mother's sister's son) [Footnote: Surrey Arch. Coll. XVH, 29, 30.] These
lands were in the hands of the King in 1378 because John de Hastings had
died and his son was still a minor; naturally he appointed the next heir
custodian of them. But William de Beauchamp's management of the estates
was certainly not satisfactory and, if the suretyship of Chaucer was
anything but a form, the poet stood a good chance of losing by it. The
first notice we find of Beauchamp's unsatisfactory management is in
1386, when a commission was appointed to enquire touching the waste in
the possessions of John de Hastyngs by William de Beauchamp, to whom the
King had committed the custody of the land. In the same year we find
record of an indenture made between Margaret Mareschall, countess of
Norfolk, guardian of John de Hastyngs, and the said John, on the one
side, and William de Beauchamp on the other, whereby the latter agreed
to surrender his custody of the estates, and the former in return to
free him of liability for the "waste." [Footnote: Cal. Pat. Roll, p.
257.] In 1389 the King appointed a commission to enquire touching the
waste in the lands of the alien priory of Kirkeby Monachorum, county
Warwick, in the time of William de Beauchamp, Knight, farmer thereof.
[Footnote: idem, p. 350. i idem, p. 208.]

In 1390 we find a "Revocation for reasons declared before the King and
council in the present parliament, with the assent of the nobles,
magnates, etc., of recent letters granting during pleasure to William de
Beauchamp the custody of the lands, tenements, etc. of John de
Hastyngs." [Footnote: Whether these were part of the Pembroke holdings
or not, I do not know.] In the same year the custody was regranted to
John Golafre, Knight of the King's chamber, at a farm of L600 (Beauchamp
had paid L500). [Footnote: Gal. Pat. Roll, p. 180.] In 1390, however,
the young Earl of Pembroke was killed in a tournament, and according to
the provisions made by his father, the estates devolved upon William de