parish contributed £42 3s. to the new Priory -- in all, £75 15s. 1d. St. Michael's paid £8 2s. 2d. only, or less than one-ninth : 250 years before it was rated at double. In 1544 Henry made Seaford a corporate body, consisting of bailiff and commonalty, to induce that ancient limb of Hastings to furnish somewhat more than five-fourths of a ship. In his charter, he says " the town of Hastings . . . . . one of the greatest of the ancient towns of the Ports aforesaid, and near the sea -- where the entrance of our enemies and rebels may soonest appear, is by the flux and reflux of the sea, and by conflagrations there often committed by such our enemies, not only of lands and tenements, but also of the inhabitants, there so reduced to waste, destruction , and poverty, that the said town, or the barons and honest men of the same, are not sufficient to find their part of such shipping to us, and our heirs, as they ought of their own strength , without their insupportable expenses." [1].
The connection with the Abbot of Fecamp was finally severed on the dissolution of the alien priories. This was a time of change. The discovery of the New World , and the doubling of the Cape of Good Hope, brought into existence ships of much greater burthen, and drawing more water, than those which had hitherto served for commerce and warfare in the narrow seas ; the largest ship of the old navy of the Cinque Ports was but 80 tons-- whereas, from this time, ships of 1000 tons began to be built. The havens which had sufficient depth for such small craft, -
- ↑ Horsfield i, 278.
