Cylchgronau Cymru

THE CAMBRIAN JOURNAL. A LB AN ^%v !$#^ ELVED. (autumnal equinox.) LETTERS RELATING TO THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION IN WALES. [From MSS. in the British Museum.] I. LETTER OF WILLIAM BARLOW1 TO SECRETARY CROMWELL. Pleaseth your good Mastership with compassion to advertise the complaint and unfeigned petition of your 1 William Barlow, the writer of this letter, was not a Welshman, but a native of Essex. He was Prior of Haverfordwest, where, in a meadow on the banks of the Cleddau, a Priory of Black Canons had been founded by the Norman settler, Robert de Hwlfordd, the son of Richard Fitz-Tancred, castellan to Gilbert de Clare, first Earl of Pembroke. A portion of the ruins of the priory is still con¬ spicuous near the river. In the latter part of 1535 Barlow, who had previously removed from Haverfordwest to Bisham, in Berkshire, was raised to the bishopric of St. Asaph, from which, in a short time, he was translated to the see of St. David's, which he held for thirteen years. For an account of his infamous conduct in damaging the episcopal palace at St. David's, and in plundering the diocese to apportion his five daughters to five prelates, see Browne Willis's Survey of the Cathedral Church of St. David's, pp. 49, 120.—G. CAMB. JOUR., 1864. * U