About the year 1502, King Henry be-
gan that magnificent structure which is
now generally called by his name; for this
purpose, he pulled down the chapel of
Henry III. already mentioned, and an ad-
joining house called the White Rose Ta-
vern; this chapel, like the former, he de-
dicated to the blessed Virgin, and design-
ing it for a burial place for himself and his
posterity, he carefully ordered in his will,
that none but those of royal blood should
be permitted to lie there.

At length on the general suppression of
religious houses, the Abbey was surren-
dered to Henry VIII. by William Benson,
the Abbot, and seventeen of the monks,
in the year 1539, when its revenues a-
mounted to 3977l. 6s. 4d. ¾ per annum, a
sum at least equal to 20,000l. a year at
present.  Besides its furniture, which was

The Abbey thus dissolved, that Prince
erected first into a college of secular Canons,
under the government of a Dean, an ho-
nour which he chose to confer on the last
Abbot.  This establishment, however, was
of no long duration, for two years after
he converted it into a bishopric, which was
dissolved nine years after by Edward VI.
who restored the government by a Dean,
which continued till Mary's accession to the
crown; when she, in 1557, restored it to
its ancient conventual state; but Queen
Elizabeth again ejected the monks, and in
1560 erected Westminster Abbey into a
college, under the government of a Dean,
and twelve secular Canons or Prebendaries,
a Schoolmaster, Usher, and forty Scholars,
denominated the Queen's, to be educated
in the liberal sciences preparatory to the
university, and to have all the necessaries