In some places, for example at Edmundsbury, there were certain women employed at times by the monastery for the making of pastry, etc., called _pudding-wives_. They had a house or chamber near at hand to the kitchen, called the "Pudding-house." These women were chosen by the larderer with the assent of the chief cook; they lived in the neighbourhood and came up to the outer kitchen offices when their services were required. Great care was taken in the selection of these servants, and it was directed that they "be always married, sober, of good repute and honest, that all danger of detraction from evil tongues be avoided." At all times when animals were slaughtered, in particular about St. Martin's Day, and when pigs were being killed, the services of these women were required to make black puddings. At other times, if the cook desired, they were to be ready to make pasties and other things which seemed to require the gentler touch of a female hand. Among the women servants there were, of course, also laundresses for the washing of the clothes of the community, and others for the infirmary, the guest-hall, and the church linen. All these were selected with care and upon the same principles which guided the selection of the above-mentioned pudding-wives.
The various Orders existing in England in pre-Reformation days may be classified under four headings: (1) Monks, (2) Canons Regular, (3) Military Orders, and (4) Friars. As regards the nuns, most of the houses were affiliated to one or other of the above-named Orders.
St. Benedict, justly called the Patriarch of Western Monachism, established his rule of life in Italy; first at Subiaco and subsequently at Monte Cassino about A.D. 529. The design of his code was, like every other rule of regular life, to enable men to reach the higher Christian ideals by the helps afforded them in a well-regulated monastery. According to the saint's original conception, the houses were to be separate families independent of each other. It was no part of his scheme to establish a corporation with branches in various localities and countries, or to found an "Order" in its modern sense. By its own inherent excellence and because of the sound common-sense which pervades it, the Rule of St. Benedict at once began to take root in the monasteries of the West, till it quickly superseded any others then in existence. Owing to its broad and elastic character, and hardly less, probably, to the fact that adopting it did not imply the joining of any stereotyped form of Order, monasteries could, and in fact did, embrace this code without entirely breaking with their past traditions. Thus, side by side in the same religious house, we find that the rule of St. Columba was observed with that of St. Benedict until the greater practical sense of the latter code superseded the more rigid legislation of the former. Within a comparatively short time from the death of St. Benedict in A.D. 543, the Benedictine became the recognised form of Western regular life. To this end the action of Pope St. Gregory the Great and his high approval of St. Benedict's Rule greatly conduced. In his opinion it manifested no common wisdom in its provisions, which were dictated by a marvellous insight into human nature and by a knowledge of the best possible conditions for attaining the end of all monastic life, the perfect love of God and of man. Whilst not in any way lax in its provisions, it did not prescribe an asceticism which could be practised only by the few; whilst the most ample powers were given to the superior to adapt the regulations to all circumstances of times and places; thus making it applicable to every form of the higher Christian life, from the secluded cloister to that for which St. Gregory specially used those trained under it: the evangelisation of far-distant countries.
