These collects are of venerable age, and have much beauty of thought and expression. The reader may be glad to see one of them as an example, and as an indication of the spirit in which people entered into these religious vows: "O God, the gracious inhabiter of chaste bodies and lover of uncorrupt souls, look we pray Thee, O Lord, upon this Thy servant, who humbly offers her devotion to Thee. May there be in her, O Lord, the gift of Thy spirit, a prudent modesty, a wise graciousness, a grave gentleness, a chaste freedom; may she be fervent in charity and love nothing beside Thee (_extra te_); may she live praiseworthy and not desire praise; may she fear Thee and serve Thee with a chaste love; be Thou to her, O Lord, honour, Thou delight; be Thou in sorrow her comfort, in doubt her counsellor; be Thou to her defence in injury, in tribulation patience, in poverty abundance, in fasting food, in sickness medicine. By Thee, whom she desires to love above all things, may she keep what she has vowed; so that by Thy help she may conquer the old enemy, and cast out the defilements of sin; that she may be decorated with the gift of fruit sixty fold,[165] and adorned with the lamps of all virtues, and by Thy grace may be worthy to join the company of the elect widows. This we humbly ask through Jesus Christ our Lord." In a paper in the "Surrey Transactions," vol. iii. p. 208, Mr. Baigent, the writer of it, finds two, and only two, entries of the consecration of widows in the Episcopal Registers of Winchester, which go back to the early part of the reign of Edward I. The first of these is on May 4, 1348, of the Lady Aleanor Giffard, probably, says Mr. Baigent, the widow of John Giffard, of Bowers Giffard, in Essex. The other entry, on October 18, 1379, is of the Benediction of Isabella Burgh, the widow of a citizen of London (whose will is given by Mr. Baigent), and of Isabella Golafre, widow of Sir John Golafre.