The rules of the contemporary almshouse at Croydon were stringent. After being twice fined, the poor man at his third offence was to be utterly put away as “incorrectable and intolerable.” When convicted of soliciting alms, no second chance was given:—“if man or woman begge or aske any silver, or else any other good . . . let him be [p141] expellid and put oute at the first warnyng, and never be of the fellowship.” Expulsion was usually reserved for incorrigible persons. “Brethren and sisters who are chatterboxes, contentious or quarrelsome,” sowers of discord or insubordinate, were ejected at the third or fourth offence. Summary expulsion was the punishment for gross crimes. The town authorities of Beverley discharged an inmate of Holy Trinity for immorality. The ceremony which preceded the expulsion of an Ilford leper is described by a writer who obtained his information from the leger-book of Barking Abbey:— “The abbesse, beinge accompanyed with the bushop of London, the abbot of Stratford, the deane of Paule’s, and other great spyrytuall personnes, went to Ilforde to visit the hospytall theere, founded for leepers; and uppon occacion of one of the lepers, who was a brother of the house, having brought into his chamber a drab, and sayd she was his sister. . . . He came attyred in his lyvery, but bare-footed and bare-headed . . . and was set on his knees uppon the stayres benethe the altar, where he remained during all the time of mass. When mass was ended, the prieste disgraded him of orders, scraped his hands and his crown with a knife, took his booke from him, gave him a boxe on the chiek with the end of his fingers, and then thrust him out of the churche, where the officers and people receyved him, and putt him into a carte, cryinge, _Ha rou, Ha rou, Ha rou_, after him.”[87] This public humiliation, violence and noise, although doubtless salutary, are a contrast to the statute at Chichester, where pity and firmness are mingled:— “If a brother, under the instigation of the devil, fall into immorality, out of which scandal arises, or if he be disobedient [p142] to the Superior, or if he strike or wound the brethren or clients . . . then, if he prove incorrigible, he must be punished severely, and removed from the society like a diseased sheep, lest he contaminate the rest. But let this be done not with cruelty and tempest of words, but with gentleness and compassion.” [Illustration: _PLATE XVI._ THE WARDEN’S HOUSE, SHERBURN HOSPITAL OF ST. GILES, KEPIER] FOOTNOTES: [84] Sussex Arch. Coll., 24, pp. 41–62. [85] _Lieger Book_, Bodl. Rawl. MS. B. 335. [86] Hist. of Rochester, ed. 1817, p. 215. [87] Hearne, _Curious Discourses_, ed. 1775, i. 249. [p143] CHAPTER X THE HOUSEHOLD AND ITS MEMBERS “_No more brethren or sisters shall be admitted than are necessary to serve the infirm and to keep the goods of the house._” (St. John’s, Nottingham.)