By the same covenant the king “gave” St. Mary’s of Bethlehem to the city. Stow says:—“It was an Hospitall for distracted people. . . . the Mayor and Communalty purchased the patronage thereof with all the landes and tenementes thereunto belonging, in the yeare 1546, the same yeare King Henry the eight gave this Hospitall unto the Cittie.” In other words, the citizens bought back that which had already been in the guardianship of the city for about two hundred years. In “The Ordre of St. Bartholomewes”[155] drawn up in [p239] 1552, a report is given, so that all might know how things were administered and support the work. During the preceding five years, eight hundred persons had been discharged healed, and ninety-two had died. The charity had been carried on in spite of great difficulties, and now there was a design to increase it:— “The Citie of their endlesse good wil toward this most necessarie succour of their pore brethren in Christ, . . . wyshe al men to be most assuredly perswaded, that if by any meanes possible thei might, they desire to enlarge the benefyght to a thousand.” A wish is expressed that all almoners and houses of alms might be stirred up to do likewise “at this tyme namely, when the mysery of the poore moste busily semeth to awake.” This same year the manor of Southwark was purchased and St. Thomas’ repaired, so that whereas it lately accommodated forty sick, it was reopened with 260 beds for the aged, sick and sore. This “Hospitall of great receite for the poore, was suppressed but againe newly founded and indowed by the benevolence and charitie of the citizens,” says Stow. King Edward’s letters-patent (1551) describe the miserable condition of the sick poor lying and begging in the streets, “to their no small grief and pain and to the great infection and molesting of his subjects. The king desiring the health of the citizens in general no less than the cure of the sick, therefore grants permission to the mayor and corporation to undertake the work.” The work of the re-founded houses of St. Bartholomew, St. Thomas, and Bethlehem was supplemented in 1553 by Christ’s Hospital for fatherless children, and Bridewell for the correction of idle vagabonds. These institutions [p240] were provided partly from Edward VI’s private purse and partly from the dissolved Savoy Hospital and Grey Friars. Their initiation was due to the influence of Ridley, Bishop of London, who took counsel with the Lord Mayor as to the condition of the poor, and reported it to the young king. With the charitable provision after 1547 we are not, however, concerned, and only the ultimate effect of the general Dissolution remains to be shown. * * * * *