But this was by no means the end of the matter. A year later the whole nunnery was in an uproar[163]. The bishop, for reasons best known to himself, had removed the prioress Dame Anne Wake and had appointed Dame Helen Snawe in her place; perhaps Dame Anne had said "Tush" once too often under the new _regime_; perhaps she was getting too old for her work; or perhaps Abbess Elizabeth Boifeld had only commanded Dame Snawe's intrigues at a price; evidently the subsacrist was no less adroit than that other subsacrist of Bury St Edmund's. At any rate Dame Anne Wake was put out of her office and Dame Helen Snawe ruled in her stead. It might have been expected that this change would be welcomed by the nuns, considering how strong the Boifeld faction had been at the election of the Abbess. But no; during the year of triumph Helen Snawe had aroused the hearty dislike of her sisters; led by Dames Barbara Gray (who had voted against the Abbess at the last election) and Alice Bowlis they had strenuously opposed her substitution for the old Prioress; they had been impertinent to the Abbess of their own choice (indeed she was only a figure-head); they had written letters to their friends and refused to show them to her; and finally when the election of Dame Snawe was announced, they had risen in a body and left the chapter-house as a protest. This was intolerable, and the Bishop's vicar-general came down to examine the delinquents. Matilda Sheldon, the subprioress, admitted to having left the chapter, but denied that she had done so for the reason attributed and said that she did not know of the departure of the other nuns, until she saw them in the dorter. Margaret Nicolson showed more spirit; she said that she went out "because she wold not consent that my lady Snawe shulde be priores," and that "ther was none that ded councell hir to goo" and that "my lady abbes did commaunde them to tary, that not withestandyng they went forthe"; and she gave the names of eight nuns who had followed the subprioress out. Dame Barbara Gray was next asked "yf she ded aske licence of my Lady Abbas to wryte letters to hir frends," and replied "that she ded aske licens to wryte to hir frends and my Lady Abbas sade, 'Yf ye showe me what ye wryte I am content,' and she saide agene, 'I have done my devoir to aske licence, and yf ye wyll nede see it I will wryte noo letters.'" Asked whether she had left the chapter house, this defiant young woman declared that "yf it were to do agene she wolde soo doo," and moreover "that she cannot fynde in hir hert to obbey my lady Snawe as priores, and that she wyll rather goo out of the house by my lord's licence, or she wyll obbey hir ... and that she wyll never obbey hir as priores, for hir hert cannot serve hir." Asked for her objection to Dame Snawe, she said that "she wyll shewe noo cause at thys tyme wherfor she cannot love hir"; but after a little pressure she declared with heat