Some curious entries relating to home-brew are to be found in the registry of the priory of Worcester, A.D. 1240. At each brewing “_VIII. cronn: de greu_ and x _quarteria de meis_” were used; which probably signifies eight cronns or four quarters of growte (here meaning ground malt), and ten quarters of mixed barley and oat malt. A long list then follows of the allowances of beer amongst the different officials of the house. The beer was of three different kinds, _prima_ or _melior_, _secunda_, and _tertia_. The cellarer is to have one measure of prime and one of second. In the brewhouse four measures of the prime are to be distributed, and two measures on the day on which the ale is to be moved. The servant of the church is to have the holy-water bucket full of “mixta,” _i.e._, part prime and part second, or, it may be, a mixture of all three sorts. This “mixta” seems to have been an anticipation of the “half-and-half” and “three threads” of more modern times. Each of those who help to carry the ale are to have two measures of the first and second mixed, and so the list proceeds through all the officers and servants of the priory. Ale, indeed, seems to have been their chief drink, and even the invalid (_potionandus_) about to undergo a course of physicking was allowed his measure of ale. Our doubts as to the wisdom of this dieting hardly require the confirmation they receive from the further direction that he was to have pork, fowl with stuffing, cheese, and eggs. Sometimes the records tell sad tales of the poor monks being robbed of their beer by reason of the malt failing. This misfortune is recorded in the annals of Dunstable as having happened in 1262. The annalist ruefully mentions that “in this year, about the Feast of John the Baptist, our ale failed.” Very soon after this, however, they made provision for the deficiency by purchasing from H. Chadde £20 worth of malt; the quantity is not mentioned, but at the rates of the day it would no doubt considerably exceed 100 quarters, so that for some time the monks could have known no want. In 1274 the same disaster occurred:—“At the Feast of Pentecost our malt failed.” This time the holy fathers were equal to the occasion. “We drank,” so run the annals, “five casks of wine, and it did us much good.” {52} The crimes and misdeeds of Roger Noreys, the wicked abbot of Evesham at the end of the twelfth century, seem to have culminated when he not only called the monks “puppies, vassals, and ribalds,” but, adding injury to insult, compelled them to live for many days on hard bread and “ale little differing from water.” This was too much, and the monks petitioned the archbishop against such ill-treatment. The abbot, it may be remarked, appears from the records of the House to have taken very good care of himself, though he treated the monks so ill, and it might have been said of him as it was of another ecclesiastic whose name, unfortunately, has not accompanied the verse:—