Jocelin hints a polite incredulity; but there are evidences that Samson was fond of books, and was indeed an author. There is a small volume, Titus A viii. in the Cottonian collection, which includes in its contents a work in two books, entitled De Miraculis Sancti Ædmundi. From a number of marginal notes, of even date with the fourteenth century text, and which ascribe to Samson, amongst other writers, the authorship of various passages in the great legendary life of St. Edmund in the Bodleian Library (MS. 240), Mr. Arnold arrived at the conclusion that "the writer of the work was unquestionably Abbot Samson." For the evidence the reader is referred to Appendix I. (pages 215-21); but it would appear that the work was written before the date when he became abbot, and perhaps before he had been appointed to any one of the numerous offices in the monastery to which he was from time to time transferred by the capricious Hugh (9).
Whenever any new event was recorded in his patron saint's honour, Samson caused it to be recorded: hence at his desire the episode of Henry of Essex, whom St. Edmund had "confounded in the very hour of battle" (102), was reduced to writing at Reading, and interpolated by some other monk in Jocelin's chronicle.
Samson's Masterfulness.—Samson, like his prototype of Scripture, was a "strong man," and as such he came into constant conflict with those who sought to try conclusions with him, usually to their own regret. From instances innumerable, the following may be selected as typical. At his very first general court of his knights, Thomas of Hastings tried to press the claim of his nephew Henry—a minor—to the hereditary stewardship of the Abbey; but Samson said he would consider the matter when Henry could perform the duties (41). Richard, Earl of Clare, demanded his guerdon of five shillings for the office of Standard-bearer of St. Edmund. Samson retorted that the payment of the money would not inconvenience the Abbey; but there were two other claimants for the post, and Richard must settle first with them. The Earl said he would confer with Roger Bigot his kinsman, "and so the matter was put off even to this day" (86).
Geoffrey Ridel, the Bishop of Ely, sent a blundering messenger to the abbot to ask for timber from woods at Elmswell, meaning Elmsett. Samson assented to the request for Elmswell, and meanwhile sent his foresters to Elmsett and cut down a great quantity of oaks, branding them as the property of the Abbey. The bishop overwhelmed his stupid servant with reproaches, and sent him back to explain. But it was too late, "and the bishop, if he wanted timber, had to get it elsewhere" (107).
Herbert the dean erected a windmill upon the Haberdon, and tried to brazen it out with Samson. But the abbot bade him begone, and told him that before he had come to his house, he should hear what had befallen his mill. Whereupon the trembling dean had the mill pulled down himself, so that when the servants of the sacrist came to the spot, they found their work already done for them (90).
In the domestic quarrel with his monks over the case of Ralph, the gate porter, who had been punished by Robert the prior with the assent of all the monastery, Samson upset the proceedings on his return from London, and, after a violent struggle, got his own way (179-83).
There is a pleasing affectation of impartiality in the case of another Herbert, the junior candidate for the office of Prior, on the much-worried Robert's death in 1200. The monks were conscious that Samson "would seek the advice of each with great show of formality," but that the affair would end as he had all along intended (193). On the day of election the Precentor was egged on by one of the elder brethren in an audible aside to nominate Herbert. Samson behaved as if this was a new light to him, but offered no objection to receive Herbert if the convent willed. And so, after a protestation of his unworthiness, Herbert was elected (196); and Jocelin tried, after these bare-faced proceedings, to recover his equanimity in the porch of the guest-chamber (197).
Samson as an Administrator.—Samson seems to have been something of a financial genius; he certainly freed the monastery from debt, and brought its internal affairs and its landed estates from chaos into order. He was undoubtedly more of an administrator than an ecclesiastic. He obviously enjoyed his ceremonial duties as Commissioner for the King or for the Pope. He went to the siege of Windsor in 1193 in martial array, though Jocelin is constrained to admit that he was "more remarkable there for counsel than for piety" (82). He appeared to be in his highest spirits when he went to Coventry in January, 1198, to help to restore the monks there who had been ejected by their somewhat truculent Bishop, Hugh de Nonant. Samson gave magnificent entertainments at Oxford, where the Commission sat, and "never in his life did he seem so joyful as at that time" (143).
He was fond, too, of country life, spending much time at his manors of Melford and elsewhere, "enclosing many parks, which he replenished with beasts of chase, and keeping a huntsman with dogs," though Jocelin is careful to add that he "never saw him take part in the sport" (43). With some of these dogs Samson appeased Richard's wrath when he flouted the king as to a disputed wardship (149). One of the complaints against him by those who chafed under his rule was that he was fond of betaking himself to his manors, and Jocelin's excuse for him is that "the abbot is more in spirits and in good humour elsewhere than at home" (53). Jocelin took him to task over this, but had a text from Ecclesiasticus hurled at his head, which induced him to "hold his peace henceforth" (54).
With broader outlook than his obedientiaries, Samson recognized the necessity of granting greater freedom to the inhabitants of the town of Bury, and, despite the grumbling of his monks, he gave the burgesses a Charter in 1194 (116). The resentment against him in the monastery ran so high in 1199 that he professed to be afraid of his life (182). Though matters were then patched up, the old feeling of indignation against his concessions to the townsfolk endured, and an occasion for manifesting it arose when, early in 1203, Samson was summoned by King John to advise him on a brief sent by the Pope as to the dispensation of certain Crusaders from their vows. To the undisguised astonishment of Jocelin, Samson sought the advice of the monastery, "a thing he heretofore had seldom done" (207); but he was boldly asked what he proposed to do to get back the lost privileges of the Abbey (210). He was then "weakened by infirmity of body, humbled, and (as was not his wont) timid" (207); and it must be remembered that he was by this time not far short of seventy years of age. He spoke the monks fair, promised redress, and "that upon his return he would co-operate with us in everything, and make just order and disposition, and render to each what was justly his" (211).