Henry VIII had wrought great damage to elementary education, although he had professed "I love not learning so ill, that I will impaire the revenues of anie one house by a penie, whereby it may be upholden." But it has been calculated that in 1546 there was probably one school for every eight thousand people, whereas three hundred years later, the proportion was thrice as small. Yet Edward VI did not found one school in Yorkshire, and many, which had previously existed, he deprived of all revenue. So diminished were the means of education in 1562 that Thomas Williams, on his election as Speaker of the House of Commons, took occasion to call Queen Elizabeth's notice to the great dearth of schools "that at least one hundred were wanting, which before this time had been." In other words in a period of less than thirty years the number had decreased by a third. And this was in spite of a six years' reign of Edward VI., the supposed progenitor of schools. In the report of the Commissioners of 1548 Giggleswick is recorded as having three chantries. There was the Chantry of Our Lady, the incumbent of which, Richard Somerskayle, is described as "lx yeres of age, somewhat learned" and enjoying the annual rent of £4. The Tempest Chantry with Thomas Thomson as incumbent 70 yeres old and "unlearned." The Chantry of the Rode, "Richard Carr, Incombent, 32 yeres of age, well learned and teacheth a gramer schole there, lycensed to preach, hath none other lyving than the proffitts of the said chauntrie." The net value of the chantry was £5 15_s._ Richard Carr was a nephew of the founder and from the description of his two fellow chaplains he was evidently superior to the ordinary chantry priest. They were "unlearned," "somewhat learned," he was "well learned" and "lycensed to preach." For all that the chantry lands were taken from him, but the School was not dissolved: he was maintained as a Schoolmaster by a stipend of the annual value of £5 6_s._ 8_d._ charged on the crown revenues of York "for the good educacyon of the abbondaunt yought in those rewde parties." The population of Giggleswick, which as a parish included Settle, Rathmell, Langcliffe and Stainforth, was roughly 2,400 and at the beginning of the nineteenth century was unaltered. Such a population was too "abbondaunt" for one man to teach, particularly if he took boarders, and it is not surprising to find in the report of 1548 the following paragraph: "A some of money geven for the meyntenance of scholemaster there. The said John Malhome and one Thomas Husteler, disseased, dyd gyve ... the some of £24 13_s._ 4_d._ towards the meyntenance of a Scholemaister there for certen yeres, whereupon one Thomas Iveson, preist, was procured to be Scholemaister there, which hath kept a Scole theis three yeres last past and hath receyved every yere for his stypend after the rate of £4, which is in the holle, £12." "And so remayneth £12 13_s._ 4_d._"