Among the first Christian institutions for the care of the ailing founded by private benevolence, a refuge for the insane was undoubtedly built in England before the seventh century. Burdett says that: "How far the two institutions established in England prior to A.D. 700 were entitled to be considered asylums, we have discovered insufficient evidence to enable us to decide." He evidently inclines to the opinion, however, that provision was made in them for the care of those ailing in mind as well as in body. There is a rather well-grounded tradition that Sigibaldus, the thirty-sixth bishop of Metz during the papacy of Leo IV., about A.D. 850, erected two monasteries and paid special attention to the sick in body and mind. There are records that the insane in Metz were placed under the guardianship of persons regularly appointed. The attendants in the hospitals had to take a special oath of allegiance to the King, and that they would fulfil their duties properly. There is definite evidence of Bethlehem in London, afterwards known as Bedlam, containing lunatics during the thirteenth century, for there is the report of a Royal Commission in the next century stating that there were six lunatics there who were under duress. Burdett says that Bedlam has been devoted exclusively to the treatment of lunatics from some years prior to 1400 down to the present time, so that it takes precedence in this matter of the asylum founded in Valencia in Spain, which Desmaisons has erroneously held as the first established in Europe. Esquirol states that the Parliament of Paris ordered the general hospital, that of the Hotel Dieu, to provide a place for the confinement of lunatics centuries before this; and while definite evidence is lacking, there seems no doubt that in most places there were, as we have said, what we would call psychopathic wards in connection with medieval hospitals. Early in the fifteenth century there are a number of bequests made to Bedlam which specifically mention the care of the insane. Indeed, "the poor madmen of Bethlehem" seem to have been favourite objects of charity. The care of the insane there seems to have touched a responsive chord in many hearts. Mayor Gregory describes in his "Historical Collections" (about 1451) this London asylum and its work of mercy, and from him we have evidence of the fact that some of the patients were restored to reason after their stay in the asylum. He has words of praise for how "honestly" the patients were cared for; but recognizes, of course, that some could not be cured. In his quaint old English he emphasizes particularly the church feature of the establishment.