and to give full testimony to the church of his piety, and zeal, and devotedness, by founding three religious houses. When, exactly a century later, Richard Fox, Bishop of Winchester, communicated to his friend, Hugh Oldham, Bishop of Exeter, his intention of founding a monastery, his friend, instead of giving him encouragement to proceed with his plan, remonstrated with him on the folly of building houses, and providing a maintenance for monks, who would live in idleness, unprofitable to themselves and to society;[27] urging him at the same time rather to found a college for the encouragement of sound learning: and the College of Corpus Christi in Oxford owes its existence, humanly speaking, to that sound admonition. Perhaps, had Henry V. been fortunate enough to meet with so able and honest an adviser, Oxford might have had within its walls now another nursery of religion and learning,—a monument of his piety and of his love for whatever was commendable and of good report. Our Oxford chronicles record his expressed intention both to reform the statutes of the University, and also to found an establishment within the castle walls, annexing to it all the alien priories in England for its endowment, in which efficient provision should be made for the instruction of youth in all the best literature of the age.[28] Had he first resolved to found his college, and reserved his religious houses for later years, his work might still have been flourishing at this day, and might have yet continued to flourish till the hand of spoliation and refined barbarism shall be strong and bold enough (should ever such a calamity visit our native land) to wrest these seminaries of Christian principles and sound learning from the friends of religion, and order, and peace. As it is, Henry's establishments survived him little more than a century; and the lands which he had destined to support them passed away into other hands, and were alienated from religious purposes altogether.

The sites which Henry selected for his establishments were, one at Shene, in Surrey; the other at Sion, in the manor of Isleworth, on the Thames.

The terms of the foundation-charters of these religious houses, their rules, and circumstances, and possessions, it does not fall within the plan of this work to specify in detail. The brothers and sisters admitted into these asylums appear to have been bound by very strict rules of self-denial and poverty.

The monastery at Shene, built on the site of Richard II.'s palace, which he never would enter after the loss of his wife Anne, who died there, and which on that account he utterly destroyed, was called "The House of Jesus of Bethlehem," and was dedicated "to the honour, and glory, and exaltation of the name of Jesus most dear;" Henry expressing in the foundation-charter, among sentiments less worthy of an enlightened Christian, and savouring of the superstition of those days, that he founded the institution in pious gratitude for the blessings of time and of eternity, which flow only from Him.

The house of Sion in Isleworth, or Mount Sion, as it is called in the Pope's bull of confirmation, was dedicated "to the honour, praise, and glory of the Trinity most High, of the Virgin Mary, of the Disciples and Apostles of God, of all Saints, and especially of the most holy Bridget." This house was suppressed by Henry VIII; when the nuns fled from their native country, and took refuge, first in Zealand, then at Mechlin, whence they removed to Rouen; at last, fifteen reached Lisbon in 1594. The history of this little company of sisters is very remarkable and interesting. In Lisbon they were well received, and were afterwards supported by royal bounty, as well as by the benevolence of individuals. They seem to have settled there peaceably, and to have lived in their own house, and to have had their own church, for more than fifty years. In 1651 their house and church were both burnt to the ground; but, through the beneficence of the pious, they had the happiness of seeing them restored. In 1755 this little community suffered in common with the other unfortunate inhabitants of Lisbon, and seem to have lost their all in the earthquake. In their distress they cast their eyes to the land of their fathers, and applied for the charity of their countrymen. There is something very affecting in the language of the petition by which our countrywomen in their calamity sought to excite the sympathy, and obtain the benevolent aid, of their fellow-Christians at home.

We, the underwritten, and company, having on the 1st of November last suffered such irreparable losses and damage by the dreadful earthquake and fire which destroyed this city and other parts of the kingdom, that we have neither house nor sanctuary left us wherein to retire; nor even the necessaries of life, it being out of the power of our friends and benefactors here to relieve us, they all having undergone the same misfortune and disaster. So that we see no other means of establishing ourselves than by applying to the nobility, ladies, and gentlemen of our dear country, humbly imploring your tender compassion and pious charity; that, so being assisted and succoured from your bountiful hands, we may for the present subsist under our deplorable misfortune, and in time retrieve so much of our losses as to be able to continue always to pray for the prosperity and conservation of our benefactors.
Augustus Sulyard, Eliz. Hodgeskin,
Peter Willcock. Frances Huddleston,
Cath. Baldwin,
Winifred Hill.
Sion House, Lisbon,
May 25, 1756.

Through another fifty years, the little band, still keeping up the succession by novices from England, remained in the land of their refuge; till, in 1810, nine of them, the majority, it is said, of the survivors, fled from the horrors of war to their native island; and their convent, whose founder was Henry, the greatest general of his age, became the barracks of English soldiers under Wellington, the greatest general of the present day. On their first return they lived in a small house in Walworth; and in 1825, the remainder, now advanced in years and reduced to two or three in number, were still living in the vicinity of the Potteries in Staffordshire,—the last remnant of an English convent dissolved in the time of Henry VIII. There are at this time mulberry-trees growing at Sion House, one of the Duke of Northumberland's[29] mansions, which are believed, not only to have been living, but to have borne fruit, in the time of the monastery.[30]

Henry seems to have had much at heart the intellectual, moral, and religious improvement of those who might be admitted to a share of his bounty in these establishments. The Pell Rolls record a payment "of 100l. part only