he should pass or meet in going to execution. The abbey was fortified in the reign of Edward the Third. At the dissolution, in the twenty-sixth of Henry the Eighth, its income was valued at £880. 148. 7½d. , according to Dugdale, or £987. 0s. 104d., according to Speed ; the abbot received a pension of £66. 13s. 4d., and sixteen officers and monks had smaller sums settled upon them. The site and demesnes of the abbey were granted by the king to a person named Gilmer, who pulled down great part of the buildings in order to sell the materials ; the land was afterwards purchased from him by Sir Anthony Browne, who began to convert what was left of the abbey building into a mansion, which was finished by his son, Lord Montague. When the property was purchased by Sir Thomas Webster, the building was found to have gone so much to decay, as to be quite uninhabitable ; the present dwelling was therefore repaired on one side of the quadrangle of the old abbey. The proprietor is Sir Godfrey Webster .
The abbey stands on a gentle rise, having before it a rich and beautiful country of hill and dale ; the wooded valley winding to the south-east, with the hills of Hastings in the distance, is introduced in the painting of the battle of Hastings, occupying the eastern part of the noble hall ; which is also decorated with coats of mail and antique arms. Though the abbey is greatly demolished, yet the ruins show the ancient magnificence of the structure. The abbey church stood on the eastern side of the grand entrance ; the only vestiges are some stone coffins near the gate, and nine elegant arches which appear on the outside of the house ; they formerly belonged to the inside of the cloisters. Contiguous to the church are the ruins of the refectory. There is another beautiful building, a little detached from the -
