Before this, however, Bishop Richard Toclive had a dispute with the Knights of St. John, who claimed the almshouse of Noble Poverty at St. Cross as Hospitallers. They had unfortunately a reputation for avarice, and Toclive bought them off by giving them the impropriation of Merton and Hursleigh {25} for 53 marks a year. PAGANUS DE LYSKERET, styled Presbyter, was collated in 1280. It appears that at this time there was a perpetual vicar established in the Church of Hursley as well as a rector; and that he was instituted by the bishop, had a certain fixed maintenance assigned to him, and was independent of the rector. In the register of John de Pontissera, Bishop of Winton, may now be seen what is there called the “Ordinatio Episcopi inter Rectorem et Vicarium de Hurslegh.” It is therein settled that the vicar shall have a house as described and other emoluments, and that the rector shall pay to him forty shillings per annum. The vicar at this time was Johannes de Sta. Fide. The deed of settlement was executed in Hyde Abbey, in the year 1291; Philip de Barton, John de Ffleming, William de Wenling, and others being witnesses to it. Vide Regist. de Pontissera, fol. 10. Forty shillings or five marks was, it appears, the stipend usually assigned to vicars and curates at this time, the vicar being _really_ what we now call a curate. HUGO DE WELEWYCK, styled Clericus, succeeded in 1296 on the resignation of Paganus and was the last rector, the benefice having in his time been reduced to a vicarage by the appropriation of the rectorial-house, tithes, and glebe to the College of St. Elizabeth. The _pretences_ assigned for this act, for true _reasons_ they could scarcely be, since in all cases of appropriation and consolidation they appear to have been almost exactly the same, were the unfinished state of the college buildings and the insufficiency of the revenues for the maintenance of the society, owing to wars, sickness, pestilence, and the like. But notwithstanding this serious deprivation and loss, a vicar it appears was still continued in the church, Hugh de Welewyck having presented two, viz. Henricus de Lyskeret in 1300, and Roger de la Vere in 1302; of whom the latter was certainly appointed after the appropriation. WILLIAM DE FFARLEE was collated Vicar of Hursley, on the death of Welewyck in 1348. WILLIAM DE MIDDLETON was collated in 1363. CHAPTER III REFORMATION TIMES