Yet the keeping of the gaol in spite of these and other instances of resultant trouble would seem to have been profitable, for Islip was diligent in defending not only the rights of sanctuary but also the privileges of receiving accused folk whether clerical or lay arrested within his jurisdiction, a diligence observable in subsequent centuries in those who took his place, though not his office. He was jealous too of his position as Abbot of Westminster, with all that that high office involved. For example, it chanced that he was present at a Chapter of the Prior and Convent of Greater Malvern in 1529, perhaps on a visitation, and he took the opportunity of professing certain of their novices, but he was careful to make it understood that he was in no way detracting from the old arrangement by which the Malvern monks must make their profession at Westminster. The various inventories of the time and the records of the Augmentation Office and Exchequer bear testimony to his generous gifts of vestments and ornaments to the Abbey church. The elaboration of his unfinished mortuary roll witnesses to the esteem in which his Convent held him. He was the last of the great Abbots of Westminster, a not ignoble line, and it may confidently be asserted that his rule will bear comparison with that of any of his predecessors. It is natural to scan the Abbey records of his time for signs of the approaching cataclysm and equally natural perhaps to exaggerate the significance of their presence or absence. Among these records the signs are few. As long as Islip lived one might suppose from them that monastic life at Westminster eight years before the dissolution of the monastery was pursuing the same even and profitable course that it had pursued half a century earlier when he first entered the monastery, and indeed that in some respects it was shewing even greater vigour. The enthusiasm for the internal work of the rebuilding of the nave and the external stimulus of the foundation of Henry VII. do not point to a community anticipating any breaking of its bonds. Yet it must be confessed that the materials for an accurate and well-considered judgment are lacking. If a verdict must be passed on the evidence which exists it would be in favour of the supposition just mentioned. At the same time it must not be supposed that the community was blind as to the general trend of the times or oblivious to the possibilities that awaited it.