{149b} Ayen-bite of Inwyt, by Dan Michel (Early English Text Society), edited by R. Morris, Esq.

{151a} This being in a fragile condition was recently removed to the wall of the east end by the late Vicar, and forms a rather fine reredos.

{151b} The device on this stone was a cross, within a circle. On the four arms of the cross were the capital letters LXDISTVRA, and in the centre the letter E. Taking this letter as common to all four arms, we get Lex., Dei, Est, Vera; the law of God is true. A similar device is graven on one side of the font in Dunsby church, near Bourne.

{152a} Itner. Cur., vol. i., p. 88.

{152b} Monast., vol. i., p. 486.

{152c} Stikeswalde Prior. Monial Cistert. Collectanea, vol. i., p. 92.

{152d} The Rev. Thos. Cox, in his Lincolnshire, calls it a Gilbertine Priory, and Dugdale, in a second notice of it (vol. ii., 809), also places it among the Gilbertines. Further, Dr. Oliver, on what authority he does not state, says that the nuns were habited in a white tunic, with black scapulary (bands across the back and shoulders), and girdle, with a capacious hood, called a culla; whereas Dugdale has an engraving of a nun, in black cloak, under skirt, and culla. Probably they wore different attire on different occasions.

{153a} Leland, vol. i., p. 92.

{153b} Dugdale, vol. i., 486 ii., 809.

{153c} Within quite recent times a handsome satin pulpit cloth, embroidered with rich emblematical devices, was still in use in Scopwick church, some 6 miles from Woodhall.

{154a} Candlemas was one of the chief festivals, of which we now only retain the name; but in those days every family contributed its quota, or shot for wax.Oliver, p. 65, note 4.

{154b} Oliver, p. 67, note 8.

{154c} It is still on record that Queen Elizabeth, an ardent sportswoman, shot her four bucks before breakfast.

{154d} Placit. de quo Warrento, 22 Ed. I.

{154e} Matthew of Westminster, Flores Historiarum, p. 313.

{154f} Rot. Hund., p. 317.

{154g} Rot. Can. Reg., 6 Rich I.

{154h} Leland, Coll., vol. i.. 92.

{155a} The buildings of the Priory must have been on a large scale, as they covered several acres, and of great architectural beauty. Not one stone of them now remains upon another, but, as an ornament, outside the front door of a house in Horncastle, there stands a large boss, formerly in the Priory roof, from which branch off six concentric arches. It is about 2ft. in diameter, and most exquisitely carved with elaborate foliage. The writer has a photograph of it.

{155b} The Rev. James Alpass Penny, now Vicar of Wispington.

{156} Bedæ Martyrology, D. Kalend, Nov.

{157} Commem. of All Souls. Golden Legend, fol. 200.

{158} Maddisons Lincolnshire Wills, Series I., p. 32, No. 84.

{159} This collar disappeared about the year 1887, but has since been recovered.

{160} The Story of Two Noble Lives. Memorials of Charlotte, Countess Canning, and Louisa, Marchioness of Waterford, pp. 93, 95, 96.

{161a} It is said that Thistlewoods last words before mounting the scaffold, addressed to one executed with him, were Courage, brother, we shall soon learn the great secret.

{161b} The Story of Two Noble Lives, p. 187.

{161c} Compare Bucks., Buckinghamshire, Buckland, Buckhurst. Taylors Woods and Places, p, 321. Beechnuts, it should be remembered, were the chief food of the herds of swine, very numerous in olden times.

{162} A carucate is the extent cultivated by one plough in one year and a day (120 acres). Villeins were the lower class of labourers, living in the village; bordars a better class, living in cottages attached to the Manor House, and enjoying certain privileges. Soc-men were tenants of the lord, holding their tenures by rent or service of various kinds; i.e., freemen.

{165} I am indebted for these particulars to an account given by the Rev. J. A. Penny in Lincs. N. & Q., vol. iii., pp, 97201.

{166a} Among the questions asked at Monastic Visitations were, whether the monks were guilty of superstition, apostacy, treason or thieves, or coiners.MSS., Cott. Cleop. ii., 59. Henry, Prior of Tupholme, was said to be very ingenious in making false money.Monas. Anglic., ii., p. 269. Thompsons Boston, Append., p. 61.

{166b} Horn was much used for drinking vessels, spoons, hunting horns, the heads of walking sticks, etc.; and, by statutes of Edw. II. and IV., a Horners Guild was founded and protected by Charter. Thus the Priory might well ply a lucrative, if illicit, trade.

{168a} Monasticon, vol. i., 142.

{168b} Itin., vol. vi, p. 214.

{169a} Dugdales Mon., vol. ii., 848.

{169b} Quoted in Olivers Religious Houses on the Witham, p. 87, note 21, ed. 1846. The Venerable Bede relates that while Oswalds body remained outside the Abbey through a night, awaiting burial, protected by a tent, a pillar of light was seen reaching up from the waggon to heaven. The water in which his remains were washed was poured on the ground in a corner of the sacred place, and the soil which received it had the power to expel devils.Hist. vol. iii., c. xi.

{171} Among the monks of Bardney was one known as Richardus de Bardney, whose chronicles are preserved to this day (Anglia Sacra, II., 326). Among other curious items given by him is one recording the miraculous birth of Bishop Grossetete, so named from his great head. It reads thus, in something better than monkish Latin:

Impregnata parens patitur per somnia multum, Quod nihil in ventre sit, nisi grande caput; Et tam grande caput, et tanto robore forte, Quod puer ex utero fultus abit baculo.

Which may be done thus into English:

A mother, great with coming child, Much suffers in her dreams, That naught beyond a monster head Her inward burden seems. A head so huge, yet with such might Endowed, that at his birth, Supported on a wooden staff The infant issues forth.

{173} The account of this incident is also given in Gilda Aurifabrorum, by Chaffers, 66. King Charles seems to have made himself merry over his cups, with others beside the Lord Mayor. It is recorded that dining with Chief Justice Sir George Jeffreys, the sovereign found his lordships wine so good that he drank to him seven times.Verny, Memoirs, vol. iv., p. 234

{175} Early in this chapter.

{176} Religious Houses on the Witham, Appendix, p. 167, note 46.

{178} Bull-baiting was in vogue at Stamford in this county as early as the reign of King John, 1209, and continued till 1839.

A bill against the sport was introduced into the House of Commons, May 24th, 1802, but was rejected, mainly through the influence of Mr. Wyndham, who used some curious arguments in favour of the sport. It has since been made illegal, through the instrumentality of the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, established 1824. At one time many towns, and even villages, practised the sport. Strutt, Sports (p. 277), says many of the rings remain at the present time (1780.)

{179} Liberty to hold an annual fair, two days before the Eve of St. Barnabas, and to continue eight days, was granted by Henry III. by charter, to Ralph de Rhodes, Lord of the Manor. This is the present June Fair. A. second charter, granted by the same king, empowered the Lord of the Manor to hold an annual fair, to commence on the Eve of the Feast of St. Lawrence, and to continue seven days. This is the great August Fair, once perhaps the largest in the world, though now greatly reduced. Our third, or October, Fair was removed to Horncastle from Market Stainton, where it was a Statute Fair, in 1768.

{180} The institution of Bough-houses at fairs was not confined to Horncastle. By Act of Parliament (35 George III., c. 113, s. 17) an exception was made to the general rule of a license being required for the sale of beer, that at fair-time any one hanging a bough at their door, and thus constituting the house a booth, might sell beer without a license. It prevailed at Pershore, with the sanction of the magistrates, as late as 1863; also at Bridgewater, Church Staunton, and Newton Poppleford (Notes and Queries, 3rd series, vol. iv., pp. 141 and 258). Hence we find at Carmarthen, the principal hotel named The Ivy Bush; and at Carlisle, in English Street, there is a coaching inn called The Bush. (On the track of the Mail Coach, by J. E. Baines, p. 226). There is also a Bush Hotel at Farnham. In out-of-the-way parts of Germany, as in the Upper Eisel District, at the village feast called Kirmess a bough is hung out at a house door to shew that refreshment may be obtained there. (Field, Forest, and Fell, by J. A. Owen, p. 74). Of the existence of similar houses at an early period in England, we have evidence in Chaucers Canterbury Tales. There were ale-houses on the country road-sides, marked by a pole projecting over the door; and as the pilgrims rode along, the Pardoner would not begin his tale till he had stopped to refresh himself,

But first, quod he, her, at thys ale-stake, I will both drynke, and biten at a cake.

Jusseraud, in his Wayfaring life of 14th century, gives a sketch of such a Bow-house from a XIV. century illuminated MS.

{181} This peculiar and ready mode of dissolving the bond of wedlock was not uncommon in former times; but I have a note of a similar transaction occurring in or near Scarborough in a quite recent year; and in 1898 (Nov. 18) a case came before Mr. Justice Kekewich, in the Chancery Court, when it was found that one of the parties concerned, before leaving this country for Australia, had sold his wife for £250.

{183} Abbey and Overton, Church of England in the 18th Century, quoted Church Folklore, by J. E. Vaux, p. 2.

{184} Literæ Laureatæ; or, the Poems of John Brown, the Horncastle Laureate. Edited by J. Conway Walter.

{188a} Other Roman mazes have been found in Lincolnshire at Alkborough, as well as at Louth and Appleby; at Wing, in Rutlandshire; at Sneinton and Clifton, in Notts.; at Hilton, in Hunts.; and many other places. The one at Hilton is also called Julians Bower. Views of the plans of some are given in the Architectural Societys Journal (Yorkshire), vol. iv., pp. 251268. I shall go into this subject again further on, in dealing with Troy wood, at Coningsby.

{188b} Architect. Soc. Journ, vol. iv., p. 200.

{188c} Stukeley, Itin. Curios. p. 91.

{188d} At Helston, in Cornwall, on May 8th, a procession of young persons marches through the town, decked with flowers; and the day is called Flurry-day, doubtless a corruption of the Roman Floralia.

{188e} The Vikings of Western Christendom, by C. F. Keary, p. 52.

{188f} History of Horncastle, p. 27.

{188g} Collectanea, vol. ii, p. 509.

{190} In the Memoirs of the Verney Family, Vol. i., it is stated that the Kings army were raw levies, pressed by force at short notice, ill fed and ill clothed. The Verneys relative, Dr. Denton, present with the forces, writes, Our men are very rawe, our armes, of all sorts, naught, our vittle scarce, and provision for horses worse (p. 315). Sir Jacob Astley writes, his recruits have neither colours nor halberts; and he has to receive all the arch knaves of the kingdom, who beat their officers and break open prisons. Edmund Verney writes, We have 6 weeks pay due, and unless there be some speedy payment, you may expect to hear that our souldyers are in a mutiny; they are notable sheep stealers already. Many had only rude pykes and lances; few who had a musket had a sword as well. Pistols and matchlocks were scarce. Old armour, which had hung in churches and manor houses, was used over again (pp. 109116).

{192a} Walkers Sufferings of the Clergy, pt. ii, pp. 252, 253.

{192b} Chancery Inquis., p. mort, 8 Ric. II, No. 99.

{193c} Some of these fragments were taken by Mr. Stanhope to Revesby Abbey. Two of them stand in the writers garden, at Langton Rectory.

{193} Cl. Rot., 13 Hen III., given in Lincs. N. & Q., vol. i, p. 49. From a very early period churches and churchyards were regarded as so sacred that a criminal, having reached one of these, like the Biblical cities of refuge, could not be disturbed. On the north door of Durham Cathedral there is a ponderous bronze knocker-ring, to which the criminal, clinging, was safe. There is another at Hexham, and at St. Gregorys, Norwich. At Westminster, Worcester, Croyland, Tintern, and many other places, there was the same privilege. In Beverley Minster there is a remarkable stone called the Frith-stool, because it freeth the criminal from pursuit. It is recorded that in 1325 ten men escaped from Newgate, four of them to the Church of St. Sepulchre, and one to St. Brides. Nicholas de Porter joined in dragging a man from Sanctuary, who was afterwards executed. But this act was itself so great an offence, that he only obtained pardon through the Papal Nuncio, on doing penance in his shirt and bare head and feet in the church porch, on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday in Whitsun week. A result, however, of the abuse of Sanctuary was, that churches being so numerous over the country, criminals could always obtain a refuge, and the roads became infested with highwaymen. Henry VIII. passed Acts curtailing the privilege, and it was finally abolished by James I., 1624New Quarterly Mag., Jan., 1880. Et alibi.

{194a} Collectanea, vol. ii., p. 300.

{194b} Although these events happened more than 250 years ago, it does not require many links to connect that day with the present. The writer was informed, at the time he was putting these records together, that a man named John Barber died in Horncastle, aged 95, in the year 1855 or 1856, whose grandfather remembered Oliver Cromwell sleeping in the above-named house, then a mud and stud structure, on the night before Winceby fight. In the Register of West Barkwith is recorded the burial of Nicholas Vickers in 1719, who guided Cromwell over Market Rasen Moor after the battle. Cromwell may well, therefore, have returned to the same house at Horncastle before proceeding northward by Market Rasen.

{196a} Monasticon, p. 45.

{196b} History of the House of Marmion, p. 18.

{197a} Berewick is a hamlet or minor manor attached to a larger. The word strictly means cornland (bere, or barley). This Dispenser, as his name (Latin Dispensator) implies, was steward to the Conqueror. His descendants were the Despensers, Earls of Gloucester. He was brother to the Earl Montgomery. Being a powerful man, he forcibly seized the lordship of Elmley from the monks of Worcester. At the time of Domesday he held 15 manors in Lincolnshire, seventeen in Leicester, four in Warwickshire, &c.

{197b} Maddisons Wills, series i., p. 360, No. 96.

{198} In a note on the Will, Mr. Maddison says, The testator was the second son of Robert Dighton (of Sturton), by his wife, Joyce St. Paul (a lady of another very old and well-connected county family).

{199a} Land Revenue Records, bundle 1392, file 79, Pub. Rec. Off.

{199b} Norths Church Bells of Lincolnshire, p. 497, ed. 1882.

{200a} There are still Willoughbys in the neighbourhood, and one living in Langton.

{200b} There are, however, several modern spires since this saying came into vogue, twoat Horsington and Wispingtonbeing within sight from Woodhall, and a third at Sausthorpe near Spilsby, a very fine one, designed by Mr. Stephen Lewin, who was the architect of St. Andrews Church, Woodhall Spa.

{201} Gov. Geol. Survey, Country round Lincoln, p. 205.

{204} He was supposed to have been asleep in the train, and hearing the name of the station called out, he aroused himself too slowly, and stepped out of the carriage when the train had passed 80 yards or more beyond the platform. He was discovered an hour or more afterwards by a railway servant, who walked down the line. He was conveyed to his residence at Horncastle, but never recovered the sense of feeling below his neck. The present writer frequently read to him in his illness. After some weeks he regained a slight power of movement in his feet, which gave hopes of recovery; but soon after this, his attendant, on visiting him, found him dead in his bed.

{205a} Blomfield, Hist. of Norfolk, vol. iii., p. 187.

{205b} Dugdales Baronage, vol. i., p. 439.

{208a} This list was published by T. C. Noble.

{208b} Architect. Soc. Journ., vol. xxxiii, pt. i, pp. 122 and 132.

{208c} Locally pronounced Screelsby, and even on one of the family monuments in the church we find, the Honourable Charles Dymoke, Esquire, of Scrielsby, died 17 January, 1702.

{209a} Weirs History, p. 63.

{209b} This is referred to in the old book, Court Hand Restored, by Andrew Wright of the Inner Temple (1773) p. 48. where, among a list of canting titles of different families, we find a note, de umbrosa quercu, Dimoak. This ancient family have performed the office of Champion to the Kings of England ever since the coronation of Richard II., as holding the manor of Scrivelsby hereditarily, from the Marmyons of Lincolnshire, by Grand Sergeantry, so adjudged, M. 1. Henry VIth. The umbrosa quercus, or shadowy oak, represented a play upon the two syllables dim-oak. The term Rebus is from the Latin rebus, by things, because it is a name-device, the representation of a name by objects. On this principle the crest of Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam, was a boar. The boar is also found in the arms of Swinburne, Swinton, Swinney, &c. An old poem says,

Whilst Bacon was but bacon, had he fearde, He long ere this had proved but larde; But he, instead of larde, must be a lord, And so grew leane, and was not fit for boarde.

And, again, we find,

There needed not to blazon forth the Swinton, His ancient burgonet the boar; &c.

Cambridge Portfolio, vol. i., pp. 233, 234.

This may be a convenient place to discuss the origin of the name Dymock. Walford (Tales of Great Families) says the name is Welsh, being a contraction of Daimadoc, which means David Madoc. He was a descendant of Owen Tudor, Lord of Hereford and Whittington. This chief had three sons; the second married a daughter of the Prince of North Wales, half a century before the Conquest, and was ancestor of David ap Madoc; Dai-Madoc, in course of time, shrinking into Daimoc, or Dymoke. Burke says that the John Dymoke who married Margaret de Ludlow, granddaughter of Philip de Marmion, was a knight of ancient Gloucestershire ancestry, and there is a village of Dymock, near Gloucester. A Welsh origin is likely, as there were Dymokes of Pentre in Wales; the Lady Margaret de Ludlow, who married Sir John Dymoke of Scrivelsby, took her title from Ludlow in the adjoining county of Salop. And another Welsh origin of the name has been suggested. Ty, pronounced Dy in Welsh, means house; moch means swine; and so Dymoke would mean Swinehouse, after the fashion of Swynburne, Swinhop, Swineshead; all old names. The motto of the Dymokes, adopted at a later date, Pro Rege Dimico, I fight for the King, is again a case, though most appropriate, of a canting motto.

{211} I am indebted, for these details, to that very interesting work, Walfords Tales of Great Families.

{212a} Words of Wellington, by Sir William Fraser, Bart., pp. 4144. The Gentlemans Magazine for 1821 contains a picture of Sir H. Dymoke, riding on his white charger into Westminster Hall, supported on either side by the Duke of Wellington and Marquis of Anglesey, on horseback; and two Heralds, with tabards and plumes, on foot.

{212b} (a) sword, (b) girdle, (c) scabbard, (d) partisans, i.e. halberts, (e) gilt, (f) pole-axe, an ancient weapon, having a handle, with an iron head, on the one side forming an axe, and the other side a hammer; this, in the hands of a strong man was a fatal instrument of destruction; (g) the chasing staff was a gilt wand of office carried before the Champion, to clear the way, (h) a pair of gilt spurs.

{215} Had we continued on the road skirting the Park and passing within 150 yards of Scrivelsby church, we should have presently reached the village of Moorby, with a modern brick church, but having a remarkable old font, and part of an uncommon minstril column; thence, turning westward, we might have passed through Wood Enderby, with modern church of sandstone; and so have reached Haltham, our next stage; but this route must be considered as rather beyond a walk or drive from Woodhall Spa, although it would repay the energetic visitor to take it.

{216} This description is mainly taken from an account given by the Rev. J. A. Penny in Linc. N. & Q. vol. iv., pp. 161164.

{217} Lincs. N. & Q., vol. iii., pp. 245, 246. It may be remarked that this kind of tenure is not so uncommon as has been supposed. In an old undated Deed, but of the time of Richard I., William, Clerk of Hameringham, a parish within four miles of Haltham, makes a grant of land to the monks of Revesby on condition of their providing him and his heirs annually at Michaelmas a pair of spurs. Blount (Tenures of Land and Customs of Manors, pp. 115, 237) mentions similar tenures in Notts. and Kent (Lincs. N. A Q., vol. i., p. 256). There is a peculiarity about these two spur tenures in our neighbourhood worthy of note. An old chronicler says that, when the freebooters larder got low, his wife had only to put a pair of spurs in his platter, as a hint that he must issue forth to replenish it. We can, without any great stretch of imagination, picture to ourselves the knight, Ralph de Rhodes, making an inroad on a neighbours soil, and therefore the annual gift of spurs would be acceptable, for himself or his men. But to the country parson we can hardly deem such a gift appropriate. He could scarcely be a clerk of St. Nicholas, as well as clerk of his benefice; and even were he always to make the round of his parish on horseback, his spurs would hardly need yearly renewal.

{218} The Saxon is Cyning; the Danish Koning, and Konge; English King. In not a few cases history records the occasion when the kings presence gave the name; as at Kingston-on-Thames, where there is a stone, still carefully preserved, on which the Saxon kings sat to be crowned. Kings-gate, in the Isle of Thanet, is the spot where Charles II. landed at the Restoration. The manor of Hull (Kingston-on-Hull) was purchased by Edward I., and Kings Lynn, Lyme Regis, Conington, Cunningham, Coney-garth, Coningsby, all tell the same tale. They perpetuate their respect for Royalty in the very name they took.Taylor, Words and Places, pp. 201, 203.

{219a} Lord Coningsby had two sons, Humphrey and Ferdinand, whose baptisms are entered in the register of Bodisham, or Bodenham, Herefordshire, with dates 16 Feb., 16812, and 6 May, 1683.Lincs. N. & Q., vol. iii, p. 24.

{219b} Sac means the power to hear causes, levy fines, &c.; soc is the district over which he had this power. Mansion, according to Bracton, is a dwelling-House consisting of one or more tenements.

{220a} Britannia, p. 742. His name, as Terrius de Bevra, (Bevere, or Bever-lee in Holderness), he holding the Seigniory of that country, appears among the Milites Flandriæ in the rolls of Ban and Arriere Ban, in the time of Philip Augustus. To show that he was of a somewhat overbearing spirit, it is related of him, that the Conqueror, having bestowed upon him the lordship of Holderness, he was not content with that, but claimed all the land held by the church of St. John (now the Minster) at Beverley, with which it had been endowed by the King.

{220b} Linc. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 10 and 108.

{220c} Ibid., pp. 141, 142.

{220d} Ibid., p. 228.

{221a} Linc. N. & Q., vol. iii., pp. 245, 246.

{221b} Ibid., p. 150. The above Burgavenny should be Abergavenny, in South Wales, but both forms were used.

{222} A similar thoroughfare formerly existed through the tower of the old All Saints Church at Cambridge, and there is still one through the tower of the church at March.

{223} In the church at Walton-on-Thames there is preserved in the vestry, a scolds bridle: two flat steel bands, which go over the head, face, and round the nose, with a flat piece going into the mouth and fixing the tongue. It locks at the back of the head. It bears this inscription:

Chester presents Walton with a bridle To curb womens tongues that be idle;

the said Chester being, it is said, a man who lost money through a talkative woman of Walton. An engraving of a brancks is given in the volume of the Archæological Institute for 1848, p. 211. It was exhibited, by Col. Jarvis of Doddington, at Lincoln, on the visit of the Institute to that city.

{228} River names, as Taylor, in his Words and Places (p. 130), tells us, are almost invariably of Celtic, i.e. British, origin. Ban means bright, or clear, and is found not only in our Bain, but in several other rivers. There is a Bain in Hertfordshire, a Ben in Co. Mayo, Bandon in Co. Cork, Bann in Co. Wexford, Bana Co. Down, Bannon (or Ban-avon) in Pembrokeshire, Banney in Yorkshire, &c.

{229a} Britannia, pp. 470, 471.

{229b} The name de Albini, corrupted into Daubeny survives, as a family name, and as a place-name in many localities. In the writers own parish there is a field called Daubneys Walk, and a small stream named Daubneys Beck.

{229c} The Patent Roll, 15 Henry III., m. 2, gives this: Pro Roberto de TatteshaleRex concessit Roberto de Tatteshale quod libere et sine impedimento unam domum de petra et calce firmari faciat apud manerium suum de Tatteshal. In cujus &c, teste Rege, apud Hereford xxj die Maii. Et mandatum est vicecomiti Linc. per literas clauses quod ipsam dictam domum firmare permittat sicut prædictum est; teste ut supra.

{230} Itin., p. 162.

{231a} See Proceedings of Essex Archæol. Society, vol. iv.; and Beauties of England, vol. x., p. 285.

{231b} Beauties of EnglandSussex, vol. xiv., p. 205.

{231c} A ground-plan of the castle and its precincts is given in a Selection of Papers of the Lincolnshire Topographical Society, 1841, 1812, printed by W. & B. Brooke, Lincoln; and a full description is given by the late Bishop Suffragan, E. Trollope, in the Architectural Societys Journal, 1858, in a Paper on The Use and Abuse of Red Bricks.

{232} Mr. H. Preston, F.G.S., of Grantham, examined these on the visit of the Linc. Naturalists Union to Tumby in the autumn of 1898, and gave this as his opinion.

{233} Allen, in his History of Lincolnshire, states that these conical roofs remained in the thirties, but they were there at least ten years later, to the writers own knowledge.

{236} At Revesby there is St. Sythes Lawn, where the Abbot of that monastery used to reside, and some of the carving from his residence is still preserved in the very handsome new church erected there by the late Right Honourable E. Stanhope. In Mells church, Somerset, in the coloured glass of a window, St. Sitha is also represented with two keys in one hand and three loaves in the other. She was slain by the Danes about A.D. 870. (Archæol. Journal, No. 6, June, 1845).

{238} Toll-bars are not always so successfully negotiated. The writer, when at Cambridge, had three college acquaintances who, on one occasioncontra legesattended Newmarket races. Riding home in the dusk, they found the toll-bar closed, and charged it. The first of them cleared it successfully; the second, rather a bulky man, rode at it, but the horse stopped short and he himself shot over, without it. The third took the gate, but the horse and rider fell together, and he was carried into the bar-house insensible, to be presently found there, and taken home by the Proctor, who had been looking for them. He, however, proved a friend in need and in deed, for he kept council, and did not divulge the incident. A future clergyman, afterwards residing in this neighbourhood, attempted the same feat, but suffered for it ever afterwards. A screw was left loose in his cranium, and he might sometimes be seen riding along the ditches by the roadside rather than on the road itself. His horse, however, and he, as should always be the case, thoroughly understood each other, and did not fall out, or in.

{239a} Quarterly Review, July, 1891, p. 127.

{239b} A volume was published by the Lincolnshire Architectural Society, in 1846 (J. H. Parker, Oxford), which gives a History of the Architecture of the Abbey Chapel, now standing. Dr. Oliver, also, in his Religious Houses on the Witham, gives a very interesting history of the Abbey. Both these books are now scarce.

{240a} MS. Vespasian E. xviii, in British Museum: quoted Architect. Soc. Journ., 1895, p. 109.

{240b} Harlevan MS., No. 4127.

{240c} Quoted from the Fenmans Vade Mecum.

{241a} Placitum de quo Warranto, p. 401.

{241b} Quoted Olivers Religious Houses, pp. 77, 78.

{241c} Hundred Rolls, p. 317.

{241d} Ibid., p. 365.

{241e} Ibid., p. 299.

{241f} Placit de quo Warranto, p. 404.

{241g} Hundred Rolls, p. 317.

{241h} For the years 1281 to 1301.

{241i} Letter from Rev. R. W. Sibthorpe to Dr. Bloxham, Life of Sibthorpe, (1880), p. 138.

{242} Stukeley, Itin. Cur., p. 29. The pageants of Corpus Christi day are described by Dugdale, and in the Northumberland Household Book, 1512.

{243a} Acta Regia. Quoted by Oliver, Religious Houses, p. 52, note 68. The corruption which was gradually eating its way into the monastic life came, in some cases, to be felt by those who were admitted to their intimacy. The author of a poem contemporary with Chaucer, in the 14th century, says,

I was a friere ful many a day, Therefor the soth I wot; But when I saw that their lyvinge Accorded not to their prechynge, Of I cast my friere clothynge, And wyghtly went my way.

Quoted, Jusserauds Way-faring Life of 14th Century.

{243b} Cottonian MS. Cleopatra, E.

{244a} Cowper, The Task, 1. 206.

{244b} Quarterly Review, July, 1891, p. 126.

{246} Referring to these portions of screen, Mr. G. E. Jeans, author of Murrays Handbook to Lincolnshire, says Kirkstead Abbey, most valuable Early English screen, one of the earliest in England (Lincs. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 91). Also Dr. Mansel Sympson, in a Paper on Lincolnshire Rood Screens, read before the Architectural Society, June, 1890, goes into further detail. He says, It is composed of 13 bays. Each bay consists of a lancet-headed trefoil, supported by octagonal pillars, with moulded capitals and bases . . . total height 2ft. 9in. Some screen-work exists in Rochester Cathedral of exactly the same character. And the late Mr. Bloxam gave a drawing of a similar specimen in Thurcaston Church, Leicestershire. That at Stanton Harcourt, Oxfordshire, is not quite similar, and is 40 or 50 years later (1260); so that we may be proud of possessing, at Kirkstead, almost the oldest fragment of work, in this particular line, in the country. (Architect. Soc. Journ., 1890, pp. 198, 199).

{247} See Archæological Journal, vol. xl., p. 296.

{249} Vol. i., p. 286, 1886.

{250a} Col. Richard Ellison, of Boultham, in a poem, entitled Kirkstead; or, The Pleasures of Shooting, printed by Painter, 342 Strand, London, 1837.

{250b} The concluding words of Mr. Hartshornes Paper quoted above.

{251} A photo of the writer in this attitude, in Alpine costume, hat and alpenstock in hand, and with the sweat of his brow still glistening from a mountain climb, has been exhibited at more than one lantern-illustrated lecture.

{254} Archæol. Journ., No. 7, Sept., 1845, p. 353; and Saunders Hist. Linc., vol. ii., pp. 170, 171.

{255} Sir Charles Anderson says Tennysons Northern Farmer, excepting his yal for ale, is a failure. (Pocket Guide to Lincoln, p. 17).

{256} Tennyson Land, by J. Cumming Walters, note p. 79. Less than a mile away there is a saline spring, in the adjoining parish of Salmonby, said to be similar in its properties to the Tunbridge Wells water, but stronger. (Saunders Hist. Linc. vol. ii., p. 178).

{257} One of these slabs has the inscription, Orate pro anima Albini de Enderby qui fecit fieri istam ecclesiam cum campanile, qui obiit in Vigillia Sancti Matthie Apostoli, Anno MCCCCVII. The other has, in Norman-French, Thomas Enderby, et Loues sa feme gysont yey dieux de lour aimees pour sa grace eyt mercy. A nearly similar inscription runs round the cross-legged figure of a knight on an incised slab in the church of St. Brides, Glamorganshire, Iohan: Le; Botiler: git: ici: Deu: De: Sa: Alme: Ait: merci: Amen.Archæolog. Journal, No. viii., p. 383.

{259} Harleyan MSS. No. 6829. Saunders Hist. Lincs., vol. ii., p. 173.

{260} Col. Ellison of Boultham, author of the poem Kirkstead; or, The Pleasures of Shooting, Preface, Painter, 342 Strand, 1837. A book now out of print.

THE END