Note 65 — THE LITERARY ASSOCIATIONS OF DORSET

It is probable that Prior’s parents were Nonconformists. We are told that before a dissenting chapel was built in the town the people met for worship in a barn in the neighbouring hamlet of Cowgrove. To this Prior seems to allude in his epistle to Fleetwood Shepherd:

At pure Barn of loud Non-con Where with my granam I have gone.