Cloisters, with Fromond’s Chantry in the centre (for College has two chapels), forms one of the most poetic spots of Winchester College.
In earlier days school was held in Cloisters during the summer months. In Cloisters the College dead lie buried. Many former scholars have cut or carved their names on the stone-work of Cloisters, among them the famous Ken, afterwards Bishop of Bath and Wells, who wrote his Manual of Prayers for the use of Winchester College Boys.
His morning hymn
“Awake, my soul, and with the sun,”
and evening hymn
“Glory to Thee, my God, this night,”
first appeared in this Manual. The inscription in Cloisters is “Thos. Ken, 1665.”
nowhere readily obtainable as at present. As an additional corrective, blood-letting, five times a year, was an habitual practice, and as this involved three days in hospital, i.e. practically three days’ holiday, it was rather looked forward to than otherwise. ‘Shaving day’ was an important event. On Maunday Thursday the monks washed each other’s feet, and once a year they had a bath. The straw for the pallets, on which they slept in the ‘dortour,’ was changed once a year.
The meals were taken in silence in the refectory, while, to transpose the poet’s words,
The Reader droned from the Pulpit,
Like the murmur of many bees,
The legends of good St. Swithun
And St. Benet’s homilies.