again struck the church,
and great part of it was burned, and the bells melted, and many houses
in the town reduced to ashes.

The chapel of St. John the Evangelist was added by John De la Porte, the
twenty-seventh abbot, who died in 1334.

In 1350, a fresh injury was sustained from a tempest; but so great was
the zeal employed in repairing it, that the monastery is said to have
been, a very short time subsequently, in a better state than it had
almost ever been before: it raised its head, however, above these
misfortunes, only to experience new ones, and from the same source, in
1370. The damage was then greater, but was soon repaired; and the chapel
of St. Catherine was erected. This happened during the prelacy of
Geoffrey de Servin. Peter le Roy, the following abbot, is ranked among
the greatest benefactors to the convent: no one contributed more to the
diffusion of its fame, or the increase of learning within its precincts;
but he does not appear to have done any thing to its buildings. His
successor, Robert Jolivet, surrounded the mount with the walls and
towers that now remain, with the view of defending it against the
English, whom he afterwards joined.

In 1421, the whole roof of the choir fell in. The foundations of the new
choir, the remains of which are now standing, were laid by the Cardinal
d'Estouteville, in 1452; and he continued the work till his death,
which happened thirty years afterwards. During his prelacy, the chapels
of the choir were completed, and roofed with lead; and the choir and the
columns that surround the high altar, were raised to the height of the
chapels.

In 1509, another accident arose from lightning: the steeple, and the
bells, and the wood-work of the nave, were destroyed; but the damage was
soon repaired by William de Lamps, then abbot, who also built the
abbatial palace and alms-house, and raised the part of the church that
was unfinished, as high as the second tier of windows.--The choir was
completed under the prelacy of his brother, John de Lamps, who was next
but one to him in the succession, and wore the mitre from 1513 to 1523.

From that time forward, till the period of the revolution, the abbacy of
St. Michael's Mount was held in commendam; and the abbots, regardless of
a charge in which they did not feel themselves personally concerned,
ceased to bestow care or expense upon the buildings. Some of them even
refused to do the necessary repairs; and more than one inst