in England. He launched his excommunication against the Cinque Ports and the city of London. But Guido Fulcodi was hastily summoned to assume the Papal tiara as Clement IV. Guido Fulcodi forgot not the insult that, as Legate, he had received in England. The Pope himself suspended Henry de Sandwich (A.D. 1265). The Bishop of London had during the war excommunicated the Prince and all his followers. In the year following London and three other Bishops were solemnly excommunicated at Northampton. The Pope ratified the Ban. No favour was to be shown to the Bishops of Worcester, London, Lincoln, and Ely; they were on no account to be released from excommunication.

Sandwich was obliged to journey to Rome to obtain absolution. He lingered, or was detained there six years in exile. At length he wrung forth his slow pardon from Pope Gregory X. In the pardon his crimes were duly recited. He had favoured the Barons with his counsel; he had celebrated divine service in London, when under suspension by Cardinal Hadrian, and, in despite of the excommunication; he had communicated with excommunicated persons. He had lately shown good conduct and devout penitence. Full pardon and absolution were granted by the Holy Father. Sandwich returned to England in 1273, after the accession of Edward I. He returned to die, not to preside, but to be buried in his Cathedral.

It was during the absence of Bishop Sandwich at Rome, after the battle of Evesham and the death of Simon de Montfort, at the close of the Barons' war, that the Cardinal Legate Ottobuoni appeared in the greatest pomp at S. Paul's, having summoned all the Prelates and dignitaries of the first and second orders throughout the realm. There, in the Cathedral of the metropolis, he promulgated and caused to be read, in the presence of a great multitude, the famous Constitutions. These Constitutions, enlarging and confirming those of Cardinal Otho, became the code of ecclesiastical law in England for several centuries down to the Reformation. The code was fully and distinctly proclaimed in all its solemnity. The Legate is said to have heard with patience the objections and appeals of the assembled ecclesiastical Parliament or Council. The Legate assumed, in the name of the Pope, full legislative powers not only over England, but over Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. In another work I have given a summary of these statutes, and will only add, that there were strong canons relating to religious houses, and to monks, and conventual bodies of all orders.

JOHN DE CHISHULL, who became Bishop of London in 1273, had accumulated not a few ecclesiastical and civil offices. He had been Provost of Beverley, Archdeacon of London, Dean of S. Paul's, High Treasurer and Chancellor of the Exchequer. Bishop Chishull fell into ill health. No wonder, considering his various arduous functions! The Primate, John Peckham, issued a commission to the Dean and Treasurer of S. Paul's, empowering them to present to prebends and other benefices, with or without cure of souls, and to perform other acts belonging to the episcopal function. Another commission, with the same powers, was issued to the Archdeacon of Colchester, no doubt for the part of the diocese in Essex.

On the death of Chishull (A.D. 1268) a singular transaction took place. The Canons elected Fulk Lovel, Archdeacon of Colchester, who on the same day refused the bishopric. Level alleged bodily weakness and scruples of conscience for his refusal; but some averred that Lovel held other benefices, as many as twenty, worth more than the bishopric; others, that he might have been rejected by the Primate Peckham, for the sin of holding so many pluralities. Peckham rebuked Level for his modesty, or his interested motives, in declining the duty and dignity of a Bishop; but some said that Lovel had also been elected to Lincoln, their a richer bishopric than London, and had declined that also.

It is curious, however, that, from the will, or rather the recital and valuation of the wealth of Chishull's actual successor we may form, not indeed till after the death of that prelate, some estimate, however loose and conjectural, of the revenues of the bishopric of London. But RICHARD DE GRAVESEND occupied the see for twenty-three years, from 1280 to 1303 ; and in that time may have accumulated, without parsimony or avarice, a great treasure.

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The Annals of St. Paul's: Index