From Stafford a long journey was made northwards as far as Leek. There stood the imposing Cistercian house of Dieulacres,[184] with its fine church, with a timbered roof and a screen bearing twelve candles, a glazed cloister with carrells, a dormitory and fratry, an infirmary, hall and buttery, larder and kitchen, and outhouses of various kinds. Dr. Legh’s eyes must have glistened as they came in sight of the wealth of lead which covered the roofs, and which he subsequently computed to be worth no less a sum than the enormous amount of £720. There was also a fine peal of bells. Sheep and cattle, horses and pigs, were in the fields, stores of grain were in the granary, and abundance of hay was on the site. So large a house gave employment to a large number of servants. The monks numbered thirteen, under Thomas Whitney, the Abbot. The King’s Commissioners did not know how their visit had been prepared for. The _personnel_ at Dieulacres comprised a useful proportion of members of the Abbot’s family. Besides himself there were four other men of the name of Whitney--Humphrey, who was bailiff of the Cheshire Manors, John, who was Chamberlain, and two other lay members of the household. Under these circumstances it was not difficult to devise a scheme which should to some extent defeat the plan for wholesale confiscation. William Davenport, steward of the courts and collector of the rents in the Frith and elsewhere, who acted as Abbot Whitney’s secretary, prepared blank forms which were duly sealed with the Convent seal while it was still in the Abbot’s keeping. On these forms various leases were subsequently made out, when Legh and Cavendish were safely out of the way, one of which was the lease and reversion of the Manor of Poulton for a tenure of sixty-one years. All this was carefully concealed from the Commissioners when they arrived. The seal having been used for the last time on the Deed of Dissolution on October 20th,[185] was duly handed over, and it was not till Elizabeth had reigned for some years that John Whitney turned Queen’s evidence and divulged the whole story.[186]