This was a short-lived but extremely interesting Order growing out of the Franciscans. It was founded in 1231, or, as is also stated, in 1241. St. Francis, as we know, founded the Gray Friars, Fratres Minores; his disciple, St. Clara, founded the Clares, or Sorores Minores, and the _Pœnitentiarii_, or _Fratres de Pœnitentiâ Jesu_, or _Fratres de Saccâ_, were established shortly afterward. The Order contained both men and women; the brothers and sisters might be married; they might also hold property. They came over to England in the year 1257, and very soon possessed nine Houses, viz.: at Lynne, where Prior was the Head of the English Branch; at London, Canterbury, Cambridge, Norwich, Worcester, Newcastle, Lincoln, and Leicester. The Council of Lyons, in 1274, passed an edict permitting only four orders of Mendicants. This edict seems to have been a deathblow to the _Fratres de Pœnitentiâ_: they languished and obtained little support--perhaps the people had no belief in friars who held property and were married. In 1305 Robert Fitzwalter obtained the permission of the King to assign their house to him, which was done, and the Penitential Friars disappeared from history. A hundred years later Robert Large obtained the house and held his Mayoralty in it; as did Lord Mayor Clipton in 1492. It was afterward turned into a tavern called the Windmill. In this house Caxton began his apprenticeship. He did not finish it here, because, unfortunately, in the year 1441 Robert Large died. As there is no document in which a man reveals himself so much as in a will, wherein may be found his religion, his superstition, his love, his hatred, his charity, the whole heart and soul of a man, I transfer to these pages a part of Robert Large’s will, by which you may understand what manner of man was this rich merchant, Caxton’s master, from whom he received his ideas of honorable trade.