At this time there were, in the house, fifty monks, including the abbot, the prior, and one sub-prior, with a revenue of £2,091 4s. 7d. per annum, equal to £20,000 of our money, which was a pretty good sum for the support of fifty monks. The mitred abbeys, at the dissolution, were for the most part granted by the King to noble or wealthy families, in consideration of service or exchange of lands, or for the payment of money; and the harvest was a rich one that the King reaped by this plundering of the monks. Soon after the dissolution, an order was issued by the Crown, to level the Abbey, and erect, with due alacrity, a palace for the residence of the Lords President of the North: thus its splendid architecture was cut up piecemeal. Some beautiful remains were, notwithstanding, still left; and, upon the formation of a Philosophical Society, in 1822, the site of St. Mary’s Abbey was chosen as a proper situation for the erection of a Botanic Garden. It was the spot on which the front of the palace had formerly stood, and which had previously been occupied by the range of buildings and apartments of the monastery. The first opening of the ground discovered antiquarian treasures, that even Keet, the great antiquarian, would have rejoiced at. Not mere heaps of mutilated stones were there, but whole portions of the walls of the monastery; of spacious and elegant door ways; of columns of various forms, rising to the height of five or six feet, standing, as they had been, before the dissolution of the monastery, intersected by massive foundations of the palace. Not an hour passed without bringing to light some long-buried specimens of the art and fancy of the monastic sculptor. In travelling over a country, my young friends will frequently meet with similar buildings to those I have attempted to describe—and I would only observe, that antiquities are a most interesting study. The spirit of times gone by live in the midst of monastic ruins—and from such we may trace the deeds of our forefathers, and enter into familiar conversation with them. Nor must we deem our progenitors entirely unworthy our regard and veneration; for, notwithstanding the barbarous ages in which they lived—notwithstanding the ignorance that surrounded them—and notwithstanding their superstition and bigotry—they have left us a rich inheritance; and our own times teem with the glories, the virtues, and sterling worth of the past. [Illustration] Oranges and Lemons, or the Bells of St. Clement’s.