A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE the ministers appointed by the Assembly of Divines complained that they could not get in their tithes from the parishioners ; while at Temps- ford, Flitton, Marston, Potton, the ejected incumbents refused for a long time to leave their parsonages, and in two cases were clearly supported by parishioners in their refusal. 1 At Luton the minister who held the living in 1658 (Thomas Jessopp) complained that for eight years a malicious and prelatical party had withdrawn from his church and wor- shipped in the prelatical form. 2 The same thing may very likely have happened elsewhere. But this much is clear : though the numbers of those appointed by Parliament (and therefore probably without episcopal ordination) went on steadily increasing, by sequestration or the death of the old incumbents, during the five and twenty years between the out- break of Civil War and the Restoration of the Monarchy, there were only eleven 3 in this county who resigned their livings on St. Bartholo- mew's Day, 1662, rather than submit to the new act of uniformity. The rest conformed and were ordained, if not already in orders. But, as it had been proved before under similar circumstances, such enforced con- formity was bound to be very half-hearted in many cases. Calamy tells us of the old vicar of Arlesey, who had kept his living all through the Commonwealth, how he conformed by reading just such parts of the liturgy as he approved of, and leaving out the rest ; 4 it cannot be doubted that others did the same as they found opportunity. The only university men among the Nonconformists of this year were William Dell, master of Caius College, Cambridge, and rector of Yelden ; Samuel Fairclough, fellow of the same college, and rector of Houghton Conquest ; and John Donne, of King's College, rector of Pertenhall. 5 Dell was a remarkable man in his way, though apparently of shifting views. He had been chaplain to the Parliamentary army before he came to Yelden. In 1660 his parishioners sent a petition to Parliament accusing him, among other things, of neglecting to adminis- ter the sacraments ; but the parish registers prove that he certainly had his own children baptized. The rest of his accusations need not be detailed, as they are probably worth about as much as those made at an equally convenient time against Giles Thorne, Hugh Reeve and the ejected of an earlier date. But one of them is of historical interest ; he had allowed ' one Bunyan, a tinker,' to preach in his pulpit on Christmas Day. 6 It is probably true that he thought lightly of all outward cere- 1 At Tempsford Mr. Rolt complained that the late incumbent still kept the parsonage house, and 'prohibited' the parishioners from paying tithes, 9 July 164.7 ; at Potton the late incumbent had in- truded himself with violence into the vicarage house, and also prohibited the payment of tithes, 2 Sep- tember 1 64.7. At Marston Dr. Cookson, though he left the vicarage, went ' from house to house ' and told the people not to pay their tithes, 17 August 164.7. The ' prohibitions ' of ejected parsons would not have had much weight with unsympathetic parishioners.
- Luton Chunk, by the Rev. H. Cobbe, p. 21 5.
3 Appendix to the Life of Baxter, Calamy, ii. 91-5. As Dr. Fowler of Northill, though not satisfied at first, afterwards conformed and became Bishop of Gloucester (p. 95), while Shepherd, rector of Tillbrook, conformed at first but afterwards resigned his living (edition of 1 727, p. 1 30), they balance each other, and neither has been counted. 4 Ibid. 93. 6 Ibid. 91, 93, 95. « Hist. MSS. Com. vii. 102. 342
