The nuns were accustomed to indulge in amusements, for there are injunctions which show that games and revels were common.
“Also we enjoyne you that alle daunsyng and revelyng be utterly forborne among you except Christmasse and other honest tymys of recreacyone, among yourse selfe in absence of seculars in all wyse.”
The nuns of Appleton, Yorkshire, were apparently rather jovial, and the prioress is commanded in 1489 to see “that none of your sisters use the alehouse nor the watersyde where course of strangers dayly resorte.” It was likewise ordered that the sisters should not--
“bring in, receave, or take any layman religious or secular into the chambre or any secrete place day or night, nor with thaim in such private places to commine, ete or drinke, without lycence of your priorisse.”
“Conversation with seculars was permitted only in company and with the license of the abbess from noon to vespers, and this only on Sundays, and the great feasts of the Saints, not however by going out of the house, but by sitting at the appointed windows; for to none was it permitted after their entrance to leave the cloisters of the monastery. If any sister desired to be seen by her parents or honest and dear friends, she might, with the permission of the abbess, open the window occasionally during the year; but if she did not open it, a more abundant reward was assured to her hereafter.”[23]
This monastery is described by Wriothesley as “the vertues [most virtuous] house of religion that was in England.” Taine speaks of it in very different terms: “Au monastère de Sion les moines confesseurs des nonnes les debauchent et les absolvent tout ensemble.” Sion Monastery was of the Order of St. Bridget which was reputed to be one of the best. It was suppressed in 1539.
That there was laxity in the government of some of the convents which resulted in idleness and waste of money is evident. The Bishop of Lincoln, Longland, sent very peremptory orders to the Superior of the nuns of Cottam or Cottram, in Lincolnshire, respecting her duties:
“Ouer this I charge you lady prioresse undre the said payne that ye yereby make your accompte openly and truely in your chaptour house afore the mooste part, and the senours of your susters that they may knowe frome yere to yere the state of said house, and that ye streight upon sight hereof dymynishe the nombre of your seruants as well men as women, whiche excessyve nombre that ye kepe of them bothe is oon of the grette causes of your miserable povertye.”