york00orns

CONDITION OF PARISH CHURCHES. 213
to intensify the bitter feeling which would often be
engendered.
Information is also afforded of a very interesting
nature respecting the re-construction of some of the
old parish churches, sometimes as to the erection of
a hew one on a more convenient site, or the building
of chapels or oratories in some outlying corner of a
wide and scattered parish. An indulgence occurs
under the year i486 which is worthy of note. It
refers to the erection of a new and sumptuous chapel
at Towton, on the spot where the bodies of a great
multitude of those who fought and fell on that bloody
field, many of high rank and lineage, had been tlirown
hastily into a common grave. Another indulgence
for the same object bears date as late as 1502.
The presentments made at the visitations of the
Minster, of the parish churches of York and other
parts of the diocese at this period, throw a lurid light
upon the religious history of the time. It was a time,
be it remembered, when the mighty fabric of the
Minster received its completion. It was a period
which witnessed many a stately addition, and much
costly renovation, as regards the parochial churches
in many parts of the diocese. But all this was accompanied
by a manifest decay of piety, of reverence,
even of common decency in the celebration of divine
offices by the clergy, and that, above all, in the Minster
itself The Chancellor, the Sub-dean, and the Succentor
canonicorum, who are specially bound to reside,
do not fulfil their obligation. The vicars choral
straggle into choir after the divine office is commenced
and slip out before it is ended. Sometimes, even on