Matilda gave the ground, and endowed the hospital with the magnificent sum of L3 per annum! Her foundation provided for forty lepers, one chaplain, one clerk, and one servant. Henry II. confirmed all privileges and gifts which had accrued to the hospital, and added to them himself. Parton says, "His liberality ranks him as a second founder." During succeeding reigns the hospital grew in wealth and importance. In Henry III.'s reign Pope Alexander issued a confirmatory Bull, but the charity had become a refuge for decayed hangers-on at Court who were not lepers. This abuse was prohibited by the King's decree. In Edward III.'s reign the first downward step was taken, for he made the hospital a cell to Burton St. Lazar. The brethren apparently rebelled, refusing to admit the visitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and destroying many valuable documents and records belonging to the hospital. Two centuries later King Henry VIII. desired the lands and possessions of St. Giles's, and with him to desire was to acquire. The hospital was thus shorn of the greater part of its wealth, retaining only the church (not the manor) at Feltham (one of its earliest gifts), the hospital estates at Edmonton, in the City of London, and in the various parishes in the suburbs; and in St. Giles's parish the actual ground it stood on, the Pittance Croft, and a few minor places. But even this remnant came into the possession of the rapacious King two years later, at the dissolution of the monasteries, when Burton St. Lazar itself fell into the tyrant's hands. Henry held these for six years, then granted both to John Dudley, Viscount Lisle, Lord High Admiral. From the time of the dissolution the hospital became a manor. In the earliest charters the head of the hospital is styled Chaplain, but not Master. The first Master mentioned is in 1212, and after this the title was regularly used. The government was vested in the Master or Warden and other officers, together with a certain number of sound brethren and sisters--and in certain cases lepers themselves--who formed a chapter. "They assembled in chapter, had a common seal, held courts as lords of the manor."[1] There were also guardians or custodians, who did not reside in the precincts of the hospital, and these seem to have been chosen from the most eminent citizens; they formed no part of the original scheme. [1] "Some Account of the Hospital and Parish of St. Giles-in-the-Fields," 1822, by John Parton. [Illustration: SEAL OF ST. GILES'S HOSPITAL.]