In the case of almsmen of a later period corporal punishment was never practised. If a poor pensioner at Heytesbury, after instruction, could not repeat his prayers properly, he must be put to “a certayne bodely payne, that is to say of fastyng or a like payne.” In most fifteenth-century almshouses, however, the inmates were no longer boarded, but received pocket-money, which was liable to forfeiture. An elaborate system of fines was worked out in the statutes of Ewelme. The master himself was fined for any fault “after the quality and quantitye of his crime.” The fines were inflicted not only upon those who were rebellious, or neglected to clean up the courtyard and weed their gardens, but also upon those who arrived in church without their tabards, or were unpunctual:—
“And if it so be that any of theym be so negligent and slewthfull that the fyrst psalme of matyns be begon or he come into his stall that than he lese id., and yf any of thayme be absent to the begynnyng of the fyrst lesson that thanne he lese iid.; And for absence fro prime, terce, sext and neynth, for ich of thayme id. Also if any . . . be absent from the masse to the begynnyng of the pistyll . . . id., and yf absent to the gospell . . . iid.” etc.
Industry, punctuality and regularity became necessary virtues, since the usual allowance was but 14d. weekly.
The rules of the contemporary almshouse at Croydon were stringent. After being twice fined, the poor man at his third offence was to be utterly put away as “incorrectable and intolerable.” When convicted of soliciting alms, no second chance was given:—“if man or woman begge or aske any silver, or else any other good . . . let him be p141 expellid and put oute at the first warnyng, and never be of the fellowship.”
Expulsion was usually reserved for incorrigible persons. “Brethren and sisters who are chatterboxes, contentious or quarrelsome,” sowers of discord or insubordinate, were ejected at the third or fourth offence. Summary expulsion was the punishment for gross crimes. The town authorities of Beverley discharged an inmate of Holy Trinity for immorality. The ceremony which preceded the expulsion of an Ilford leper is described by a writer who obtained his information from the leger-book of Barking Abbey:—
“The abbesse, beinge accompanyed with the bushop of London, the abbot of Stratford, the deane of Paule’s, and other great spyrytuall personnes, went to Ilforde to visit the hospytall theere, founded for leepers; and uppon occacion of one of the lepers, who was a brother of the house, having brought into his chamber a drab, and sayd she was his sister. . . . He came attyred in his lyvery, but bare-footed and bare-headed . . . and was set on his knees uppon the stayres benethe the altar, where he remained during all the time of mass. When mass was ended, the prieste disgraded him of orders, scraped his hands and his crown with a knife, took his booke from him, gave him a boxe on the chiek with the end of his fingers, and then thrust him out of the churche, where the officers and people receyved him, and putt him into a carte, cryinge, Ha rou, Ha rou, Ha rou, after him.”[87]
This public humiliation, violence and noise, although doubtless salutary, are a contrast to the statute at Chichester, where pity and firmness are mingled:—
“If a brother, under the instigation of the devil, fall into immorality, out of which scandal arises, or if he be disobedient p142 to the Superior, or if he strike or wound the brethren or clients . . . then, if he prove incorrigible, he must be punished severely, and removed from the society like a diseased sheep, lest he contaminate the rest. But let this be done not with cruelty and tempest of words, but with gentleness and compassion.”
