After some farther remarks on the manners of the monastic orders, the venerable author thus beautifully concludes:—“In these temperate regions I have obtained, according to the usual expression, a place of dignity, but no great omen of future pomp or riches; and possessing a small residence near the castle of Brecheinoc [Brecknock?], well adapted to literary pursuits, and to the contemplation of eternity,[327] I envy not the riches of Crœsus; happy and contented with that mediocrity, which I prize far beyond all the perishable and transitory things of this world.”
So far the monk of Llanthony—whose partiality is very excusable; but, unfortunately, the act or charter of Edward IV., uniting the two abbeys, gives a different colouring to the transactions between the two abbeys—mother and daughter. It recites that, owing to the depredations committed on the convent by the neighbouring inhabitants, and the frequent removal of the priors and other members of the convent, the religious functions were negligently performed, and acts of charity and hospitality to strangers no longer exercised: Also, that as John Adams, the prior, had profusely squandered away the revenues of the church, maintaining only four canons besides himself, who paid no attention to the holy duties of the establishment: And whereas all due regard and reverence were paid to the sacred offices of the church by the members of the monastery of new Llanthony near Gloucester, the king hereby grants all the lands—both in England, Wales, and Ireland—now appertaining to the convent of Llanthony in Wales, to the prior of the convent of Llanthony near Gloucester, to have and to hold for ever, on the payment of the fine of three hundred marks, and on condition that he maintains an establishment—dative and removable at will—of a prior and four canons, as the mother-church, for the purpose of performing religious service and mass for the souls of its founders. “Thus,” continues our author,[328] “in the short period of thirty years, we see the simple chapel of St. David transmuted into a spacious and elegant abbey; that same building nearly deserted, and another, still more magnificent, erected and translated from the solitary banks of the little river Hodni, to the rich and luxurious shores of the Severn.”
Milo, Founder of Llanthony Secunda.—Under this head, it is recorded in the Abbey Chronicle, that in the reign of King Henry, son of the Conqueror, there flourished a certain warrior of noble family named Gwalterus, or Walter, who was Constable, under the King, of the Castles of Gloucester and Hereford. The said Walter caused to be erected on his own demesne the Castle of Gloucester, and dying some time thereafter, his remains were conveyed to Llanthony Abbey, in Wales, and there buried. The aforesaid Walter left an only son, Milo by name, whom King Henry created Earl of Hereford; and moreover, by way of augmentation to the said earldom, made over to him and his heirs for ever a grant of the whole Forest of Dean.
This Milo, first earl of the name, took to wife Sibylla, heiress of Brecknock, and daughter of Bernard and Agnes of New March.[329]—The offspring of this marriage were five sons and three daughters, namely, Roger, Henry, Walter, Matthew, and William, Margery, Bertha, and Lucy. He founded the Abbey or Priory of New Llanthony, near Gloucester, on the 25th of May, 1136, being the first of King Stephen’s reign; and dying on Christmas-eve, 1143, was buried in the chancel of the Abbey which he had founded seven years before. After his demise, he was succeeded in his titles and estates by each of his five sons, one after the other; but all of whom died without legitimate issue. Hereupon his possessions were shared in equal proportions by his three surviving daughters.[330] Lucy, his third daughter, was married to Herbert Fitz-Herbert, and had for her share and dowry the Forest of Dean, and other estates in England.[331] The offspring of this marriage was a son named Peter, who became the father of a long line of descendants.
Bertha, second daughter of Count Milo, married William de Brewes, and took for dowry the lordship of Brecknock. The offspring from this marriage were three sons, William, Egidius, and Reginald. William, their eldest son and heir, in the time of King John, having made war upon his enemy Guenhunewyn, subdued him, and slew no less than three thousand Welsh in one day at Elvel. This battle took place on the morrow of St. Lawrence the Martyr, in the year of our Lord 1498. But for this rebellious act he was disinherited by King John; and, without trial, condemned to quit the realm of England. He died in exile; while his unhappy wife and their only son, being thrown into prison by the same heartless and arbitrary power, died shortly after in captivity.
Egidius, the second son, became Bishop of Hereford; and Reginald de Brewes, the third son, after the death of King John, and that of his two brothers the afore-named William and Egidius, was pronounced heir to all the possessions which had been forfeited by his brother William, and took possession of the same accordingly. He married a daughter of William de la Bruere, and had by his wife a son whom he named William de Brewes, quartus. The latter espoused the lady Eve, daughter of the renowned William, Earl Marshall, so frequently mentioned in these pages.[332] By this union he had issue four daughters—Isabella, Matilda, Eve, and Alionora. Of these, Isabella was married to David, son of Llewellyn, Prince of Wales.
But at a great festival where he presided, immediately after the Paschal Feast, in 1229, Llewellyn conceiving a bitter jealousy between his wife and the said William de Brewes, most treacherously caused the latter to be ignominiously hanged—an atrocity which threw the whole Welsh frontier into the greatest confusion and alarm; for at that time King Henry was still in France with a large army; and in his absence the country was but ill provided with the means of enforcing the law.
Matilda, the second daughter, married Roger Mortimer, Lord Wigmore, from whom sprang a numerous progeny. Eve, the third daughter, married William de Cartello. Alionora, the fourth and youngest, married Humphrey de Bohun, with the lordship of Brecknock, which for some time had belonged to the Counts or Earls of Hereford. Among the names here mentioned, those of Bertha and Lucy, daughters of Milo, are to be held in special reverence as eminent patrons and benefactors of New Llanthony.
And here, for the present, we take leave of the genealogical table, which exhibits in many striking examples the instability of fortune, the frailty of human nature, the vanity of riches, and the uncertain tenure of life.
