In the towns also, the civic governors and the guilds began to control some of the endowments for the relief of the poor. Even in Anglo-Saxon times, the distribution of alms formed part of the functions of the guilds, and it is not unlikely that it was partly owing to customs formed by the municipal rulers through their association in guilds that the towns began to take an active part in the administration of poor relief. Thus at Lynn, one of the ordinances of the town guild provided that relief should be given to any brother in poverty, either from the common fund or from the private purses of the guild brothers. A piece of land was bequeathed to the guild, partly for the purpose of relieving the poor, and, we are told, £30 a year was distributed to the poor brethren, to blind, lame and sick persons, and for other charitable purposes. The whole charity distributed by this association must have been considerable, for though only four great meetings of the guild were held during the year, one of these was especially concerned with the management of its charities[17]. At Sandwich also[18], the burgesses or the town rulers controlled the two hospitals dedicated respectively to St Bartholomew and St John. Both were virtually almshouses providing for a certain number of old people. The Mayor and Jurats of Sandwich, not only appointed the governors of St Bartholomew's, but audited the accounts, controlled the management and appointed new recipients of the charity. The whole was connected with an annual festal procession to the hospital in which many of the townsfolk took part[19]. [17] C. Gross, _The Gild Merchant_, vol. II. pp. 159-161. [18] Boy's _History of Sandwich_, pp. 3 and 127. The references to this and several of the following examples of municipal action are quoted by Mrs Green, _Town Life in the Fifteenth Century_, vol. I. p. 41, note 2. [19] In Hereford also, St Giles' and the Sick Man's hospital were governed by the Corporation from the time of Rich. II. (_Reports of Char. Com._), and in Exeter, the town rulers at one time exercised rights over St Mary Magdalen's hospital, and afterwards exchanged these for power over St John's hospital for lepers. Freeman's _Exeter_, pp. 68, 174, etc.