poverty of the house and the diminished number of the inmates, we can hardly believe that the buildings had not already suffered considerable declension before active spoliation commenced.

Immediately after its suppression in 1538 it became the property of Edward Grey Lord Powis. In 1617 it was purchased by Thomas Lord Ellesmere, and in 1648 his son John Earl of Bridgewater sold it to a younger member of the Shropshire family of Acton, and in the reign of Charles II, by marriage with a lady of that family, it became the property of Walter Moseley, Esq., of the Mere, in the county of Stafford, by a descendant of whom, Walter Moseley, Esq., it is at present enjoyed. By one of the possessors in the seventeenth century the late abbot's residence was fitted up as a manor house. The ground floor ceiling at the eastern part is elaborately decorated with panels, containing coats of arms executed in plaster, which would, if examined, determine the personage by whom this was done. To the work of that time is probably to be attributed the erection of the pigeon house tower at c, Plate VII, out of the ruins at F F, as well as the building BB already noticed, similarly constructed, and perhaps the erection of the building D D. Distinctly, however, as we see, by the absence of all bond to the older work, that this last is an extraneous building, the want of any features in it whose previous place can be distinctly pointed out, or which possess any very marked character in their present position, makes its age doubtful. It is yet certain that in very early times the position of the passage door at 15, Plate VII, was reversed and new dressings inserted, making the inside of the door to the east instead of to the west. This must have been done with the view of roofing over the nook formed by the projection of the chapter house, and again the intention of that alteration is obscured by the removal of stonework and erection of brickwork, which has occurred within a few years.