You'm each a wicked sinner.'
Cruel vex'd wor Passon Brown,
Sick to death he laid him down
Passonless was soon our town,
For why?—we'd starved our Passon.
Tell'y—did'y ever hear
Such a story, true but queer,
How 'twixt Christmas and New Year
The flock had ate their Passon?"
There was non-residence undoubtedly previous to the Act against holding more than one living at a time, unless near together. Men of birth and influence obtained a good deal of preferment, but never in post-Reformation times to the extent that this abuse existed before. To take but one instance. Thomas Cantilupe, who died in 1282, was Precentor and Canon of York, Archdeacon of Stafford and Canon of Lichfield, Canon of London, Canon of Hereford, and held the livings of Doderholt, Hampton, Aston, Wintringham, Deighton, Rippel, Sunterfield, and apparently also Prestbury. Pretty well! It was never so bad in the maligned Hanoverian period.