catastrophe, that accidents of a similar nature may be avoided through
this calamity allotted to us. On the day above mentioned, which was
very destructive to us, a vile plumber, with his two workmen, burnt our
church whilst soldering up two holes in the old lead with fresh pewter.
For some days he had already, with a wicked disposition, commenced, and
placed his iron crucibles, along with charcoal and fire, on rubbish, or
steps of a great height, upon dry wood with some turf and other
combustibles. About noon (in the cross, in the body of the church,
where he remained at his work until after Mass) he descended before the
procession of the convent, thinking that the fire had been put out by
his workmen. They, however, came down quickly after him, without having
completely extinguished the fire; and the fire among the charcoal
revived, and partly from the heat of the iron, and partly from the
sparks of the charcoal, the fire spread itself to the wood and other
combustibles beneath. After the fire was thus commenced, the lead
melted, and the joists upon the beams ignited; and then the fire
increased prodigiously, and consumed everything.' Hemingburgh concludes
by saying that all that they could get from the culprits was the
exclamation, 'Quid potui ego?' Shortly after this disaster the Prior
and convent wrote to Edward II., excusing themselves from granting a
corrody owing to their great losses through the burning of the
monastery, as well as the destruction of their property by the Scots.
But Guisborough, next to Fountains, was almost the richest
establishment in Yorkshire, and thus in a few years' time there arose
from the Norman foundations a stately church and convent built in the
Early Decorated style.

One of the most interesting relics of the great priory is the
altar-tomb, believed to be that of Robert de Brus of Annandale. The
stone slabs are now built into the walls on each side of the porch of