OUR
 
 GLIMPSES OF OUR ANCESTORS IN SUSSEX.
 
 GLIMPSES 
 
 OF 
 
 OUR ANCESTORS IN SUSSEX; 
 
 WITH 
 
 SKETCHES OF SUSSEX CHARACTERS, 
 REMARKABLE INCIDENTS, &c. 
 
 CHARLES FLEET, 
 
 Author of "Tales and Sketches," "The City Merchant" 
 
 " I have some rights of memory in this 'County,' 
 Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me." 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 LEWES : 
 
 FARNCOMBE Si CO., PRINTERS, "EAST SUSSEX NEWS" OFFICES. 
 
 1882.
 
 FARNCOMBE AND Co., PRINTERS, LEWES.
 
 Stack 
 Annex 
 
 76 
 Sffi 
 
 /rw. 
 
 PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
 
 [HE contents of this Volume appeared in the 
 columns of the BRIGHTON HERALD in the 
 years 1 875-6-7, under the title of "GLIMPSES 
 OF OUR ANCESTORS," and the Author of them is 
 induced to re-publish them in their present form by 
 the frequent applications which have been made for 
 the numbers of the Journal containing them. With 
 the hope that they may help to fill up a gap or two in 
 the history of Men and Manners in his native County, 
 and with full acknowledgment of the large debt he 
 owes, in respect to the matter of several Papers, to 
 the contributors to the Collections of the Sussex 
 Archaeological Society especially to his old and 
 esteemed friends, the late Mark Anthony Lower and 
 William Durrant Cooper he commits his work to the 
 indulgent consideration of the Public.
 
 PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 [HE rapid sale of the First Edition of this 
 work, and the very favorable notices which 
 it drew from the Metropolitan and Local 
 Press, explain the re-appearance of " GLIMPSES OF 
 OUR ANCESTORS IN SUSSEX " in its new, and, the 
 Author ventures to think, improved form. Some few 
 additions have also been made to it and some errors 
 corrected ; and he trusts that the continued patronage 
 of the Public will re-pay the Publishers for the care 
 they have bestowed and the expense incurred on this 
 Second Edition of " GLIMPSES OF OUR ANCESTORS 
 IN SUSSEX."
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 1. THE SUSSEX DIARISTS I 
 
 2. THE SUSSEX IRONMASTERS 63 
 
 3. THE SUSSEX SMUGGLERS 72 
 
 4. THE SOUTHDOWN SHEPHERD 87 
 
 5. THE SUSSEX SHEEP-SHEARER 98 
 
 6. SUSSEX CHARACTERS : 
 
 THE SUSSEX COTTAGE- WIFE 105 
 
 THE OLD SUSSEX RADICAL 112 
 
 THE OLD SUSSEX TORY 119 
 
 THE SUSSEX COUNTRY DOCTOR 127 
 
 SELF-EDUCATED SUSSEX MEN 135 
 
 THE LAST OF THE SUSSEX M.C.'s 149 
 
 THE LAST OF His KIND 155 
 
 7. THE SUSSEX REGICIDES 163 
 
 8. SUSSEX TRAGEDIES AND ROMANCES . . . . i8S 
 
 9. SUSSEX POETS 226 
 
 10. SOCIAL CHANGES IN SUSSEX : 
 
 SERVANTS AND THEIR WAGES 271 
 
 SUSSEX ROADS 288 
 
 Music IN SUSSEX ............. 295
 
 GLIMPSES OF OUR ANCESTORS, &c. 
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 
 
 REAT changes material, political, social are 
 easily seen. They stand out on the surface. 
 Every body can discern the difference between 
 a railway and a highway; between Fielding's 
 Squire Western and the modern country gentle- 
 man. But there are other changes, scarcely less 
 important, which are not so easily to be noted : for instance, 
 between the men who carry on the general trade of country- 
 places in the present day and those who carried it on, say 100 
 years ago. That such a class as this has participated in the 
 changes which have been going on all over the country, who 
 will deny ? But who is to note the change ? Who to describe 
 it ? Who to draw the portrait of " the general trader" at one 
 end of the century and compare it with the lineal successor 
 of the same individual at the other? How rarely do we get 
 a correct delineation of such classes as these, or, indeed, of 
 any classes in country places. A Fielding will draw the 
 Squire and Parson, the fast young man and poacher and barber 
 of his day, and a Thackeray will do something in the same 
 way in his; but they select different classes and points of 
 view. The one takes the country the other the town.-- We 
 still miss the point of comparison. In fact, the country 
 is passing more and more out of the range of vision 'of
 
 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 writers of fiction; these writers live in towns, and naturally 
 describe what they see most of : that is, town manners. So, 
 perhaps, 100 years hence, our descendants will wonder what 
 kind of creature was the agricultural labourer, or even the 
 farmer, or small country tradesman of these days. And, unless 
 any of this class happen to have kept a diary, and this diary 
 shall happen to have been preserved, the feeling of wonder 
 will go unsatisfied ! 
 
 But " sufficient for the day is the evil thereof." Let us 
 make use of some of the material which other ages have pro- 
 vided for us, and endeavour to present, as much as possible in 
 their own language, some of the moral and social features 
 and characteristics of our forefathers to their successors of 
 the present day, beginning with The Sussex Diarists. 
 
 The range of the Sussex Diaries is from 1655 to 1750. 
 Previous to the earlier date, clerkly accomplishments were 
 rare except in the higher spheres of life, and it is not in that 
 sphere that diaries are to be found. The Duchess of New- 
 castle (who lived in the reign of the two Charles's) is an 
 exception to the rule ; but she was not a Sussex woman, nor 
 were the Fastens (whose letters, written during the Wars of 
 the Roses, may almost pass for diaries) a Sussex family. 
 Would that they had been! Sussex had its men of letters in 
 Andrew de la Borde, the original " Merry Andrew," and the 
 author of that "merry conceit," the "Wise Men of Gotham," 
 as also in Nicholas Culpepper, the author of the Herbal. 
 But neither of these men was a diarist. They were, perhaps, 
 too, occupied with other, and, as they thought, higher matters. 
 Men who keep diaries would seem, according to our Sussex 
 experience, to be " home-staying youths" men with a certain 
 amount of leisure, and whose minds are more active than 
 their bodies ; not engaged in great affairs for these engross 
 the mind and lead it from smaller details, such as make up 
 diaries, to the contemplation of greater results but men in 
 the middle ranks of life, to whom ordinary passing events, 
 such as occur in all civilized communities, possess an interest,
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 
 
 and are not as yet so insignificant as to be utterly unworthy 
 to be recorded. We are afraid that such is the case now ; 
 that diarists are an extinct class. They have been superseded 
 by the newspaper. Of what use, it may now be asked, for 
 individuals to chronicle events which it is the business of the 
 journalist to send forth to the world with all the authority of 
 official and verbatim reports? The notes of a Pepys or an 
 Evelyn would now only be partial and incorrect copies of the 
 Times or the Telegraph. No; the golden days of the English 
 diarists are gone; they extend from the period of the Reforma- 
 tion, when the middle ranks began to read and write, up to 
 the introduction of the newspaper. 
 
 All our Sussex diaries fall within that period, and they fill 
 up a most important gap in social history. We are afraid the 
 newspaper 'itself will not supply to coming ages that insight 
 into domestic life and manners that peep at personal pecu- 
 liarities at the little failings and the foibles of men their 
 peccadilloes and prejudices which we get in the diaries of 
 the Rev. Giles Moore, Rector of Horstead Keynes; Thomas 
 Turner, general shopkeeper, of East Hothly; Anthony Stapley, 
 Squire of Hickstead Place ; Walter Gale, schoolmaster, of 
 Mayfield ; Leonard Gale, ironmaster, of Worth ; Thomas 
 Marchant, yeoman, of "Little Park," Hurst; Counsellor 
 Timothy Burrell, of Cuckfield ; and Dr. Burton, of Oxford. 
 
 The names and avocations of the above list of Sussex 
 Diarists bear out our statement that it is the middle classes 
 that have been the largest contributors to this species of 
 literature, and not so much the noble, or rich, or learned, who 
 might be supposed to have most leisure for such occupation 
 not so much these as the ordinarily educated and intelligent 
 man, interested in his own and his neighbours' affairs, and 
 with business habits to which the keeping of a daily record 
 might be a help as well as a diversion. 
 
 It is to be regretted that no female diary has been dis- 
 covered, or published, in Sussex, which might give us a 
 glimpse of the ladies' side of the question ! In a description
 
 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 of the hall or refectory of an old English mansion it is said 
 that an aperture was left in the " bower" of the lady in the 
 upper story, through which she could hear the wise, and, 
 doubtless, sometimes the foolish things said by her lord when 
 he was feasting with his friends below. Now, a diary is just 
 such a peephole as this, through which the actions of one 
 generation are revealed to another; and, to be complete, the 
 lady should tell her story as well as the lord. But, unfortu- 
 nately, no lady thought of doing this in Sussex at least, if 
 kept, her record has not been found, and so we must be 
 content to take the evidence from the only party who puts in 
 an appearance, and that is the male. 
 
 The first witness whom we will call into Court is the Rev. 
 Giles Moore, Rector of Horstead Keynes, whose diary extends 
 from 1655 to 1679. He is methodical, frank, concise, and 
 good-tempered; in fact, has most of the good qualities of a 
 good diarist, and though we could have wished he had told 
 us a little about things more interesting than the price 
 he paid for his extinguishers, his bellows, his grate, the shoe- 
 ing of his horses, &c., &c., yet, as it was in order to chronicle 
 these items that he kept the diary, we must take the boon as 
 he gives it, and get as much instruction and information out 
 of it as we can. 
 
 The Rev. Giles Moore was, we are afraid, open to the charge 
 of "time-serving." He was one of those gentry called, in the 
 Commonwealth times, "Compounders;" and it was with his 
 own conscience, as well as with the Protector, Oliver Cromwell, 
 that he compounded. He was, in point of fact, a Royalist 
 and an Episcopalian. According to his own statement, he 
 was serving in the ranks of the Royalists (in what capacity he 
 does not say perhaps as Chaplain) when he was taken 
 prisoner by Essex's army. How long he remained so we do 
 not know; but in 1655 he was presented to the Rectory of 
 Horstead Keynes (then vacant by the death of Mr. James 
 Pell) by Mr. William Michelborne, of Broadhurst and Stanmer, 
 whom he calls his patron, and being admitted by "the
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 
 
 Commissioners for the approbation of Publique Preachers 
 sitting at Whitehall " (a body of men partly ministers, partly 
 laymen, appointed by Cromwell and his Council for the proper 
 filling-up of benefices in England and Wales), he " removed 
 fully and wholly from Lindfield to Horstead Canes" (sicj, 
 where he immediately commenced his diary (from February, 
 1655), and continued it up to within a few days of his death in 
 1679. It occupies 60 pages of the first volume of the Sussex 
 Archaeological Collections; and the greater part of the entries 
 relate to the price of things bought and sold, the amount of 
 tithe taken for lands, crops, &c., and the personal expenses 
 of the Rev. Giles Moore. 
 
 But ever and anon a fact crops up which helps to diversify 
 the otherwise dry and matter-of-fact character of the diary. 
 Thus, how business was carried on in Sussex more than 200 
 years ago may be guessed from the fact that the Rector 
 bought his "coverletts," blankets, bolsters, &c., of William 
 Clowson,* "upholsterer itinerant, living over against the 
 Crosse at Chichester, but who comes about the country with his 
 packs on horseback" This, in fact, was the way in which 
 business was chiefly carried on in Sussex in the iyth century. 
 The roads were too heavy for vehicles, and "packmen," who 
 rode on horseback, were the chief carriers of " dry goods." 
 Still, some of his heavier furniture Mr. Moore procured from 
 London, notably, "a bed, with purple rug, curtaines, &c., 
 which cost mee altogether /'ao. i6s. 7d." 
 
 If this was dear, house labour was cheap. To his man- 
 servant, Mr. Moore paid $ a-year; and to his maid-servant, 
 Rose Coleman, $. What would be said to such salaries at 
 the present time, even if doubled to allow for the deprecia- 
 tion of gold ? 
 
 If Mrs. Moore had kept a diary (would that she had !) she 
 would doubtless have told us what her weekly household 
 
 * Was this William Clowson an ancestor of that William Clowes who went from 
 Chichester 100 years later and established the world-famed printing business of Clowes 
 and Son ? Names got very much altered cropped or augmented in past ages.
 
 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 expenses were. Mr. Moore does not do so ; but one entry 
 shows that the labour of carrying on "the house" was a 
 divided one that the wife had her department distinct from 
 the husband's. Ex. gr.: " I bought of my wyfe a fat hog to 
 spend in my family, for the which I payed the summe of 305. ; 
 the two flitches of bacon, when dryed, weighed 64-lb. I gave 
 her, to buy a qr. of lambe, 35. 6d." 
 
 Thus buying and selling went on between husband and 
 wife a novelty to us. 
 
 The religious practice of that day the very acme of 
 Puritanism was very strict and severe. Mr. Moore has 
 several entries of the number of communicants at his Church, 
 and in three Communions they numbered on an average above 
 1 80 persons. To this Mr. R. W. Blencowe (who edits the 
 Diary for the Sussex Archaeological Society) attaches a note 
 to the effect that in the three last years (preceding 1848) the 
 average number of communicants at Horstead Keynes, at eight 
 sacraments, had been 148 persons that is, considerably less 
 than the number who attended three Communions in Mr. 
 Moore's time. But we must bear in mind that the reign of 
 Cromwell and the Puritans was an exceptional period for the 
 practice of religion. And with many, doubtless, religion and 
 morality went hand in hand. But not with all. The license 
 of the following reign showed that, with the majority, both 
 religion and morality were but skin deep, and even in 
 those stern times, when play-houses were shut up and the 
 may-pole was pulled down, there did not lack occasional 
 proofs of the weakness of the flesh even, alas! in the house- 
 hold of the Rev. Giles Moore. Here is one, under the date 
 of November 8, 1659 : 
 
 " Thos. Dumbrell came to mee as servant to dwell with mee, with whom 
 I agreed to give after the rate of ^5 a yeare. On the 22nd Dec. I payed 
 him up to that time \. 8s. ; that same night I found him sleeping with 
 my mayd Mary, and I packed them off. Jan. 2nd I marryed Thos. Dum- 
 brell and Mary his wyfe gratis, and I gave him on his wedding 8 stone of 
 beefe i6s. 8d. a hind qr. of mutton 35. 4d. and a lambe 75. 6d., besydes 
 butter, wheate, and fewell." 
 
 The Rev. Giles Moore must have been of a more forgiving
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 
 
 temper than many of his reverend brethren in those stern 
 days, or Thomas Dumbrell and "my mayd Mary" would 
 have come off less easily than this ! 
 
 The above domestic event occurred during the Protectorate. 
 But let not the enemies of Puritanism triumph over that! In 
 1676, after the King had got "his own again," and the true 
 Church had been reinstated in all its rights, something very 
 much like a parallel event occurs in the household of the 
 Rev. Giles Moore: 
 
 " I3th October I marryed Henry Place and Mary Holden, my two ser- 
 vants, and spent at theyr wedding 2OS. ; I gave the fiddlers is. I also gave 
 them a large cake, all theyr fewell, and the use of my house and stables 
 for two dayes, with a quart of white wine, being in all not less than 405. or 
 one yeares wages. On the 6th of February following shee was delivered 
 
 of a daughter, so that the (and here the rev. diarist uses a very strong 
 
 expression) went but 15 weekes and five dayes after her marriage." 
 
 We are afraid that, so far as the morals of Horstead 
 Keynes were concerned, there was not much to choose between 
 King and Protector ! 
 
 It will be noticed that there were fiddlers at the wedding 
 of Henry Place and Mary Holden ; and on various other 
 occasions the Rev. Giles Moore makes an entry to the same 
 effect, "I payd the fiddlers 6d.," or is. This shows that the 
 fiddlers were a fixed institution in country parishes 250 years 
 ago, and so they continued until our own times, "a case of 
 viols " being kept for their use in most villages. These are 
 the only references to music by the Rector of Horstead 
 Keynes, except a not over-flattering entry anent the national 
 instrument of Scotland: "To a begging Welchman and a 
 bagpipe player, 6d. each." 
 
 As may be concluded from these entries, the Rev. Giles 
 Moore was very careful in the setting-down of his outgoings 
 and the national taxes and poor-rates begin about this time 
 to figure rather largely and frequently in the diary. At first 
 the requisitions made by Oliver upon the country, for the sup- 
 port of his army, navy, and government generally must have 
 seemed very exorbitant. But it could not be denied that the
 
 8 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Protector gave quid pro quo, and that the interests and the 
 glory of England were protected by him and the country 
 well governed. Still, the people rejoiced when Charles the 
 Second was restored in 1660; and the Rector of Horstead 
 Keynes, who, as we have seen, fought or prayed perhaps 
 both for the Royal cause in his youth, was foremost amongst 
 the rejoicers. As, during the Commonwealth, he had occa- 
 sionally aired his Latin by giving expression to his loyal 
 feelings in that safe language, so now he poured forth his 
 rejoicings at the restoration of Monarchy in the same classic 
 and orthodox form. But the Rev. Giles Moore soon found 
 that, whether under King or Protector, he had to "pay the 
 piper," and, under the former, to a more lively tune than the 
 latter. Assessments both for King's taxes and for poor-rates 
 became both heavier and more frequent. In April, 1665, the 
 Rector records as follows : 
 
 " A taxe was made for the reliefe of the poor of the parish, at gd. in 
 the , I being then raysed from 16 to ^30 per an. I payed for the par- 
 sonage and glebe l. 2s. 6d. This single time I payd I2S. 6d. extraordinary, 
 through Fields malignity, with Cripps concurrence ; the next poore booke, 
 however, I got it downe againe. In Deer. I payed another taxe for the 
 poore at 3d. in 
 
 " There are," adds Mr. Blencowe, " two assessments for 
 King's taxes recorded in this year (1665) ; the share paid by 
 the Rector amounted to 2. 125. 6d." Three years later 
 in 1668 the King's taxes paid by the Rector amounted to 
 7. 6s., or just treble, exclusive of hearth-money and poll- 
 tax ; and he began, shrewdly remarks Mr. Blencowe, to show 
 symptoms of what, in after ages, Lord Castlereagh called an 
 " ignorant impatience of taxation." He was, in fact, paying 
 for his loyalty, and getting very little return for his money ; 
 for the foreign wars of Charles (against the Dutch) were 
 disastrous ; and the internal government was anything but 
 satisfactory. The poll-tax and hearth-tax referred to in 
 the above entry pressed most unfairly upon the working and 
 middle classes, who paid in respect to the first as much as the 
 wealthy, whilst the latter laid open the habitations of all to
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 
 
 the tax-gatherer. That the hearth-tax was not a light one we 
 can gather from the following entry : 
 
 " To Mr. Moore, of East Grinstead, collector, for 8 fire hearths due 
 for one whole yeare expiring at Michaelmas, together with one yeare more 
 for the brewhouse chimney, I payed i8s." 
 
 Pepys, who was keeping his diary at the same time as 
 the Sussex Rector, was better informed as to the extravagant 
 expenditure of the Court at this time. "It was," he says, 
 writing in 1666, "computed that the Parliament had given 
 the King for this war only, besides prizes, and besides the 
 ^"200,000 which he was to spend of his own revenue to guard 
 the sea, above ^5,000,000 and odd ^100,000, which is a most 
 prodigious sum. It is strange how everybody do now a days 
 reflect upon Oliver, and commend him ; what brave things he 
 did, and made all the neighbouring princes to fear him ; while 
 here, a prince come in with all the love and prayers and good 
 liking of his people, who have given greater signs of loyalty 
 and willingness to serve him with their estates than was ever 
 done by any people, hath lost all so soon, that it is a miracle 
 what way a man could devise to lose so much in so short a 
 time." 
 
 Friend Pepys took care to write in cypher, or this reference 
 to the " brave things that Oliver did " might have cost him 
 dearly ! 
 
 Poor-rates also continued to increase in Horstead Keynes. 
 In 1730 they had reached 25. gd. in the , and in 1831 they 
 amounted to 2 a-head in a population of 782 persons. Even 
 in 1848 they averaged 6s. 4d. in the . Horstead Keynes, 
 indeed, was, from some cause or other perhaps its remote- 
 ness from any large town, lying as it does in the very centre 
 of the Weald of Sussex one of the poorest and most 
 neglected, though most picturesque villages in the South 
 of England. It was here that the Sussex peasantry met 
 when they broke out into something like rebellion against 
 their lords and masters, and made the reporter of the Brighton 
 Herald (professionally present at their meeting) a few hours' 
 prisoner in order that he might put into shape the rough
 
 io Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 draft of their petition to Parliament for a redress of grievances. 
 On a subsequent occasion the Riot Act was read (by Mr. 
 Mabbott, if we recollect rightly) and the agricultural labourers 
 of East Sussex were put down with a strong hand. 
 
 But enough of taxation. Let us turn to more agreeable 
 matters. What will Rectors' wives of the present day say to 
 this indication of the tastes of Mistress Giles Moore? 
 " Tobacco for my wyfe, 3d." It was, really, a little too bad of 
 the Rector to put down this. Why couldn't he let his "wyfe" 
 have her three pennyworth of tobacco without telling all 
 succeeding generations of it ? Oh, that Mrs. Moore had only 
 thought of setting down all the Rector's little indulgences! 
 
 " For a Ib. of sugar, to preserve quinces, is." shows the 
 high price of colonial produce at that day (Oliver had only 
 recently annexed Jamaica to the English Crown). There are 
 numerous other proofs of it, whilst, on the other hand, home 
 produce was very cheap. Thus, in 1662, "I pay'd for 3 pecks 
 of barley malt, 25. 7d.; for nibs, of beef, 23. 2d." 
 
 Wine was also cheap. Claret and " sack " that is, dry 
 sherry (sherry sec] were chiefly drunk ; the former was is. per 
 bottle, and the latter little more. Here is one entry: " ist 
 April, 1662. I had 5 bottles of claret, and as many of sack 
 from London, for which I payed, and for the bringing them 
 down, at 2d. the bottle, in all 1 25. For a pint of old sack 6d., 
 2 quarts of muscadine 35., 2 ounces of tobacco is. For a 
 sugar loafe weighing 4 pounds is." 
 
 Mr. Giles Moore was evidently a temperate man for the 
 times, and this entry in February, 1668, on the principle of 
 the exception proving the rule, shows it : 
 
 " This evening, between nine and ten o'clock, when I had began prayers 
 with my family, I was so overpowered with the effects of some perry which 
 I had taken, not knowing how strong that liquor was, that I was obliged 
 to break off abruptly. O God 1 lay not this sin to my charge 1 " 
 
 The original entry, we may add, like the Rev. Diarist's 
 political effusions of an earlier date, is in Latin.
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 1 1 
 
 Close to this entry we have two "signs of the times." 
 Videlicet: "I was with Mistress Chaloner and bargained with 
 her at \^ per an. for board and schooling for Mat." "I 
 gave Mr. Salisbury, a begging Minister, 4d." 
 
 The Mistress Chaloner to whom Mat. (an adopted daughter 
 of the Diarist) was sent for a year's schooling and board at 
 /^i2a year (!), was, doubtless, a member of the great Chaloner 
 family, whose Sussex seat in the iyth century was at Kennard's, 
 Lindfield, and whose head, now in exile "Ye Major Chaloner 
 of Kennard's" had been an active adherent of the Common- 
 wealth and was punished by the confiscation of his estates. 
 His family, doubtless, shared in this reverse of fortune, and this 
 "Mistress Chaloner" had to keep a school in London, to 
 which " Mat." was sent, on terms which would make the 
 heads of modern seminaries cast up their eyes in wonder. 
 The " begging Minister" was, doubtless, as Mr. Blencowe 
 surmises, one of those unfortunate Ministers of the Church 
 of England who, admitted, like Mr. Giles Moore, to benefices 
 during the Commonwealth, refused unlike him to conform 
 to the new doctrines introduced after the Restoration, and so 
 " went out " one " black Monday " to poverty and often 
 destitution, to the number of 2,000. Nonconformists do not 
 forget this little fact even at the present day. 
 
 Two circumstances point significantly to the alteration in 
 diet which has taken place since the days of the second 
 Charles. The first is, the frequent reference in this and other 
 diaries to fresh-water fish, now so insignificant a matter in 
 domestic economy; the other is, the total absence of any 
 mention of the potato. It was, as Mr. Blencowe remarks in 
 a note, introduced into England probably by Raleigh in 
 the reign of James I.; for, in an account of the household 
 expenses of his Queen, there is an entry of their purchase at 
 2S. per Ib. But the cultivation of it was slow, " and," says 
 Mr. Blencowe, "before the year 1684, when they were first 
 planted in the open fields in Lancashire, they were raised only 
 in the gardens of the rich." And then Mr. Blencowe gives
 
 1 2 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 the following interesting account (on the authority of his 
 friend, Col. Davies), of the introduction of potatoes into 
 Sussex : 
 
 " William Warnett, of Horstead Keynes, yeoman, who is turned of 90, 
 but in full possession of his faculties, says that before the year 1765, when 
 he was seven years old, potatoes had never been heard of in this neigh- 
 bourhood ; that in that year the late Lord Sheffield, who had recently pur- 
 chased the Sheffield estate, brought some, as it was reported, from Ireland, 
 and that his father received a few from his lordship's gardener. He adds, 
 that no one knew how to plant them, but that they got a man who worked 
 on the road, and who came from some distant County, to plant them, which 
 he continued to do regularly on old Lady Day for many years, and it was 
 very long before they began to plant them in the fields. They used in 
 those times to leave their potatoes in the ground all the winter, covering 
 the ground with brakes, and taking them up as they wanted them for use. 
 Before potatoes came into use, pease pudding was usually part of the dinner. 
 So strong was the prejudice against them, that, at the elections which took 
 place at Lewes about this period, it shared with Popery the indignation of 
 the people, and ' No Popery, no potatoes ! ' was the popular cry." 
 
 In France the cultivation of the potato by the poor was 
 still more tardy than in England ; and, doubtless, our readers 
 will call to mind the graphic account which is given, in 
 MM. Erckmann-Chatrian's " History of a Peasant," of the 
 excitement produced at Phalsbourg, in 1785, when the first crop 
 of potatoes ever raised in Alsace made its appearance in the 
 garden of the blacksmith, Maitre Jacques the ridicule which 
 attended the planting of the peelings, which had been brought 
 from Germany the curiosity excited by the first appearance 
 of the green sprouts above the ground, and the triumph with 
 which the wonderful roots were dug up and the gusto with 
 which they were eaten. It marked an era in the life of the 
 French peasant. 
 
 The introduction of the potato and other vegetables and 
 fruits, and their greater use by all classes, contributed not a 
 little, doubtless, to check the prevalence of that " dire dis- 
 order," the scurvy, from which the Rector of Horstead 
 Keynes himself suffered and for which his brother in the 
 Isle of Wight constantly sent him " scurvy water and scurvy 
 grass." 
 
 Another mode of curing (?) this and all other diseases was 
 by " letting blood." Such entries as this constantly occur in
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 13 
 
 the diary. " I was bled, as usual at haemorroyadal times, the 
 quantity of 10 oz., for which I paid Mr. Parker 3d." On 
 which entry, Mr. Blencowe remarks, " The custom of being 
 blooded at the spring and fall of the year prevailed till within 
 a few years. The labourers generally attended the village 
 surgeon on a Sunday morning, that their week's work might 
 not be interrupted ; the charge for bleeding them being 6d. 
 each." 
 
 It is only in our days that this most pernicious practice 
 has been completely exploded, though Le Sage had made it 
 the object of his satire, directed against Dr. Sangrado, in Gil 
 Bias, 150 years before. 
 
 Newspapers had no existence in the Rev. Giles Moore's 
 days; but the "Gazettes" and "Letters" out of which they 
 sprang had made their appearance during the preceding civil 
 war, and they were not to be rooted out by the Licenser of 
 the Press, Sir Roger L'Estrange. Our Sussex Diarist had 
 evidently acquired a taste for them. Ex. gr. : " To John 
 Morley, for gazettes read from Lady Day till Midsr., at id. 
 per each gazette, is. 3d. I payed him for i qr. newes bookes, 
 2S. 6d. ; and I promised him a paier of old breeches for his 
 letters." A mode of barter not very complimentary to litera- 
 ture. But, doubtless, John Morley was only the carrier, not 
 the inventor of the news ! Another entry of a payment to 
 the same person has a curious addendum': " I payed John 
 Morley for a letter 2d., for carrying news books 25. 6d., and 
 6d. more gratis to stop his mouth." Doubtless there had been 
 some scandal at Horstead Keynes which the Rector did not 
 wish to spread ! 
 
 One entry would puzzle modern readers, did not Mr. 
 Blencowe kindly append an explanation to it. It is this : 
 " z6th Dec. I gave the howling boys 6d." This was not the 
 waits! "On New Year's Eve," writes Mr. Blencowe, "it was, 
 and it still continues to be the custom, to wassail the orchards. 
 At Horstead Keynes and elsewhere, the ceremony retains the 
 name of ' Apple Howling.' A troop of boys visit the different
 
 14 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 orchards, and encircling the apple trees, they repeat the follow- 
 ing words : 
 
 Stand fast root, bear well top, 
 
 Pray the God send us a good howling crop. 
 
 Every twig, apples big ; 
 
 Every bough, apples enou ; 
 
 Hats full, caps full, 
 
 Full quarters, sacks full. 
 
 They then shout in chorus, one of the boys accompanying 
 them upon the cow's horn. During this ceremony they rap 
 the trees with their sticks. This custom is alluded to in 
 Herrick's ' Hesperides,' p. 3 1 1 : 
 
 Wassail the trees that they may beare 
 You, many a plum, and many a peare : 
 For more or less fruits they will bring, 
 As you do give them wassailing. 
 
 This practice is not confined to Sussex ; it prevails in Devon 
 and in Herefordshire." 
 
 Evidence of the manners of the day crops up here and 
 there in the diary. Ex. gr. : " To Mrs. Stapley, I lost is. at 
 cards" " I bought for my wyfe a new horse pillion, for which 
 I gave 8s." " I payed Wm. Bachelor, at the Tiger Inn, at 
 Lindfield, for a dinner for 12 persons, \. 43.; for beer, bread 
 and tobacco, 73. 7d. ; 3 bottles of sack, 55. ; horse meate, 8d." 
 
 The Tiger Inn still stands at Lindfield, and a curious old 
 building it is ! 
 
 The fashion of tradesmen to put up signs over their doors 
 was in full vogue in Mr. Moore's days. He made not infre- 
 quent journeys to London, always riding on horseback, as was 
 the practice in those days, when, indeed, in Sussex, there were 
 no roads for vehicles ; and he duly sets down his purchases. 
 Here is one entry as a sample of numerous others: "For 
 6 yards of black cloth to make a cloake, bought of Mr. 
 Theophilus Smith, at the White Lion, Paul's Church Yard, I 
 payd \. 1 6s., and for 7 yards of calaminko to make a 
 cassock /i. 45. 6d., and i qr. of a yard of velvet 6s.; I 
 bought of Mr. James Allen, at the Hat and Harrow, a new hat,
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 15 
 
 costing mee \ ; I bought for my wyfe a lute string hood, 
 costing 6s." 
 
 And so this amusing and instructive diary goes on from 
 its beginning, in 1655, to its termination, in August, 1679, 
 when it closes in the following suggestive entry : 
 
 "3rd of August, I payed to Capt. Fishenden for a cephalic playster, 
 and to Mr. Marshall, of Lewis, for a julep, and for something to make mee 
 sleep, 2s. 6d." 
 
 The narcotic must have had the required effect, for the 
 next extract, from the Parish Register, is as follows: 
 
 " Mr. Giles Moore, Minister of this parish, was buryed the 3rd of 
 October, 1679." 
 
 So the Rector of Horstead Keynes slept the long sleep to 
 which there is only one awakening. But his diary survives, 
 and in it he and his doings will live for many a day, to amuse 
 and interest Sussex people. 
 
 The Stapleys, of Hickstead Place, in the parish of Twine- 
 ham, may be said to have been a family of diarists. Their 
 memoranda, in account books and journals, extend from 1607 
 to 1743 a period of 136 years! The example was set by 
 John Stapley, who, in addition to being the Squire of Hick- 
 stead Place, was a Trainband Captain. His career was in the 
 latter years of the reign of "Good Queen Bess" and the 
 earlier ones of James the First ; but his memoranda, or what 
 remains of them, are limited to one item, namely, " that for 
 all my landes within the whole parish I am to impaile of the 
 churchyard of Twineham 174^ feet. The churchyard is in 
 compass 28 rods and 2 feet." 
 
 This refers to a custom still, according to the late Rev. E. 
 Turner, observed in some places, of the fences of the church- 
 yard being kept up by the landowners according to the number 
 of acres they possessed in the parish. But, for the most part, 
 we take it, the custom is obsolete, and the burthen is borne 
 by the whole of the parishioners. 
 
 At this early period 1607-10 the prices of all home- 
 productions were very low, as compared with those which they
 
 1 6 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 now fetch. Of course, the value of money has depreciated ; 
 a sovereign, a shilling, and a penny 250 years ago were worth 
 double or treble their present value. But, even allowing for 
 this, an ox which weighed "6oolbs. the foure quarters," would 
 be very cheap at g. ios., and 23. $d. the stone of 81bs. for 
 mutton would be very acceptable to consumers of butcher's 
 meat. Lambs, too, at 6s. 8d. each (the weight is not specified) 
 would not be dear. And these were the prices of 1610 for 
 meat, whilst those for wheat and eggs may be learnt from the 
 following stanzas of an old ballad : 
 
 I'll tell what, old fellowe, 
 
 Before the friars went hence, 
 A bushell of the best wheate 
 
 Was sold for fourteen pence. 
 And forty egges a penny 
 
 That were both good and newe, 
 And this, I say, myself have seene, 
 
 And yet I am no Jewe. 
 
 Forty eggs for a penny ! Will not that make our modern 
 housewives' mouths water ? 
 
 In 1662 wheat was 303. per quarter; peas, 245. per ditto; 
 lime, i2s. per load so that even in the half century which 
 followed 1610 prices had risen. And they have not ceased to 
 do so from that time to this. 
 
 The diary of the Rev. Giles Moore bore testimony to the 
 low rate of educational charges in the Charles's day, and the 
 Stapley diaries confirm it. But we should note that we have 
 now reached the Stapley Diarists proper. These were the two 
 sons of the before-mentioned John Stapley, the Trainband 
 Captain, and successively the owners of Hickstead Place, 
 namely, Richard Stapley up to 1724 and Anthony up to 1738. 
 These two Stapleys systematically recorded their expenses and 
 the chief events of their lives from 1657, which is contempo- 
 raneous with Giles Moore's diary, and when Oliver Cromwell 
 was England's ruler, until 1738, when George the Second was 
 King; and Richard Stapley, the son of Anthony, adds a 
 closing memorandum in 1743. What a momentous period in 
 the history of this country! What vast changes social,
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 17 
 
 religious, political, and, above all, scientific and economical 
 took place in the interval of the commencement and the 
 closing of these Stapley diaries ! and yet, in the retirement 
 of this little Sussex homestead, the current of life seems to 
 have flowed on with a quietude that no civil or political con- 
 vulsion could disturb. There were restorations and revolu- 
 tions plots, sham and real civil and foreign wars victories 
 and defeats the rise and fall of Ministers, the death and 
 banishment of Kings; great discoveries in science, by a 
 Newton, a Hervey, and a Boyle ; great changes in the 
 industrial world, such as the introduction of coal and the 
 substitution of the iron of Wales for the iron of Sussex. But, 
 of all these changes, we get little or no indications in the 
 Stapley diaries. A Sussex village like that of Twineham must 
 have been, in those days of impassable roads, almost as 
 remote from the great movements of life at the centres of 
 civilization as the islands of the South Seas are now; and 
 those who lived in them seemed to concern themselves as 
 little about such movements. They paid taxes, of course 
 and these kept on increasing ! and we presume that they 
 occasionally gave a vote at county elections. But, if so, no 
 note is made of such voting. As Mr. Blencowe remarks, a 
 battle like that of Naseby might have been fought in another 
 county and the news of it never have reached such a village 
 as Twineham ! 
 
 But there were events and incidents even in the Stapley 
 world. There were children born into the world, and they 
 had to be taught to read, write, and reckon. How cheaply, 
 we may infer from the entry (May, 1731) that "Anthonie 
 Stapley went to school to Thomas Painter by the week, to 
 learn to write and read, and cast accounts, at 6d. per week" 
 Previous to this the same Anthony (a son of Anthony Stapley, 
 we presume) had been to a Brighton boarding school, and we 
 have this entry: "Paid Grover and Browne, of Brighton, 
 l> 6s. rod." Doubtless for the year : for at the same period, 
 we are told, " Sarah Stapley went to William Best's to board 
 c
 
 1 8 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 at 35. 6d. per week. She is to go to Miss Leach's school at 
 6d. per week ; and Jane, and John, and Samuel went to Dame 
 Bellchamber's the same day the boys at 2d. and Jane at 4d. 
 per week." Again (May zoth, 1735) "Carried my son John to 
 Mr. Browne, of Lindfield, to be boarded by him at 33. per 
 week. And on the 23rd he is to go to school to John Wood 
 to learn to read and write, at 6d. per week." 
 
 Verily, the education rate was not a heavy one at Hick- 
 stead Place ! 
 
 The practice of sending children to board with one person, 
 and to another to get their schooling, seems to have been a 
 common one ; and, certainly, the bodily food was better paid 
 for than the intellectual ! Ex. gr. : " Paid Thomas Burten- 
 shaw his half-year's salary for teaching the girls and boys, 
 \. i os." As much is now often paid for a single lesson on 
 the pianoforte. 
 
 Domestic servants were a different class of persons in the 
 i yth century from what they are now. They came, indeed, 
 from the same ranks of life those of the agricultural labourer. 
 But their pretensions were much humbler, and their affections 
 seem to have been much more constant. Instances were not 
 rare of both male and female servants devoting their whole 
 lives to their masters and mistresses, and periods of 10, 20, 
 and even 30 years of service in the same family were common ; 
 and that, too, at wages which would now be laughed at. 
 Here are some entries by Mr. Anthony Stapley who kept 
 three men and three maid-servants of the wages he paid 
 them : 
 
 " 1730. Mary White began her year May 1st, and is to have i. 53. 
 if she stay until May, 1/31. Hannah Morley came, and is to have 2 if 
 she stays until Lady Day next. Paid Edwd. Harland and George Virgoe 
 J year's wages each, ^3. 55. James Hazelgrove came to live with me at 
 j6. 55. per annum. 
 
 " 1740. Sarah Chandler came to live with me, and she is to have 
 2. i os. if she stays until Lady Day, 1741. But as she left my service in 
 about 8 weeks I gave her is. only. Sarah Martin left me, and William 
 Sully. Also Mary White, who went back to Bolney ; and Thomas Fair- 
 hall, whose loss of time was a week, and he allowed me a shilling for it. 
 Richard Sayers took his place, and is to have 2. 155. if he stays twelve
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 19 
 
 months. He stayed with me but a very short time. Paid Thos. Avery 
 his wages in full, though he was sick part of the time. 
 
 "1741. John Steer went away from my house Dec. i6th. He was 
 with me about a year, and I had just given him a coat, waistcoat, breaches, 
 and hat, and 3 shirts, which cost me $. is. 
 
 " 1 742. Sarah Juppe came to live with me March 25th, and is to have 
 2. los. if she stays with me to Lady Day, 1743. But this she did not do. 
 For she left me Nov. 7th, and came to me on the i6th of the same month." 
 
 Mr. Turner suggests a reason for this quitting service one 
 day and returning to it two or three days later. It was to 
 avoid making a servant chargeable to the parish by an unin- 
 terrupted twelve months' hiring. One of the blessings of the 
 old Poor Law ! 
 
 Like most country gentlemen, the Stapleys were sportsmen, 
 and there are numerous entries concerning dogs, guns, foxes, 
 and even hawks, showing that falconry was not yet an 
 obsolete sport. Thus, in 1 642, " Bought a hawk for 2, and in 
 1643 bought another at the same price." These must have 
 been well-trained birds to fetch such high prices. 
 
 There is nothing about music in the Stapley diaries no 
 mention of concerts or pianofortes or even fiddles ; but Mr. 
 Richard Stapley had an ear for one species of music. Ex. gr. : 
 " Paid to William Ashford, for two beagles, which make my 
 cry complete, ^. \ $s." 
 
 This expression calls to mind the beautiful lines uttered by 
 Theseus in A Midsummer Night's Dream : 
 
 v My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind, 
 So flew'd, so sanded ; and their heads are hung 
 With ears that sweep away the morning dew ; 
 Crook-knee'd and dew-lapp'd like Thessalian bulls ; 
 Slow in pursuit, but match'd in mouth like bells, 
 Each under each. A cry more tuneable 
 Was never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn, 
 In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly : 
 Judge, when you hear. 
 
 On the 5th of October, 1739, Mr. Stapley records a sad 
 misfortune to his canine establishment : "I had a mad dog 
 in my kennel, and was obliged to kill all my hounds. Six of 
 them were all hanging at the same time."
 
 2O Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Mr. Anthony Stapley had the feelings of a "gentleman and 
 a Christian " for his dumb servants. Here is an example : 
 
 "1735, Octr. gth. James Matthew had my old white horse away, 
 which I gave him to keep as long as he should live, and when dead to bury 
 him in his skin, and not to flaw him or abuse him in any way." 
 
 By a later entry it appears that this old horse died May 
 2ist, 1736, and was buried in the sawpit in the Laines Wood. 
 His age when he died was supposed to be 35 years. 
 
 In all articles of home-produce the rise of prices has been 
 immense since the Stapley's days; and horse-flesh has "gone 
 up" with the rest. In May, 1737, Mr. A. Stapley records 
 that "Chowne bought me a mare, which cost me 10. ios., 
 and I gave him is. for bringing her." Again, in 1739, 
 " Bought a black mare for John Stapley to ride ; she cost $, 
 with bridle and saddle in." 1740 : " Boughi. a mare of John 
 Daulton, for which I gave him 5." 
 
 Sometimes, however, a higher figure was reached, as in 
 1741, when he " bought a mare of John Lindfield, of Dean 
 House, for which I paid him i$" 
 
 They were great meat-eaters at Hickstead Place ; but they 
 did not go to the butcher for it. "The calves, sheep and 
 lambs," writes Anthony Stapley, " which I have killed in my 
 house this year (1642) are 4 calves, 20 sheep and 45 lambs." 
 The practice of neighbours exchanging meat with each other 
 was, it is evident, common: Thus, in 1645, "Had of Georg 
 Luxford, of Hurst, 21 nailes of beef, which I have since re- 
 paid him." And in 1654, "Goodman Butcher owes me 15 
 nailes of beef and 2lbs., and he has been paid all the beef I 
 owed him." 
 
 It was very convenient, doubtless, when it was necessary 
 to kill a sheep in order to get a leg or shoulder of mutton, to 
 exchange in this way with a neighbour. 
 
 Brewing, of course, was carried on at Hickstead Place, 
 for home consumption, and doubtless, very good ale was 
 brewed. There are numerous entries of the purchase of malt.
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 2 1 
 
 The average consumption at Hickstead was, says Mr. Turner, 
 until 1746, about eight bushels a month. In speaking of malt 
 the Stapley accounts generally describe it as barley malt. This 
 (remarks Mr. Turner) doubtless is done to distinguish it from 
 malt made of other grain. In the early part of the reign of 
 Edwd. II. great quantities of wheat were made into malt, and 
 this, towards the close of his reign, he found it necessary to 
 prohibit. But this practice was subsequently resumed, for in 
 the " Chronicles of London " we find the following receipt : 
 " For brewing 60 barrels of good Songel Beer, 10 quarters of 
 Barley Malt, 2 do. of Wheat do., 2 do. of Oats do., and 4olbs. 
 of Hoppys." And this appears to have gone on until the 
 year 1630, when wheat was again prohibited from being made 
 into malt by royal proclamation, and it was further ordered 
 that " no' grain, meet for bread to feed men, be wasted and 
 consumed in stuif called starch," which was profusely used 
 for stiffening the ruffles, and cuffs, and other linen attire which 
 an ostentatious and inconvenient fashion had been the means 
 of introducing into the habits both of the gentlemen and 
 ladies of the times of Charles the First and Second. 
 
 Hops, though grown at Twineham, were also bought by 
 the Stapleys in large quantities. 
 
 Whilst upon this subject of liquor, we may note that claret 
 was the principal wine drunk by the Stapleys, and doubtless 
 other families of the period, with a certain quantity of sherry, 
 under the name of sack. Thus (1646), "I had from Cleer, 
 of London, one runlet of sacke, and 3 runlets of claret." 
 "For sack, when strangers were here, 123. 6d." "Had a 
 dozen of white wine and one gallon of sack, which cost me 
 i. i7s. 4d." 
 
 We have referred to the absence of politics in these diaries, 
 and to the utter ignoring of the rise and fall of Kings and 
 Governments. Only in the payment of taxes, which all 
 Governments, Kingly or Republican, levy, can we detect any 
 signs of the great events going on in England, and this is
 
 22 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 shown in the curious admixture of " King " and " Parlia- 
 ment" in the following entries : 
 
 " 1644. To the King, i. 43. 2d. To William Dumbrell, for tax, 
 i. 155. 2d. To the Parliament, i. To Goodman Erie, for a six months' 
 tax, 2. 75. 6d. 
 
 " 1645. To the Parliament, i. 75. 6d. 
 
 " 1646. Taxes for the Parliament, April 8th. To Arthur Luxford, for 
 four months' tax, IDS. To William Dumbrell, for eight months' tax, 
 i. os. 4d. To do. for twelve months' tax, i. IDS. 6d. 
 
 " 1649. To William Dumbrell, for a tax, 135. d. To Thomas Averie 
 for a do., 143. 6d. To Thomas Marchant, of Hurst, for a tax for the Par- 
 liament, 5. To Arthur Luxford for the use of the King and Parliament, 
 145. To William Dumbrell, for an eight months' tax, 2. IDS. 6d. For 
 the King's Provision, 143. 8d." 
 
 The contribution to King and Parliament is pretty equal, 
 and perhaps the feelings of the Stapleys who counted 
 Roundheads and Cavaliers among their successors, and one 
 of whom was a friend of Cromwell, and figured as a Regicide 
 were pretty equally balanced. All that they cared for at 
 Twineham was to be let alone ! 
 
 As we go through the entries of the Squires of Hickstead 
 Place, as to their eatings and drinkings, buyings and sellings, 
 we cannot help wishing that they had given us a glimpse of 
 themselves and of their "interior" the ways and fashions 
 of the house and of its inmates, male and female. But we 
 look in vain for anything of the sort. It was a diary for the 
 use of Richard and Anthony Stapley, and not for the informa- 
 tion of those who might come after them. If it had not been 
 for entries of fees paid to Mr. Nightingale " for his journey 
 half-a-guinea, and 25. for things which he brought with him " 
 we should scarcely have known that Richard Stapley had a 
 wife, until her death, from a cause which is thus quaintly but 
 forcibly described : " Struck with the dead palsy from head 
 to foot in a moment of time." 
 
 For pictures of the mode of life of such families as that* 
 of the Stapleys the squires or gentry of the iyth and i8th 
 centuries we must go to other sources. The Rev. E. Turner, 
 who edited these Stapley diaries for the Archaeological 
 Society, and who had other sources of information as to the
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 23 
 
 manners of Sussex people in their day, drew the following 
 lively picture of the style in which our forefathers lived 200 
 years ago : 
 
 " They dined at one or two o'clock, and many now do the same ; the 
 only difference between them and us being, that what they called dinner 
 we call luncheon. They sat down to a substantial meal at half-past seven 
 or eight o'clock, and so do we ; and this they called supper, but we call 
 dinner. And as soon as supper was over the squire sat down at the shovel- 
 board table, with his canine pets about him ; and his tenants and retainers 
 being called in, they smoked their pipes and quaffed they grogs unless 
 any of the party preferred instead potent home-brewed October ale dis- 
 cussing all the while the business as well as the passing events of the day. 
 And this continued varied, perhaps, with now and then a hunting song, 
 in the chorus of which all heartily joined, or with a game played with cards 
 until it was time to prepare for bed, which, in well-regulated families, 
 was seldom later than ten o'clock ; while in another part of the hall, if it 
 was spacious enough to admit of it, or if not in some adjoining apartment 
 opening into the hall, sat the lady of the house, with her family, and any 
 female friends that might be staying with her, busily engaged in spinning. 
 Pianofortes, -now to be found in every tradesman's and farmer's house, were 
 unknown even in the houses of many of the gentryin those days. The drone 
 of the spinning-wheel was the music they most delighted in ; and singing, 
 or, as one of my church choir used to call it when he was in a grandilo- 
 quent humour, 'the tuneful music of the vocal voice,' was all the melody 
 that arrested the ear within the substantial walls of the Place House ; and 
 profitable music it was, for all the linen of the house, body, bed and table, 
 was, for the most part, thus supplied ; the maid-servants, as well as the 
 mistress of the house, her daughters and her friends, employing all their 
 not otherwise occupied time in the same way. Tea was a repast not then 
 much appreciated, even if it was known ; the article itself from a decoc- 
 tion of which the meal took its name being far too costly during the 
 period under consideration to be much used in a common way, even in 
 the houses of the better class ; though it appears to have been occasionally 
 indulged in at Hickstead ; the price given for the article thus consumed 
 being charged, according to the accounts, at 255. and 305. per pound. The 
 family breakfasts at this date were upon the substantial Elizabethan scale. 
 They consisted for the most part of hot meats, with a liberal supply of 
 well-matured nut brown malt liquor. A hot beef steak, with no scant 
 measure of two years' old ale, was no unusual thing for the lords and ladies 
 of Queen Elizabeth's Court at breakfast to indulge in ; and her most 
 gracious Majesty did the same. And at Hickstead this meal was taken at a 
 somewhat unusually early hour, so that by eight o'clock the squire was 
 ready either for business or pleasure. If, during the hunting season 
 
 'A southerly wind and a cloudy sky 
 Proclaimed a hunting morn,' 
 
 K 
 
 the hounds were unkennelled, and every servant that could be spared from 
 his customary duties in and about the house, each with a hunting pole in 
 his hand, attended his master to the cover, and the welkin soon rang with 
 the music of their tuneable voices ; for game was far too plentiful in the 
 Hickstead woods and hedgerows in those days to be long in being found. 
 Or if the day was better adapted to shooting, the old Sussex spaniels, for
 
 24 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 which Hickstead was then famous, were brought out, and the squire spent 
 his morning in trying either the covers for pheasants or the stubbles for 
 partridges ; and by twelve o'clock he was able to return home with a well- 
 filled bag." 
 
 For a contemporary picture of Sussex manners in the i8th 
 century, though not of a very flattering character, we are 
 indebted to Dr. Burton, the learned Greek Lecturer of Oxford, 
 who, in 1751, was bold enough to "go down, through muddy, 
 fertile, pastoral Sussex," to Shermanbury, to see his mother, 
 who had married the Rector of that place, Dr. John Bear. 
 Here he had an opportunity of seeing a little of the people 
 who constituted the society of Sussex 137 years ago the 
 squires and yeomen of the county and he draws the follow- 
 ing not over-flattering sketch of them : 
 
 " You should observe that the farmers of the better sort are considered 
 here as squires. These men, however, boast of honourable lineage, and, 
 like oaks among shrubs, look down upon the rural vulgar. You would be 
 surprised at the uncouth dignity of these men, and their palpably ludicrous 
 pride; nor will you be less surprised at the humility of their boon- 
 companions (compotantium) , and the triumphs of their domineering 
 spirit among the plaudits of the pothouse or kitchen ; the awkward 
 prodigality and sordid luxury of their feasts ; the inelegant roughness and 
 dull hilarity of their conversation ; their intercourse with servants and 
 animals so assiduous, with clergymen or gentlemen so rare ; being illiterate, 
 they shun the lettered; being sots, the sober (sobrios bibaculi). Their 
 whole attention is given to get their cattle and everything else fat, their 
 own intellect not excepted. Is this enough about the squires ? Don't 
 ask anything further about their women. They who understand Latin will 
 feel that these remarks do not apply to them ; they who do not, I need 
 not dread their abuse." 
 
 This is certainly not very complimentary to the Sussex 
 gentry of 1751. 
 
 To the ladies he is a little more polite, but it is at the 
 expense of their lords and masters : 
 
 " You would probably admire the women if you saw them, as modest in 
 countenance and fond of elegance in their dress, but, at the same time, 
 fond of labour, and experienced in household matters ; both by nature and 
 education better bred and more intellectual generally than the men." 
 
 In social position, as in worldly possessions, Thomas 
 Marchant, of Little Park, Hurst, who follows next in order of the 
 Sussex diarists, was a degree below the Stapleys, of Hickstead 
 Place. They were squires, and one (Richard) was a Justice 
 of the Peace. Thomas Marchant was a Yeoman. Yet they
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 
 
 touched closely upon each other, and mixed with and were 
 probably related to the same families : the Campions, Court- 
 hopes, Dodsons, Scutts, Harts, Turners, Whitpaines, Lind- 
 fields, Stones, &c. For Thomas Marchant belonged to that 
 higher order of English yeomen who farmed their own land, 
 and the house he resided in at Hurst was one of some preten- 
 sions. It had originally belonged to Sir William Juxon, of 
 whom it was bought by Mrs. Annie Swaine, of Hurstpierpoint, 
 and was purchased of her son and heir by the father of Thomas 
 Marchant. Little Park is now the property of Col. Smith 
 Hannington, who acquired it from the Executors of the last 
 male representative of the Marchants of Hurst. Thomas 
 Marchant, our diarist, was the second of his family who held 
 Little Park, and he began his diary in September, 1714; a 
 few years before that of the Stapleys was brought to a close. 
 
 There is a certain family resemblance between the Stapley 
 and the Marchant diaries. Both illustrate the character of 
 the times one of great material prosperity, but, in country 
 places, at all events, of little intellectual activity, and of 
 peaceful pursuits. The sword had, in very truth, been turned 
 into the ploughshare. The campaigns of Marlborough were 
 brought to a close, and the next 50 years were passed, with 
 only rare exceptions, in profound peace, and in a state of 
 material prosperity which has perhaps never been exceeded 
 in England. But it was of a gross kind. This is reflected 
 in the diary of Thomas Marchant, of Hurst; in that of 
 Thomas Turner, of East Hoathly ; and others of the same 
 period. They are redolent of eating and drinking and of 
 the dealings connected therewith. People married, begat 
 and christened children, eat and drank " hugely," amused 
 themselves in a coarse kind of way, bought and sold, died, 
 and were buried. And all this went on in an uniform way as if 
 there were nothing more in life, and as if life would always 
 go on in the same way. The education of the lower classes 
 was utterly neglected, and their morals did not improve. 
 But they were fed well to a large extent in the houses of
 
 26 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 their employers, who were not much superior to them in 
 manners or in education. It was the period, perhaps, when 
 the relations of the farmer and the labourer were closest to 
 each other. The time was yet to come when they were to 
 separate : the former struggling to maintain their position 
 and eventually rising in the scale ; the latter sinking more and 
 more into poverty and pauperism, until poor-rates threatened 
 to swallow up rents, and then a reactionary movement set in 
 towards independence, which, assisted by new forces, is going 
 on in our own day. 
 
 But these changes were far off in Thomas Marchant's days. 
 The Cival Wars were well nigh forgotten ; the great wars in 
 Flanders, where our soldiers fought so well and swore so 
 terribly, were over. Sir Robert Walpole was entering on his 
 long lease of political power, and rinding out the price at 
 which men were to be bought ; peace being the great object 
 of his policy, and a gross national prosperity the reward of it. 
 
 Thomas Marchant, of Little Park, Hurst, was, we may be 
 sure, one of those who accepted this policy, and his life was 
 a capital illustration of it. He had received a practical kind 
 of education could read, write and keep accounts, and was, 
 in all probability, rather superior in these respects to his 
 neighbours ; for he was frequently selected as executor to 
 their wills and as overseer, &c. ; and was eventually chosen 
 by the owner of Petworth, the " proud " Duke of Somerset, 
 to be his steward, and for some time filled that post, living 
 then near Petworth. But, at the time he began this diary, he 
 was at Little Park, farming his own land there, and doing a 
 great deal as the breeder of fresh-water fish, for which, it is 
 clear, there was a much greater demand in those days than 
 there is now. In every way, indeed, he was a good man of 
 business ever ready to turn a penny and make a bargain. 
 The first day's entry, September 29, 1714, isnotabad sample 
 of the character of the whole diary. Here it is : 
 
 "John Shelley went away. Set 4 pigs to fatting yesterday. Lent 
 James Reed 4 oxen. Paid John Gun I guinea. Went by Henfield to
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 27 
 
 Steyning fair : and received 313. 6d. of John Goffe, as part paiment of 
 3 guineas which I had lent him. Bought five runts of Thomas Jones for 
 16. Drank with Thomas Vinal of Cowfold at J. Beard's. Met with 
 J. Gold of Brighthelmstone at Bramber as we were coming home; and 
 concluded that he should have a load of my wheat at "]. los. which is to 
 be delivered on friday se'nnight next at the Rock. We did not agree for 
 any Barley ; because some one had told him that my Barley was all of it 
 mowburnt. Ned Grey kept holiday. The day was dry ; we took in the 
 evening 22 pigeons." 
 
 And so the diary of Thomas Marchant runs on, filled with 
 details which are purely personal and, for the most part, 
 relating to business matters, and pounds, shillings and pence 
 scarcely a reference to national affairs, which now occupy 
 so much of men's thoughts of the great contests of parties 
 or collisions of Empires hardly a thought beyond the parish 
 in which Mr. Marchant lived, or its immediate neighbourhood. 
 Brighthelmstone, indeed, figures more than once in the diary 
 and Lewes pretty frequently, Mr. Marchant going to the 
 Sessions on parochial business, disputed settlements being a 
 fertile source of litigation between neighbouring parishes, 
 which rejoiced in their triumphs over each other as though it 
 were a gain to the community that some unfortunate labourer, 
 who had strayed from his parish, was transferred from Hurst 
 to Cuckfield, or vice versa, as the case might be. 
 
 " Went to the Sessions at Lewes, where we had a trial with the parish 
 of Cuckfield about the settlement of Thomas Mitchell: and 'we cast them ." 
 
 With what exultation did Thomas Marchant make that 
 entry, not forgetting the inevitable sequel : " Dined at the 
 Crown " the parish paying for the dinner to celebrate the 
 victory over Cuckfield in re Thomas Mitchell, pauper ! 
 
 Obsolete customs, coins and terms crop up here and there. 
 Ex. gr. : " Sold John Smith a steer at (> certain ; and, if he 
 prove worth it, I am to have a noble more." 
 
 How long is it since nobles disappeared from our current 
 coin ? 
 
 Thomas Marchant was not an intemperate man ; but all 
 men in those days, in all ranks of life, drank freely and at 
 times deeply, and our Sussex diarist does not blink the matter.
 
 28 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 At Danny, on one occasion, he, his wife and others " staid 
 late and drank too much." On another occasion, at Mr. 
 Whitpaine's, " staid late there and drank enough" Again, at 
 John Smith's, " stay'd late and drank too much." Nor was 
 he very particular with whom he drank. A mountebank came 
 to the town (Hurst), and Mr. Marchant records, " Mr. Scutt 
 and I drank tea with the tumbler. Of his tricks (he modestly 
 writes) I am no judge ; but he appears to me to play well on 
 the fiddle." 
 
 Perhaps the trick of playing the fiddle was to Thomas 
 Marchant (as, indeed, it was at a later date to Dr. Johnson) 
 the most wonderful of all tricks ! The arrival of a mountebank 
 was evidently an event at Hurst. In subsequent entries we are 
 informed, " A mountebank man here the znd time. * * * 
 I drank with him yesterday at the Swan." And, later on, 
 " The mountebank in the town. A smock race in our field." 
 Probably in honour of the mountebank ! The visits of 
 mountebanks are rare enough now ; but the visits of another 
 sort of gentry have died out quite. " Mr. Russell, the non- 
 juror, came there (to Mr. Dodson's, the Rector of Hurst) 
 in the evening." Non-jurors were those clergymen of the 
 Church of England who refused to take the oaths of allegiance 
 to the new dynasty and denied the orthodoxy of the Bishops 
 who recognised William and Mary as their Sovereigns. 
 
 Bleedings and shavings of the head are frequently recorded, 
 and cyder is still brewed. Side by side with these old 
 fashions, now extinct, are symptoms of new ones, which still 
 flourish. Thus, in 1717, "Willy went to see a cricket 
 match" an early record of that now national game. In 
 Whitsuntide of the same year " the new singers began to sing 
 in the church," and Mr. Blencowe adds, in a note, that the 
 then Bishop of Chichester granted a faculty at this time for 
 a singing gallery at the west end of Hurst Church, where, 
 doubtless, the " new singers " were located. " Carried flax" 
 is a reference to a growth now seldom seen in Sussex. The 
 Sussex iron mills were in full work; prize-fighting was in
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 29 
 
 vogue ; " Will and Jack went to Lewes to see a prize-fight 
 between Harris and another." Horses and carts were 
 "mired" in Sussex roads, and people died of the small-pox in 
 a way which would gladden the hearts of modern anti-vaccina- 
 tors ! " Crying lost goods in church " is a custom " more 
 honoured in the breach than the observance." But there are 
 some signs of civilization : " Mr. Lun, the dancing-master, 
 began teaching at Kester's." Tea begins to be drunk with 
 greater frequency, and the following entry "Paid Norman 
 6d. for the reading of a book yesterday, and reed, a case to 
 carry pen and ink and sand " indicates that letters were not 
 quite neglected. Indeed, this diary itself is a proof of this. 
 But, at the same time, it proves the slight extent to which 
 literature had penetrated to the middle classes at the begin- 
 ning of the 1 8th century. In the diary of Thomas Turner, 
 mercer, of East Hoathly, we shall find great advance in this 
 respect. He was a reader of books and had a taste for their 
 contents. To Thomas Marchant, as to the Stapleys, they 
 appear to have been totally closed. The only books they 
 were acquainted with, judging from their own records, were 
 account books. Yes, one book is named by Thomas 
 Marchant: it is a book entitled "Lex Testamentaria " (the 
 law of Wills), which he received from Mr. Norman, and he 
 couples the fact with another : " paid zos. for a ribbon and 
 slouch for Molly Balcombe ! " We wonder if Mrs. Marchant 
 was privy to this purchase ! 
 
 In fact, the whole time and attention of the country 
 gentry and farmers of that time were absorbed in res angusta 
 domi, but which to them were a source of pleasure as well as 
 of profit. It was a prosperous period ; but the leisure which 
 prosperity produces had not yet begun to give that refinement 
 and taste for luxuries which were to follow. The men eat, 
 drank, fished, shot, hunted, bought and sold, raised stock, 
 sowed and reaped, married and begot children ; and these, 
 with a little parish business, or a county election now and 
 then, and an occasional bout of drinking, made up life at
 
 30 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 least, there are signs of little more in the Stapley and 
 Marchant diaries. The political allusions, as to the Corona- 
 tion Day of George I. (October 18, 1714), his death, and the 
 accession of George II. (1727) ; the report about the Duke of 
 Ormond, the great supporter of the Chevalier St. George, 
 commonly called the Pretender, " going off at Shoreham" 
 with Sir Harry Goring, Mr. Middleton and one or two. 
 more, are of the most meagre kind. There is a little more 
 detail than usual about the contested election for Sussex 
 which followed on the accession of George I., and in which 
 the Whigs gained the victory " by a vast majority," but, as 
 Mr. Marchant (who had Tory, if not Jacobite proclivities) 
 insinuates, " by all manner of indirect practices." But these 
 are " few and far between," and show the faint interest taken 
 in politics in those days compared with present times. In 
 one respect they seem to have had the advantage over us : 
 there was, to all appearance, a more free mixture of classes 
 less separation between the degrees of social rank which 
 made up the rural community. Mr. Thomas Marchant, 
 although only a yeoman, farming his own land, dines and 
 sups at Danny with the Campions and the Courthopes, and 
 goes to Mr. Dodson's at the Rectory, and mixes with the 
 Whitpaines, the Scutt's and other members of the landed 
 gentry living at or near Hurst, on terms of perfect equality. 
 One of the last entries tells us how " three of Sir George 
 Parker's daughters supt and spent the evening here." In 
 fact, there is no evidence of social differences or jealousies 
 in the Marchant diary, and we are afraid that such would not 
 be the case if one of the same rank were to keep a diary in 
 the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eighty- 
 one! 
 
 The first and foremost of our Sussex diarists, in diaristic 
 ability, though, in order of time he came last, is without 
 question, Thomas Turner, general dealer, of East Hoathly. 
 He is our Sussex Pepys, and possesses many of the qualities 
 of that Prince of Diarists. He is intelligent, frank, open- 
 speaking, rather fond of recording his own failings, disposed
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 3 1 
 
 to be social, a good man of business, but yet with a decided 
 bent towards literature. In all these points Samuel Pepys, 
 Secretary of the Admiralty, and Thomas Turner, grocer, 
 draper, haberdasher, hatter, clothier, druggist, ironmonger, 
 stationer, glover, undertaker for Thomas Turner was all of 
 these, cum multis aliis resemble each other and if one enjoys 
 a world-wide fame and the other only a local reputation, it is 
 owing, perhaps, to the Fate that placed them in such different 
 spheres. 
 
 Still, in his own sphere, Thomas Turner is a man to be 
 esteemed, and he has performed a work namely, that of 
 describing the life of a Sussex rural tradesman 100 years 
 ago for which he ought to be held in high regard by all 
 students of social history in England. 
 
 He was' not a native of Sussex. He was born in 1728 at 
 Groombridge, in Kent ; but he claimed descent from an old 
 Sussex family the Turners of Tablehurst, at East Grinstead 
 and he must have settled in Sussex pretty early in life, for 
 he begins his diary in 1754, at which time he was only 26 
 years of age. Where he was educated we are not told ; but 
 he had evidently received an education above the average, 
 and though, as was the failing of the times, his orthography 
 was by no means perfect, he expresses himself with ease and 
 force, and has a considerable command of language. In this, 
 indeed, and in other respects, he is far above the Stapleys 
 and Marchants, or even the Rev. Giles Moore. Take, as a 
 sample, the sentence with which he opens his diary on 
 Sunday, Feb. 8, 1754: 
 
 "As I by experience find how much more conducive it is to my health 
 as well as pleasantness and serenity to my mind, to live in a low, moderate 
 rate of diet, and as I know I shall never be able to comply therewith in so 
 strickt a manner as I should chuse, by the unstable and over-easyness of 
 my temper, I think it therefore fit to draw up rules of proper Regimen, 
 which I do in the manner and form following, which I hope I shall always 
 have the strictest regard to follow, as I think they are not inconsistent 
 with either religion or morality." 
 
 As is the wont of young men beginning life young 
 women, too, perhaps Thomas Turner forms a number of
 
 32 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 good resolutions, which but the sequel will show how he 
 kept them. He determines to rise early, to breakfast between 
 seven and eight, and to dine between the hours of twelve and 
 one; eating sparingly of meat, but plenty of garden stuff; 
 his supper to consist of weak broth, water-gruel, or milk 
 pottage, varied occasionally with a fruit pie. 
 
 "If," he says, "I am at home, or in company abroad, I will never 
 drink more than four glasses of strong beer ; one to drink the King's 
 health, the second to the Royal Family, the third to all friends, and the 
 fourth to the pleasure of the company. If there is either wine or punch, 
 never upon any terms or perswasion to drink more than eight glasses, each 
 glass to hold no more than half a quarter of a pint." 
 
 He concludes with the resolution, " allways to go to bed at 
 or before ten o'clock." 
 
 Mr. Turner was at this time a married man. Men married 
 early 100 years ago, in all ranks of life ; for competition was 
 not so fierce as it is now, and men were less ambitious in 
 their aims and women less expensive in their dress and houses. 
 His wife, too, shared in his literary tastes, for an early entry 
 tells us that on one occasion " my wife read to me that moving 
 scene of the funeral of Miss Clarissa Harlow" (in Richardson's 
 novel), and thereupon he makes the edifying remark : 
 
 " Oh, may the Supreme Being give me grace to lead my life in such a 
 manner as my exit may in some measure be like that divine creature's." 
 
 And let it not be supposed that the East Hoathly grocer's 
 readings was limited to novels. In the course of five or six 
 weeks, say the editors of his diary (Messrs. R. W. Blencowe 
 and M. A. Lower), "we find him recording his perusal of 
 Gray's Poems, Stewart On the Supreme Being, the Whole Duty 
 of Man, Paradise Lost and Regained, Othello, the Universal 
 Magazine, Thomson's Seasons, Young's Night Thoughts, 
 Tournefort's Voyage to the Levant, and Peregrine Pickle" 
 
 A very good six weeks' reading for a man engaged all the 
 day in trade ! Another day we find him reading part of 
 Boyle's Lectures ; then he turns from science to politics and 
 reads " several numbers of the Freeholder" which, he adds,
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 33 
 
 "I think is a proper book for any person at this critical 
 juncture of affairs" it was in April, 1756 and from politics 
 to poetry ; for on the same day he read "Homer's Odysseyss" 
 (sic\ and thus records his opinion of it : 
 
 " I think the character which Menelaus gives Telemachus of Ulisses, 
 when he is a specking of his warlike virtues, in the 4th Book, is very good. 
 Read the I3th Book after supper; I think the soliloquy which Ulysses 
 makes when he finds the Phoenicians have in his sleep left him on his 
 native shore of Ithaca, with all his treasure, contains a very good lesson 
 of morality." 
 
 At the same time he copies out in full the passages he 
 admired from Pope's translation. 
 
 As some explanation, however, of this unusual taste for 
 literature in a Sussex tradesman of that day, it should be 
 noted that Mr. Turner began his career at East Hothly as a 
 schoolmaster. It was not a long nor apparently a successful 
 career, for in May, 1756, he resigned his school and scholars 
 to Mr. Francis Ellis and entered on the more lucrative vocation 
 of a general shopkeeper. But he did not give up his reading. 
 To the last we find him deep in such solid works as "Burnett's 
 History of the Reformation," and Beveredge's " Thoughts," 
 varied by Shakspeare's plays and John Wilkes's "North 
 Briton." 
 
 It would have been well for Thomas Turner if he had 
 been constant to his books, and had not indulged in another 
 habit more in keeping with the times ; and that was of 
 excessive drinking. The reader will not forget the good 
 resolution with which he started, "never upon any terms or 
 persuasion to drink more than eight glasses (of wine or 
 punch), each glass to hold no more than half a quarter of a 
 pint." 
 
 Quite enough, one might have thought, for a moderate 
 man. But Thomas Turner was, it is evident, not proof 
 against temptation, and his lapses from sobriety commence 
 early and recur only too frequently. Here is the first set 
 down : " I went to the audit and came home drunk. But I 
 think never to exceed the bounds of moderation more." 
 D
 
 34 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Alas ! for the frailty of human nature. Close upon the 
 above is the following: "Sunday, 28th, went down to Jones, 
 where we drank one bowl of punch and two muggs of bumboo ; 
 and I came home again in liquor. Oh ! with what horrors 
 does it fill my heart, to think I should be guilty of doing so, 
 and on a Sunday, too ! Let me once more endeavour never, 
 no never, to be guilty of the same again." 
 
 Can any reader tell us what " bumboo " is ? But perhaps 
 it is as well they should not know ! 
 
 It is amusing, but scarcely edifying, to find our diarist 
 perfectly awake to the enormity of his offence, and yet still 
 offending. "In the evening" so runs one of his entries 
 " I read part of the fourth volume of the Taller; the oftener 
 I read it the better I like it. I think I never found the vice 
 of drinking so well exploded in my life as in one of the 
 numbers." 
 
 So of his attendance, or rather non-attendance, at church. 
 He plainly saw the right road and he followed the wrong one. 
 
 Yet never was a man who kept a diary less disposed to 
 screen his weaknesses, or more ready to lay the lash upon his 
 own back ! In the making of good resolutions, too, he was 
 decidedly strong. We have had some specimens. Here is 
 another: "June zoth. This is my birthday, in which I 
 enter the zgth year of my age ; and may I, as I grow in years, 
 so continue to increase in goodness ; for, as my exit must 
 every day draw nearer, so may I every day become more 
 enamoured with the prospect of the happiness of another 
 world, and more entirely dead to the follies and vanities of 
 this transitory world." 
 
 The next entry, June 21, is a curious comment on this : 
 
 " June 2ist. Attended the funeral of Master Goldsmith at Waldron ; 
 this was the merriest funeral that ever I saw, for I can safely say there was 
 no crying." 
 
 There is, indeed, throughout Mr. Turner's diary a comical 
 contradiction of precept and action. The writer is a sage
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 35 
 
 and moralist in theory; in practice he is but we will leave 
 him to name himself: 
 
 " Aug. 22nd. I sett off for Piltdown, where I saw Charles Diggens and 
 James Fowle run twenty rod for one guinea each. I got never a bet, but 
 very drunk." 
 
 " Tuesday, 23rd. Came home in the forenoon, not quite sober ; at home 
 all day, and I know I behaved more like an ass than any human being 
 doubtless not like one who calls himself a Christian. Oh ! how unworthy 
 am I of that name ! " 
 
 The reader, perhaps, has had enough of these lapses from 
 sobriety and self-criminations. Let us turn to another page 
 in Mr. Turner's diary, in which, with a frankness very unusual 
 in our Sussex diarists, he introduces us into his family interior 
 and imparts to us his domestic troubles. He had taken to 
 himself a wife soon after his arrival at East Hothly, and we 
 presume that she was a native of that place, for he refers to 
 his mother-in-law, Mrs. Slater, as a ( " very Xantippe," with a 
 " great volubility of tongue," " especially if I am the subject." 
 This lady was one of the stirrers-up of dissension between 
 Mr. and Mrs. Turner. Another cause of conjugal irritation was 
 Mrs. T.'s inclination to visit her friends at Lewes on occasions 
 when her absence from home was inconvenient to Mr. T. 
 " I have," he writes on one occasion, " several journeys to go 
 next week, which I must postpone on account of her absence. 
 But, alas! what can be said of a woman's temper and thought? 
 Business and family advantage must submit to their pride and 
 pleasure. But tho' I mention this of women, it may perhaps 
 be as justly applyed to men ; but most people are blind to 
 their own follies." 
 
 The way in which these journeys were made by Mr. Turner's 
 better-half would astonish ladies of the present day. In the 
 first place a horse had to be borrowed, and then both man and 
 woman had to mount it, the latter riding on a pillion behind 
 her lord. And sometimes Master Dobbin was indisposed to 
 bear the double load and behaved accordingly : 
 
 " My wife having hired a horse of John Watford, about four o'clock 
 we set out on our journey to Hartfield, and as we were riding along near 
 to Hastingford, no more than a foot's pace, the horse stood still, and 
 continued kicking-up until we was both off, in a very dirty hole (but,
 
 36 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 thanks be to God, we received no hurt). My wife was obliged to go in to 
 Hastingford House, to clean herself. My wife and I spent the even at my 
 father Slater's. We dined off some ratios [rashers] of pork and green 
 sallard." 
 
 Mr. Turner often particularises the dishes off which he 
 dined, and certainly they were not epicures in those days. 
 This is a Sunday's meal : " Sept. i8th. My whole family at 
 church myself, wife, maid and the two boys. We dined off 
 a piece of boiled beef and carrots, and currant suet pudding." 
 
 It will be observed that the whole household boys, maids 
 and all, dined together a custom long disused. 
 
 Up to this point that is, some three or four years after 
 marriage the domestic happiness of the Turners had not 
 been much disturbed, except by Mrs. Slater's tongue and her 
 daughter's frequent illness. But now we come to a very tragic 
 entry : 
 
 "This day how are my most sanguine hopes of happiness frustrated ! 
 I mean the happiness between myself and wife, which hath now 
 continued for some time ; but, oh ! this day it has become the contra ! I 
 think I have tryed all experiments to make our life's happy, but they have 
 all failed. The opposition seems to be naturally in our tempers not 
 arising from spitefulness ; but an opposition that seems indicated by our 
 very make and constitution." 
 
 John Milton himself could have set down no stronger 
 reason for that right of divorce for which he pleaded so 
 eloquently, and, in his days, ineffectually! And from this 
 time there is a continual recurrence of these doleful entries. 
 " Oh ! " Mr. Turner breaks out on Nov. 3, " how transient is 
 all mundane bliss ! I who on Sunday last was all calm and 
 serenity in my breast, am now nought but slorm and tempest. 
 Well might the wise man say, ' It were better to dwell in a 
 corner of the house-top than with a contentious woman in a 
 wide house.' " 
 
 He had, however, his intervals of calm, and seems to have 
 enjoyed them. Thus, "1751, Jan. 9, Mr. Elless(his successor 
 in the school), Marchant, myself and wife sat down to whist 
 about seven o'clock and played all night ; very pleasant, and, 
 I think I may say, innocent mirth, there being no oaths nor
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 37 
 
 imprecations sounding from side to side, as is too often the 
 case at cards." 
 
 And, again, Feb. 2, in the same year, "We supped at Mr. 
 Fuller's, and spent the evening with a great deal of mirth, 
 till between one and two. Tho. Fuller brought my wife home 
 upon his back. I cannot say I came home sober, though I 
 was far from being bad company. I think we spent the 
 evening with a great deal of pleasure." 
 
 Cards all night and merriment till between one and two 
 in the morning do not say much for the habits of the day ! 
 to say nothing of carrying home ladies pick-a-back ! But 
 this is nothing to what took place on the succeeding 22nd 
 and 25th of February : 
 
 "About 4 p.m. I walked down to Whyly. We played at bragg the 
 first part of the even. After ten we went to supper on four boiled chicken, 
 four boiled ducks, minced veal, cold roast goose, chicken pasty and ham. 
 Our company, Mr. and Mrs. Porter, Mr. and Mrs. Coates, Mrs. Atkins, 
 Mrs. Hicks, Mr. Piper and wife, Joseph Fuller and wife, Tho. Fuller and 
 wife, Dame Durrant, myself and wife and Mr. French's family. After 
 supper our behaviour was far from that of serious, harmless mirth ; it was 
 downright obstreperious, mixed with a great deal of folly and stupidity. 
 Our diversion was dancing or jumping about, without a violin or any 
 musick, singing of foolish healths and drinking all the time as fast as it 
 could be well poured down ; and the parson of the parish was one among 
 the mixed multitude. If conscience dictates right from wrong, as doubtless 
 it sometimes does, mine is one that I may say is soon offended ; for, I 
 must say, I am always very uneasy at such behaviour, thinking it not like 
 the behaviour of the primitive Christians, which I imagine was most in 
 conformity to our Saviour's gospel. Nor would I be thought to be either 
 a cynick or a stoick, but let social improving discourse pass round the 
 company. About three o'clock, finding myself to have as much liquor as 
 would do me good, I slipt away unobserved, leaving my wife to make my 
 excuse. Though I was very far from sober, I came home, thank God, very 
 safe and well, without even tumbling ; and Mr. French's servant brought 
 my wife home at ten minutes past five " (probably, add the Editors of the 
 Diary, on his back). 
 
 This is pretty well in the way of "fooling;" but what 
 follows beats it : 
 
 "Thursday, Feb. 25th. This morning, about six o'clock, just as my 
 wife was got to bed, we was awaked by Mrs. Porter, who pretended she 
 wanted some cream of tartar ; but as soon as my wife got out of bed she 
 vowed she should come down. She found Mr. Porter, Mr. Fuller, and his 
 wife, with a lighted candle, and part of a bottle of port wine and a glass. 
 The next thing was to have me down stairs, which being apprized of, I
 
 38 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 fastened my door. Up stairs they came and threatened to break it open; 
 so I ordered the boys to open it, when they poured into my room ; and, 
 as modesty forbid me to get out of bed, so I refrained ; but their immodesty 
 permitted them to draw me out of bed, as the common phrase is, topsy- 
 turvey; but, however, at the intercession of Mr. Porter, they permitted 
 
 me to put on my , and instead of my upper cloaths, they gave me 
 
 time to put on my wife's petticoats; and in this manner they made me 
 dance, without shoes and stockings, until they had emptied the bottle of 
 wine and also a bottle of my beer. . . . About three o'clock in the 
 afternoon they found their way to their respective homes, beginning to be 
 a little serious, and, in my opinion, ashamed of their stupid enterprise and 
 drunken preambulation. Now, let anyone call in reason to his assistance, 
 and seriously reflect on what I have before recited, and they will join 
 with me in thinking that the precepts delivered from the pulpit on Sunday, 
 tho' delivered with the greatest ardour, must lose a great deal of their 
 efficacy by such examples." 
 
 Most unquestionably there are few in these days who will 
 not give a hearty approval to these sentiments of Mr. Thomas 
 Turner. Perhaps it was in a vein of satire that, immediately 
 after chronicling the above nocturnal orgies, our diarist 
 adds: "Sunday, March 3. We had as good a sermon as I 
 ever heard Mr. Porter preach it being against swearing." 
 
 Drinking would have been a topic more to the point. 
 
 We have before remarked on the greater freedom of 
 intercourse between different classes in country places in 
 former days. And here, in the above entries, is another 
 instance; not very edifying certainly, but forcible. 
 
 Nor was this an exceptional meeting. Another is entered 
 on the following March yth, at which the same party with 
 the addition of a Mr. Calverley and Mrs. Atkins met to sup 
 at Mr. Joseph Fuller's, "drinking," says our diarist, "like 
 horses, as the vulgar phrase is, and singing till many of us were 
 very drunk, and then we went to dancing and pulling of wigs, 
 caps and hats; and thus we continued in this frantic manner, 
 behaving more like mad people than they that profess the 
 name of Christians." 
 
 Three days after this they sup at Mr. Porter's, with a 
 repetition of the same excesses, except that (perhaps in defer- 
 ence to the recent exhortations from the rev. gentleman's 
 pulpit) " there was no swearing and no ill words, by reason
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 39 
 
 of which Mr. Porter," he says, " calls it innocent mirth, but 
 I in opinion differ much therefrom." 
 
 The next day Mr. Thomas Turner was " at home very 
 piteous," and certainly deserving no pity. For, yet once 
 more, on the following Friday, the orgies were renewed at 
 his own house, and then, he adds, "all revelling for this 
 season is over; and may I never more be discomposed with 
 so much drink, or by the noise of an obstreperous multitude, 
 but that I may calm my troubled mind and sooth my dis- 
 turbed conscience." 
 
 A more striking illustration of the grossness of the manners 
 of the age will scarcely be found even in the pages of Fielding 
 or Smollett. That the clergyman of the parish, and a man of 
 learning, as Mr. Porter evidently was, should have joined in 
 such scenes shows to what a low point " the cloth " had sunk, 
 and that the Trullibers and Thwackams and Squareums of 
 fiction were not mere " inventions of the enemy." 
 
 Thomas Turner did not take the same trouble as Samuel 
 Pepys did to conceal what he wrote. He had not the same 
 reasons for doing so, for he was not the servant of a jealous 
 Government, nor did he live in a scandalous Court, which 
 might not have been too well pleased to have its doings 
 handed down to posterity. He wrote his diary in a fair 
 legible hand, in some 116 "stout memorandum books," and 
 the manuscript went down to his son and his grandson, by the 
 latter of whom it has been given to the world. But in Turner's 
 own life-time he must have kept it very close. His first wife, 
 his " dear Peggy," we are certain never saw it, or it would 
 scarcely have survived to the present day! He must have 
 written it " on the sly," and it must have taken up a good 
 deal of his time. Yet he had a large business to attend to. 
 What were his motives, then, for keeping so voluminous a 
 diary? Why did he chronicle with such minuteness his own 
 doings and those of his neighbours not always of the most 
 creditable kind? Why did he so often enter such good 
 resolutions, and alas! why did he so frequently have to
 
 4O Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 chronicle that he had broken them? There can be little 
 doubt that Thomas Turner had a " tender conscience" that 
 he really did grieve when he drank too much, gambled away 
 his money, and played the fool; and probably he had some 
 idea that in recording his delinquencies he made some 
 reparation for them and strengthened himself for better things. 
 He was also, it is plain, of an open, social, communicative 
 temper in this resembling his great prototype, Pepys. He 
 did not live in a great city or see much of life ; but he got as 
 much as he could out of the little rural community in which 
 he did live. He was a lively actor in it and he was an acute 
 observer. He was a good business man, too, in the habit of 
 keeping accounts, and, from making entries of his business 
 dealings, there was but a step to making entries of his personal 
 affairs his pleasures and his troubles his discretions and his 
 follies. It was a diversion from his more sedate occupations. 
 There was, too, doubtless, a little smattering of vanity in it. 
 He was the hero of the drama at once the victor and the 
 sufferer. If he sinned it was some consolation that he also 
 inflicted the punishment; if he suffered (and as he had a 
 Xantippe for his mother-in-law there is no doubt he did!) 
 there was some solace in giving expression to it. If he failed, 
 he could condole with himself. If he succeeded, did he not 
 prolong the pleasure of success by setting it down in his 
 diary? And then there was, as we have said, a little vanity 
 mixed up with it. It is not every man that can keep a 
 diary of any kind; and Thomas Turner's was not an ordinary 
 diary. He had some literary taste and ability and must have 
 felt, as he made his entries, that he was doing what no other 
 man in his parish perhaps in the county could do. He 
 was, perhaps, prolonging the memory of his name to other 
 ages conferring on himself a species of immortality! We 
 have reason to be thankful that he did it. The result is that 
 we have a picture of rural manners in the last century which 
 is worth a whole library of learned essays or sermons or 
 fashionable novels, and that we can see here how Englishmen 
 of the middle classes actually passed their lives in those small
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 41 
 
 communities, composed of clergyman, squire, a few farmers 
 and shopkeepers and a large gathering of labourers and of 
 labourers' wives, sons, and daughters, which made up the 
 greater part of England 100 years ago how they worked and 
 played eat, drank, rode, and smoked, swore and prayed 
 quarrelled and amused themselves. Such a picture as this 
 does Thomas Turner, general dealer, of East Hothly, give; 
 and whatever his motives may have been for doing so we are 
 thankful that he kept a diary. 
 
 Now, to leave our speculations and resume our quotations. 
 
 The spirits of Thomas Turner rose and fell with business, 
 according as it was dull or brisk. In July, 1757, he chronicles 
 " a most prodigious melancholy time and very little to do," 
 adding, in a moralising vein, " I think that luxury increases so 
 fast in this part of the nation that people have little or no money 
 to spare to buy what is really necessary. The too frequent use 
 of spirituous liquors and the exorbitant practice of tea-drinking 
 has corrupted the morals of people of almost every rank." 
 
 The conjunction of spirituous liquors and "the exorbitant 
 practice of tea-drinking " as corrupting the morals of the 
 people will be a novelty in the eyes of tee-totallers of the 
 igth century! Mr. Turner makes this conjunction more than 
 once, and, although he was a seller of tea, evidently did not 
 look upon it with favourable eyes. 
 
 On the previous Sunday a brief had been read in East 
 Hothly Church "to repair the groins and fortifications of the 
 town of Brighthelmstone against the encroachments of the 
 sea on that coast, which, if not timely prevented, will in all 
 probability eat in and destroy the town, several houses having 
 in a few years been swallowed up by the sea." Times are 
 changed with Brighton as well as with tea ! 
 
 If it be any consolation to know that there were wet 
 summers in former days, it may be found in the following 
 entry in July, 1757: "This is the 2gth day on which we have 
 had rain successively." And yet some people think that the 
 sun always shone in the olden summers.
 
 42 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Manners and morals go, as a rule, together. When the 
 former are gross and Thomas Turner's dairy is full of 
 evidence that they were such in the middle ranks of society 
 100 years ago we maybe pretty sure that the latter were not 
 very pure. The matter-of-course tone in which Mr. Turner 
 sets down certain family facts which, in the present day, 
 supposing them to occur, would be kept out of sight as much 
 as possible, indicates that they were comparatively ordinary 
 occurrences. Thus he records, on May z6th, 1764, that 
 " My brother Moses came to acquaint me of the death of 
 Philip Turner, natural son of my half-sister, Elizabeth 
 Turner (the boy we had the care of, as also his maintenance, 
 according to the will of my father). He died this morn about 
 five o'clock of a scarlet fever, aged fifteen years." 
 
 And again, immediately after this, " In the morn I went 
 over to Framfield, and, after taking an account of the gloves, 
 hatbands, favours, &c., I set out for the funeral of Alice 
 Stevens, otherwise Smith, natural daughter of Ben Stevens, 
 at whose house she died." 
 
 Upon these facts, occurring in families of good repute, 
 the Editors remark, " Natural children one hundred years 
 ago were considered the most natural things in the world." 
 The example was set by the higher classes. " Mistresses " 
 were an established part of the household of a great man 
 100 years ago, and when they had lost their early bloom the 
 ladies were, according to Macaulay, handed over to the 
 domestic chaplains as wives. That the conjunction was not 
 so very unequal we may conclude from some of the entries 
 in this diary in respect to the clergy amongst them the 
 
 following: " Mr. , the curate of Laughton, came to the 
 
 shop in the forenoon, and he having bought some things of 
 me (and I could wish he had paid for them) dined with me 
 and also staid in the afternoon till he got in liquor, and being 
 so complaisant as to keep him company I was quite drunk. 
 How do I detest myself for being so foolish !" 
 
 The great nobleman in the neighbourhood of East Hothly
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 43 
 
 was the Duke of Newcastle, the first and last of the House 
 of Pelham who bore the title, and whose seat, Halland House, 
 was situated at Laughton and was the scene of great 
 festivities in other words, of much dissipation, upon which 
 Mr. Thomas Turner does not omit to pass some severe and 
 just strictures, though, considering from whom they came, it is 
 a little like the pot calling the kettle black ! " Oh, how glad," 
 he exclaims on one occasion, " am I that the hurry and con- 
 fusion is over at Halland, for it quite puts me out of that regular 
 way of life which I am so fond of ; and not only so, but occasions 
 me, by too great hurry of spirits, many times to commit such 
 actions as is not agreeable to reason and religion!" 
 
 Cock-fighting was at this period one of the "national" 
 sports. Ex. gr.: "Was fought, this day, at Jones's, a main 
 of cocks between the gentlemen of Hothly and Pevensey." 
 
 The grossness of manners that showed itself, in private 
 life, in inordinate drinking and " romping " and the carrying 
 home of each other's wives on their backs was, as might 
 be expected, not without its public phase. Mr. Turner 
 occasionally attended Vestry meetings and he does not speak 
 of them in the most flattering terms. Thus, "after dinner I 
 went down to Jones, to the Vestry. We had several warm 
 arguments at our Vestry to-day and several vollies of execrable 
 oaths oftentime redounded from almost all parts of the room. 
 A most rude and shocking thing at publick meetings." 
 
 In the midst, however, of the hard drinking and swearing 
 and coarse immorality of the day, indications occur in Mr. 
 Turner's diary of the deeper current that was setting in. 
 Literature entered largely into the delights of our East Hothly 
 trader and science put in an occasional appearance, though 
 as yet she was a wonder and a mystery. " There being at 
 Jones's a person with an electrical machine my niece and I 
 went to see it; and tho' I have seen it several years agoe, I 
 think there is something in it agreeable and instructing, but 
 at the same time very surprising. As to my own part, I am 
 quite at a loss to form any idea of the phoeinomina."
 
 44 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Though Mr. Turner was not quite at home in scientific 
 terms this entry is creditable to him, and is a great advance 
 on Mr. Marchant's admiration of the tricks of the " tumbler" 
 at Hurst. 
 
 Mr. Turner also had his opinions in politics, and was not 
 afraid to read the North Briton, nor to express his approval of 
 its contents: "July 13, 1763. In the even read several 
 political papers called the North Briton, which are wrote by 
 John Wilks, Esq., Member for Ailesbury, Bucks, for the 
 writing of which he has been committed to the Tower and 
 procured his release by a writ of Harbus Corpus. I really 
 think they breathe forth such a spirit of liberty that it is an 
 extreme good paper." 
 
 Well done, country trader of a hundred years ago ! There 
 is many a country trader in the present day who would hesitate 
 to speak out so boldly as this! It may be doubted, indeed, 
 whether the position of the country shopkeeper has not 
 degenerated in the last hundred years, both in respect to the 
 amount of trade done and the character of the men who 
 carry it on. It is clear that Mr. Thomas Turner, general 
 dealer, of East Hothly, was a man of some importance and 
 standing. He and his wife associated, as we have seen, on 
 equal terms with the clergyman and the clergyman's wife, and 
 he was "hail fellow, well met" with the gentry and farmers. 
 He carried on a very extensive trade, and it is recorded of his 
 son and successor that he "turned over" ^50,000, and, in 
 one or two years, as much as ^70,000 a year: the profits upon 
 which, we may be sure, were much larger than they would be 
 at the present day. " It is," say the Editors of this diary, 
 " certainly a fact that several county families in Sussex can, 
 if they are so disposed, trace their pedigree up to the mercers 
 of bye-gone times." We do not for a moment suppose that 
 they are so disposed! Country mercers are not the men they 
 were. A large part of their custom has been diverted to towns, 
 now so numerous and accessible, and we question if the county 
 families of the future will be much recruited from their ranks.
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 45 
 
 The indignation with which our East Hothly general- 
 dealer looked upon any intrusion on his ground is shown by 
 the following note, in which he refers to the first appearance 
 in the parish of a licensed hawker: 
 
 "July 6. This day came to Jones's a man with a cartload of milinery, 
 mercery, linen-drapery, silver, &c., to keep a sale for two days, which 
 must undoubtedly be some hurt to trade; for the novelty of the thing (and 
 novelty is surely the predominant passion of the English nation, and of 
 Sussex in particular) will catch the ignorant multitude, and perhaps not 
 them only, but people of sense, who are not judges of goods and trade, 
 as indeed very few are; but, however, as it is it must pass." 
 
 Novelty, the passion of Sussex in 1763! What would 
 Thomas Turner say now? 
 
 We have said that the beginning and the middle of the 
 last century was a time of prosperity, though gross in manners 
 and low in morals. The state of crime shows it. "Monday, 
 Aug. u, 1754. This day the Assizes at Lewes and only one 
 prisoner." Thirty-two years later, after the American war, 
 there was a different tale to tell. " I preached," writes the 
 Rev. Mr. Poole, " before the Judge in the College Chapel at 
 East Grinstead, the Church being in ruins. A very full Assize 
 and heavy calendar. Twenty-six prisoners; nine condemned 
 and six for execution." Possibly for what would now be 
 treated as light offences ; for the penal code was Draconic, 
 and Jack Ketch flourished under it! 
 
 Before we take up the thread of Mr. Turner's domestic 
 history we will note one or two points of interest to the 
 archaeologist. In 1756 he attended a sale at Lewes, and the 
 mode of auction was that the last bidder, whilst a candle 
 burned, was the buyer. The candle was lighted before four 
 o'clock and burned till eight ; four hours being occupied in 
 the disposal of property worth ^420! Pepys notices the 
 same custom. "Sept. 3, 1662. After dinner we went and 
 sold the Weymouth, Success and Fellowship Hulkes, where it 
 was pleasant to see how backward men are at first to bid; and 
 yet, when the candle is going out, how they bawl and dispute 
 afterwards who bid the most first. And here I observed one
 
 46 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 man cunninger than the rest, that was sure to bid the last 
 man, and to carry it ; and inquiring the reason, he told me 
 that just as the flame goes out the smoke descends, which is 
 a thing I never observed before, and by that he did know the 
 instant when to bid last." 
 
 Few of our readers, we take it, have ever heard of 
 "pandles." It was "the good old Sussex word (so says 
 Mr. Lower) for shrimps," which latter word is comparatively 
 modern. Mr. Turner writes, " In the morn Fielder brought 
 our herrings, but could get no pandles" 
 
 The fear of over-population had not yet come upon the 
 nation. In fact, Mr. Thomas Turner evidently thought that 
 there was room for a large increase: 
 
 " Nov. 14. This day was married, at our church, Mr. Simonds Blackman 
 and Mary his wife (alias Mary Margenson). She being under age, some 
 months agoe they went into Flanders, and was married at a place called 
 Ypres ; but, as this marriage was not in all respects agreeable to the laws 
 of England, in regard to their issue enjoying the gentleman's estate, they 
 was married this day by a licence, which styled her Mary Margison, 
 othenvise Blackman. In my own own private oppinion I think, instead of 
 making laws to restrain marriage, it would be more to the advantage of 
 the nation to give encouragement to it ; for by that means a great deal of 
 debauchery would, in all probability, be prevented, and a greater increase 
 of people might be the consequence, which, I presume, would be real 
 benefit to the nation; and I think it is the first command of the Parent 
 and Governor of the universe, 'increase and multiply,' and the observation 
 of St. Paul is, that ' marriage is honourable in all men.' " 
 
 But then at this particular moment the mind of our diarist 
 was again directed towards matrimony. He had lost his 
 " dear Peggy," and is as melancholy under the affliction of 
 her death as he was in her life-time under the infliction of 
 her temper. There can be but little doubt that he did value 
 her highly, though his grief is probably a little exaggerated 
 when he says, " with the incomparable Mr. Young" (" Night 
 Thoughts"), "Let them who ever lost an angel pity me!" 
 Perhaps there was a twinge of remorse, for past entries to the 
 prejudice of " dear Peggy," in the outbursts that now meet 
 us, or perhaps (and we think this is the fact), in the absence 
 of Mrs. Turner, his old temptation proved too strong for him. 
 There are signs of it. " I lodged at Joshua Durrant's, and
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 47 
 
 my brother and Mr. Tomlin lodged at my house" a funny 
 arrangement this, but with the same consequences to both 
 parties, for "not one of us went to bed sober, which folly of 
 mine makes me very uneasy. Oh, that I cannot be a person 
 of more resolution." And immediately upon this we have 
 the following: 
 
 " July 27. Very bad all the even. Oh, my heavy and troubled mind ! 
 Oh, my imprudence pays me with trouble ! " 
 
 "July 28th. I am intollerable bad: my conscience tears me in 
 pieces ! " 
 
 " Aug. 5th. Almost distracted with trouble : how do I hourly find 
 the loss I have sustained in the death of my dear wife ! What can equal 
 the value of a virtuous wife ? I hardly know which way to turn, or what 
 way of life to pursue. I am left as a beacon on a rock, or an ensign on a 
 
 In his "grief and melancholy" Mr. Turner takes to 
 "sawing of wood" in his leisure hours trade being dull 
 and time hanging heavily on his hands. It was, he says, "a 
 melancholy time in trade " throughout the County, and he 
 has "no friend no, not one with whom I can spend an 
 hour to condole and sympathise with me in my affliction." 
 In this frame of mind he goes and dines with " my father 
 Slater," and came home "I cannot say thoroughly sober 
 I think it almost impossible to be otherwise [than drunk?] 
 with the quantity of liquor I drank." " But," he proceeds, 
 " however much in liquor I was, my reason was not so far 
 lost but I could see a sufficient difference at my arrival at my 
 own house between the present time and that of my wife's 
 life, highly to the advantage of the latter. Everything then 
 was serene and in order; now, one or both servants out and 
 everything noise and confusion. Oh! it will not do. No, 
 no! it never will do." 
 
 Clearly Mr. Turner was thinking about the wisdom of 
 taking unto himself another wife! "If," he says, a little 
 further on, "if ever I do marry again, I am sure of this that 
 I will never have a more virtuous and prudent wife than I 
 have been already possessed of; may it be the will of 
 Providence for me to have as good an one; I ask no better."
 
 48 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 We may set it down for a certainty that when a widower 
 begins to asseverate to himself, or to his friends, that he will 
 never get so good a wife as she whom he has just lost and 
 "asks no better," he is very far on the road to a second 
 marriage! 
 
 Another consequence of " single blessedness " now breaks 
 upon his mind. " For want of the company of the more 
 softer sex and through my over much confinement, I know I 
 am become extreme awkard, and a certain roughness and 
 boisterousness of disposition has seized on my mind, so that, 
 for want of those advantages which flow from society, and a 
 free intercourse with the world, and a too great delight in 
 reading, has brought my mind to that great degree of morose- 
 ness that is neither agreeable to myself nor can my company 
 be so to others." 
 
 A more considerate man to his friends never breathed 
 than Thomas Turner! If he marry again it will clearly be 
 for the advantage of East Hothly society! But then, how 
 repair the loss of his " dear Peggy ?" How find a counterpart 
 to that incomparable one? "I know not," thus he bursts 
 forth in his despair, "the comfort of an agreeable friend and 
 virtuous fair; no, I have not spent an agreeable hour in the 
 company of a woman since I lost my wife, for really there 
 seems very few whose education and way of thinking is 
 agreeable and suitable with my own." 
 
 We have our doubts whether we ought to make this 
 exposure to the world of the weak side of a widower! But 
 then, why did Mr. Thomas Turner keep a diary ? However, 
 we are drawing to a close. Who can doubt to what all this 
 woe and lamentation tends? Still, despite these scientific 
 "approaches" to the inevitable result, it comes upon us in 
 the end rather suddenly. Perhaps our diarist intended to be 
 "sensational." " Sunday, Dec. 9. After dinner Jenner and 
 I walked to Lewes in order to see a girl I have long since 
 had thoughts of paying my addresses to, and he for company. 
 I was not so happy, shall I say, as to see her, or was I
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 49 
 
 unfortunate in having only my walk for my pains, which, 
 perhaps, was as well ?" 
 
 Who can answer this question ? Still, the quaerist's temper 
 was not improved by the failure of this first step, for his 
 " cuz. Thos. Ovenden," coming to see him and staying to sup 
 with him, he thus tells us what he thinks of Mr. Thomas 
 Ovenden: "I think I never see a more stupid young fellow 
 in my life than my couz. Thos. Ovenden: his discourse is 
 one continued flow of oathes, almost without any intermission." 
 
 Poor Thos. Ovenden! He came across his "cuz" in an 
 unlucky moment. A little later and his " flow of oathes " 
 might not have been thrown away upon unappreciative ears. 
 For, a day or two later, our widower made another attempt, 
 and this time all went smoothly: 
 
 " March 28th. In the afternoon rode over to Chiddingly, to pay my 
 charmer, or intended wife, or sweetheart, or whatever other name may be 
 more proper, a visit at her father's, where I drank tea, in company with 
 their family and Miss Ann Thatcher. I supped there on some rasures of 
 bacon. It being an excessive wet and windy night I had the opportunity, 
 sure I should say the pleasure, or perhaps some might say the unspeakable 
 happiness, to sit up with Molly Hicks, or my charmer, all night. I came 
 home at forty minutes past five in the morning I must not say fatigued ; 
 no, no, that could not be ; it could only be a little sleepy for want of rest. 
 Well, to be sure, she is a most clever girl ; but, however, to be serious in 
 the affair, I certainly esteem the girl and think she appears worthy of my 
 esteem." 
 
 We suppose it was the fashion, 100 years ago, for wooers 
 to stay up all night with their fair ones! It had its dangers 
 and also its inconveniences, as appeareth by the following: 
 " Saturday, April 7. In the even very dull and sleepy; this 
 , courting does not well agree with my constitution and perhaps 
 it may be only taking pains to create more pain." 
 
 Really, this last expression is highly dramatic not 
 unworthy of a man who had read and appreciated Shakespeare! 
 
 This, however, was only a passing cloud, to give a deeper 
 azure to the coming sky: 
 
 " Sunday, April I5th. After dinner I set out for Mailing, to pay 
 Molly Hicks, my intended wife, a visit, with whom I intended to go to 
 church, but there was no afternoon service. I spent the afternoon with a
 
 5O Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 great deal of pleasure, it being very fine, pleasant weather, and my companion 
 very agreeable. Now, perhaps, there may be many reports abroad in the 
 world of my present intentions, some likely condemning my choice, others 
 approving it ; but, as the world cannot judge the secret intentions of my 
 mind, and I may therefore be censured, I will take the trouble to relate 
 what really and truly are my intentions, and the only motive from which 
 they spring (which may be some satisfaction to those who may happen to 
 peruse my memoirs). First, I think marriage is a state agreeable to nature, 
 reason and religion; I think it the duty of every Christian to serve God 
 and perform his religious services in the most calm, serene and composed 
 manner, which, if it can be performed more so in the married state than 
 a single one, it must then be an indispensable duty. . . . As to my 
 choice, I have only this to say : the girle I believe, as far as I can discover, 
 is a very industrious, sober woman, and seemingly endued with prudence 
 and good nature, with a serious and sedate turn of mind. She comes 
 of reputable parents, and may perhaps, one time or other, have some 
 fortune. As to her person, I know it's plain (so is my own), but she is 
 cleanly in her person and dress, which I will say is something, more than 
 at first sight it may appear to be, towards happiness. She is, I think, a 
 well-made woman. As to her education, I own it is not liberal ; but she 
 has good sense and a desire to improve her mind, and has always behaved 
 to me with the strictest honour and good manners her behaviour being 
 far from the affected formality of the prude, on the one hand ; and on the 
 other, of that foolish fondness too often found in the more light part of 
 the sex. For myself, I have nothing else in view but to live in a more 
 sober and regular manner, to perform my duty to God and man in a more 
 suitable and religious manner, and, with the grace of the Supreme Being, 
 to live happy in a sincere union with the partner of my bosom." 
 
 This, we admit, is rather long and prosy. But we owe it 
 to Thomas Turner to give it verbatim et literatim. It is his 
 justification to the world to all who read his diary, and it is 
 obvious that he intended it should be read. He was not 
 afraid to exhibit his follies and weaknesses his resolutions 
 and his failures to the world. He had an inkling that there 
 was something in the diary that " the world would not 
 willingly let die," and he was quite right. It is a very 
 valuable picture of the times and a very amusing one of an 
 individual man. There are not many such genuine ones in 
 the whole range of literature. We get from this diary a more 
 lively conception of life and manners and morals in the 
 middle of the i8th century than from any book of history or 
 divinity that was ever writ. We cannot part from Thomas 
 Turner without acknowledging his rare merits his frankness,, 
 simplicity, honesty and desire to do what is right and proper, 
 albeit he sometimes fails. This he does, indeed, to the very
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 5 1 
 
 last, for in the last entry but one, taking " a ride to pay my 
 intended wife a visit," after a " serious walk," he takes his 
 leave at the very proper hour of ten o'clock, but, "after 
 parting with her, I went to take my horse, and, happening into 
 company [alack, that company was to Thomas Turner, as to 
 Jack Falstaff, the ruin of him!] I staid till ten minutes past 
 12 and came home about four o'clock." 
 
 Let us hope that this was the last lapse and that " his dear 
 Molly " kept him in better order than his " dear Peggy " and 
 never required to be taken home on Mr. Tho. Fuller's back! 
 He was married to her by his old friend and boon companion, 
 Mr. Porter, on the igth June, 1765, and now he writes, 
 " Thank God, I begin once more to be a little settled and am 
 happy in my choice. I have, it's true, not married a learned 
 lady, nor is she a gay one ; but I trust she is good-natured 
 and one that will use her utmost endeavour to make me happy. 
 As to her fortune, I shall one day have something considerable, 
 and there seems to be rather a flowing stream. Well, here 
 let us drop the subject and begin a new one." 
 
 And so we part with Thomas Turner. Here he dropped 
 his diary and did not commence a new one; at least, none 
 has been preserved. Perhaps Molly found it out and put a 
 stop to such waste of time, or she may have burnt it, finding 
 some impertinent reference to herself, or used it as waste 
 
 paper, or but there, let us rejoice that we have got so 
 
 much as we have. The diary, the Editors of it tell us, was 
 originally in at least 116 stout memorandum books, and these, 
 with the exception of a few, have been preserved. They may 
 be ranked amongst the literary treasures of Sussex, of which, 
 as we have already said, Thomas Turner is the Pepys the 
 first, in point of merit, of the Sussex Diarists. 
 
 Walter Gale, schoolmaster at Mayfield, was a contemporary 
 of Thomas Turner, general dealer at East Hothly. Both 
 " flourished " in the middle of the last century ; both belonged 
 to the middle class of life; and the educational gifts of each 
 were of much the same extent. The chief difference in their
 
 52 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 career was, that Thomas Turner began as a schoolmaster and 
 ended as a trader, whereas Walter Gale, beginning as an 
 Officer of Excise, ended as a schoolmaster. How he came 
 to fail in the former capacity admits of very little doubt; he 
 shared in the general failing of the age: an inordinate love 
 of drink. He had been discharged from his office, and he 
 was not so enamoured of the instruction of youth but that he 
 was desirous to be replaced in it, and, in an application to a 
 friend with that view, he states that " the many vicissitudes of 
 fortune which I have experienced since my being discharged 
 from the office [of Exciseman] would constitute a pretty 
 good history." 
 
 Perhaps a pretty bad history would have been nearer the 
 mark. There can be little doubt that, though Walter Gale 
 was a clever man and could turn his hand, as his diary shows 
 he did, to a good many things, he was not at all fitted, by his 
 habits or inclinations, for the office of a schoolmaster. But 
 that office stood at a very low ebb in the middle of the last 
 century. It was a period of general neglect and carelessness 
 so far as the education and morals of the lower indeed, it 
 might be said of the middle classes, were concerned. The 
 old Grammar Schools and " Free Schools," so freely endowed 
 in the first years of the Reformation, had been suffered to fall 
 into decay, or, where they still flourished, it was owing, not 
 to any general system of supervision, but to the accident of 
 some efficient man having been appointed as schoolmaster, 
 as, for instance, Dr. Bayley, at Midhurst, or John Grover, at 
 Brighthelmstone. 
 
 It was not likely that a very efficient man would be obtained 
 at Mayfield (a parish at the north-eastern extremity of Sussex), 
 where the salary was \b a-year, until increased by the 
 bequest of a house and garden which let for \ 8 a-year. No 
 man could support a wife or bring up a family on such a 
 miserable stipend as this; but this difficulty was got over at 
 Mayfield by the election of a single man. The election lay 
 with the Vicar and principal inhabitants of the place, and
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 53 
 
 the first " principal inhabitant " who subscribed to Gale's 
 appointment, John Kent, not being able to write, made his 
 mark! The qualifications for the office were, to possess "a 
 genius for teaching," write a good hand, and understand 
 arithmetic well; in addition to which he was "to be 
 particularly careful of the manners and behaviour of the poor 
 children (it was a ' free school ') committed to his care." 
 
 How far Walter Gale acquitted himself of these duties we 
 shall have an opportunity of judging by-and-bye. The school 
 must have been a poor place; for its master soon had occasion 
 to note " I found the greatest part of the school in a flow, 
 by reason of the snow and rain coming through the leads." 
 The scholars were 21 in number, "the third part of which 
 are supposed to be writers " (that is, taught to write). 
 
 Walter Gale commemorated his appointment to his office 
 by the commencement of a diary, one of the first uses (?) of 
 which is to chronicle a dream to the effect "that I should be 
 advantageously married and be blessed with a fine offspring, 
 and that I should live to the age of 81, of which time I 
 should preach the Gospel 41 years." There is no evidence 
 in the succeeding entries that any of these prophetic 
 intimations ever came to pass. But in this and other entries 
 there are signs of the superstition of the times. One of Mr. 
 Gale's earliest visitors at the school is " Mr. Hassel, the 
 conjuror," and the worthy pair soon adjourn to Elliott's (the 
 public-house, we presume) " where he (that is, the conjuror), 
 treated me (the schoolmaster) with a quartern of gin, and I 
 gave him a dinner at Coggin's Mill " (Mr. Gale's place of 
 abode). " Having," he proceeds, " dined the conjuror, we 
 returned to Elliott's, where he treated me as before." 
 
 " The conjuror," it seems, was at work on the map of a 
 farm belonging to Col. Fuller, and Mr. R. W. Blencowe, who 
 edits the diary, remarks, " The profession of a conjuror a 
 hundred years ago was by no means uncommon, nor does it 
 seem to have been thought a discreditable one. A person of 
 the same name was in full practice as a cunning man in the
 
 54 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 neighbourhood of Tunbridge Wells very recently. One of 
 the best known of his craft was a man of the name of 
 Saunders, of Heathfield, who died about fifty years ago. He 
 was a respectable man and at one time in easy circumstances ; 
 but he neglected all earthly concerns for astrological pursuits, 
 and, it is said, died in a workhouse." 
 
 Of the credulity of Walter Gale we find many instances, 
 amongst them the following: 
 
 " May 10th, 1758. Received a testimony of a death in our family within 
 a twelvemonth, and, by the appearance of it, I suppose it to be myself." 
 
 " April roth, 1759. My mother, to my great unhappiness, died in the 
 83rd year of her age, agreeable to the testimony I had of a death in our 
 family on the loth of May last." 
 
 What strikes one in the diary of the Mayfield school- 
 master is the almost total absence of any reference to his 
 school or scholars. He engages in a multiplicity of tasks 
 from the drawing of quilts that is, the patterns of them 
 to the drawing of wills; he measures land, engraves tomb- 
 stones, paints public-house signs, designs ladies' needlework, 
 &c., &c.; but as to the 21 scholars whom he undertakes to 
 teach to read, write, and keep accounts we hear very little; 
 and that little is not of a very edifying character. Like 
 Falstaff with his ragged soldiers, Walter Gale would not 
 " march through Coventry " with them : 
 
 " 26th. Old Kent came, and I went with him to Mr, Baker; they said 
 they should have a ragged congregation of scholars, who should sit together 
 in the new gallery, and that they should insist on my sitting with them ; to 
 this I did not assent." 
 
 The very first reference to school duties, "began my 
 school at noon," followed by, " I waited on Miss Annie Baker, 
 of whom I received a neckerchief to draw," shows the 
 " divided duties " that occupied Mr. Walter Gale's time and 
 talent. He could not, indeed, live on the miserable stipend 
 allotted to him as schoolmaster of the free school of Mayfield, 
 and had to eke out a revenue by other means, one of which 
 (and it was permitted by the Trustees of the school) was to 
 " enter on the assistant hop business at Rotherfield."
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 55 
 
 The chief opponent of Mr. Gale in these multifarious 
 money-getting pursuits was John Kent " old Kent," as Gale 
 irreverently calls him the same who put his cross to the 
 rules laid down for the management of the school; and no 
 small part of the diary is occupied with the quarrels between 
 the two. Gale having accompanied a neighbour on what was 
 evidently a drinking bout, and the worthy pair having lost 
 their road, and Gale slipped from a high bank, "but received 
 no hurt," " Old Kent came to the knowledge of the above 
 journey and told it to the Rev. Mr. Downall in a false manner, 
 much to my disadvantage; he said that I got drunk and that 
 that was the occasion of my falling, and that, not being 
 content with what I had had, I went into the town that night 
 for more." 
 
 And, shortly afterwards, "The old man entered the school 
 with George Wilmhurst and Eliz. Hook and said they should 
 be taught free. I asked him how many I was to teach free; 
 without any further ado he flew into a violent passion. 
 Among other abusive and scurrilous language he said I was 
 an upstart, runnagate, beggarly dog, that I picked his pocket, 
 and that I never knew how to teach a school in my life. He 
 again called me upstart, runnagate, beggarly dog, clinched 
 his fist in my face, and made a motion to strike me, and 
 declared he would break my head. He did not strike me, but 
 withdrew in a wonderful heat, and ended all with his general 
 maxim, ' The greater scholler, the greater rogue.' " A maxim 
 worthy of the age! 
 
 The division of the scholars into free boys and such as 
 were paid for by their friends was one of the causes that 
 ruined so many Grammar Schools and Free Schools. The 
 free boys those on the foundation were neglected by the 
 Master, and came to be looked down upon by the other 
 scholars, until at last many a public school, like that at 
 Midhurst, had not a scholar on the foundation and was shut 
 up altogether. 
 
 We have said that Walter Gale, in spite of his dream of
 
 56 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 advantageous marriage and fine offspring, remained a bachelor 
 all his life. But it was not by reason of indifference to the 
 sex. Ex. gr. : " I set out for Frantfield Fair with a roast pig 
 for my sister Stone. Came to her, and there drank tea with 
 the incomparable Miss Foster." 
 
 We are rather surprised that we do not hear any more of 
 "the incomparable Miss Foster!" But she passes out of 
 sight like a fairy vision, or 
 
 Like a snow-flake on the river, 
 
 One moment seen then lost for ever. 
 
 Admiration of a single lady might be allowed to the 
 Mayfield Dominie even by "old Kent;" whereas it was 
 scarcely fair to rouse the jealousy of a fellow-pedagogue, 
 and he, too, so estimable a character as John Grover, of 
 Brighthelmstone. Yet, by the following entry, Walter Gale 
 seems to have been " guilty of as great a sin :" 
 
 " I set off for Brighthelmstone and came at noon to Mailing-street and 
 went to the Dolphin. Kennard told me that Burton's successor had had 
 a great many scholars, but that their number began to decrease by reason 
 of his sottishness, and he offered, if their dislike of him should increase, 
 to let me know of it. The rain clearing off at three o'clock I set out for 
 Brighthelmstone, passing through Southover, but being advanced on the 
 hills the rain returned and drove me for shelter under a thin hawthorn 
 hedge, and I was obliged to return to Grover's, where I drank tea and 
 discoursed merrily, but innocently, with his wife, notwithstanding which, 
 Grover was so indiscreet as to shew some distaste at it and to have great 
 difficulty to keep his temper." 
 
 It did not take much to draw Master Gale from his school 
 duties. Thus, " Left off school at 2 o'clock, having heard the 
 spellers and readers a lesson a piece, to attend a cricket match 
 of the gamesters of Mayfield against those of Lindfield and 
 Chailey." This is a singular application of the word 
 "gamesters." 
 
 No small part of the diary is taken up with jaunts to fairs, 
 &c., and convivial meetings, in which riot a little beer, brandy, 
 milk, punch, cherry brandy, elderberry wine, &c., is consumed, 
 and Mr. Gale is none the better for it in health or reputation. 
 There is not a total absence of reference to books; but the 
 literary taste of Mr. Gale was not of so high a character as
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 57 
 
 that of Thomas Turner. Here is the chief entry: "Mr. 
 Rogers came to the school and brought with him four volumes 
 of Pamela, for which I paed him 43. 6d., and bespoke Duck's 
 Poems for Mr. Kine and a Caution to Swearers for myself (!) 
 He wanted to borrow of me the three volumes of Philander 
 and Silvia, which I promised to lend him. I went to Mr. 
 Baker's for the list of scholars, and found him alone in the 
 smoaking-room ; he ordered a pint of mild beer for me, an 
 extraordinary thing. Left at Mr. Rogers' the three volumes 
 of Love Letters from a Nobleman to his Sister" 
 
 The majority of these works do not bespeak a very refined 
 taste, and none of them have anything to do with scholarship. 
 In fact, it is clear that Master Walter Gale's heart was not in 
 his schopl, nor was his time given to his scholars. He took 
 to teaching, like too many Masters of his day, to earn a living, 
 and he was accepted for want of a better man and because 
 little real interest was felt in the education of the people. A 
 great many people believed, in the last century and the belief 
 came down to our own times, though now pretty well extinct 
 that the working classes were better without reading and 
 writing that such things did more harm than good. As 
 then taught, perhaps, there was some truth in it. In one of 
 the altercations between " old Kent " and the schoolmaster 
 of Mayfield the former said that " I (Walter Gale) spent my 
 time in reading printed papers, to the neglect of the children ; 
 and that I was covetous . . . that the children did not 
 improve, and that he would get an old woman for zd. a-week 
 that would teach them better." To which the Master replied 
 that " many of them (the boys) were extremely dull, and that 
 I would defie any person that should undertake it to teach 
 them better." 
 
 Altogether, the glimpse we have in this diary of the Free 
 School of Mayfield is not calculated to raise our ideas of the 
 education of the people in the middle of the i8th century; 
 and if it were general, as there is reason to believe it was, it 
 cannot be a matter of surprise that at the beginning of the
 
 58 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 1 9th century England stood, educationally, very low; that 
 the great mass of the people did not know how to read or 
 write, and that, morally and religiously, the nation was rather 
 going back than forward. 
 
 Mr. Gale outlived his old antagonist, John Kent. But a 
 day of reckoning was to come at last, and on the i8th of 
 October, 1771, it was unanimously resolved by the then Vicar 
 and four parishioners " that he be removed from the school 
 for neglecting the duties thereof," and, on the loth April 
 following, that he " be not paid his salary due till he has 
 absolutely put the schoolhouse in such a condition as to the 
 form of it as it was at the time of his entering upon such 
 house." 
 
 From which it may be inferred that neither the school- 
 master nor the schoolhouse of Mayfield was very efficient in 
 the years 1771-72. 
 
 That Walter Gale was not an exceptional teacher of youth 
 in the i8th century, the Editor of his diary (Mr. R. W. 
 Blencowe) gives many evidences of; and he concludes with 
 the following characteristic anecdote: " Two or three years 
 
 ago a friend of the Editor visited the school of in no 
 
 distant part of England; and, observing some deep-coloured 
 stains upon the oaken floor, inquired the cause. He was told 
 that they were occasioned by the leakage of a butt of Madeira 
 which the Master of the Grammar School, who had grown 
 lusty, not having had for some time any scholars who might 
 afford him the opportunity of taking exercise, employed 
 himself upon a rainy day in rolling up and down the school- 
 room for the purpose of ripening the wine and keeping 
 himself in good condition." 
 
 Upon which we may remark, with some degree of satis- 
 faction, " These things are ordered differently in England " in 
 the present day. 
 
 It may be questioned whether "Timothy Burrell, Esq., 
 Barrister-at-Law, of Ockenden House, Cuckfield," who kept 
 a Journal and Account-Book from the year 1683 to 1714,
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 59 
 
 despite the excellence of his character, his good family, 
 learning, and social position, deserves to be ranked among 
 the diarists of Sussex. Most certainly the Journal and 
 Account-Book on which his claims to do so rest, fall in 
 interest far below the diaries of the Rev. Giles Moore, 
 Anthony Stapley, Thos. Turner and Walter Gale. It consists 
 chiefly of bald entries of moneys paid and received; of the 
 presents which were sent to him (often, doubtless, in 
 acknowledgment of legal advice) by his friends and neighbours, 
 rich and poor; of the wages of servants, the price of grain, 
 &c. Occasionally, however, Mr. Timothy Burrell enters into, 
 to him, more interesting and domestic matters, and on these 
 occasions, like the Rev. Giles Moore, he makes use of the 
 Latin language. Thus (as rendered into English by Mr. R. W. 
 Blencowe), "I severely reprimanded John Packham for his 
 continual drunkenness, and at last I turned him out of my 
 house, of which he had had the free run for five years: a 
 drunken extravagant fellow ! " And, touching on more 
 delicate ground, he thus records a family trouble: "My 
 sister quarrelled with me, and was insolent to me, and I was 
 somewhat, not to say too much, irritated with her; the 
 consequence was, that for two days my stomach was at 
 intervals seriously affected. I took Tipping's Mixture, and 
 one or two doses of hiera picra" (still a favourite medicine, 
 says Mr. Blencowe, who edited this journal for the Sussex 
 Archaeological Society, with the common people of Sussex). 
 And if sometimes Mr. Timothy Burrell could call his sister to 
 account for insolence, he also shows that he was not blind to 
 his own defects of temper. Ex. gr.: "I was rather too 
 impatient with my servant for having put too much salt in my 
 broth." 
 
 The larger number of entries are, however, of the 
 business-like and homely character we have adverted to, and 
 one or two of these will serve to illustrate the rest. As 
 showing the price of wheat, in October, 1709, Mr. Burrell 
 enters, "I bought two bushels of wheat for i6s., and then 
 two bushels more for 173. The two bushels, with the bag,
 
 60 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 weighed i34-lbs. Since that wheat has fallen to 8s. a bushel." 
 And then he adds: " Query, what returned from the miller? 
 izi-lbs. So the toll paid was i3-lbs., which was reasonable 
 for double toll, which Sturt saith might have been i6d. the 
 bushel." 
 
 "Bringing grist to the mill" is still a Sussex proverb; 
 but the days of taking toll in this way for grinding small 
 parcels of wheat are well-nigh gone ; and the old jokes at the 
 expense of " honest millers " are obsolete. 
 
 Mr. Burrell records the receipt, in 1698, of "the three 
 first Flying Posts," the newspaper of that day, which was 
 thus recommended to purchasers: "If any gentleman has a 
 mind to oblige his country friend or correspondent with his 
 account of public affairs he may have it (that is, the ' Flying 
 Post') for zd., of G. Salisbury, at the 'Rising Sun,' Cornhill, 
 on a sheet of fine paper, half of which being blank he may 
 write his own private business or the material news of the 
 day." This offer of a choice between the news of the news- 
 paper and that of the purchaser betokens, at least, modesty 
 in the journalist of the age! 
 
 On one occasion, in 1699, Mr. Timothy Burrell, after 
 visiting at the Comb or Highden, the residences of his 
 relations, the Bridgers and the Gorings, records that he paid 
 the following sums in "vails:" "Mr. Johnson, IDS. gd. 
 (half-a-guinea) ; chambermayd, ios.; cook, IDS.; coachman, 
 53.; butler, 53.; chief gardener, 53.; under-cook, 23. 6d.; boy, 
 23. 6d.; under-gardener, 23. 6d.; nurse, as. 6d. Total, 
 $. os. gd." Rather a heavy price the "vails" of those 
 days for the pleasure of visiting one's friends or relations ! 
 
 In one respect the journal of Mr. Timothy Burrell 
 surpasses those of his Sussex fellow-chroniclers. It is an 
 illustrated one. Mr. Burrell evidently had a talent for pen- 
 and-ink sketches, and there is scarcely an object named or 
 subject referred to by him but it finds a " counterfeit present- 
 ment " in the margin of his journal. Pipes, spoons, fiddles, 
 spades, rakes, hats, honey bees, horns, bottles, jugs of all
 
 The Sussex Diarists. 6 1 
 
 sizes, pigs, cows, cocks and hens, horses, trees, tables, bells, 
 barrows, carts, books, candles and candlesticks, and even 
 neckties and shirts, figure on the margin of the journal, and 
 the likenesses of " Nanny West" and "Mary Slater" when 
 he paid them their wages all these and numerous other 
 objects to which reference is made in the journal are limned 
 with a tolerably faithful and skilful hand. One of the most 
 ambitious attempts at art is a sketch of his own residence at 
 Cuckfield, Ockenden House, which, by-the-bye, still stands 
 whether in its integrity or not we cannot say and was, up 
 to the last two or three years, occupied by a member of the 
 Burrell family. Another pretentious flight, and with a touch 
 of humour in it, is that of a barrel of liquor on its stollage 
 and with a vessel below the tap ready to receive the contents. 
 This is in illustration of the Latin entry: " Nov. Pandoxavi." 
 A fishing-net, with the captured fish, and two hind-wheels of 
 the family coach, " made by Juniper," and the window on 
 which the first window-tax a most objectionable tax then 
 just introduced was paid, also* find a place in this most 
 original of journals. 
 
 Two of the most curious of the illustrations, and which 
 Mr. Timothy Burrell could scarcely have intended for the 
 public eye, accompany the following entries: "Forapayrof 
 fine scarlet stockings for my girle, 35." "I bought of a 
 Scotchman a payr of pink scarlet stockings for my girle." To 
 each of these entries is attached a representation of a very 
 shapely foot and leg, which we may presume to be that of Miss 
 Burrell, the draughtsman's only daughter "my girle;" the 
 limb being carried to a little above the garter-line and the 
 garter itself made a very conspicuous object. The Scotch 
 pair of stockings' is distinguished by the tartan, very neatly 
 drawn. 
 
 Mr. Burrell continued this practice of illustrating his 
 journal up to the very last. Only a fortnight before his death 
 an entry of a hog which was shut up to fatten is accompanied 
 by a drawing of the animal, but which, says Mr. Blencowe,
 
 62 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 without the context no one would imagine was intended to 
 represent it. 
 
 One of the most prominent features of Mr. Timothy 
 Burrell's Journal and it marks the benevolence of his 
 character and illustrates the closer relations which once 
 existed between the higher and the lower classes in England 
 is the lists of guests, from the humbler classes of society, 
 whom he invited to dine with him at Christmas, and the bills 
 of fare that he provided for them. He commenced this 
 custom in 1691, and he kept it up to the year before his death 
 (1717). The following are the bills of fare for the Christmas 
 dinners of 1706: 
 
 " ist January, 1706. Plumm pottage, calve's head and bacon, goose, 
 pig, plumm pottage, roast beef, sirloin, veale, a loin, goose, plumm 
 pottage, boiled beef, a clod, two baked puddings, three dishes of minced 
 pies, two capons, two dishes of tarts, two pullets." 
 
 " 2nd January, 1706. Plumm pottage, boiled leg of mutton, goose, 
 pig, plumm pottage, roast beef, veal, leg, roasted pig, plumm pottage, 
 boiled beef, a rump, two baked puddings, three dishes of minced pies, 
 two capons, two dishes of tarts, two pullets." 
 
 It will be remarked that plum pudding, without which no 
 Christmas-day festivities would be now complete, does not 
 figure in Mr. Timothy Burrell's bill of fare. Its place is 
 supplied by " plumm pottage " (sometimes called plumm 
 broth) which occurs thrice in each bill, and which, no doubt, 
 stood in the place of and was the embryo of its more famous 
 successor. Minced pies had arrived at maturity ; but plum 
 puddings had yet to be invented ! 
 
 The journal of Mr. Timothy Burrell, Barrister-at-Law 
 " Counsellor Burrell " was his more common title amongst 
 his neighbours was brought to a close on the 25th July, 1715, 
 when he gave over the cares of housekeeping to a Mr. Trevor, 
 who had married his only daughter, Elizabeth. The death of 
 this lady, after a short and very unhappy married life, hastened, 
 it is believed, the death of her father, who expired on the 
 26th of December, 1717, at the age of 75, and lies buried in 
 Cuckfield Church ; and with him we will bring this chapter 
 of Sussex Diarists to a close.
 
 The Sussex Ironmasters. 
 
 |T is not an easy task to call up again a picture of 
 Sussex when its Weald was the seat of extensive 
 iron works when the ore was dug and smelted 
 in Sussex, when the fuel was grown in Sussex, 
 and when the iron was manufactured in Sussex. Let the 
 reader try to conceive the activity and noise and bustle that 
 must have attended the working of 42 forges or iron mills, 
 and the blowing of 27 furnaces. These existed little more 
 than 200 years ago in 1653 in the Weald of Sussex, in a 
 district where all is now as quiet and as peaceful as it was in 
 Arcadia. As the modern traveller walks or rides through such 
 villages as those of Waldron, Robertsbridge, Lamberhurst, 
 Horsted Keynes, Ardingly, Mayfield, Maresfield, Ewhurst and 
 Ashburnham, or rambles through the remains of Tilgate and 
 St. Leonard's forests, and as his eyes and ears take in only 
 the sights and sounds of rural life the slow-going plough, 
 the browsing sheep, and the heavy-looking labourers how 
 difficult is it to conceive that these places have known any 
 other kind of life than that in which they now slumber ! 
 And yet these were the places which supplied " His Majesty's 
 stores" with guns and shot in the days when Rupert and 
 Monk and the Duke of York thundered day after day against 
 Van Tromp and De Ruyter nay, it was the forges and furnaces 
 of these Sussex villages which furnished the ships of the 
 Drakes and Hawkins and Frobishers with the artillery which
 
 64 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 they used so well against the floating castles of the Armada.* 
 Sussex was then the Wales and the Warwickshire of England 
 the centre of the country's iron works. Foreign countries 
 sought eagerly for its cannon its culverines and falconets. 
 Its richly-decorated fire-backs and fantastic andirons or 
 " dogs," as they were called in common parlance, were the 
 pride of lordly mansions. London had to send hither for the 
 railings that went round its great Cathedral ; and Sussex 
 ploughshares and " spuds," and other agricultural implements 
 and articles of hardware, were sent all over the Kingdom. 
 Fancy the glare and noise and activity that must have gone on 
 in and around these 42 forges and iron mills the digging 
 and carting of ore the cutting down and dragging in of 
 trees the blowing of furnaces, the ding of hammers, the 
 clatter of mill-wheels, turned by merry little streams; to say 
 nothing of the building of workshops for the men, cottages 
 for their families, and mansions for the masters. 
 
 Of all this busy and active scene, what remains to indicate 
 to the passer-by that it once existed ? Here and there a name, 
 like Cinder-hill, at Chailey, or Mill-place, at Eastgrinstead, 
 to raise a faint suspicion of uses of which no sign or vestige 
 now remains. Nature has resumed her original rights. 
 Ceres has driven out Vulcan. The only forge is that of the 
 village blacksmith; the stream turns the wheel of no iron 
 mill raises no hammer works the bellows of no furnace 
 only harbours a few meditative trout, which are persecuted by 
 a few deluded anglers ; the ore lies undisturbed in the 
 ferruginous soil, and the forest is once more safe from the 
 
 * In the Inventory taken of the goods of the Lord High Admiral Seymour, when he 
 was impeached for high treason (temp. Edward 6th), are included a number of 
 furnaces and forges possessed by him in the forest of Worth, Sussex, with the number 
 of men "founders, (Tylers, coleyers, miners, gon-founders," &c., who worked them. 
 One item will show the warlike nature of the manufacture : " Ffyrste, a duble 
 ffurnace to cast ordynaunce, shotte or rawe iron, wt all implements and necessaries 
 appertenyng unto the same: Item, there ys in sowes of rawe iron, cxij.; Itm., certain 
 pieces of ordynaunce, that is to say, culverens, xiv.; dim culverens, xv.; Itm., of shotte 
 for the same, vi. tonne, v. ct.; Itm., ordynaunce caryed from tliens to Southwark and 
 remanyeth ther as foleth : sakers, xv.; ffawkons, vj.; mynnyons, ij.; and dim. 
 culverens, j.; Itm., in shotte for the same delyvered at the h. std., xiij. toune; Itm., in 
 myne or pwer at the furnace, redye receved, xyjc. lode; Itm,, in myne, drawen and 
 caried, Mixx. lode; Itm., in whode, viijc. corde."
 
 The Sussex Ironmasters. 65 
 
 woodman's axe. The skies are unsullied, the air is pure. 
 All is peaceful rural and very slow and sleepy. The fierce 
 tug of life, the strife for gold in the shape of iron, has passed 
 away, with its noise and smoke and dirt, to other districts, 
 the denizens of which that is, such as can afford it escape 
 as often as they can from their Pandemoniums to the peaceful, 
 rural villages of Sussex, ignorant, perhaps, for the most part, 
 that they are coming to the ancient homes of the mine, the 
 furnace, the forge, and the mill. 
 
 But are there no records of these old Sussex ironmasters ? 
 of the Burrells, the Fullers, the Challoners, and the Gales? 
 Are there no memorials of the life they lived, of the houses 
 they built, and the fortunes they made of their ups and downs 
 in life? 
 
 Thanks to the labours of modern archaeologists, a few 
 relics have been preserved, " few and far between." Of the 
 works that existed at different periods and Mr. Lower 
 believes that they date from the first century of the Christian 
 era there are several lists, and in a few cases with the names 
 of the families who owned them. But we only know of two 
 Sussex ironmasters who left any personal records for the 
 information of those who came after them: and these are 
 Leonard Gale, and his son and namesake, the owner of 
 Crabbett House, Worth. 
 
 From the journals of these two, contributed to the Sussex 
 Archaeological Society's Collection by Mr. R. W. Blencowe 
 (to whom the MS. was lent by Mrs. Morgan, of Cuckfield), 
 we will try to select a few facts that will illustrate an extinct 
 class of men : the Ironmasters of Sussex. 
 
 Leonard Gale was not Sussex born or bred. " I was born," 
 he says, "in the Parish of Sevenoaks, in Kent, in 1620." 
 " My mother was the daughter of one George Pratt, a very 
 good yeoman, living at Chelsford." There was a family of 
 five sons and one daughter, and the whole of these, with the 
 exception of Leonard and a brother, were swept off by the 
 plague. The brother went to sea and died. Leonard, the 
 F
 
 66 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 sole survivor of this large family (and this is only a sample of 
 the days of plague and small-pox and other enemies of the 
 human race) began life with /~20o, and in two years and a half 
 "ran out/*i5o of it" not, as he pathetically says, "with ill 
 husbandage, for I laboured night and day to save what I had 
 left to me, but bad servants and trusting was the ruin of me." 
 
 So that times have not changed in these respects, for could 
 not many a man say the same thing now in 1881? But 
 Leonard Gale had the true stuff in him. He was a deeply 
 religious man of the Puritan type. "Then," he says, "I 
 was in a great strait and knew not which way to steer, but I 
 cryed unto the Lord with my whole heart and with tears, and 
 He heard my cry, and put into my mind to try one year more, 
 to see what I could do, for I resolved to spend nothing but 
 mine own, and I resolved always to 'keep a conscience void 
 of offence towards God and towards men.'" 
 
 "Then," he proceeds, "I took a boy to strike and to blow 
 for me and a man to work by the piece, but kept no maid nor 
 woman in my house; and then I so thrived that, within two years 
 and a half, I got back all that I had lost before, so that, by the 
 time I came to 21 years of age, I had lost 150 and got it 
 again, and I began to be looked upon as a thriving man, and 
 so I was, for all the time I kept a smith's forge I layd by 
 /~ioo a-year, one with another, and being burdened with free 
 quartering of soldiers, I left off, and came down into Sussex, 
 after one Spur, who owed me between ^o and /'so, and he 
 being in a bad capacity to pay me, though he did afterwards 
 pay me all. Before I went home again, I took St. Leonard's 
 forge, and so kept a shop to sell iron, and let out the smith's 
 forge. ... I had not been in the country one year, but 
 Mr. Walter Burrell, whom I looked upon as my mortal enemy, 
 sent to speak with me, and when I came to him he told me 
 he heard a very good report of me, and desired to be 
 acquainted with me, and he told me if I would let his son 
 Thomas come into partnership with me, he would help me 
 to sows nearer and better and cheaper than I had bought
 
 The Sussex Ironmasters. 67 
 
 before. I told him I wondered to hear such things from him, 
 for I heard he was my mortal enemy because I took that forge, 
 and I told him that if he would let me go partners with him 
 in the furnace, he should go partners with me in the forge. 
 He desired time to consider of it, and he rode presently into 
 Kent to inquire of me, and found such an account of me, that 
 he told me I should go partners with him in all his works." 
 
 After a partnership of 15 years with the Burrells (the 
 progenitors of the owners of Knepp Castle, Westgrinstead, 
 and Ockenden House, Cuckfield), Leonard Gale became the 
 sole proprietor of Tinsloe forge, one of the best in Sussex. 
 At 46 years of age, having made, in 30 years, about ^"5,000 
 or /^6,ooo, he thought it time to marry, "and chose (to use 
 his own words to his sons) this woman, your mother, the 
 daughter of Mr. Johnson, with whom I had ^500 and one year's 
 board with her'' A singular provision this, and which, we 
 believe, is now unknown to newly-married couples in England. 
 
 Things now prospered so well with Leonard Gale that at 
 66 years he had improved his estate to at least \ 6,000, 
 "which is," he remarks, "^"500 a year, one year with another, 
 which is a very great miracle to me how I should come to so 
 great an estate, considering my small dealings, the bad times, 
 and my great losses by bad debts, suits of law, and by building." 
 A proof, this, that fortunes were not so rapidly accumulated, 
 even by Sussex ironmasters, 200 years ago, as they are now. 
 
 Leonard Gale had five children, and, addressing his two 
 sons, Leonard and Henry, he gives them some advice which 
 throws a light on his own character and also on the times. 
 " Be not," he charges them, " too familiar with your vile 
 neighbours, as I have been, and you now see how they hate me" 
 It is clear from this that there was a Nemesis of prosperity 
 200 years ago; and that the man who rose from the lower 
 classes, be his virtues what they might, had his enviers and 
 detractors. "Next, suffer no man to inclose any land nor 
 build houses on the waste." Here shines out the old spirit 
 of resistance to encroachment, came it from high or low.
 
 68 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 " Next, I charge you never to suffer that lane to be inclosed 
 by Woolbarrow or Sears, or anyone else, for you see I have 
 made them take away the gates, but they leave the posts 
 standing, thinking to set them up again when I am dead. 
 But you may safely cut down the gates, for it was never 
 inclosed but by old Sears, who took delight to damm up 
 highways to his own ruin; and so it was observed by his own 
 neighbours, for he never thrived after he took in Langley- 
 lane and turned the Crawley footway, and to my knowledge 
 he never thrived after he took in this lane." A piece of 
 rural superstition for which some allowance maybe made, for 
 it has doubtless kept open many a pleasant path. 
 
 And now comes another "sign of the times:" "Next, I 
 advise you to have a great care of ill and debauched company, 
 especially wicked and depraved priests, such <ts are at this 
 present time about me, as Lee and Troughton, of Worth; 
 never give any of them any entertainment, nor none of their 
 companions, for they are most vile and wicked men to my 
 knowledge." 
 
 And, returning to the same point, he says: "Next, my 
 advice is, that whatever estate either of you ever attain to, 
 yet follow some employment, which will keep you from 
 abundance of expenses and charges, and take you off from 
 evil thoughts and wicked actions; and observe the mechanic 
 priests, which have nothing to do but to come to church one 
 hour or two on a Sunday, and all the week besides they will 
 eat and drink at such men's houses as you are; but avoid 
 them; but love and cherish every honest, godly priest, 
 wherever you find them; and, above all, hold fast the ancient 
 Protestant religion, for a better religion cannot be found out 
 than that is, only I could wish the abuses were taken away 
 and wicked men found out and punished, or turned out." 
 
 There can be no doubt that there was much of the old 
 Puritan spirit in Leonard Gale the senior. And he closes his 
 parental advice as follows :" Next, my advice is, that you 
 avoid swearing, lying, drunkenness, whoring, and gaming,
 
 The Sussex Ironmasters. 69 
 
 which are the ruin of all men's estates, that are ruined in this 
 nation, and pride of apparel, which is a great consumer of 
 men's estates in this kingdom." 
 
 Neither did Leonard Gale, in his last advice, lose sight of 
 the "main chance:" "If you can get," he says, "one of the 
 Cowden furnaces, it will be very well, for I do assure you 
 that, if I were but 40 years old, I would, by God's help, get 
 a good estate by this employment, for I have within these 20 
 years cleared near /^oo per annum out of that very forge." 
 
 Leonard Gale died in 1690, leaving the larger share of 
 his estate to his son Leonard, who had received a liberal 
 education and was called to the bar, but did not practice. 
 In 1698 he purchased the house and estate of Crabbett, in 
 the parish of Worth, for ^8,000, and took his position 
 among the gentry of the county, the son of the blacksmith 
 being, as Mr. Blencowe remarks, elected one of the Members 
 for Eastgrinstead in 1710. He, too, like his father, was a 
 deeply religious man, and he, too, had his annoyances in life 
 some of them proceeding from " those inferior beggarly 
 fellows," as he calls them, who had been the plague of his 
 father, and who, it appears, had brought about the ruin of the 
 previous owner of Crabbett, Mr. John Smith. 
 
 At 52 years of age Leonard Gale had so far successfully 
 carried out his father's precepts as to be "now worth, at 
 Michaelmas, 1724, at a reasonable computation, ^"40,667, 
 though," he adds, " I have been guilty of a great many 
 oversights in missing good bargains and taking bad 
 (particularly the Mayfield estate), and not for want of care, 
 but of understanding; but I will not look back upon what is 
 passed, but with a thankful heart daily praise Almighty God 
 for what I have." 
 
 He had married, and had a large family, and the terms in 
 which he records this event of his life are very simple and 
 touching. " I marryed with Mrs. Sarah Knight, my mother's 
 sister's only daughter, after I had made my court to her two 
 or three years ; by her I had a plentiful fortune : we were
 
 7O Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 marryed in the parish church of Charlwood, by Mr. Hesketh, 
 the rector. She was truly my own choice, and I am extremely 
 well satisfied with it; and do verily believe that for truth and 
 sincerity, kindness and fidelity, humility and good nature, she 
 has few equals. I am sure none can exceed her; and I pray 
 God to continue us long together in health and prosperity, 
 and to crown us with all those blessings which he has promised 
 to those that serve Him, and walk in His ways." One of the 
 entries of the journal tells us that on Nov. 18, 1703, " My wife 
 went to London in the Ryegate stage-coach," and whilst there 
 occurred the great storm chronicled by De Foe, and by which, 
 amongst other places, Brighthelmston was " miserably torn to 
 pieces," and many of its fishing boats lost, with their crews. 
 
 A considerable portion of Leonard Gale's journal is 
 occupied with records of family calamities in the deaths of 
 the children born to him. Indeed, in all these old diaries 
 and journals a striking feature is the ravages of death amongst 
 children and young people. The small-pox had something 
 to do with it; but there is good ground for concluding that 
 bad drainage lay at the root of the mischief. Leonard Gale 
 outlived all his sons, only one of whom, in fact, lived to man's 
 estate. The family became extinct, in the male line, in the 
 third generation from the Kentish blacksmith. In the female 
 line there are still descendants of it in the Blunt and Clitherow 
 families. 
 
 The memoir of Leonard Gale closes with an account of 
 the marriage of his daughter " A woman," he says, " of 
 excellent accomplishments, and who will, I doubt not, prove 
 an ornament to her sex, to her parents, and the family she is 
 grafted in." She married James Clitherow, Esq., and received 
 a portion of ^8,000, and had ^1,200 a-year settled on her 
 and her heirs, " of which ~6oo per annum is for her jointure." 
 
 Though the bride was so well provided for, the wedding 
 was a sober one, and offers a strong contrast in this respect 
 to modern nuptials. As Mr. Blencowe says, " No carriage 
 with four horses and smart post-boys in those days was
 
 The Sussex Ironmasters. 7 1 
 
 waiting at the door to carry the happy pair away toTunbridge 
 Wells or the Isle of Wight; the bride and bridegroom 
 returned quietly to her father's house, where they remained a 
 week, and a fortnight after that her mother accompanied her 
 to her new home at Boston House." 
 
 Leonard Gale died in 1750, and was buried in Worth 
 Church. He left estates of the value of about 1,1 10 a-year, 
 which were divided among his three daughters. One of the 
 latest entries of his journal indicates the character of the man : 
 " I am now in the 58th year of my age, and my memory is 
 sensibly growing worse, for I have made some mistakes in 
 my accounts within the last three years of above /"iso, which 
 I cannot possibly find out after my utmost endeavours." 
 
 The_ Gales must have witnessed the decline of those iron 
 works to which they owed their fortune. The growing 
 scarcity of wood, and the opening of coal mines in Wales 
 and other parts of the kingdom, where iron ore was in close 
 proximity to them, were fatal to the Sussex works, which 
 gradually grew fewer and fewer, until the last of them, at 
 Ashburnham, was closed in 1809, the immediate cause of it 
 being the failure of the foundry-men, through intoxication, 
 to mix chalk with the ore, by reason of which it ceased to 
 flow, and the blasting was stopped, and it was never renewed 
 again. So ended, ignominiously, the Sussex iron works. 
 Their very sites are now for the most part only a matter of 
 tradition: the streams which turned the wheels by which the 
 furnaces were "blown" are only visited by the angler; the 
 pits from which the ore was dug are bosky dells, dear to the 
 naturalist; the furnaces are cold the forges silent. The 
 Sussex iron works are, like the Gales, who assisted to work 
 them, extinct. Whether they will ever be revived depends on 
 the problem now in course of being solved: is there coal in 
 Sussex?* If there be, perhaps some new ironmaster will 
 write a journal for future ages like the Gales ! 
 
 * Since the above was written it has been solved fortunately for the lovers of the 
 
 Picturesque in the negative: the attempt to rind coal by boring at Netherneld, in East 
 ussex, leading to no result.
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 
 
 ITHIN little more than a century Sussex has seen 
 two classes of smugglers flourish on her coast. 
 The first were exporters of an English production 
 wool which English legislators were foolish 
 enough to try to keep at home under the idea of " protecting " 
 the woollen manufacturers, and so there was a regular war 
 along the southern coast (encouraged, it was asserted, by 
 members of the higher classes who owned sheep-farms) 
 between the smugglers of wool to France and Holland and 
 the supervisors, " surveyors," and "riders" who were appointed 
 to prevent the exportation of wool. The second and later 
 class of smugglers were importers of foreign goods chiefly 
 tea, spirits, tobacco, and silk the duties on which were so 
 enormous as almost to prohibit the use of them indeed, 
 some manufactured articles were prohibited altogether. If 
 it had not been for the smuggler in the latter years of the last 
 century and the beginning of the present century, a large 
 proportion of the population of England would have had to 
 go without a good many articles now looked upon as 
 necessaries of life. The smuggler supplied the farmer with 
 spirits, and the farmer's wife with tea. He supplied the fine 
 lady with silk and lace, and the fine gentleman with Bandana 
 handkerchiefs. Huskisson, who saw the folly of the system 
 long before the days of Cobden and Bright, told the House 
 of Commons once that the only way to put down smuggling 
 was to take off duties; otherwise it would defeat all their
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 73 
 
 supervisors and blockade men. " Hon. Members," he went 
 on to say, " were well aware that Bandana handkerchiefs 
 were prohibited by law, and yet," he continued, at the same 
 time drawing forth a Bandana from his pocket amidst the 
 roars of the House, " I have no doubt there is hardly a 
 gentleman in the House who has not got a Bandana 
 handkerchief." 
 
 So, from 1671 to 1787, all the severity of the law could 
 not prevent the exportation of British wool. Calais was often 
 full of it 40,000 packs at a time. A law was passed that no 
 person living within 15 miles of the sea in Sussex or Kent 
 should buy wool without entering into sureties not to sell it 
 to any people within 15 miles of the sea. It was of no avail. 
 In 1698, the Supervisor of Sussex and Kent (Mr. Henry 
 Baker) wrote to the authorities to say that in a few weeks 
 160,000 sheep would be shorn in Romney Marsh, and that 
 the greater part of their fleeces would be " sent off hot into 
 France." Warrants were sent down to arrest the wool 
 smugglers at Romney, and some wool was seized on the 
 horses' backs; but the smugglers assembled 50 armed 
 horsemen attacked the supervisor, rescued his prisoners, and 
 pursued him and his officers till they were glad to make their 
 escape to Guildford. More officers were appointed, but with 
 little or no effect. " Large gangs of twenty, forty, fifty, and 
 even one hundred, rode, armed with guns, bludgeons, and 
 clubs, throughout the country, setting everyone at defiance, 
 and awing all the quiet inhabitants. They established 
 warehouses and vaults in many districts, for the reception of 
 their goods, and built large houses at Seacock's Heath in 
 Etchingham (built by the well-known smuggler, Arthur Gray, 
 and called 'Gray's Folly'), at Fix Hall and the Four Throws, 
 Hawkhurst, at Goudhurst, and elsewhere, with the profits of 
 their trade." 
 
 "The illicit exportation of wool," says Mr. W. D. Cooper, 
 in his paper on "Smugglers in Sussex," " was never stopped ;" 
 and when a new kind of "fair trade" commenced, and it
 
 74 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 became profitable to import as well as export, the men and 
 machinery were ready for it in Sussex. The nature of the 
 goods smuggled doubtless had some effect on the class of 
 men engaged in it. The wool smugglers were men of 
 substance, and landowners and farmers were interested in 
 the illegal exportation of wool to France. But the smugglers 
 of brandy, hollands, gin, tea, &c., into England, were a lower 
 class ; and a brutality showed itself in some of their pro- 
 ceedings which ultimately raised the whole country against 
 them. As early as 1737 an engagement, with loss of life, 
 had taken place at Bulverhithe, near Hastings, between the 
 Custom officers and some of the murderous gangs with 
 which the county was over-run, and for the next ten years 
 there was a guerilla war between the smugglers of Sussex 
 and Kent and the officers of the Government, in which for 
 the most part the smugglers had the advantage, frequently 
 making the officers prisoners, disarming and cruelly cutting 
 them with their swords, and riding off triumphantly with 
 their goods. 
 
 The state of the Sussex roads at this time will furnish 
 some clue to this defiance of the law. They were all but 
 impassable. "The foul ways in Sussex" were proverbial. 
 In 1703 the King of Spain, who paid a visit to Petworth 
 House the seat of the Percies and the finest house in the 
 county was six hours in travelling the last nine miles. 
 Gentlemen and ladies were drawn to Church by oxen ; and 
 so recently as 1818 Bishop Buckner advised a gentleman 
 whom he had ordained in the November of that year as the 
 curate of Waldron to lose no time in going there, for in the 
 course of a very short time he would find it impossible to do 
 so ! By some true Conservatives of the times this state of 
 things was rejoiced in ; and it is a fact that when the 
 highway from London to Brighton, through Cuckfield, was 
 projected, it was petitioned against by the residents of 
 Hurstpierpoint, and diverted from that place, on the ground 
 that it would be the means of bringing down cut-throats and
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 75 
 
 pickpockets from London ! The impassable roads were also 
 looked upon by some Sussex people as a protection against 
 foreign invaders ! 
 
 This is a diversion ; but it explains a state of things 
 otherwise incredible: a guerilla war carried on within 60 
 miles of London, and an organised resistance to the Govern- 
 ment, in which towns were besieged, battles fought, Custom 
 Houses burnt down, and the greatest atrocities committed. 
 
 The gang chiefly guilty of the latter was known as "The 
 Hawkhurst gang," Hawkhurst being a village in Kent. But 
 its leaders were Sussex men, and some of them in a respectable 
 station of life. Such was Perin, a native of Chichester, who 
 had been a master carpenter in that city for some years, 
 until, being deprived of the use of his right hand by a stroke 
 of the palsy, he became a purchaser of French goods for 
 smugglers, and was on board a cutter off the Sussex coast 
 with a large quantity of brandy, tea, and rum, when the 
 vessel was captured by the Revenue officers and its cargo 
 taken to Poole, in Dorsetshire. 
 
 Perin and the crew of the smugglers made their escape in 
 a boat. 
 
 On Sunday, October 4, 1747, the smugglers of Sussex 
 and Kent met in force in Charlton Forest (the Duke of 
 Richmond's hunting ground, near Chichester), and resolved, 
 upon Perin's suggestion, to attack and break open the Poole 
 Custom House. A portion of the gang, under the same 
 Thomas Kingsmill who now headed the attack on Poole, had 
 shortly before attacked Goudhurst, in Kent, and only been 
 repelled by a regular force of militia after having three of 
 their men killed and several others wounded. Others were 
 taken and executed ; but Kingsmill escaped, and acted as the 
 leader in the attack on Poole. Assembling at Rowland's 
 Castle, in Hampshire, armed with swords and firearms, they 
 marched on Poole, which they reached at 1 1 at night, and, 
 receiving intelligence that, owing to the ebb tide, the sloop 
 lying off the town could not bring her guns to bear, they
 
 76 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 proceeded to the Custom House, broke it open, loaded their 
 horses with goods, and rode off, first to Fordingbridge and 
 thence to Brook, where they divided their booty and dispersed. 
 
 Now follows the tragic part of the affair. A reward was 
 offered for the apprehension of the perpetrators of this 
 daring act, but for some months with no avail. At length, a 
 man named Diamond was captured and lodged in Chichester 
 Gaol. The chief witnesses against this man were a Custom 
 House officer named Galley and a shoemaker of Fordingbridge 
 named Chater. On the i4th of February these two were on 
 their way to Major Batten's, a Magistrate at Stanstead, near 
 Chichester, to have their evidence taken, when they were 
 induced to stop at the White Hart, at Rowland's Castle, in 
 Hampshire, for refreshment, and here something fell from 
 them which led the landlady to suspect the business they 
 were travelling on. It shows how strongly the popular 
 feeling was in those days with the smugglers that this woman 
 should have sent for two of the men engaged in the late 
 outrage, named Jackson and Carter, and communicated her 
 suspicions to them. They sent for others of the gang, and 
 Galley and Chater being made drunk they were put to bed, 
 and then, in the middle of the night, were woke up, brought 
 out, and, having been placed on a horse, their feet were tied 
 under its belly, and a journey commenced, which, perhaps, 
 is unparalleled for barbarity in a civilised country. As they 
 rode along the smugglers lashed the unfortunate men with 
 their long whips, until, in their agony, they fell with their 
 heads under the horse's belly, and so the journey was 
 continued, until Lady Holt Park was reached, and here 
 Galley was taken from the horse in order to be thrown down 
 a well. Changing their purpose, however, the brutes replaced 
 the wretched man on the horse, and then, re-commencing 
 their torture of him, whipped him to death on the Downs, 
 and there dug a hole and buried him. Chater was still alive, 
 and was reserved for further sufferings. Being taken from 
 the horse and chained in a turf-house, he was here brutally
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 77 
 
 cut about the eyes and nose with a knife ; and then, in the 
 dead of night, he was taken to Harris's Well a noose tied 
 round his neck by Tapner (a native of Aldrington, near 
 Brighton), and he was ordered to get over the palings to the 
 well. Having done so, his murderers tied one end of the 
 rope to the pales, and pushed the miserable man into the 
 well. The rope, however, was too short to strangle him 
 so, after hanging some time and being still alive, he was 
 drawn up, untied, and then thrown head-foremost down the 
 well. Still he was not dead. His groans were audible, and, 
 to stifle these and finish the horrible deed, the smugglers 
 tore up the rails and gateway round the well and threw them 
 and large stones upon their victim till he expired. 
 
 These atrocious murders were not long undiscovered ; 
 though the discovery of them was by accident. Whilst a 
 gentleman named Stone was hunting on the Downs his dogs 
 unearthed the body of Galley, and six miles off, in the well, 
 was found the corpse of Chater. Such a crime as this could 
 not be allowed to go unpunished. Seven of the fourteen 
 men engaged in it were captured before Christmas (1748), 
 and a Special Commission was issued for their trial at 
 Chichester, in January, 1749. The whole of them were 
 convicted, either as principals or accessories in the murders, 
 and six of them (namely, Tapner, two men named Mills, 
 father and son, John Cobby, and John Hammond all Sussex 
 men and William Carter, a native of Hampshire) were 
 executed some of them in chains, as Tapner, on Rook's 
 Hill, near Chichester, and Cobby and Hammond on Selsey 
 Island. The seventh convict, Jackson, escaped a similar 
 fate by dying in prison. 
 
 The daring character of these men, and the danger which 
 travellers ran from them, is illustrated by a circumstance in 
 connection with these trials. One of the men executed, 
 Richard Mills, had another son besides the one who suffered 
 with him, and this worthy, being at liberty at the time of the 
 trial, actually proposed to his associates to stop the Judges
 
 78 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 as they were travelling over Hind Heath and to rob them ! 
 In company with the Judges were officers of the Court and 
 Counsellors, altogether enough to fill six coaches, each drawn 
 by six horses, so that the smugglers thought the risk was too 
 great ; and the Judges escaped this danger and the country a 
 very great scandal. 
 
 So far, however, from the execution of these men acting 
 as a warning, a crime of the same character was, shortly 
 afterwards, committed with the same circumstances of brutality 
 almost on the same ground. The son of Mills above referred 
 to, meeting one Hawkins, whom Mills and a party of fellow- 
 smugglers suspected of stealing two bags of tea, they accused 
 him of it, and, on his denying it, they flogged and kicked 
 him to death, and then, carrying his body to a pond in 
 Parham Park, twelve miles off, sunk it there. Mills the 
 third of the family who so suffered was for this crime 
 hung in chains on Slindon Common, and others of the 
 gang were convicted at the same Assizes as highwaymen and 
 executed. 
 
 Still there were some of the leaders in the attack on Poole 
 at large amongst them, Perin, the concocter of it, and 
 Kingsmill, the leader. Both of them were, however, betrayed 
 by one of their gang and captured and convicted, with two 
 others, named Glover and Fairhall. Their behaviour at their 
 trial was most insolent. Fairhall threatened one of the 
 witnesses, and when Perin, whose body was directed to be 
 given up to his friends, was lamenting the fate of his 
 associates not so favourably treated Fairhall exclaimed : 
 " We shall be hanging up in the sweet air, when you are 
 rotting in your grave." The night before his execution, 
 Fairhall kept smoking with his friends till he was ordered by 
 his keeper to go to his cell, when he exclaimed: "Why in 
 such a hurry ? cannot you let me stay a little longer with my 
 friends ? I shall not be able to drink with them to-morrow 
 night." Kingsmill was only twenty-eight, and Fairhall only 
 twenty-five years of age, at the time of their death.
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 79 
 
 The Hawkhurst gang was thus broken up some of its 
 leaders " hanging up in the sweet air," and others seeking 
 safety in flight to France or Holland. But the "trade" still 
 went on ; its profits were too great to be given up, and to 
 some wild spirits it had an attraction even in the perils that 
 attended it. So for nearly another 100 years nearly, in 
 fact, up to our own time smuggling was carried on, with 
 more or less success, along the Sussex coast ; and there were 
 few persons who 30 or 40 years ago were not brought, in 
 some way or other, in contact with the men who carried it 
 on. Stories of them and their adventures were a staple 
 topic of conversation, and smuggling anecdotes the good- 
 luck or ill-luck of former townsmen still live in the memories 
 of Sussex men of this generation. It is amusing to find Mr. 
 W. D. Cooper, himself a Hastings man, whilst recording 
 some of the doings of his smuggling fellow-townsmen, in the 
 Sussex Archaeological Collections, not 20 years ago, cautiously 
 explaining that "it would be improper to enter into any 
 details which might involve the characters of those still alive!" 
 We ourselves have a vivid recollection of an incident which 
 our immediate predecessor in the proprietorship of the 
 Brighton Herald was in the habit of narrating. He was 
 taking a stroll along the Shoreham-road somewhat late at 
 night when he suddenly heard the tramp of horses and saw 
 a long file of mounted men approach him. He stood still in 
 wonderment, not unmingled with alarm, when one of the 
 riders, quitting the ranks, rode up to him and presented a 
 pistol at his head. At that moment the hero of the adventure 
 recognised the horseman as an intimate acquaintance and 
 uttered his name. At the same moment the leader of the 
 smugglers for it was a large body of these men engaged in 
 " running " the contraband cargo of a vessel off the coast 
 
 recognised him and exclaimed, " By , if you had not 
 
 spoken, , I should have shot you." They had taken him 
 
 at first for a Revenue officer, and if he had been one it would 
 have gone hard with him. As it was, there was a laugh, a 
 shake of the hands, and the party rode off.
 
 8o Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 It is difficult to say to which of the long lines of coast 
 that lie to the west and east of Brighton the credit, or 
 discredit, of carrying on the " Fair Trade " with the greatest 
 daring and resolution should be given. Both were favourably 
 circumstanced for it, in Ihe ruggedness of the coast, the 
 sparseness of the population, the badness of the roads, and 
 the total absence of police. From Worthing to Selsey there 
 was a long line of flat coast on which boats could be 
 " beached " at any time and their tubs or bales landed from 
 a lying-off Dutch or French lugger, and there was a wild and 
 almost unpopulated country lying behind the few small towns 
 or villages which, like Steyning, and Shoreham, and Bramber, 
 lay nearer to the coast. It was, as we have seen, in the 
 wild country between Chichester and Worthing taking in 
 Charlton Forest, Slindon, Parham, &c., that the Hawkhurst 
 gang organised their attack on Poole and afterwards con- 
 summated their crime by the murder of Galley and Chater. 
 But the signal punishment which these atrocities brought 
 down upon the chief actors in them seems to have checked 
 their proceedings for a time in this quarter at least, they 
 were not carried on in the same daring spirit. The improve- 
 ment, too, in the roads of the western part of Sussex, about 
 this time chiefly by the agency of Sir Walter Burrell may 
 have had something to do in arresting smuggling. However 
 that may be, in the latter part of the last century and the 
 beginning of this it is in the eastern part of Sussex that we 
 find the smugglers most active and daring. The Hastings 
 men took the lead in it, and, following in the footsteps of the 
 famous Viking, from whom their town presumedly takes its 
 name, joined piracy to smuggling. 
 
 In 1758 Nicholas Wingfield (Wingfield is still a good 
 Sussex name) and Adams Hyde, masters of two Hastings 
 cutters, had the audacity to board a Danish ship, on which 
 was the Ambassador to Denmark from Spain, and carried off 
 a portion of its cargo. For this they were tried, convicted, 
 and executed as pirates. So far from the Hastings men being
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 81 
 
 deterred by this example, for the next seven years vessels 
 coming up Channel were exposed to the piratical attacks of 
 a gang known as " Ruxley's crew," most of the members of 
 which lived at Hastings, and who did not hesitate, when 
 resisted, to add murder to piracy. Thus, the master of a 
 Dutch hoy, called "The Three Sisters," was "chopped 
 down " with an axe, and the perpetrators betrayed themselves 
 by boasting " how the Dutchman wriggled when they cut him 
 on the back-bone!" To put down this gang it was thought 
 necessary to send a detachment of the Inniskilling Dragoons, 
 200 strong, to Hastings, and a man-of-war and a cutter were 
 stationed off the town to co-operate with the military! If 
 the town had been in the hands of the French and about 
 to be besieged, more warlike measures could scarcely have 
 been taken. Nay, so fearful were the authorities of their 
 unscrupulous fellow-townsmen who favoured "Fair Trade" 
 and piracy that the soldiers had strict orders to conceal the 
 object for which they had been sent down; and because the 
 Mayor of Hastings would not divulge this he was attacked, 
 and ran considerable danger of being murdered. Then it 
 was considered time to act. Several men were arrested, 
 brought to trial for piracy, and four of them hung. 
 
 This was in 1769, and yet ten years afterwards we have the 
 strongest proof that smuggling was carried on as actively as 
 ever along the Sussex coast. A new Act had been passed 
 against it, and, In a pamphlet issued by the authorities to 
 enforce the law (called "Advice to the Unwary," 1780), it is 
 stated that the practice of smuggling had made such rapid 
 strides from the sea coast into the very heart of the country, 
 pervading every city, town, and village, that universal distress 
 had been brought on the fair dealer. The quantity of spirit 
 distilled at Schiedam, to be smuggled into England, was 
 estimated at 3,867,500 gallons, and five or six millions of 
 pounds of tea were yearly imported in the same way from 
 France. For the management of the transactions connected 
 with the " trade," the Sussex smugglers had regular resident 
 
 G
 
 82 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 agents at Flushing: and these official representatives of Sussex 
 smugglers continued to be appointed up to 30 years ago!* 
 
 The exportation of wool had ceased, but the high duties 
 on tea, silks, tobacco, and spirits left plenty of work for the 
 smuggler in the introduction of those articles into the country 
 without payment of duties; and, when successful, the profit 
 was so great that plenty of men were ready to risk their lives 
 for it. So the work went on, not only through the whole of 
 the war with France, from 1793 to 1815, but up to 1840; and 
 during that period scarcely an Assize went by without some 
 trial taking place for more or less heinous offences arising 
 out of it; whilst the loss of life in the constant conflicts 
 between the blockade-men and the smugglers was incessant, 
 and sometimes heavy on both sides. 
 
 "In May, 1826," writes Mr. W. D. Cooper in the paper 
 on " Smuggling in Sussex," from which we have before 
 quoted, "a smuggling galley, chased by a guard boat, ran- 
 ashore near the mouth of Rye Harbour, and opened fire on 
 the guard. The blockade-men from Camber Watch-house 
 came to the spot and seized one of the smugglers, when a 
 body of not less than two hundred armed smugglers rushed 
 from behind the sand-hills, commenced a fire on the blockade- 
 men, killing one and wounding another, but were ultimately 
 driven off with the capture of their galley, carrying off, 
 nevertheless, their wounded. On another occasion, four or 
 five smugglers were killed whilst swimming the military 
 canal at Pett-horse Race, having missed the spot where it 
 was fordable. On April 13, 1827, about twenty smugglers 
 went down to the eastward of Fairlight; a struggle ensued; 
 
 * The cool audacity of these men is illustrated by a piece of intelligence co:nrnunicated 
 to the Chichester Journal and Hampshire and Wiltshire Chronicle of October 6, 1783, under 
 the head of "Lewes, Sept. 29." It is as follows: "One night last week Mr. Marson, 
 Excise officer at Newhaven, was seized by six or eight smugglers, who escorted him to 
 their main body, composed of near aoo, assembled at the sea-side, by -whom the Excise- 
 man -was tried for his life on a charge of aiding and abetting in wantonly shooting a 
 smuggler some time since, when, happily for him, he was acquitted by a majority of 
 ten and suffered to depart unhurt." This was, indeed, turning the tables! Only try 
 to conceive the state of things when smugglers apprehended and tried for their lives 
 Excise officers 1
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 83 
 
 the smugglers wrested some muskets from the blockade-men, 
 beat them with the butt ends, and ran one through with a 
 bayonet. The smugglers at length retreated, leaving one of 
 their number dead ; another was found afterwards, having 
 been apparently dropped by the smugglers; a third, some 
 distance on the way to Icklesham, the body scarcely cold; 
 the rest of the wounded men were carried off by their 
 companions ; and I have been informed that one of the 
 party alone carried one of his fellows on his back from the 
 scene of the conflict at Fairlight to his residence at Udimore, 
 a distance of six miles at least." 
 
 It was, indeed, one of the best traits in these lawless men 
 that they always carried off their wounded comrades; and we 
 will do them the credit to attribute it to a fellow-feeling on their 
 part, and not to the fear of being "split upon" by their 
 captured comrades. 
 
 One of the latest of the smugglers' battles for such they 
 often really were in Sussex, was fought in 1828, near Bexhill. 
 A lugger having landed its illicit cargo between that village 
 and the little public-house at Bopeep, a party of smugglers, 
 armed with "bats" (large clubs), rushed down to the beach, 
 and, placing it in carts, on horses, and on men's backs, made 
 straight to Sidley Green. But here they were overtaken by a 
 Blockade force of 40 men, and the smugglers halting, and 
 drawing up in a line, a regular engagement took place. With 
 such resolution did the smugglers fight on this occasion that 
 they repulsed their assailants, after killing Quartermaster 
 Collins, and severely bruising several others. In the first 
 volley from the Blockade an old smuggler named Smethurst 
 was shot dead and his body was found the next morning, his 
 " bat " still grasped in his hand, but almost hacked to pieces 
 by the cutlasses of the Blockade-men. As usual, all the 
 wounded smugglers were carried off. 
 
 For this fatal affair eight men were tried at the Old Bailey, 
 and, pleading guilty, received sentence of death. But the 
 sentence was eventually commuted to transportation.
 
 84 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Two smugglers were shot dead near Hastings in 1831, and 
 another at Worthing in 1832, in an affray in which between 
 200 and 300 smugglers were engaged. In 1833 the chief 
 boatman of the Blockade was killed at Eastbourne, and on 
 this occasion the smugglers, forming in two lines down to the 
 beach, kept up the fight until the whole cargo had been run, 
 in spite of having several of their party wounded. On none 
 of these occasions were any of the men engaged discovered. 
 Indeed, as a rule, the smugglers were " true " to each other. 
 
 In the " History of the Rifle Brigade," by Sir W. H. Cope, 
 Bart., the following passage occurs: " Early in the year 1833 
 Captain Horatio Stewart's Depot Company was ordered to 
 proceed from Dover by forced marches to Hastings. The 
 whole of that part of the coast was in a state of great 
 excitement in consequence of the proceedings of smugglers, 
 who had not long before had an affray with the coastguard, in 
 which one of the latter was killed and others wounded. On 
 the arrival of the Company at Hastings the men, after being 
 allowed to rest and refresh themselves for about an hour, 
 were ordered to fall in and were divided into parties, under 
 officers and non-commissioned officers, which were directed 
 to patrol the beach for many miles in various directions during 
 the night. This unpleasant duty continued for six weeks; 
 patrolling by night and target-practice by day. This was 
 watched by numbers of the people, and no doubt the practice 
 made at the target was observed with good effect by the 
 smugglers and their friends, for no smuggler was ever met 
 with by the patrols, nor was any attempt made, while the 
 Riflemen continued at Hastings, to land contraband goods. 
 The company then rejoined the Depot." 
 
 The last occasion on which life was lost in a smuggling 
 affray on the Sussex coast was in 1838, when a poor fiddler, 
 named Monk, was shot dead by the Coast-guard at Camber 
 Castle. Since then no blood has been shed in smuggling 
 transactions, and, in fact, smuggling may be said to have 
 died a natural death. No farmer would now connive at a
 
 The Sussex Smugglers. 85 
 
 fraud on the Government by allowing his barns to be filled 
 with kegs of brandy, or his horses to be " borrowed " a 
 frequent practice in the olden times or even by leaving his 
 gates unlocked for their passage; all of which things were at 
 one time usual. Nor would any respectable tradesman now 
 buy lace or silk which had not come through the regular 
 channels of commerce and paid the duty to which they are 
 subjected. In fact, the smugglers, as a body of men acting 
 to some extent in the interests of the public, by keeping 
 open commercial dealings with other nations which would 
 otherwise have ceased altogether, and who certainly were 
 looked upon with a good deal of sympathy by the general 
 community, belong to the past. Traditions of the spots 
 where they concealed their goods (one of them, a hole near 
 Falmer Pond),* or where they suffered for their crimes, still 
 remain, but every year they become fainter. It is difficult, 
 indeed, in the present day, when, thanks to Free Trade, 
 commerce has free scope, to form an idea of the extent to 
 which illicit dealings with the opposite coast were carried 
 on, even by the respectable classes, and how it perverted 
 men's notions of right and wrong. The smuggler was a 
 popular man, except where, as in the Chater and Galley 
 case, he committed atrocious crimes ; he had the majority of 
 his fellow-subjects with him, though the law was against him. 
 He was carrying on a hazardous game that was all. If he 
 was successful people looked upon and talked of him as a 
 fine fellow; he had "done" the Exciseman, nothing more. 
 As for defrauding the revenue or gaining an unfair advantage 
 over his fellow-subjects who paid duty on their goods, nobody 
 thought of reproaching him with that, or of denouncing him 
 as a public robber, and thus respectable tradesmen entered 
 into smuggling transactions in those days, as respectable 
 
 * Very curious places were sometimes chosen by the smugglers to conceal their 
 goods in. The Vicar of a country parish not far from Brighton wanted to visit his 
 Church rather earlier than usual one Sunday morning and was met by all kinds of 
 excuses and obstructions from the Sexton for not rinding the key, until at last it came 
 out that the sacred edifice was full of kegs of brandy ! And they had to be cleared out 
 before Service could be proceeded with. Of course the Revenue Officers did not think 
 of looking for spirits of this kind in the Parish Church !
 
 86 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 people in these days gamble in shares. Fifty or sixty years 
 ago some of the leading tradesmen of Brighton, Worthing, 
 Hastings, Rye, and other towns along the coast took the 
 goods that were " run " by the Fair Traders, and some of 
 them made fortunes, and some of them indeed, most of 
 them were ruined. The effect of this gambling, to call it 
 by the mildest term, may be conceived. The very foundations 
 of public morality were sapped ; a war was carried on between 
 the Government that acted, or professed to act, for the people, 
 and the people themselves; and the- sympathies of the public 
 were against the Government. It was a fine thing in the 
 estimation of numbers of men to defy it to go out in armed 
 bands to resist the officers of the Crown, and to fight with, 
 and sometimes to murder, these officers. Many of the men 
 who did this were known and applauded as fine fellows, and 
 were, in fact, men of great courage and resolution and talent, 
 and who, acting in a lawful cause, would have won honour 
 and fame. Their daring acts were talked of with a sort of 
 admiration, and even when they were brought to justice, and 
 deservedly suffered for such acts of brutality as those of the 
 Tapners and the Mills and the Perins, they were looked upon 
 in a different light from the ordinary criminal. Up to the 
 present day it is held to be no disgrace to have had these 
 men for your ancestors rather the reverse ! The smugglers 
 are still heroes in people's opinion, though, fortunately, the 
 race is extinct. Free Trade has put it down, and if we had 
 no other cause to thank the men who, like Huskisson and 
 Cobden, Gladstone and Peel, have given us Free Trade, we 
 should thank them for this : that they have removed such a 
 blot on the social body as the Sussex Smuggler.
 
 The Southdown Shepherd. 
 
 |F any class of men in Sussex have escaped the 
 touch and changes of time it is surely the 
 shepherd of the Southdowns. Not only is his 
 occupation one that does not change, and does 
 not admit of change, or of very little change, but the spot 
 where he pursues it remains necessarily the same. Ages go 
 by, fashions come and go, and revolutions sweep over him, 
 and he takes no note or heed of them; and they have no 
 word or work for him. No matter who is master in the land, 
 king, or lords, or people, they do not want and yet cannot do 
 without the shepherd. The sheep must be tended on the 
 hills, and the man who does it is equally respected and 
 disregarded by all parties. He is part of the flock. He does 
 not constitute a class; his numbers are too few for that; he 
 is but a unit in the great total of humanity. He stands apart 
 out of the crowd is an exceptional being, and retains his 
 place and his characteristics his peace and his solitude 
 when all around him is in a state of flux and mutation. 
 
 It would be a great mistake, however, to suppose that the 
 shepherd of the Downs is like other shepherds, or rather, 
 perhaps, we should say, that shepherds in other parts of the 
 world, or even in our own England, are, or have been, like 
 the shepherd of the Downs. The shepherds of the East, like 
 Abraham and Laban and Jacob, were, as their descendants 
 are to this day in the oases of Arabia, the chiefs of great 
 tribes often warriors and kings, sages and legislators, with
 
 88 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 a wide and changing field of action, and an outlook upon the 
 world. The shepherds of the Alps pursue their task beset 
 by dangers of crevasse, glacier, and cataract floods and 
 landslips. The shepherds of South America and Australia 
 are armed horsemen, who carry their lives in their hands and 
 must be prepared for attack at any moment from savages or 
 bushrangers. They are often the owners, too, as well as the 
 guardians of the countless flocks which they drive over 
 thousands of miles of almost trackless prairie, scrub, or 
 desert, and often return to the life of cities, which they have 
 left for a time, as millionaires and men of note. 
 
 In other parts, too, of Europe, and even of England and 
 Scotland, the shepherd's or drover's life is one of varied 
 change from place to place, of collision and dealings with 
 other men, and has no small amount of incident and excite- 
 ment and ups and downs in it, such as accompany the 
 dealings of men with men. 
 
 But, with the shepherd of the Southdowns, life must be as 
 peaceful and unchanging as like from day to day, year to 
 year, and century to century, as one can well imagine it. 
 Shakspeare has put into the mouth of Henry the 6th, when 
 weary of the intrigues of Courts and the tragedies of war, a 
 picture of the shepherd's life a Southdown Shepherd, it 
 must have surely been in his day, which will serve to picture 
 it just as truly now : 
 
 O God ! methinks it were a happy life, 
 
 To be no better than a homely swain ; 
 
 To sit upon a hill, as I do now, 
 
 To carve out dials quaintly, point by point, 
 
 Thereby to see the minutes how they run 
 
 How many make the hour full complete, 
 
 How many hours bring about the day, 
 
 How many days will finish up the year, 
 
 How many years a mortal man may live. 
 
 When this is known; then to divide the time: 
 
 So many hours must I tend my flock ; 
 
 So many hours must I take my rest; 
 
 So many hours must I contemplate; 
 
 So many hours must I sport myself; 
 
 So many days my ewes have been with young; 
 
 So many weeks ere the poor fools will yean ;
 
 The Southdown Shepherd. 89 
 
 So many years ere I shall shear the fleece; 
 
 So minutes, hours, days, months, and years 
 
 Pass'd over to the end they were created, 
 
 Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. 
 
 Ah, what a Hfe were this! how sweet, how lovely! 
 
 Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade 
 
 To shepherds, looking on their silly sheep, 
 
 Than doth a rich embroider'd canopy 
 
 To kings that fear then- subjects' treachery? 
 
 Oh, yes, it doth; a thousand-fold it doth; 
 
 And to conclude the shepherd's homely curds, 
 
 His cold thin drink out of his leather bottle, 
 
 His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade, 
 
 All which secure and sweetly he enjoys, 
 
 Is far beyond a Prince's delicates, 
 
 His viands sparkling in a golden cup, 
 
 His body couched in a curious bed, 
 
 When care, mistrust, and treason wait on him. 
 
 Allow for the poet's exaltation of this life of the hill- 
 shepherd, and it is as true a picture now as it was in the day 
 that Shakspeare drew it. Still the same peaceful spot, with 
 no shadow of danger on it which a dog or a crook may not 
 ward off; still the same fleecy forms and innocent faces 
 creeping up and down the hill-sides; still the same quiet 
 buzz of insects in the wild thyme, that still gives out the 
 same sweet scent, or the melancholy cry of the pee-wit as it 
 sweeps with the wind over hill and dale; still the same softly- 
 rounded horizon landward, or, seaward, a vast flat of waters 
 until sea and sky meet, and close in the little world of the 
 shepherd. For he has none besides this, and thinks of none 
 and wishes for none. Sheep and dog, and birds and Downs, 
 with the alternations of the seasons, and the flock-duties 
 they bring, are to him the Alpha and the Omega of his 
 existence. For generations it has been so how many we 
 do not venture to say, for sheep did not come in with the 
 Conqueror; he found them here, and that being the case, of 
 course there were shepherds. In the Weald, most probably, 
 the swineherd held sway, and many a Gurth fed his unruly 
 herd on the fruit of the oak and the beech. But swine could 
 find no mast or acorns, or such-like food, on the unwooded 
 Downs of Sussex. Here there was, and is, nothing but the 
 short sweet grass which has covered it since the day when
 
 go Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 the rounded backs of the ribbed chalk began to show them- 
 selves, "dolphin-like," above the waves, and to which the 
 sweet breath of the south is as much the parent as Zephyr 
 and Aurora were, in their May sportings, to the spirit of 
 Mirth. 
 
 On .these Downs, then these beautiful Southdowns of 
 Sussex must the first sheep that were brought from Spain 
 by Carthaginians, or from Gaul by Celts or Romans, have 
 been turned out to feed. And, allowing something for the 
 difference of nationalities, we do not think the first guardian 
 of them could have differed very much in garb or customs 
 from those shepherds who now tend them. He must have 
 had his toga his warm great coat or mantle to shelter him 
 from the keen winds that sometimes blow eastward and 
 northward over the Downs, and he must have had some kind 
 of flopping head-gear sombrero or cappello to shade his 
 eyes from the mid-day sun. And when he had these Celt 
 or Carthaginian, Roman or Saxon he did not, probably, 
 look so very unlike that figure that now meets our gaze on 
 the Down side. Motionless, of course the Down shepherd 
 always is motionless, but erect, or just leaning on his crook, 
 with his wallet at his side, and with his dog at his feet, 
 looking up at him with that eager look, in expectation of a 
 command, which sheep-dogs are born with. Not a young 
 man who ever saw a young shepherd ? but of an age not 
 easy to fix, nor with an expression of face easy to decipher. 
 A blank, and yet not a blank; rather an unwritten page in 
 which much may be read an expression moulded by 
 generations of men (for Down shepherds, as a rule, descend 
 from father to son) who have looked daily on the same scene 
 and that mainly made up of three great elements sky, 
 and sea, and Down and with the same object in view: to 
 feed that flock of sheep and renew it from year to year. 
 Objects, these, uninterfered with by the outer world, and with 
 as little intermixture of those personal elements of love and 
 hope and fear of desire to rise or fear to fall as it is 
 possible for human life to go on with. For as to those
 
 Th^Southdown Shepherd. 91 
 
 passions and that poetry which the Pastoral poets and Italian 
 and Spanish novelists import into the shepherd-life, it may 
 have been true of Arcadia or Andulasia, or in the vales of 
 Tempe or Tivoli, but with these things the Down shepherd 
 has naught to do and never had. If he " told his tale " it 
 was his tale of sheep and not of love, and he did not tell it, 
 as Milton sings, under a hawthorn tree there are few or no 
 hawthorn trees on the Southdowns but as the animals passed 
 into or out of their fold; and if he had his likes and his 
 dislikes his desires and his disappointments they had 
 reference to the masters into whose service he passed, the 
 wages he received, the "guerdon" he got for successful 
 lambing, and such-like business matters, and not to rages 
 and jealousies and hates arising from the tender passion 
 the jiltin'gs of mistresses (his "young woman" never thought 
 of jilting him nor his "missus" of planting the "green-eyed 
 monster" in his breast!) or the treasons of friends. If the 
 human passions slumber anywhere they do so in the heart of 
 a Southdown shepherd, and thus he seldom or never figures 
 at a Police Court or in an Assize calendar. Even the Game 
 Laws lose their terrors to him: he is no poacher, but fast 
 friends with the sportsman, to whom a "shepherd's hare" is 
 always a dernier ressort, and a safe one too, when the covers 
 fail to supply sport. 
 
 The Down shepherd, too, has his own field of sport, or 
 used to have. Wheatears, which once abounded on our 
 Downs, were a little mine of wealth to him he caught them 
 with springes set in the turf and plovers' eggs were another 
 source of revenue. The capture of the first and the search 
 for the second, the marking down of a hare's seat, or the 
 watching of rabbits going in and out of their burrows these, 
 doubtless, supply those varieties to the shepherd's life on the 
 Downs without which it would be dull indeed, for days must 
 sometimes pass with no other society but that of sheep 
 and dog, and nothing more to do than watch the one and 
 order the other.
 
 92 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 "What a fine opportunity for study!" some contemplative 
 reader, or some member of a School Board, eager for juvenile 
 development, may exclaim. We believe that the class is as 
 innocent of literary or scientific tastes as Audrey was of 
 poetry. It is in the society of men, and not of sheep or 
 beeves, that these cultivated tastes flourish in England at 
 least. Now and then there is an exception ; but they are 
 few and far between. Scotland can boast of a poet and an 
 astronomer who were shepherds, and Sussex has one instance, 
 and only one, of a shepherd who turned aside from sheep to 
 letters. This latter was John Dudeney, a native of Rotting- 
 dean, and a descendant from a long line of shepherds, who, 
 in a " plain unvarnished tale," has left us a chronicle of the 
 life of a shepherd of the Southdowns which is, in prose, as 
 truthful a picture as Shakspeare's is in verse. 
 
 John Dudeney was born at Rottingdean on the 2ist 
 April, 1782, his father being shepherd to John Hamshaw, 
 Esq. His own shepherd-life extended from his 8th to his 
 23rd year, when he exchanged his flock of sheep for a flock 
 of children in fact, became a schoolmaster at Lewes, and so 
 spent a long and useful life. 
 
 "When I was eight years old," he tell us, in a communication made 
 by him to Mr. R. W. Blencowe at an advanced period of his life, " I 
 began to follow the sheep during the summer months ; in winter I some- 
 times drove the plough. I was fond of reading and borrowed all the books 
 I could. When I was about ten a gentleman (whom I aftenvards found 
 to be Mr. Dunvan, author of what is called Lee's History of Lewes) came 
 to me on the hills and gave me a small History of England and Robinson 
 Crusoe, and I read them both with much interest. When he first came 
 he inquired of the boy who tended my father's flock, while I was gone to 
 sheepshearing, for a wheatear's nest, which he had never seen. These 
 birds usually build their nest in the chalk-pits and in the holes which the 
 rabbits had made. I afterwards bought, when I came to Lewes fair, a 
 small History of France and one of Rome, as I could get the money; 
 indeed, when I came to the fairs, I brought all the money I could spare to 
 buy books. 
 
 " My mother sometimes tended my father's flock while he went to 
 sheepshearing. I have known other shepherds' wives do the same; but 
 this custom, like many others, is discontinued. I have not seen a woman 
 with a flock for several years. 
 
 " The masters allowed me the keeping of one sheep, the lamb and the 
 wool of which brought me about 145. or 155. a year, which I saved till I
 
 The Southdown Shepherd. 93 
 
 had enough to buy a watch, for which I gave four guineas, and which has 
 now shown me the time of day for more than half a century. My father 
 let me have the privilege of catching wheatears, which brought me in a 
 few shillings. These birds are never found in great numbers so far from 
 the sea-coast, and I very seldom caught a dozen in a day. The bird called 
 the bustard, I have heard old shepherds say, formerly frequented the 
 Downs ; but their visits have been discontinued for nearly a century. I 
 have heard my father say that his father saw one about the year 1750 ; he 
 saw that near to Four Lords' Dool, a place so called because at the 
 tumulus or dool there four parishes meet St. John's under the Castle, 
 Chailey, Chiltington and Falmer. When I was sixteen I went to service, 
 as under-shepherd, at West Blatchington, where I remained one year. 
 When the transit of Mercury over the sun's disc took place on the 7th 
 of May, 1799, my curiosity was excited; but in looking for it without due 
 precaution I very much injured one of my eyes. 
 
 "In the winter of 1798-9, during a snow, my flock was put into a barn-yard, 
 the first instance I know of putting the sheep into the yard, except in lambing 
 time. There we caught more wheatears than at my father's. I used to sell 
 some to the gentry on their excursions to the Devil's Dyke for 2s. 6d. or 35. a 
 dozen ; at the beginning of the season sometimes catching three dozen in 
 a day, but not often. At Midsummer, 1799, I removed to Kingston, near 
 Lewes, where I was under-shepherd for three years. The flock was very 
 large ([,400 the winter stock), and my master, the head shepherd, being 
 old and infirm, much of the labour devolved on me. While here I had 
 better wages, 6 a year ; I had also a part of the money obtained from 
 the sale of wheatears, though we did not catch them here in great numbers, 
 a dozen or two a day, seldom more. The hawks often injured us by tearing 
 them out of their coops, and scattering their feathers about, which frightened 
 the other birds from the coops. During winter I caught the moles, which, 
 at twopence each, brought me a few shillings. I could, therefore, spare a 
 little more money for books. I still read such as I could borrow, on history, 
 &c., for I never, after I was twelve or thirteen years of age, could bear to 
 spend my time in what is called light reading. 
 
 " I had very little opportunity of reading at home, so used to take a 
 book or two in my shepherd's coat-pocket, and to pursue my studies by 
 the side of my flock when they were quiet. I was never found fault with 
 for neglecting my business through reading. I have sometimes been on 
 the hills in winter from morning till night, and have not seen a single 
 person during the whole day. In the snow, I have walked to and fro 
 under the shelter of a steep bank, or in a bottom, or a combe, while my 
 sheep have been by me scraping away the snow with their forefeet to get 
 at the grass, and I have taken my book out of my pocket, and, as I walked 
 to and fro in the snow, have read to pass away the time. It is very cold 
 on the Downs in such weather ; I remember once, whilst with my father, 
 the snow froze into ice on my eyelashes, and he breathed on my face to 
 thaw it off. The Downs are very pleasant in summer, commanding 
 extensive views of both sea and land : I very much wanted a telescope, 
 and could not spare money to buy one ; but I met with some lenses, and 
 putting them into a paste-board case, I contrived one, which afforded me 
 much amusement in pleasant weather. 
 
 " In 1802 I began practical geometry from Turner's 'Introduction.' I 
 bought some paper and a pair of iron compasses. I riled off part of one
 
 94 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 of the legs so that I could fasten on a pencil or pen, then, laying my paper 
 on the greensward on the hill, I drew my circles, triangles, &c. 
 
 " On that part of the hill where my sheep required least attention, I 
 dug a hole in the ground amongst the heath, and placed a large flintstone 
 over it. No one would think of there being anything under it if they had 
 seen it. In that hole I kept some books and a slate, which, when 
 convenient, I took out and went to work at arithmetic, algebra, geometry, 
 &c. This under-stone library was on Newmarket Hill, not far from a 
 pond, near to which a cottage and a barn have since been erected. For 
 more than thirty years the place where the hole had been was to be seen; 
 and I have several times gone a little way out of my road to visit it and 
 offer up my thanks to that gracious Providence who has so directed my 
 way; but within these last few years the plough has passed over it, and I 
 can no longer find the exact spot. 
 
 " My master, the head shepherd, at Kingston, had the keeping of 
 twenty sheep as part of his wages ; and I have heard old shepherds affirm 
 that, in the generation before them, some of the shepherds had nearly, or 
 quite all, their wages in this way, and it seems to have been of very ancient 
 practice. We have an instance in the case of Jacob and Laban ; and I 
 think it probable that the wages of the labouring man were, almost of 
 necessity, money being scarce, paid in this manner. 
 
 " At Midsummer, 1802, I went (at his request) to be head shepherd to 
 James Ingram, Esq., of Rottingdean. Mr. Thomas Beard and Mr. 
 Dumbrill had each of them sheep in the flock, but Mr. Ingram having 
 most, he was my real master. The farm was called the Westside Farm, 
 extending from Rottingdean to Black Rock, in Brighton Parish ; it was a 
 long narrow slip of ground, not averaging more than half a mile in width. 
 My flock required very close attention, as they had to feed so much 
 between the pieces of corn, and there were no fences to keep them off. 
 In such situations a good dog is a most valuable help to a shepherd, and I 
 was fortunate in having a very excellent one. 
 
 " The farm extending along the sea-coast, I caught great numbers of 
 wheatears during the season for taking them, which lasts from the middle 
 of July to the end of August. The most I ever caught in one day was 
 thirteen dozen ; but we thought it a good day if we caught three or four 
 dozen. We sold them to a poulterer at Brighton, who took all we could 
 catch in the season at i8d. a dozen. From what I have heard from old 
 shepherds, it cannot be doubted that they were caught in much greater 
 numbers a century ago than of late. I have heard them speak of an 
 immense number being taken in one day by a shepherd at East Dean, near 
 Beachy Head. I think they said he took nearly a hundred dozen ; so many, 
 that he could not thread them on crow-quills in the usual manner, but took 
 off his round frock and made a sack of it to put them into, and his wife did 
 the same with her petticoat. This must have happened when there was a 
 great flight. Their numbers now are so decreased that some shepherds 
 do not set up any coops, as it does not pay for the trouble. 
 
 " I had a good father and mother, though they were poor, my father's 
 wages being only ^"30 a year, and the keeping of ten or twelve sheep, 
 having a family of ten children, yet we were never in want." 
 
 We doubt if John Dudeney has had any followers among 
 Southdown shepherds in his pursuit of knowledge under
 
 The Southdown Shepherd. 95 
 
 difficulties, or in his exchange of the tending of sheep for 
 the instruction of children. The life of the Southdown 
 shepherd is, at best, a " hard one," and presents few or no 
 opportunities for self-improvement, and none of those degrees 
 or steps in the social scale by which men mount Fortune's 
 ladder. As a rule, once a shepherd, always a shepherd ; and 
 the shepherd's boy has nothing higher to look to than to be 
 a shepherd. The opportunities of leisure and contemplation 
 which, to minds already formed to study, may seem tempting 
 to some, are more than counter-balanced by the absence, in 
 a shepherd's life, of those incentives to exertion which are 
 supplied to other men by closer contact and the fiercer 
 competition of city-life. To those engaged in them these 
 seem to be evils ; and doubtless they have their evil side. 
 But let the theoretic lover of solitude poet or philosopher 
 try a year or two of sheep-tending on the Southdowns, and 
 those hills, so beautiful and delightful when seen in their 
 summer garb, would soon disgust him by their barren solitude 
 and bleakness. The shepherd endures all this with stolid 
 patience ; but it does not develop his mind or raise him in 
 the scale of humanity. We question if the tendency in the 
 life of the Southdown shepherd of modern days is not to 
 sink, rather than to rise, in comparison with other classes of 
 labourers. The latter move onward with the stream ; he, 
 almost necessarily by the conditions of his life, is stationary. 
 His world of action is rather narrowed than enlarged. The 
 wide-sweeping Downs are pressed upon by the plough on 
 the one side and by Building Societies on the other; the 
 limit of the shepherd's domains is yearly narrowed, and he is 
 brought more under the eye and within the ordinary control 
 of the farmer, and is less his own master; has lighter 
 responsibilities and less trust ; and all this tends to make the 
 Down shepherd a less important member of the rural com- 
 munity than he used to be in bygone days. Still, he remains 
 perhaps more closely and truly resembling the figure that was 
 seen on the same hills a thousand years ago than any other 
 set of men, on mountain or plain, in this England of ours.
 
 9 6 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 And, of all spots so to see the shepherd in his primitive state, 
 the Southdowns are the best. 
 
 "Shepherds," writes Richard Lower, of Chiddingly, 
 Sussex (the father of Mark Antony Lower), in a paper on 
 " Old Southdown Shepherds," " were famous for spinning 
 long yarns; and if it chanced that two or three met together 
 on some lofty brow, within sight of their respective flocks, 
 stories of great length would surely be related. These, chiefly 
 referring to their own calling, would beguile many hours, and 
 sometimes concerned matters that happened ' fifty year 
 agoo,' or very likely a ' hundud.' I once accidentally 
 overheard two retired shepherds, who were sitting on a March 
 morning under a sunny hedge, conversing in a somewhat 
 disconsolate tone concerning the prosperity of bygone days. 
 One was telling the other how he had known the time when, 
 in a single year, from forty to fifty thousand sheep had been 
 washed near the spot where they were sitting, and ' now,' he 
 exclaimed, ' there be none! ' The ' wash ' had been removed 
 to another locality and this seemed to him almost a national 
 calamity. 'As to birding,' he continued, in a still more 
 doleful tone, 'birding is now all auver; why, I used to make 
 quite a harvest of my birds twelve pound a year or more I 
 have made of my birds ; and one year I made fourteen pounds 
 eight shillings. We sent 'em ye see to Burthemson (Bright- 
 helmstone Brighton) and otherwhile we catched so many 
 that the Burthemsoners coud'nt take 'em all, and I myself 
 have sent some to Tunbridge Wells. That was the time o' 
 dee, Old Boy, for shepherds.' For laziness the shepherd, in 
 his every-day habits, had no equal. Wrapped up in his thick 
 great-coat, impervious to rain, snow or hail, he would throw 
 himself backwards into a hawth bush and snugly repose as on 
 a bed of down for hours together. If a traveller, chancing 
 to stray to the spot where he lay, enquired his road over those 
 trackless, lonely hills, the shepherd, too lazy to rise to give 
 the required information, would stretch out his leg, pointing 
 with his foot, and say ' over dat yander hill by de burg
 
 The Southdown Shepherd. 
 
 97 
 
 down that 'ere bottom and so up de bostle,' as the case 
 might be, and drop again into his doze as snug as a dormouse." 
 
 This matter-of-fact view of shepherd life, from shepherds 
 themselves, may help us to qualify the somewhat artificial 
 and sophisticated one which poets and outsiders are apt to 
 take. The truth, perhaps, lies between the two pictures, for 
 shepherd life has its poetry as well as its practical hardships 
 and common-places, and we leave our readers to arrive at it 
 by the help of the material, drawn from both sides, that we 
 lay before them. 
 
 H
 
 The Sussex Sheep-Shearer. 
 
 O some readers it may suggest itself that the shearer 
 of sheep ought to have been associated with the 
 shepherd that it is one and the same set of men 
 who tend the sheep and who shear them. But 
 this would be to fall into a mistake. A shepherd may be, 
 and, indeed, usually is a shearer, but the great majority of 
 shearers are not shepherds ; and whilst the character of the 
 shepherd varies with the locality in which he carries on his 
 work and thus the shepherd of the hills may be a very 
 different character from the shepherd of the plain or the 
 mountain the occupation of the sheep-shearer knows no such 
 variation. It is pursued in every county and country pretty 
 much under the same circumstances and conditions, and 
 gives rise to no special character in those who pursue it. It 
 is, indeed, so to say, only an accident of rural life; occupies 
 a few days' labour, and then is not needed until another year. 
 So, sheep-shearing is not a vocation a settled calling; there 
 is no body of men who get their living solely by it, as 
 shepherds get their's. A shepherd is always to be seen where 
 there are sheep ; but enquire for a sheep-shearer in any but 
 the sheep-shearing months, and the only reply you would get 
 would be to be shown a man who can shear, but whose 
 settled employment is of a very different kind. And yet it is 
 not every man that can shear only here and there one; and 
 so the sheep-shearer stands out from the common herd of 
 agricultural labourers: he is, for some few days of the year,
 
 The Sussex Sheep- Shearer. 99 
 
 a skilled labourer almost an artist and as such he must be 
 treated with some respect and calls for our notice and 
 attention. 
 
 Sometimes, indeed, a shepherd will undertake the shearing 
 of his flock, and then we have the nearest approach to a pure 
 sheep-shearer. But there is many a shepherd who does not 
 shear, as there are thousands of shearers who are not 
 shepherds not, indeed, agricultural labourers at all. It is 
 the one province of rural industry, now that spinning is no 
 longer carried on in the cottage, that approximates most 
 closely to the work of townspeople. Not only may any hand 
 on a farm take to shearing if he possess the necessary skill 
 and will be allowed by his master to shear for other farmers 
 as well as -for himself, but men who are not farm labourers at 
 all tailors and shoemakers and such-like as are skilful in the 
 use of the scissors will join a " Company " of shearers and 
 take a circuit of country, such circuits being mapped out and 
 kept by the different sets of shearers with as much strictness 
 as gentlemen of the long robe keep to their circuits and 
 some people may be malicious enough to insinuate, for the 
 same object, namely, of shearing their sheep ! 
 
 The arrival of these shearing "Companies" at a farm used 
 once to be a very important event. Each Company had its 
 captain and lieutenant, selected for their trustworthy character, 
 their superior intelligence, and their skill in the shearing art. 
 And, as a symbol of the authority with which they were 
 invested, the captain wore a gold-laced hat and the lieutenant 
 a silver-laced one. As soon as the Company was formed, all 
 the men repaired to the cottage of the captain, where a feast, 
 which was called the " White-ram," was provided for them, 
 and on this occasion the whole plan of the campaign was 
 discussed and arranged. They generally got to their place 
 of shearing about seven, and, having breakfasted, they began 
 their work. Once in the forenoon, and twice in the after- 
 noon, their custom was to "light up," as they termed it; 
 that is, th,ey ceased to work for a few minutes, drank their
 
 loo Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 beer, sharpened their shears, and set to work again. Their 
 dinner-hour was one, but this was not the great meal of 
 the day, their supper being the time of real enjoyment, and 
 when this was over they would remain for several hours in 
 the house smoking their pipes and singing their sheep- 
 shearing songs, in which they were joined by the servants of 
 the farm ; and sometimes the master and mistress of the 
 house would favour them with their presence. 
 
 Some of these sheep-shearing songs still linger in the 
 memories of old men and women, and may occasionally be 
 heard at rural merry-makings, one of their characteristics 
 being their interminable length. The following is a speci- 
 men : 
 
 Come, all my jolly boys, and we'll together go 
 Abroad with our masters, to shear the lamb and ewe ; 
 All in the merry month of June, of all times in the year, 
 It always comes in season the ewes and lambs to shear ; 
 And there we must work hard, boys, until our backs do ache, 
 And our master he will bring us beer whenever we do lack. 
 
 Our master he comes round to see our work is doing well, 
 
 And he cries, " Shear them close, men, for there is but little wool." 
 
 " O yes, good master," we reply, "we'll do well as we can," 
 
 When our Captain calls, " Shear close, boys !" to each and every man. 
 
 And at some places still we have this story all day long, 
 
 " Close them, boys, and shear them well!" and this is all their song. 
 
 And then our noble Captain doth unto our master say, 
 
 " Come, let us have one bucket of your good ale, I pray." 
 
 He turns unto our Captain and makes him this reply : 
 
 "You shall have the best of beer, I promise, presently." 
 
 Then out with the bucket pretty Betsy she doth come, 
 
 And master says, " Maid, mind and see that every man has some." 
 
 This is some of our pastime while we the sheep do shear, 
 And though we are such merry boys, we work hard, I declare ; 
 And when 'tis night, and we are done, our master is more free, 
 And stores us well with good strong beer and pipes and tobaccee. 
 So we do sit and drink, we smoke and sing and roar. 
 Till we become more merry far than e'er we were before. 
 
 When all our work is done, and all our sheep are shorn, 
 Then home to our Captain, to drink the ale that's strong. 
 'Tis a barrel, then, of hum cap, which we call the black ram ; 
 And we do sit and swagger, and swear that we are men ; 
 But yet before 'tis night, I'll stand you half a crown, 
 That if you ha' n't a special care the ram will knock you down.
 
 The Sussex Sheep- Shearer. 101 
 
 The next specimen of rural minstrelsy is in a more tuneful 
 spirit, but, we fear, is not such a genuine production of the 
 soil as the foregoing. It was, however, frequently sung at 
 Sussex sheep-shearings in former days, and, for aught we 
 know, may be so now: 
 
 Here the rose-buds in June, and the violets are blowing ; 
 The small birds they warble from every green bough ; 
 
 Here's the pink and the lily, 
 
 And the daffydowndilly, 
 
 To adore and perfume the sweet meadows in June. 
 'Tis all before the plough the fat oxen go slow; 
 But the lads and the lasses to the sheep-shearing go. 
 
 Our shepherds rejoice in their fine heavy fleece, 
 
 And frisky young lambs, with their flocks do increase; 
 
 Each lad takes his lass, 
 
 All on the green grass, 
 
 Where the pink and the lily, 
 
 And the daffydowndilly, &c. 
 
 Here stands our brown jug, and 'tis fill'd with good ale, 
 Our table, our table shall increase and not fail; 
 We'll joke and we'll sing, 
 And dance in a ring ; 
 Where the pink and the lily, 
 And the daffydowndilly, &c. 
 
 When the sheep-shearing's over, and harvest draws nigh, 
 We'll prepare for the fields, our strength for to try; 
 We'll reap and we'll mow, 
 We'll plough and we'll sow; 
 Oh ! the pink and the lily, 
 And the daffydowndilly, &c. 
 
 Some of the toasts given on these occasions were very 
 quaint and had their special ballads attached to them. One 
 of these latter commenced as follows: 
 
 Our maid she would a hunting go, 
 
 She'd never a horse to ride; 
 
 She mounted on her master's boar, 
 
 And spurred him on the side. 
 
 Chink ! chink ! chink ! the bridle went, 
 
 As she rode o'er the downs. 
 So here's unto our maiden's health, 
 Drink round, my boys ! drink round ! 
 
 The supper finished, and the profits shared, the members 
 of the Company shook hands and parted, bidding each other 
 good-bye till another year, and each man bending his steps 
 towards his own home, which, probably, lay widely apart from
 
 IO2 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 those of his late companions. Yet year after year the 
 members of these Companies meet together, make their 
 accustomed round, and carry out their compact with much 
 goodwill and harmony. It is one of the few remaining 
 instances which modern life affords of such voluntary 
 associations for a common end. In the Middle Ages they 
 were, doubtless, more common. The Masons of those days 
 went about in Companies from city to city, and parish to 
 parish, raising those wonderful and beautiful fabrics which 
 are the admiration and marvel of later days. Other " crafts- 
 men " did the same, and to the present day in Germany it is 
 a part of the education, or apprenticeship, of the youth who 
 desires to be a skilled workman, or " meister," thus to travel 
 from place to place for a certain period. 
 
 But we, too, are wandering from our subject our shearers, 
 who, indeed, are lost to us as soon as the shearing feast is 
 over. They disperse and resume their ordinary occupations. 
 Neither are these merry meetings so common as they were 
 wont to be. There has been an attempt to revive the harvest- 
 feast in another and, doubtless, improved form ; but we are 
 not aware that this has extended to the sheep-shearing feast. 
 As a consequence, the shearers take home more money to 
 their families. The amounts they earn are, indeed, pretty 
 considerable, and to be a good shearer is not only honourable, 
 but profitable. The best sheep-shearer is a man known in 
 his district, as the best swordsman or bowman used to be in 
 former days. Some few years ago prizes were contended for 
 at County competitions, and in one special instance the 
 shearers of East Sussex were pitted against those of West 
 Sussex, in Goodwood Park, and were beaten. But this, too, 
 is a practice that has passed away. So 
 
 The old order changeth, 
 Yielding place to new. 
 
 But, let there be what changes there may, there will always 
 be shepherds and sheep-shearers in the land; they are two 
 of those primeval vocations which remain unchanged and 
 unchangeable in the midst of our changing civilization, and
 
 The. Sussex Sheep- Shearer. 103 
 
 men must cease to be civilized cease to eat mutton and 
 wear broadcloth before the shepherd and the sheep-shearer 
 disappear from the ranks of labouring men. May they, then, 
 flourish and in Sussex, and on the Sussex Downs especially, 
 esto perpelua I 
 
 In the absence of any picture of a sheep-shearing feast, 
 the following graphic description of a harvest-home one, 
 given by Mr. Rock, jun., of Hastings, in the i4th volume of 
 the Sussex Archaeological Collections, as witnessed by him 
 at a farm in Boreham Street, in East Sussex, twenty years 
 previously, may be taken as closely approximating to it, 
 especially in the gravity of the proceedings ! The custom of 
 "turning the cup over" was, doubtless, common to both 
 occasions: 
 
 " Towards the close of the meal we could hear a rather monotonous 
 chanting proceeding from the kitchen. The effect, heard faintly, except 
 when occasionally an intermediate door was open, was by no means 
 disagreeable. Our host explained the ceremony of 'turning the cup over,' 
 which was going on in the kitchen, and invited us to take part in it 
 ourselves. Accordingly we all adjourned to the kitchen, which we found 
 crowded with the labourers of the farm and the men who had assisted 
 them in harvesting. 
 
 " At the head of the table one of the men occupied the position of 
 chairman ; in front of him stood a pail, clean as wouden staves and iron 
 hoops could be made by human labour. At his right sat four or five men 
 who led the singing; grave as judges were they; indeed, the appearance 
 of the whole assembly was one of the greatest solemnity, except for a 
 moment or two when some unlucky wight failed to ' turn the cup over,' 
 and was compelled to undergo the penalty in that case made and provided. 
 This done, all went on as solemnly as before. The ceremony, if I may 
 call it so, was this : 
 
 "The leader, or chairman, standing behind the pail with a tall horn 
 cup in his hand, filled it with beer from the pail. The man next to him 
 on the left stood up, and holding a hat with both hands by the brim, 
 crown upwards, received the cup from the chairman, on the crown of the 
 hat, not touching it with either hand. He then lifted the cup to his lips 
 by raising the hat, and slowly drank off the contents. As soon as he 
 began to drink the chorus struck up this chant : 
 
 I've bin to Plymouth, and I've bin to Dover, 
 I have bin rambling, boys, all the wurld over 
 
 Over and over and over and over, 
 Drink up yur liquor and turn your cup over ; 
 
 Over and over and over and over, 
 The liquor's drink'd up and the cup is turned over.
 
 IO4 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 " The man drinking was expected to time his draught so as to empty 
 his cup at the end of the fourth line of the chant ; he was then to return 
 the hat to the perpendicular, still holding the hat by the brim, then to 
 throw the cup into the air, and, reversing the hat, to catch the cup in it as 
 it fell. If he failed to perform this part of the operation, the fellow 
 workmen, who were closely watching him, made an important alteration 
 in the last line of their chant, which in that case ran thus : 
 
 The liquor's drink'd up and the cup aint turned over. 
 
 " The cup was then refilled and the unfortunate drinker was compelled 
 to go through the same ceremony again. Every one at the table took the 
 cup and ' turned it over ' in succession, the chief shepherd keeping the 
 pail constantly supplied with beer. The parlour guests were of course 
 invited to turn the cup over with the guests of the kitchen, who went 
 through the ordeal with more or less of success. For my own part, I 
 confess that I failed to catch the cup in the hat at the first trial, and had 
 to try again ; the chairman, however, mercifully gave me only a small 
 quantity of beer the second time. 
 
 "This custom of 'turning the cup over,' with its accompanying 
 chant, was rather amusing at first, but, after hearing it, as I did on the 
 occasion I have described, for at least four hours without intermission, it 
 became at last rather tiresome. I could not get the tune out of my head 
 for a long time after indeed, I have not got rid of it yet."
 
 Sussex Characters, sketched from Life. 
 
 THE SUSSEX COTTAGE-WIFE. 
 
 OW is it that all the diaries have been kept by men ? 
 One would have thought this form of auto- 
 biography would have been better suited to 
 women. Women have more leisure to jot down 
 events as they occur; they are greater observers of the little 
 matters that make up life and diaries; they delight in gossip 
 in the passing scandal of the day in what happens to Mr. 
 This or Mrs. That. And yet no diaries have been left to us 
 by women only by men like Pepys and Evelyn and the Due 
 de St. Simon, who, doubtless, had a good deal of the woman 
 in them at least, the first and last had but who were de 
 facto men. What would we not give for a diary by the wife 
 of Anthony Stapley, or of Thomas Turner, or of the Rev. 
 Mr. Moore! But the good women only talked, and left their 
 husbands to write, and when, as they perhaps thought, the 
 Benedick was casting up accounts, or making out bills, or 
 writing sermons, he was chronicling his peccadilloes and their 
 infirmities of temper! 
 
 We can only now wish that the tables had been turned ; 
 that the wife, like the lion in the fable, could have told her 
 story. What a light would be thrown on many phases of 
 character that now lie hidden in obscurity, and can only be 
 saved from total oblivion by the imperfect medium of the 
 memory.
 
 io6 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 What would we not give, for instance, to set down in that 
 freshness and sharpness which a diary can only convey, the 
 features, moral, domestic, and physical, of that specimen of 
 the old English cottage-wife whom we will try to introduce 
 to our readers under the name'of Mrs. Colly. She was a 
 type of a class that was once common in Sussex, and which 
 is still to be found in the little gable-end cottages with their 
 open timber-work fronts and shelving thatched roofs, coming 
 down at one end nearly to the ground, and little lattice- 
 windows that look out so cosily from the eaves. Prettier 
 pictures than these cottages for landscape painters, standing 
 back as they generally do from the roadside, amidst apple, 
 cherry, plum, and pear trees, it would be difficult to find in any 
 part of the world. And inside, for the most part, they are as 
 clean and neat and as carefully tended as their gardens are 
 outside not without a touch of the ornamental, too, in gaily- 
 coloured cups and saucers, and mugs and ornaments of quaint 
 design, or even of the artistic, in engravings illustrating the 
 adventures of Joseph and his brethren, or other Scriptural 
 incidents, intermixed, probably, with adventures in the sporting 
 field. But when thus much has been said for their cleanliness 
 and neatness, not much remains to be added of a compli- 
 mentary character. The brick floor is generally damp and 
 uneven the ceiling (often formed of massive oak beams, 
 strong enough to support a Church and heavy enough to pull 
 it down) is low; and the only place free from draughts full of 
 rheumatism is the innermost corner in the huge open chimney 
 the place, according to immemorial usage, of the male 
 head of the family. As to the female head, to judge by our 
 typical cottage-wife, Mrs. Colly, we should say that she never 
 sat down. She was always, like the sun, running her daily 
 course of duty. Her place was on her feet, and the chairs of 
 her cottage were for her visitors not for her. As some good 
 women are sure that they never should live " if so be they 
 took to their beds," so Mrs. Colly was assured that her days 
 would be numbered " if so be she took to a chair." Her legs 
 were, to her thinking, made to be used as much as her hands,
 
 The Sussex Cottage- Wife. 107 
 
 and as these latter were never idle, so were the former 
 members never indulged in inactivity. 
 
 And yet their burthen was not very great. A body more 
 spare than that of our Sussex cottage-wife is rarely to be met 
 with that is, in a sound healthy body, which,* as was her 
 boast, had never known a day's illness since it could take 
 care of itself. Take care of itself? No, that wont do. 
 Little care of itself had that little spare body ever taken, but 
 a great deal of other people. In the days of crinoline, it was 
 a wonder, and also to us a delight, to look at that little active 
 body, as straight as a poplar, and as curveless. " Lines of 
 beauty," physically, there were none ; but, morally, in the 
 absence' of all thought of self, Mrs. Colly was a line of beauty 
 from the top of her head to the soles of her feet. And at 
 each extremity there was something to admire. Her hair 
 and she was above 70 when we first knew her was raven- 
 black, and there was plenty of it, too; her eyes matched with 
 it, bright and quick, and with a kindly twinkle in them. If 
 you could take your eyes off her's and it was not easy and 
 give a glance at her feet, you saw that her boots, thick and 
 leather-laced as they were, could bear the scrutiny. A tidy, 
 busy little soul was Mrs. Colly one whose whole life had 
 been spent in keeping the wolf from the cottage door, and 
 making good the adage that cleanliness is next to godliness. 
 She had, of course, married young all Sussex cottage-wives 
 do marry young and, equally of course, had had a large 
 family of children, whom, to use her own expression, "she 
 had brought up in the fear of God from a month up'ards." 
 What they did in the month that preceded the "up'ards" we 
 never could fathom. It was one of those mysteries of speech 
 that went down to the grave with Mrs. Colly. But as to the 
 after-months of the children's existence, there was no doubt 
 about them. We knew all the children, sons and daughters, 
 and they were all worthy of their mother, or nearly so. How 
 she and her husband (a farm labourer) could have brought 
 them up, as they did, and given them the learning they
 
 io8 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 possessed, and which was Mrs. Colly's boast for they could 
 all read and write, and she could do neither is another 
 mystery that we must leave unsolved. 
 
 But there was a still greater mystery connected with Mr. 
 and Mrs. Colly: a mystery that made at once the glory and 
 the misery of their latter days. Nay, gentle reader! do not 
 suppose we are going to indulge you in your love of the 
 sensational. We have no tale of murder or robbery or treasure- 
 trove to tell you. These poor people's lives were absolutely 
 destitute of incident: and yet there was a tragical interest in 
 what we are going to relate. It lay in this: Besides having 
 brought up and educated a large family, without help from 
 the parish, this Sussex cottager and his wife had "put by" 
 a hundred pounds! Do not smile! You cannot, perhaps, 
 conceive the amount of labour and privation that that ."100 
 represented. You cannot imagine the depth of joy that it 
 gave, or the magnitude of care and anxiety that it imposed 
 on its possessors. The millionaire may be so rich that he 
 could not, if he wished, cast up the sum of his riches, but he 
 is not, nor ever will be, so rich as the Sussex cottager who 
 has "put by" from his earnings one hundred pounds! And 
 then the care and trouble that attended on that treasure 
 where to keep it whilst it was being saved, and what to do 
 with it when it was saved; who can sum that up? 
 
 Well, our Sussex cotters, like richer people, found a way, 
 or rather had a way found for them. The hundred pounds 
 was disposed of " invested, the wise it call " in plain 
 language, was got rid of, chiefly through the medium of a 
 favourite daughter whose husband was not well off, and partly 
 through a Building Society, by the aid of which Mrs. Colly 
 hoped some day to live in a house of her own. 
 
 We confess we could never understand the right and the 
 wrong of the matter, though we listened to the history of it 
 a hundred times, except to arrive at this conclusion: that the 
 money was gone irretrievably gone as much as though it 
 lay at the bottom of the sea or more so.
 
 The Sussex Cottage- Wife. 109 
 
 And here lay the seat of Mrs. Colly's domestic mystery: 
 that hundred pounds, to her mind, was as much in existence 
 as when it lay in good gold and silver at the bottom of a 
 worsted stocking! She had never spent that money she 
 had never thrown it away, or lost it, or been robbed of it, 
 according to her notion of throwing away or losing or robbing. 
 She had only lent it or invested it, and, accordingly, the 
 hundred pounds was in existence, and was her's and nobody 
 else's! 
 
 It would have been a cruel thing to undeceive her, though 
 we doubt if any one could have done that. The saving of 
 that 100 had entered too much into her life had been the 
 centre round which too many joys and hopes and cares had 
 grown, to be rooted up. And we verily believe the old lady 
 died in the full belief that she not her husband, though he 
 survived her not her daughter or daughter's husband, who 
 had borrowed it not the little building speculation that had 
 swallowed up a good deal of it was the owner of that IQO, 
 but she good, honest, hard-working, simple Mrs. Colly! 
 
 Our Sussex cottage-wife was a woman of strong affections, 
 or she could not have brought up that large family so well 
 " from a month up'ards." And when boys and girls were 
 grown up and were " doing for themselves," she turned her 
 affections towards her cow. Her husband was a taciturn, 
 eccentric old man not unlike an old withered crab-apple 
 tree who never uttered a syllable if he could help it, and 
 who had strange notions of dieting himself on horse-raddish 
 and such-like things. His wife did her duty by him ; but as 
 to love ! There might have been a time for such a word ; 
 but it was gone, like the hundred pounds ; and now the chief 
 object of Mrs. Colly's affection was her cow. Yes, she had a 
 cow, and not only lived by it, but for it. It was husband, 
 children, friends, neighbours, all ! She talked to it, kissed 
 it, fondled it, fed it, and suffered no one else to milk it. She 
 would lead it through the green lanes and let it browse on 
 the road-side grass, lovingly watching it. Its shed was much
 
 no Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 warmer than her own cottage ; and it was much better fed 
 than herself. It was the one little drop of comfort in the 
 domestic cup of poor Mrs. Colly, when the cottage had been 
 emptied of its children and the stocking of its savings ; and 
 it was a happy thing that Mrs. Colly died first. She died 
 quickly, as Sussex cotters and their wives are apt to do. She 
 had never had a day's illness until she was upwards of 70, 
 and at that age she would walk long distances to take her 
 milk to customers or little nosegays to friends. When sickness 
 came, it came suddenly and sharply, and Mrs. Colly had not 
 long to endure the misery, to her, of lying in bed doing 
 nothing ! She would have preferred, if her wishes had been 
 consulted in the matter, to die on her feet, upright as a post, 
 and talking, most probably, about that ^"100 and its where- 
 abouts and wherewithals her thin bony hands crossed before 
 her and her bright eyes looking sharply into your's. 
 
 One of her dying symptoms was a strange fancy it was 
 only a fancy that her husband had been experimentalizing 
 upon her with some of his strange vegetable diet, to which 
 she had a strong aversion. She never suspected that she 
 was out of health in a natural way. She never had been 
 unwell had a thorough contempt for doctor's stuff, and 
 wondered why people's hair turned grey. She went down to 
 the tomb with her's as black as ebony, and, to use one of 
 her quaint expressions, " carried all her teeth with her to the 
 grave." A harder-working woman, a better mother or cottage- 
 wife, never slept the last sleep. Some may be disposed to 
 ask what was a life so passed in drudgery, so limited in its 
 sphere, so barren of what we call pleasure what was it 
 worth ? But Mrs. Colly never asked herself such a question. 
 No Sussex cottage-wife ever does. They have too much to 
 do. A great modern philosopher has said that directly we 
 ask ourselves if we are happy we cease to be so. And, 
 certainly, Mrs. Colly never put her happiness to such a test! 
 Perhaps she did not know what happiness was certainly she 
 had no knowledge of the enjoyments in which most of us
 
 The Sussex Cottage- Wife. 1 1 1 
 
 place happiness. But neither did she ever ask herself if she 
 was miserable, because she was as ignorant of that feeling as 
 of its opposite. She had, of course, her pains and her 
 pleasures her ups and her downs her bright days and her 
 dull days. But she was, up to 70 years of age, a healthy, 
 hard-working, children-loving, flower-loving, and cow-loving 
 woman fond of talking, but never sitting down to talk 
 fond of walking, but never "going out for a walk" fond of 
 a little bit of wholesome meat, but seldom or never getting it. 
 Altogether she was an excellent specimen of a class of women 
 who have had much to do in the making of England's great- 
 ness, for they have brought up and sent into the world not a 
 few hard-headed, strong-fisted men, who have done many a 
 good day's work for themselves and their country; and we 
 doubt if England would miss many classes more than that of 
 which we have tried to draw a sketch a faint one, we know 
 it is a mere passing " glimpse " in Mrs. Colly, the Sussex 
 cottage-wife.
 
 The Old Sussex Radical. 
 
 [JET me try to draw out of the dim memories of the 
 Past the features of a man who was one of the 
 latest representatives of a class now passed away 
 of a class, indeed, which may be said to have 
 passed away before he had closed his long life, and which is 
 no longer remembered except by a few who, like myself in 
 early life, were brought into contact with one of them. 
 
 I mean the men who used to be called Radicals, but 
 whose principles were more nearly allied to Republicanism. 
 I do not refer to the later Radicals who flourished in the 
 days of the Reform agitation the Hunts and Attwoods and 
 Burdetts who, too, are now extinct and pretty well forgotten. 
 The old Radical, or Republican, of my recollection, was a 
 contemporary of Fox and Philip Francis and Cartwright, and 
 a member of the " Friends of the People" Society. He had, 
 in his youth, read the " Letters of Junius " fresh from the 
 pages of the Public Advertiser; he had execrated a kingly 
 favourite in Bute, and sympathised with the fall and death of 
 Chatham. He had, in middle life, shared with such men as 
 Wordsworth, and Coleridge, and Southey in the enthusiastic 
 hopes to which the opening scenes of the French Revolution 
 gave birth in England had watched its rapid passage from 
 Constitutional reforms to democratic excesses, and had seen 
 the Liberal ranks in England divide at this point: one section 
 seceding with Burke to the Tory ranks; the other remaining 
 true to their colours with Fox and Sheridan and Grey.
 
 The Old Sussex Radical. 113 
 
 Clio Rickman for it is he of whom I write was one of 
 these latter. Of his early life I know nothing, except that he 
 was a member of the old Sussex Quaker family of that name, 
 which still survives, and, I believe, flourishes, in this county. 
 He must have early left the communion of the Friends, taking 
 with him, however, that spirit of resistance to undue authority 
 and that contempt of forms which used to characterise the 
 followers of George Fox. But with the narrower and more 
 ascetic spirit of Quakerism he had no sympathy, and he 
 showed it by assuming that classical name of Clio the Muse 
 of History which most certainly his Quaker parents did not 
 bestow upon him,* but by which he was always known to his 
 friends in after-life. It was in his latter days that I knew 
 him and that was 50 years ago when he stood out of 
 society like some old rock that carries down to later ages the 
 evidence of a pre-existing world. How well do I recollect 
 the mingled feelings of awe and wonderment with which I 
 first encountered the heavy brow and severe-looking eyes that 
 frowned from beneath a low-crowned, broad-brimmed straw 
 hat ! with what astonishment I looked at his quaintly-cut blue 
 coat, with enormous brass buttons and square lappets, from 
 the pocket of one of which peeped the corner of a silk 
 handkerchief, at which many generations of London thieves 
 had pulled and tugged and never succeeded in extracting it; 
 and for a very good reason: it was securely sewn with stout 
 pack-thread into the inner lining ! That handkerchief was for 
 show and sport it was the fashion of the day so to show the 
 handkerchief the feHow-one was for use, a huge coloured 
 cotton one, and it lay safely inside the low-crowned straw hat 
 that covered that capacious brow. That hat itself was a 
 prodigy in the hat-way. It was a feat for us youngsters (I am 
 speaking of days when I was a boy) to lift it, or to try to lift 
 it; for its weight was enormous, and was yearly increased by 
 a pound of solid paint bestowed upon it. It was the whim 
 of its wearer so to freshen it up. But he had another reason : 
 
 * His Christian name was Thomas.
 
 114 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 namely, to strengthen its powers of resistance to the blows of 
 highwaymen (there were highwaymen in those days) or 
 collision with mother earth. Men in those days, when they 
 travelled, rode on horseback, like men, or in gigs, like 
 travellers. Stage-coaches had not yet commenced their 
 career and removed the responsibility of travelling singly in 
 your own vehicle. Clio Rickman was a great traveller, and 
 he owed his life more than once to the strength of that straw 
 hat, which had been shattered to pieces by a fall instead of 
 his skull. 
 
 But to proceed with my description of Clio's outer man. 
 To match the blue coat there were the yellow leathern 
 breeches, showing a section of the manly calf above a pair of 
 top-boots, such as the old stage-coach men used to wear 
 down to our times, but which, years ago, were worn by Dukes, 
 Earls, Lords nay, by Royalty itself. This was the garb, 
 essentially English, which the Due de Chartres (afterwards 
 Philippe Egalit6), Mirabeau, and other admirers of English 
 institutions took back with them to France in the days of the 
 first National Assembly, and it was adopted by the French 
 patriots by the Girondists especially and is still to be seen 
 in the French historical pictures of that day. Its adoption 
 in France was a compliment to England and English freedom ; 
 but it passed away, like other fashions, with the stormy days 
 that followed, when French Republicanism was swallowed 
 up in Imperialism, and English Republicanism was at a 
 discount under Pitt and Dundas. Clio Rickman and a few 
 others of the old school (Cobbett was one of them, though 
 he came later than Clio) were faithful to the old garb, in spite 
 of the gibes of little boys in the streets and the staring looks 
 of older people. 
 
 The impression left by this old English garb now-a-days 
 is a vulgar one: it smacks of stage-coaches and old-fashioned 
 farmers. But, 100 years ago, it was the dress of gentlemen 
 and wits and men of letters and beaux; and Clio Rickman 
 was all these except the latter. He was a thoroughly well-
 
 The Old Sussex Radical. 115 
 
 educated man well up in the classics a good French scholar 
 (I think he must have been a good deal in France in the early 
 days of the Revolution probably because England was too 
 hot and Pitt too hard for him), and had no small literary 
 talent, which he exercised both in verse and prose. But he 
 was a politician avant tout; and his opinions, like those of so 
 many of the older English Radicals, verged on Republicanism. 
 There was an excuse for it in those days which does not exist 
 now. At the close of the last century and the beginning of 
 the present the Crown and Church and Aristocracy were all- 
 powerful, and the excesses of the French Revolution had 
 created such a strong feeling against popular concessions 
 concessions now amply made that men might well be for- 
 given for thinking that liberty could only be secured by a 
 Republic, and that Monarchy was another name for despotism. 
 
 Amongst those who so thought was Clio Rickman, and 
 he did not conceal his opinions, either in speech or in writing, 
 or, so far as that could indicate them, in dress. His favourite 
 English heroes were Lord William Russell and Algernon 
 Sidney his classical ones, Cato, Brutus, and Cassius. The 
 education of men in those days was more classical than it is 
 now ; allusions to classical events by public speakers were 
 more frequent, and the names of Greek and Roman patriots 
 were much more common in men's mouths. In fact, there 
 was a strong classical, and that signified Republican, current 
 running through society and politics. We have worked out 
 of that and beyond it in these days I mean as to the 
 Republicanism. We have known how to erect Republican 
 institutions under the forms of Monarchy, and it is a happy 
 solution, which Sidney and Home Tooke aye, and a greater 
 than either of these Cromwell would have rejoiced at, could 
 they have achieved it. 
 
 Well, in Clio's days it was otherwise. A despotic Govern- 
 ment was "on the cards," and, therefore, men were Repub- 
 licans. But Clio's Republicanism, at the time I knew him, 
 was of a very harmless kind. It was more literary than
 
 1 1 6 Glimpses of Otir Ancestors. 
 
 political. It showed itself in quotations from Milton's 
 "Areopagitica" and Addison's "Cato," and, above all, from 
 Shakspeare's "Julius Caesar." Men did quote in those days 
 they seldom venture on it now, and, when they do, generally 
 contrive to mis-quote. And we youngsters were made parties 
 to the plot against Royalty. I was elevated to the rank of 
 Brutus; my brother (being older and "leaner") was dubbed 
 Cassius, and "so we played our parts." But, in the midst of 
 all our honours, I never lost the impression that Clio himself 
 was a Caesar ! If, in theory, a Republican, in practice he was 
 a despot. He ruled us, or would have ruled us, with a rod of 
 iron. He had been brought up in the old school, under a 
 despotic regime, when boys were scourged up their " Gradus 
 ad Parnassum," and girls were kept strictly to their samplers 
 and spinets, and when they grew up into men and women 
 they carried out the same iron discipline. Day, the author 
 of " Sandford and Merton," was a dreadful old tyrant to his 
 children, and we all know how old Sir Timothy Shelley 
 treated his son Bysshe. I don't know but that we go too 
 much the other way now : it is the children who tyrannise 
 now, and the parents have to " knock under." All Spartan 
 and Roman discipline has been thrown to the winds, and 
 boys and girls " rule the roost." 
 
 Clio resisted this.innovation ; he always turned Brutus and 
 Cassius out of the warmest seats by the fire and took 
 possession himself unless a milder authority interposed in 
 the maternal form, and then Clio retreated and discipline 
 went to the wall. For Clio, under his rough exterior, and 
 with much love of self, had the true spirit of gallantry. The 
 old Radicals, or Republicans the terms were almost synony- 
 mous were preux chevaliers to woman ; they treated her with 
 a degree of deference that is now almost unknown. They 
 had no notion, indeed, of giving her the franchise, nor had 
 she of asking for it; but the influence of woman was great 
 with them, and they loved to bow themselves before her. 
 My mother's word or look and yet there was nothing terrible
 
 The Old Sussex Radical. 117 
 
 in either was law to Clio; and it was a shield extended over 
 Brutus and Cassius against the tyranny of Caesar! So we 
 never had occasion to kill him in the Capitol! He died in 
 his bed, after the Reform Bill was passed; and to the last he 
 wooed the Muses, in lines to Clelia, Cynthia, and Celia, and 
 set down in terse prose his " Reflections" on men and things. 
 These appeared from time to time in the columns of the 
 Brighton Herald and must supply the place of that diary which 
 few men could have kept better than he, and which would 
 have been invaluable had he kept it, but which, unfortunately, 
 he never did keep. Else what scenes might he not have 
 described with the Hones, the Home Tookes, the Thelwalls, 
 and even older Radicals than they, with whom he must have 
 come in contact! 
 
 Clio lost a much-loved wife in early life, and, when I 
 knew him, had, properly speaking, no home only a room 
 in London, to which he retreated, like an old lion to its den, 
 when he was too infirm to travel. The world was his home. 
 He loved to call himself, and to hear himself called, "a citizen 
 of the world;" he belonged to no sect of religion, and his 
 political and social sympathies took in the whole human race 
 and made light of the distinctions of classes or of nations or 
 of skins. He had few family ties ; but he had a good many 
 friends, who, in his latter days, when he was somewhat out 
 at elbows with fortune, showed their friendship by pro- 
 viding for those few wants or luxuries snuff and tobacco 
 were the chief of them to which he was tributary. In his 
 palmy days he was always travelling from country to country, 
 or from county to county. It was one of his boasts that no 
 Englishman could be in his company half-an-hour without 
 betraying to him by some peculiarity of speech the county to 
 which he belonged ; and of the customs of all these counties 
 he was a master. He was as much at home in Yorkshire or 
 in Hampshire as he was in Sussex ; and, at last, he was 
 equally a curiosity in all ! Adhering to the old garb and 
 fashions of his youth and manhood, and to the old ways of 
 thinking and speaking, he looked like a portrait cut from an
 
 1 1 8 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 old picture-frame, and he talked like a page out of Boswell's 
 " Life of Dr. Johnson." He was an original man at all times, 
 even in an age when men were more original than they are 
 now, and, as men looking and thinking like himself dropped 
 off, he became a representative man of a by-gone age and 
 extinct class a strong age and a sturdy class, with more of 
 iron in it, and less of tinsel, than the present ; who had to 
 contend as freemen with real dangers to liberty, of which we 
 know nothing, and were prepared to "champion" their 
 principles " to the outrance," though they led to the scaffold. 
 Exile and imprisonment, if not worse, were always in the 
 probabilities of the " old Radical " Clio had undergone both 
 and for words and acts which now enter into our daily life. 
 So no wonder they were a little stern and sour, and looked, 
 as Clio did, with a certain contempt on the Radicals of a 
 later age, who had never known a Pitt or Castlereagh, nor 
 faced an Ellenborough! More of the Roman had these men 
 in them than our later race of Englishmen: and, looking 
 back to Clio Rickman, as I do still, with something of a boy- 
 like affection for I never knew him but as a boy, as a Triton 
 among the minnows I would not question his title to have 
 inscribed upon his tomb-stone the Brutus-like epitaph, 
 " Ultimus Romanorum"
 
 The Old Sussex Tory. 
 
 |HE present age knows no such being as the Old 
 Tory he is dead and buried ; nor do I know that 
 it would be desirable to resuscitate him or the 
 world in which he lived. But he had his good 
 points, and, at all events, he was a reality : something upon 
 which you could lay your finger, and, in due course of time, 
 fix your memory, with the consciousness that there was 
 something to rest upon. Your Conservative is a mere name: 
 the man who answers to it to-day was something else 
 yesterday, and may be something else to-morrow. Nor does 
 he even know to-day very clearly what he is. His is a 
 transitory, uncertain state of being. But the old Tory never 
 changed. My Uncle Mason never changed. The world 
 that is, his world moral, political, literary might fall to 
 pieces around him ; he, like the righteous man of Horace, 
 remained erect and immovable. He was born a Tory; he 
 lived a Tory ; and he died a Tory. 
 
 How he came to be born a Tory I don't know not having 
 known his mother. But she must have been a strong-minded 
 woman and very difficult to be turned from a thing when she 
 had made up her mind to it. Her partner in life must have 
 found her a great help and a great hindrance. She must 
 have exercised his patience and sharpened his temper. I 
 hold to the opinion (and in this I, too, am a bit of a Tory, 
 for I have no foundation for my opinion) that we derive a 
 large share of what we call character from our maternal parent
 
 1 20 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 and that we suck it in with our mother's milk.* My Uncle 
 Mason must have sucked very hard, for a more incorrigible, 
 unmitigated old Tory never breathed. His Toryism was in 
 his flesh and bones. It was not an affair, as our modern 
 political opinions are, of reasoning and arguing and such-like 
 slow processes. It was a constitutional (I mean physically 
 constitutional) fact bound up with blood and brain and 
 nerve and muscle and associated with the insoluble mysteries 
 of human nature. The idea that my Uncle Mason could 
 have been anything but a Tory ! Absurd ! ridiculous ! It 
 would have been to deny his raison d'etre. He was, I am sure, 
 a little Tory in long clothes, and held to his mother's breast 
 as Filmer did to the Right Divine of Kings! Whilst at 
 school he must have had a foretaste of all his subsequent joy 
 and pride at the spectacle which the schools of those days 
 presented of unbounded authority and dogmatism on one side 
 and a mixture of servility and brutal tyranny over younger 
 boys on the other. 
 
 But these are mere surmises of mine as to my Uncle's 
 juvenile Toryism a re-construction of the boy from the man. 
 It was as a man as a formed and complete Tory that I 
 knew him, when his education was finished when the Tory 
 principles of the age had poured into the matrix made by 
 Nature to receive them, and had become as hard and 
 infrangible as the bronze statues of stern-looking Imperators 
 that are still dug up after ages of entombment. The man 
 and the politician were then welded together, so that no 
 fracture could be detected to indicate where the man ended 
 and the politician began. 
 
 And yet my Uncle was no politician that is, in the modern 
 sense of the term. He never made a political speech in his 
 life, and couldn't for the life of him have laid down a political 
 axiom. He was a party man to the backbone ; and his party 
 
 * Shakspeare makes Volumnia say to her son, Coriolanus, 
 
 " Thy valiantness was mine : thou juck'dst it from me."
 
 The Old Sussex Tory. 121 
 
 was the Tory party. Never did any man give himself up 
 more completely to his party, in a day when men did give 
 themselves up to their party in a way they don't know now. 
 It was his country his religion the pride and glory of his 
 life. He would do anything for it. My Uncle was as moral 
 and as kind-hearted a man as ever breathed. But when his 
 party was in question when there was a Tory to be returned 
 for his native city, which was Chichester, or for his county 
 which was Sussex he threw religion, morality, friendship, 
 kind-heartedness to the winds with a fine disdain. He meant 
 his party to win ; and that meant that he meant to stick at 
 nothing which might make it win. He entered without 
 scruple nay, with a ready joy into the most atrocious 
 conspiracies against his fellow-citizens. He lured them away 
 from the poll on the last day of polling by the most 
 abominable devices he locked them up in his own house 
 until the poll was closed ; and he boasted of it afterwards (I 
 have heard him do so !) as though he had performed the 
 noblest, most patriotic, and most meritorious action in the 
 world. How he escaped fine and imprisonment for this 
 defiance of the law, I never could discover, except it was 
 that everybody else in those days did the same thing, or 
 admired those who did; or perhaps and I think this is the 
 better explanation of the two there were, as our neighbours 
 in France say when a man has murdered half-a-dozen people, 
 extenuating circumstances in his favour which saved him 
 from the penalties of the law. For, if there was a man in 
 his own city who was respected and beloved, it was my Uncle 
 Mason, not on account of his Toryism, but in spite of it. 
 Everybody knew that he was a rank old Tory, and stuck at 
 nothing to serve the Tory cause; but then, too, everybody 
 knew that he was just as ready to serve anybody who needed 
 assistance, whether he was Tory, Whig, or Radical. He was 
 really a man who did not allow his left hand to know what 
 his right hand did, for the latter was continually in his 
 breeches' pocket in search of coin, which, certainly, when 
 found, was not " made a note of." This, too, smacked of
 
 122 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Toryism. It was profuse expenditure, without discrimination, 
 and which often did as much harm as good. It was to gratify 
 his own feelings, without reference to consequences: a kind 
 of Timon of Athens bounty, in which pride went hand-in- 
 hand with generosity. " What a liberal, free-handed man 
 Mr. Mason is!" That was a bit of flattery he could not 
 resist, and so, in his little way, he scattered a shower of 
 silver on his path, and was an inexhaustible mine of wealth 
 to beggars, impostors, flymen, railway porters, chambermaids, 
 and all the fry who feed on the little weaknesses of humanity. 
 
 But this profuseness was a growth of his latter days, when 
 he moved more freely about the county in an official capacity. 
 In the earlier period of his career he was, like nearly all 
 English tradesmen 100 years ago, a fixture in his shop. This 
 fixity of tenure by the shopkeeping class was a characteristic 
 I might almost say a principle of Toryism. When the 
 middle-classes began to move about that is, when fast-going 
 coaches and rail ways came in Toryism went out. Locomotion 
 was its death-blow. The true old Tory shopkeeper never 
 thought of stirring from his city scarcely of going over the 
 sill of his door. One shopkeeper kept watch over another, 
 and if a truant were found out and he was sure to be found 
 out if he only went over to the other side of the street the 
 astounding fact was proclaimed to the community, and 
 suspicions flew abroad as to the state of the truant's affairs. 
 No man that is, no man of the shopkeeping class dared to 
 leave his counter for an hour, much less a day, except on 
 causes of paramount necessity, duly set forth, without danger 
 of being thought mad or insolvent! This was a rule of the 
 " good old Tory days," and need I say that my Uncle strictly 
 adhered to it? In his house his castle he was supreme 
 his wife permitting, despotic: workmen and shopboys were 
 slaves, who had no will of their own. Out of his own house 
 he was a slave: a slave to public opinion that opinion being 
 Tory. 
 
 Such restraint in the present day, when the middle-classes,
 
 The Old Sussex Tory. 123 
 
 and even those below them, have broken through every 
 shackle on freedom of movement imposed by " the wisdom 
 of our ancestors," would be intolerable. But it was not so to 
 our grandfathers. We are the creatures of habit, and it was as 
 easy to them to stay at home never to stir from the street in 
 which they were born for months, and even years together, 
 as it is for us to rush about the country in railway carriages, 
 or fly from land to land not to say Continent to Continent 
 in steamers. My Uncle, then, as a model Tory tradesman 
 he was a bookseller never went from home for years together 
 in the early days of his life except on duly-announced matters 
 of business. His city was his world, and everything was 
 measured by it. It was an old cathedral city, ruled by the 
 clergy, and hedged in by great aristocratic families: the per- 
 fection of a Tory city; and Toryism grew up to perfection 
 in it. Nothing was good that was not old ; nothing respectable 
 that was not sanctioned by the clergy; nothing to be admired 
 that was not aristocratic. Age, the Church, the British 
 Constitution (the latter being embodied in a Tory Govern- 
 ment), these were the essentials of British liberty, prosperity, 
 and orthodoxy, and they were summed up in one term: 
 Toryism. It took in religion, morals, and manners even 
 literature. 
 
 I have said that my Uncle was a bookseller, and in that 
 day a bookseller, and particularly in a city like Chichester, 
 meant a man who understood books as well as sold them ; 
 for books were books in those days, whereas now they are 
 merely so much printed paper. Let me explain. New 
 books, whether in the shape of newly-written works or new 
 editions of old authors, were the rare exceptions; old books 
 were the staple of a bookseller's trade: good old authors, 
 weighty in subject, and printed and bound in the same solid 
 fashion as they were written in ; Hooker, Stillingfleet, 
 Chillingworth, Barrow, Tillotson, and such like. Now, my 
 Uncle Mason was thoroughly up in his business ; he understood 
 books, and especially books of Divinity for which, of course, 
 there was a large demand in a city like Chichester as well
 
 124 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 as any man in England. I don't say that he knew their 
 contents that he had ever read one word of them. That 
 was not bookselling knowledge. But he was perfectly conver- 
 sant with all the mysteries of the trade knew which was the 
 first, or second, or third edition of such an author which 
 edition, by the mistake of a word, or the transposition of a 
 letter, was worthless, and which, by the presence of a certain 
 passage or print, was invaluable. It was a treat to see him 
 handle such books as these to see him seize on a ponderous 
 old tome fling it open at the title-page give it a glance, 
 and then fling it from him with contempt or close it with a 
 certain air which, without disclosing too much to the ignorant 
 outer world (that was, if it was a public sale), said as plainly 
 as action could speak, " That book is mine. I know all about 
 it, and you the profanum vulgus don't." I should have 
 liked to see the auctioneer in that day who dared to gainsay 
 my Uncle Mason in the matter of a book! 
 
 But it was only one class of books my Uncle cared about, 
 as it was only one set of opinions that he had any regard for. 
 And that was old, and chiefly theological, books. For new 
 works, and even for new editions of old works, he had 
 unbounded contempt. In a later day Bohn was his horror. 
 In an earlier day he turned up his nose at the different 
 "Libraries" "Classical," "Scientific," "Standard," &c., 
 &c. that were sent forth by Murray, Longman, and Bentley. 
 He would not give a novel house-room. For years did he 
 stand out against the rage for " The Great Unknown," until 
 all the world hailed the writer as Sir Walter Scott, and I never 
 exactly understood how he gave in to this violation of his 
 principles and passed under the yoke of the Magician. It 
 was too tender a subject to question him about, for my Uncle, 
 as a genuine old Tory, never admitted that he had been 
 wrong never changed his course if he could possibly help 
 it ; was always ready to stick to his ship and go down with it 
 if it was necessary. He was certainly a very obstinate man. 
 He cherished prejudices where other men conceal them. He
 
 The Old Sussex, Tory. 125 
 
 would not sit down to a table at which there were 13 guests. 
 He would make anyone who upset the salt throw some of it 
 over his or her left shoulder. He never started on a journey, 
 nor would allow anybody else if he could help it, on a Friday. 
 And everybody humoured him in his crotchets; such a dear, 
 kind-hearted, jolly, plucky old gentleman was my Uncle the 
 old Tory. He was a child in his opinions, but he was a hero 
 in his acts; he did not know what it was to be " daunted;" 
 he had what Churchill calls a "matchless intrepidity of face;" 
 he would speak up like a man to my Lord Duke This or to the 
 great Earl of That, if there was something to say for the 
 public good or for a neighbour or a neighbour's son. He 
 did not. know what fear I had almost said modesty was. 
 He was certainly a very impudent man. That is, there was 
 nothing he would not ask for, and nobody whom he would 
 not ask, if he wanted to get something for somebody. There 
 was no shame-facedness in him. And that, too, was a 
 characteristic of the old Tories! They thought they had a 
 right to all they could get, which was pretty well everything 
 that was worth having in this world! As to anybody else, on 
 the other side, wishing to get anything it was robbery, 
 spoliation, high treason, revolutionary! Put the rascals in 
 gaol transport them hang them up as high as Haman ! 
 
 A terrible blow was the Reform Bill, and, after that, the 
 repeal of the Corn Laws, to my Uncle Mason. They upset 
 his politics, as Sir Walter had demoralised his bookshelves. 
 He could not argue what old Tory ever could ? but he knew 
 it was all wrong, and that it would end in anarchy and 
 destruction. It was too bad of us reforming youngsters to 
 plague the old gentleman like so many picadores, and to make 
 him rush, in defence of his beloved Toryism, into the very 
 jaws of an absurdity! There was no difficulty in it. Like 
 the great mass of his party, he knew nothing of principles: 
 only men. Now, one of his men was Huskisson, whom he 
 knew personally, and potently believed to be a Tory, whilst 
 all the while that great statesman was working hard to bring
 
 126 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 about that Free Trade in commerce which Peel and Cobden 
 and Bright afterwards achieved. It was glorious to hear my 
 Uncle, in the innocence of his heart, launch into praises of 
 the statesman who had done all he could to consign the Tory 
 party and its principles of protection in trade and intolerance 
 in religion to the tomb of all the Capulets ! It was too bad 
 of us! But we gave over at last, as we grew wiser and he 
 grew older, and the old Tory floated into the calm waters of 
 consideration and respect which his fine qualities as a man 
 passons the politician deserved. He never surrendered a 
 single point: he was as obstinate, as superstitious, as proud of 
 his party which existed no longer as contemptuous of Whigs 
 and Liberals as ever as fond as ever of telling what enormities 
 he had committed for it. But he gradually grew less bellicose 
 would come down with less scorn upon the saucy Liberal 
 "boys" (his nephews were always "boys" to him) 
 submitted more and more to female sway was milder in 
 denunciation of political and literary revolutionists like 
 Cobden and Bright, Dickens and Thackeray troubled him- 
 self, in fact, less about the singularly perverse course which 
 the affairs of the world in general, and of England in particular, 
 had taken since he commenced his career, some 80 years 
 before, as a Tory, and, at last, amidst the general regret of all 
 who knew him Liberals, Radicals, Conservatives there 
 were no Tories left took leave of a world he had so often 
 doomed to destruction as peacefully and forgivingly as though 
 he had not been the last of the Old Sussex Tories.
 
 The Sussex Country Doctor. 
 
 |N the present day, doubtless, men attain to higher 
 points in particular branches of science than their 
 forefathers; but it may be doubted whether they 
 are so well informed " all round." At least, as I 
 look back to the past, the memories of men start up, not in 
 one, but in all departments of life, who were more varied in 
 their learning who could turn with greater ease than men do 
 now from one topic of discussion or speculation to another 
 who, if they were professional men, were also literary men, 
 and not only literary men, but politicians, and could, if need 
 were, throw aside politics, and talk nonsense to a pretty or 
 philosophy to a plain woman. Music was not cultivated to so 
 high a point as it is now-a-days; but there were more men 
 who could play an accompaniment on the flute or violin, or 
 take a part in a duet or trio, a glee or a madrigal. No such 
 things as Fine Art Exhibitions were known; but yet the 
 engravings of Raphael Morghen and of Bartolozzi were 
 generally to be found on the walls of such men as these, in 
 town and country, and they were more appreciated, perhaps, 
 than the expensive works of Art bought by millionaires for their 
 Palaces in the present day, not because the buyers appreciate 
 them, but because it is " the right thing to do," and also 
 because they are a good investment. 
 
 Of all the men who partook of this rounded character 
 and there were several within my experience 40 years ago 
 the one who came up to the highest point was Charles Verral,
 
 128 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 the " Doctor," by universal consent, of Seaford. I may pro- 
 claim his name without reserve, for he has long passed away, 
 and no member of his large family, and few, if any, of his still 
 larger circle of friends, are to be found at Seaford ; and if his 
 name and memory still linger there, it is probably because 
 they are linked with the almost tragic troubles that clouded 
 the latter years of his life.* 
 
 Charles Verral stood high as a medical practitioner in 
 Seaford and its neighbourhood. I do not know whether he 
 held a diploma as a physician, or whether, as is often the case 
 in the country, he was called " Doctor" by custom or courtesy. 
 His profession was that of a general practitioner. But he 
 was much more than a doctor. He was a poet; he was a 
 dramatist; he delighted in literature and music and Art; he 
 was a keen politician, and could hold his own when brought, 
 as he was, into contact with men moving in the highest 
 political sphere, like Agar Ellis, and even, if I mistake not, 
 Canning, the intimate friend of Agar Ellis, and a frequent 
 visitor to his seat at Seaford. And then his general conversa- 
 tion and his manners with all men and women, too, and 
 children were so charming, so genial and pleasant, so frank 
 and natural that in a moment, to whichever of these 
 categories you belonged, you were at your ease, and gave all 
 that you had to give of your little store and received with 
 delight the larger measure he dealt out in return. And of 
 this, on his side, there was no stint. He delighted to pour 
 forth his full streams of knowledge and fancy; but neither 
 did he overwhelm you with them. It was to him as great a 
 pleasure to receive as to give to encourage others to show 
 their little stock of knowledge as to exhibit his own larger 
 one. He never preached, like Coleridge, or talked for victory, 
 like Johnson, but made conversation a pleasant mode of 
 bartering thought for thought. He delighted in being one 
 
 * Several letters drawn forth from residents in Seaford and its neighbourhood by the 
 appearance of this paper in the Brighton Herald attested to the fact that Dr. Verral was 
 still, in 1876, remembered with strong affection and respect by many of his former 
 friends and patients.
 
 The Sussex Country Doctor. 129 
 
 of a very happy circle, and drew into it young, middle-aged, 
 old male and female all who chose to come. And few 
 could resist the charm of his manners the liveliness of his 
 conversation the pleasant play of his features. Not that he 
 was a handsome man far from it. His features were homely, 
 but full of tender sensibilities, and they always kept tune 
 with his thoughts. A deaf man might almost have held 
 converse with him by watching the flash of his eye and the 
 quick play of his mouth. Children would gaze upon him 
 with open eyes that did not wander as he talked about what 
 they could not understand, in tones which they liked to listen 
 to, and which held in check for a time their natural restlessness. 
 There was a spell in his manner which, whether he unbent 
 himself to them and he often did so or whether he soared 
 into regions beyond their comprehension, held them in rapt 
 attention. 
 
 With all his attractive qualities for society, Dr. Verral 
 delighted in the joys of his own home. Few kept a more 
 liberal or hospitable table. Hospitality in those days and 
 especially in the country, where travelling was difficult, and 
 visitors were rare was a more common virtue in England 
 than it is now-a-days. The table might not be so richly 
 decorated or loaded with such delicacies; but it was rich in a 
 wholesome abundance, and the house was flung open with a 
 freedom that is unknown in these days. Where, now-a-days, 
 a man in the position of Dr. Verral that is, the Doctor of 
 the Parish gives one dinner to his friends upon a sumptuous 
 scale, doubtless, and with a show and heat and crowding that 
 make half the guests ill, and at an expense that impoverishes 
 the host for the remainder of the year the old-fashioned 
 Doctor would give twenty thirty "parties." Nay, in the 
 case of a man like Dr. Verral, so sought after and so ready to 
 give pleasure, it was almost "open house" all the year round. 
 His family was large, and additions to it did not seem to make 
 much difference in the provision to be made for every-day 
 wants. There were pupils, too, and sometimes in-door 
 patients nearly always friends his own, or his sons' or 
 K
 
 130 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 daughters' all, by whatever title they sat down at his table, 
 certain to become, before they rose from it, admirers of " the 
 Doctor." 
 
 Such households as these are now things of the past, and 
 the men who formed the centre of them seem to have passed 
 away. A vigour of body and an elasticity of mind above 
 all, a variety of gifts were demanded of them, which few 
 possess now-a-days. More is given to the hard work and 
 routine duties of life; the line is stumped out, the rails laid 
 down, and in the grooves of this the head of the family revolves 
 round and round until he has completed his day's work, 
 and then he goes home to oil the machinery to eat and drink 
 and sleep perhaps to be amused, but certainly not to amuse. 
 He is too " used up," or, more likely still, he has never 
 acquired the art of amusing. It is " not in the bond." He 
 can talk about his profession or business, or, if he has read 
 his newspaper, on the news of the day, if there happen to be 
 any. But as to heading a table, or leading the conversation, 
 he is unequal to it, and, aware of his deficiencies, either 
 declines " society " altogether, or calls in the professional 
 singer and player above all, he relies on the "professed 
 cook " to cover all home defects. 
 
 Where and whence such men as Dr. Verral (and they were 
 once a class in country towns) obtained the stock of health 
 and spirits to fit them equally for business and for pleasure, I 
 cannot say. But they did it. They made long rounds of 
 calls on their patients talked, read, wrote, aye, and studied 
 too, and, when all was done, took the head of their table as 
 fresh and as genial as though they had been getting themselves 
 up specially for the occasion. Was it the lighter spirit in 
 which they went to their work, with a happy unconsciousness 
 of that rivalry that now propels a man along his narrow path, 
 forbidding him to diverge to the right or the left lest another 
 should seize the opportunity and rush past him in the race 
 for life? Was it this? or was it the hardier constitutions of 
 the men, often fresh from the farmhouse or the country
 
 The Sussex Country Doctor. 131 
 
 rectory, and renovated by fresh air and a ride " after hounds ?" 
 Or was it the diversity of occupation the passing from one 
 pursuit to another, suffering none of them to become that 
 engrossing toil of mind or body which grinds the intellect 
 of a man to dust? One or other of these it must have been 
 that gave such strength and elasticity to men of Dr. Verral's 
 stamp, and made them men of society as well as of science, 
 poets and politicians, writers and talkers and thinkers, and 
 not unfrequently, as in Dr. Verral's case, inventors as well. 
 
 For, wide and active as were the Seaford doctor's pursuits, 
 he sought to extend his practice by a mechanical invention, 
 for the relief of patients afflicted by diseases of the spine, of 
 great merit, and which has been of late years turned to good 
 account. He himself did not live to see it brought into full 
 operation. In his autumn of life a quick succession of terrible 
 misfortunes fell upon him that would have shattered a man of 
 less vigour, and did, most unquestionably, embitter and 
 shorten his life, though he bore up against them with a 
 courage that was heroic. His eldest daughter a beautiful 
 and talented young woman, and whom her father loved with 
 almost more than a father's affection the daughter who was 
 a mother to his younger children when he was left without a 
 wife she faded and pined away, and at length died, under a 
 home-sorrow that had thrown a dark shadow on her father's 
 happiness and against which she could not bear up. The 
 lines in which he poured forth his grief for her loss are now 
 lying before me. They are amongst the most touching and 
 beautiful, I think, that a poet has ever penned in the bitterness 
 of a death-grief. They were written down at the house of an 
 old friend in Brighton, whose daughter had been his daughter's 
 dearest companion. I make no excuse for copying them from 
 the columns of the Brighton Herald, where they appeared 
 above 40 years ago : 
 
 We've lain her in the cold churchyard, 
 
 Beneath a mound of clay ; 
 Lov'd as she was, we've left her there, 
 
 To loathsome worms a prey.
 
 132 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 And, lo ! the mist is on the hill, 
 
 The rain is driving fast, 
 The evening skies are wild and dark, 
 
 And chilly blows the blast. 
 
 And now this roof for many a year, 
 
 In many a storm so wild 
 This humble roof has been a home, 
 
 A shelter for my child. 
 
 And now this roof, her father's roof, 
 Can be her home no more 
 
 How shall I close mine house to-night ? 
 How bear to bar my door ? 
 
 To shut her out for whom so oft 
 
 It gladly open'd wide! 
 To shut her out that was so long 
 
 My joy, my hope, my pride ! 
 
 We, in these sheltering walls, to-night, 
 
 On beds so soft and warm, 
 Shall rest uninjur'd by the shower, 
 
 And shelter'd from the storm. 
 
 But she is in her cold, damp bed; 
 
 And o'er her lonely grave 
 The driving shower will wildly beat, 
 
 The ruthless whirlwind rave. 
 
 And livid fires will glare around, 
 And pealing thunders roar ; 
 
 How can I close mine house to-night ? 
 How bear to bar my door ? 
 
 But wildly, idly flows my verse : 
 How vain are thoughts like these ; 
 
 She heeds not now the driving shower, 
 The tempest, or the breeze. 
 
 In vain for her the Spring shall bloom, 
 
 The suns of Summer glow; 
 In vain the fruits of Autumn smile, 
 
 The blasts of Winter blow. 
 
 Untroubled in the silent tomb 
 
 She lies in peaceful sleep, 
 While I in this wide world am left 
 
 To wander and to weep ! 
 
 Clarissa! thou hast been to me 
 
 A blessing from thy birth ! 
 And time, that added to thy years, 
 
 Still added to thy worth. 
 
 A little lovely babe wert thou, 
 
 Within thy mother's arms, 
 When first thy father used to gaze 
 
 And doat upon thy charms.
 
 The Sussex Country Doctor. 133 
 
 And still thy form more lovely grew, 
 
 And still thy mind improved ; 
 Thou Avert by all who saw admired, 
 
 By all who knew thee loved. 
 
 And oh, when grief was at my heart, 
 
 And care was on my brow, 
 My kindest, truest, comforter, 
 
 My fondest friend, wert thou. 
 
 Nor was thy kindness unconfess'd, 
 
 Thy fondness unreturned 
 Living, how dearly wert thou loved ! 
 
 And dead, how deeply mourned ! 
 
 Some readers of these most beautiful and heartrending 
 lines (I do not think they are excelled, if equalled, for pathetic 
 beauty in all the range of English poetry) may ask how could 
 grief so deep put itself into the trammels of verse? The 
 reply is, that, to a poet, verse has no trammels; it is the 
 natural channel of his thoughts and feelings the form in 
 which his emotions clothe themselves as they well up in his 
 heart; it is to him what tears, and lamentations, and wringing 
 of hands are to other men a relief and a consolation, and 
 also a necessity; for if he did not so give vent to his feelings, 
 they would break his heart or madden his brain. 
 
 The death of this beloved daughter was Dr. Verral's 
 greatest sorrow in life, and yet it had its consolation in the 
 memory of the affection and virtues of the lost one. For 
 that which had preceded it there was no consolation, and in 
 that which followed there was a sharper pang. Dr. Verral 
 was walking in the streets of London with a younger child 
 a merry laughing girl. They had to cross a road, crowded 
 with traffic, and, before they could do so, a heavy vehicle was 
 upon them; they were struck down, and when he rose, the 
 child lay dead at his feet. In his agony he threw himself on 
 the corpse and refused to be comforted. What comfort, 
 indeed, was there for a father so bereaved of his child ? 
 
 Before the last of these terrible misfortunes had fallen on 
 Dr. Verral, his home at Seaford had been broken up, and he 
 had begun the world again in another sphere. Into this I
 
 134 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 will not follow him. It was as a country Doctor the centre 
 of a large circle of friends and patients the adviser the 
 comforter the friend of rich and poor the delight of society 
 the authority in all matters of literature and Art and politics 
 it was as the Doctor par excellence of Seaford that I knew 
 him; and his memory is so connected with the place, though 
 it knows him no longer, that I never hear it named without 
 recalling him. Perhaps there are some few others who still 
 do the same; for he was not a man, once known, to be 
 forgotten. His place is not filled up. Nay, the place itself 
 no longer exists. Here and there an old-fashioned " country 
 Doctor" of the type of him of Seaford a man of varied 
 parts with much wisdom as well as of "infinite mirth" is 
 to be found. But the .race is fast dying out. The great 
 towns so much more numerous and so much greater than in 
 times past naturally draw to them men of such talent as Dr. 
 Verral. The country cannot compete with them as it used to 
 do aye, and successfully too. Lesser men will now do for 
 country places: well qualified, doubtless, for their duties, but 
 not such "all-round" men not philosopher, poet, politician, 
 as well as physician like the Doctor of Seaford.
 
 Self-Educated Sussex Men. 
 
 IN a few years there will be no such thing as an 
 uneducated boy in England, and then the race of 
 self-educated men will have disappeared. When 
 the State left children to themselves and a great 
 many parents followed the example of the State there was, 
 no doubt, a great deal of ignorance a large tract of brain 
 that lay fallow. But then, as if to compensate for this, here 
 and there a boy or man took the work into his own hands 
 educated himself; and of all modes of education this, if not 
 the best, is the most fruitful in results. For it can only be 
 done, to follow out my rural simile, on " strong soils," where 
 Nature has been prodigal of her gifts, and has given a decided 
 bent in this or that direction. As a rule, this bent is followed 
 in self-education (in enforced education it is often neglected 
 or even thwarted), and the consequence frequently is, such a 
 crop as you only get from virgin soil. 
 
 These self-educated men, in times gone by, made some 
 amends for the general sterility: they vindicated the goodness 
 of the native stock the natural richness of the soil. But 
 they were not a happy race of men. They had to fight against 
 circumstances, and the jealousy of neighbours, and the doubts 
 and indifference of friends and relations; above all, against 
 the pride and superciliousness of " Society," which sets its 
 face against irregular and erratic outbursts of talent, and closes
 
 136 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 its ranks like a Macedonian phalanx against such as attempt 
 to make a way by force of genius into its Sacred Band! 
 
 So I do not know that the amount of human happiness will 
 be much diminished by the loss of the self-educated man of 
 those who attempted to mount upwards, not by the national 
 staircases, the Public Schools and the Universities, but by a 
 kind of hand-over-hand process, as boys climb trees and 
 sweeps get to the top of greasy poles! For, though the prize 
 at the top of the pole may be carried off, it is seldom worth 
 the pain and suffering which it costs to the sweep or to the 
 self-educated man! 
 
 At least, that is the conclusion I have come to from my 
 knowledge of self-educated men in this town of Brighton. 
 I have known some who that has lived 60 years has not ? 
 They used to be more or less numerous in every town in 
 England, and were generally as much known for their 
 eccentricities and misfortunes as for their talents ; for, doubt- 
 less, in the process of self-education, tares came up plentifully 
 with the wheat ; there is little time for weeding it needs a very 
 strong man to weed himself! and so the penalty paid by the 
 local genius the poet, or the linguist, or the mathematician 
 was, too often, to be pointed out to strangers as a kind of 
 lusus nature; in Sussex phrase, a "main clever kind of 
 chap," but as much to be laughed at and pitied as admired or 
 rewarded. 
 
 If I had to exemplify this class of men, as it existed in 
 Brighton some 40 or 50 years ago, I should choose two men 
 whose names are still familiar in some ears, and whose features 
 are not quite forgotten, but whose works are passing more 
 and more out of fame and use. I mean George Frederick 
 Richardson and Samuel Simes: the former a native of 
 Brighton ; the latter of Lewes. 
 
 I am not going to write their biographies, nor to draw a 
 parallel between them, after the manner of Plutarch, but 
 simply to illustrate my theory of self-educated men. In some 
 respects they agreed, as in local position for both sprang
 
 Self -Educated Sussex Men. 137 
 
 from the middle classes, and one, like De Foe, was a draper 
 the other, like Stowe, a tailor ; but in most other respects 
 they were as different as men could well be whose tastes lay 
 in the same direction Literature and who drew everything 
 from their own resources. 
 
 George Richardson had an intellect that was fitted to go 
 in harness to be trained and cultivated up to a very high 
 point; to submit to the severest discipline. If it had been 
 his lot to be born in Germany he would have been a renowned 
 Professor, and even if educated at Oxford or Cambridge he 
 must have risen to high fame as a scholar. He had a 
 prodigious memory and an aptitude for acquiring knowledge 
 that has seldom, I believe, been surpassed in this country. 
 With an education such as country tradesmen's sons received 
 60 or 70 years ago that is, in the three "r's" reading, 
 writing and arithmetic and by his unaided efforts, he acquired 
 a knowledge of Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and then, passing on 
 to modern languages, he mastered French, German, and 
 Italian, not only so as to read, but to speak them with ease 
 and elegance. This, remember, was at a time when the 
 Continent was closed to Englishmen when the language of 
 Germany was almost unknown to the English people, and 
 when its literature was only beginning to be recognised in 
 Europe. Richardson assisted to make its claims known by 
 translating the poems of Korner and Schiller and other 
 German poets. How he came to speak as well as to know 
 the language, and also French and Italian I think, too, 
 Spanish I know not or rather I do know a little; it was by 
 his indomitable courage and perseverance. Not a wandering 
 native of Faderland or of Gaul or Italy came across his path 
 were it a Bavarian broom-girl or an organ-man or a 
 Savoyard but Richardson would accost him or her and 
 bring his book-knowledge to the test of proof. He did not 
 know what shame-facedness was in the acquisition of a 
 language. He " aired " his French and German on all 
 occasions, in season and out of season, never forgetting a
 
 138 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 lesson or a hint until he became the proficient he was until 
 his French had all the exquisite mtteiiwA finesse of a Parisian, 
 and his German was acknowledged to be classic. It was, 
 doubtless, in languages that the bent of George Richardson's 
 genius lay most strongly; but he had tastes and talent in 
 many other directions, and, as opportunities offered, he 
 followed them out. He was devotedly fond of music, but had 
 no voice and little ear; and yet he laboured to sing Mozart 
 with the same assiduity, though not with the same success, 
 that he did to recite Schiller or Korner. How well do I 
 remember his singing-lessons! and his pathetic entreaties 
 to his instructress (a very patient, good-tempered young lady), 
 after successive failures in "La ci darem" or "Nott' e 
 
 giorno," for " just once more, my dear Miss ! just 
 
 that passage, if you please, once more:" that " once more" 
 being as illimitable as space! 
 
 To the Graces, indeed, though our friend Richardson 
 made tremendous sacrifices, his sacrifices were not altogether 
 acceptable. He carried the same indomitable perseverance 
 into his cultivation of them that he did into the severer 
 studies of language, and, later in life, science, but not with 
 the same result. In music and dancing (and, oh ye Gods! 
 how he did labour to dance!) he failed decidedly, and in 
 acting he was not successful. He played lago to, I think, 
 Barnard Gregory's Othello on the Brighton stage, and I don't 
 know which was the worst of the two ; but, between them, 
 Shakspeare got terribly maltreated ! No, the Graces were not 
 propitious to George Richardson, devoutly as he worshipped 
 them. In literature, he was much happier. He wrote in 
 many styles in verse and in prose as a translator and as an 
 original author as an essayist, a critic, and in a light pleasing 
 polished style that recalled the social sketches of Addison 
 and Steele in " The Spectator " and " The Tatler." A series 
 of these, under the title of " The Visitor," appeared in the 
 Brighton Herald between 40 and 50 years ago, and they 
 contain matter that would justify a more permanent form of
 
 Self -Educated Sussex Men. 139 
 
 publication. Some idea may be given of the vein in which 
 they were written by the followingyV cTesprit: 
 
 LETTER FROM MISS AMELIA JANE MORTIMER, 
 LONDON, TO SIR HENRY CLIFTON, PARIS. 
 
 Dear Harry, You owe me a letter, 
 
 Nay, I really believe it is two ; 
 But to make you still further my debtor, 
 
 I send you this brief billet doux. 
 The shock was so great when we parted, 
 
 I can't overcome my regret ; 
 At first I was quite broken-hearted, 
 
 And have never recovered it yet ! 
 
 I have scarcely been out to a party, 
 
 But have sent an excuse, or been ill ; 
 I have played but three times at Ecarte", 
 
 And danced but a single quadrille ! 
 And then I was sad, for my heart ne'er 
 
 One moment ceased thinking of thee ; 
 I'd a handsome young man for my partner, 
 
 And a handsomer still -vis-a-vis ! 
 
 But I had such a pain in my forehead, 
 
 And felt so ennuied and so tired, 
 I must have looked perfectly horrid, 
 
 Yet they say I was really admired ! 
 You'll smile but Mamma heard a Lancer, 
 
 As he whispered his friend, and, said he, 
 " The best and most beautiful dancer 
 
 Is the lady in white," meaning me ! 
 
 I've been once to Lord Dorival's soirees, 
 
 Whose daughter in music excels ; 
 (Do they still wear the silks they call moires ? 
 
 They will know if you ask at Pradel's.) 
 She begged me to join in a duet : 
 
 But the melody died on my tongue, 
 And I thought I should never get through it 
 
 It was one we so often have sung ! 
 
 In your last, you desire me to mention 
 
 The news of the Court and the Town ; 
 But there's nothing that's worth your attention, 
 
 Or deserving of my noting down. 
 The late-carried Catholic Question 
 
 Papa thinks will ruin the land ; 
 For my part, I make no suggestion 
 
 On matters I don't understand. 
 
 And Pa says the Duke has not well done 
 To put his old friends to the rout ; 
 
 That he should not have quarrell'd with Eldon 
 Nor have turn'd Mr. Huskisson out.
 
 140 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 And they say things are bad in the City, 
 
 And Pa thinks they'll only get worse 
 And they say the new bonnets are pretty, 
 
 But I think them quite the reverse ! 
 Lady Black has brought out her two daughters 
 
 Good figures, but timid and shy ; 
 Mrs. White's gone to Bath for the waters, 
 
 And the doctors declare she will die. 
 It's all off 'twixt Miss Brown and Sir Stephen, 
 
 He found they could never agree ; 
 Her temper's so very uneven 
 
 I always said how it would be ! 
 
 The Miss Whites are grown very fine creatures, 
 
 Though they look rather large in a room ; 
 Miss Grey has gone off in her features, 
 
 Miss' Green is gone off with her groom. 
 Lord Littleford's dead, and that noodle, 
 
 His son, has succeeded his sire ; 
 And her Ladyship's lost the fine poodle. 
 
 That you and I used to admire. 
 
 Little Joe is advancing in knowledge, 
 
 He begs me to send his regard ; 
 And Charles goes on Monday to College, 
 
 But Mamma thinks he studies too hard. 
 We are losing our man-cook, he marries 
 
 My French femme de chambre, Baptiste ; 
 Pa wishes you'd send one from Paris, 
 
 But he must be a first-rate artiste. 
 I don't like my last new piano, 
 
 Its tones are so terribly sharp, 
 I think I must give it to Anna, 
 
 And get Pa to buy me a harp ! 
 Little Gerald is growing quite mannish, 
 
 He was smoking just now a cigar ! 
 And I'm fagging hard at the Spanish, 
 
 And Lucy has learnt the guitar. 
 I suppose you can talk like an artist, 
 
 Of statues, busts, paintings, vertu ; 
 But, pray, love, don't turn Bonapartist, 
 
 Pa will never consent if you do 1 
 " You were born," he will say, " Sir, a Briton," 
 
 But forgive me so foolish a fear ; 
 If I thought you could blame what I've written, 
 
 I would soon wash it out with a tear 1 
 
 And pray, Sir, how like you the ladies, 
 
 Since you've quitted the land of your birth ? 
 I have heard the dark donnas of Cadiz 
 
 Are the loveliest women on earth. 
 Th' Italians are lively and witty, 
 
 But I ne'er could their manners endure ; 
 Nor do I think French women pretty, 
 
 Though they have a most charming tournure.
 
 Self -Educated Sussex Men. 141 
 
 I was told you were flirting at Calais, 
 
 And next were intriguing at Rome, 
 But I smiled at their impotent malice, 
 
 Yet I must say I wish'd you at home ; 
 Though I kept what I fancied in petto, 
 
 And felt you would ever be true ; 
 Yet I dreamed of the murd'rer's stiletto 
 
 Each night and its victim was you ! 
 
 I'm arrived at the end of my paper, 
 
 So, dearest, you'll not think it rude, 
 If I ring for my seal and my taper, 
 
 And think it is time to conclude. 
 Adieu, then dejected and lonely, 
 
 Till I see you I still shall remain, 
 Addio, mio caro Yours only 
 
 Yours ever, AMELIA JANK. 
 
 P.S. You may buy me a dress like Selina's, 
 
 Her complexion's so much like my own ; 
 And don't fail to call at Farina's 
 
 For a case of his Eau de Cologne ; 
 And whate'er your next letter announces, 
 
 Let it also intelligence bring, 
 If the French have left off the deep flounces, 
 
 And what will be worn for the Spring ! 
 
 The hit, too, at the fashionable mania which raged amongst 
 the young swells of that day of driving stage-coaches ("The 
 Modern Phaeton "), with its classical allusions, is full of wit, 
 as, at a later day, was the rhyming description of a geological 
 walk with Dr. Mantell. The lines he addressed to the young 
 lady referred to as his occasional musical instructress, on her 
 marriage day, have a tender grace in them that will justify 
 quotation: 
 
 TO MARIANNE FLEET, 
 
 On her Marriage* March 2$th, 1837. 
 
 And thou shalt be a bride to-day, thou young, and good, and fair, 
 
 And the ring is waiting for thy hand, the wreath is in thy hair ; 
 
 The young, the gay, the glad, are met to hail the joyous scene, 
 
 And thy bridesmaids wait upon thy steps, like fairies round their queen. 
 
 With her cousin, William Hayley Mason, a godson of Hayley, the Poet.
 
 142 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Thy young life hath been only past in love, and joy, and bliss ; 
 Thou but hast known a mother's care, a sister's love and kiss ; 
 But thou shalt seek another now, shalt bear another's name, 
 And the love that we alone have shared, another now may claim ! 
 
 For thou, fair girl, art like the bird that left her ark of rest, 
 
 To seek a dwelling-place on earth, and build herself a nest ; 
 
 So thou hast left thy happy home, in other spheres to soar, 
 
 And, like the dove the Patriarch sent, shalt seek thine ark no more. 
 
 And sad our task will be, and long, thy mem'ry to retrace ; 
 To see, in fancy see, thy form, and view thy vacant place ; 
 To dwell with grief on every charm that bade us once rejoice, 
 And miss the magic of thy smile, the music of thy voice. 
 
 One thought the while shall cheer our woes and soothe our grief to rest : 
 It is the thought, where'er thou art, that thou must still be blest ; 
 For howsoe'er thy lot be cast, wherever thou mayst be, 
 All gentlest hopes and kindest loves must live and die with thee ! 
 
 And when before the sacred shrine thou standest shor Jy now, 
 To pledge thy faith to God and man, and breathe the life-long vow, 
 Our warmest loves, our fondest thoughts, shall all be with thee there, 
 And meet and mingle in the sky in blessing and in prayer ! 
 
 But hark ! they call thy lover waits no more must we delay, 
 We fain would hold thee ever thus, yet dare not bid thee stay ; 
 These streaming eyes, these breaking hearts, the pain of parting tell, 
 And these faint sobs are meant to say, but cannot speak, farewell ! 
 
 The following graceful lines illustrate the union in George 
 Richardson of tastes usually so opposed as the poetic and the 
 scientific: 
 
 THE NAUTILUS AND THE AMMONITE. 
 
 The Nautilus and the Ammonite 
 Were launch'd in storm and strife, 
 
 Each sent to float, in its tiny boat, 
 On the wide wild sea of life. 
 
 And each could swim on the Ocean's brim, 
 
 And anon its sails could furl, 
 And sink to sleep, in the great sea-deep, 
 
 In a palace all of pearl. 
 
 And their's was bliss more fair than this 
 
 That we feel in our colder clime, 
 For they were rife in tropic life, 
 
 In a brighter, happier clime. 
 
 They swam mid isles whose summer smiles 
 
 No wintry winds annoy, 
 Whose groves were palm, whose air was balm, 
 
 Where life was only joy.
 
 Self -Educated Sussex Men. 143 
 
 They roamed all day, through creek and bay, 
 
 And traversed the ocean deep, 
 And at night they sank, on a coral bank, 
 
 In its fairy bowers to sleep. 
 
 And the monsters vast, of ages past, 
 
 They beheld in their ocean caves, 
 And saw them ride, in their power and pride, 
 
 And sink in their billowy graves. 
 
 Thus hand in hand, from strand to strand, 
 
 They sailed in mirth and glee, 
 Those fancy shells, with their crystal cells, 
 
 Twin creatures of the sea. 
 
 But they came at last to a sea long past, 
 
 And, as they reached its shore, 
 The Almighty's breath spake out in death, 
 
 And the Ammonite lived no more. 
 
 And the Nautilus now, in its shelly prow, 
 
 As o'er the deep it strays, 
 Still seems to seek, in bay and creek, 
 
 Its companion of former days. 
 
 And thus do we, on life's stormy sea, 
 
 As we roam from shore to shore, 
 While tempest-toss'd, seek the loved the lost, 
 
 But to find them on earth no more ! 
 
 This and many more of his poetical effusions found a 
 place in the best periodicals of the day, and were also published 
 in a volume that is to be found in the Public Library of his 
 native town. 
 
 But in the case of George Richardson, as in so many 
 others, the truth of the saying was exemplified, that "a 
 prophet is not honoured in his own country." George 
 Richardson got little honour in Brighton, and less profit. 
 His habits, indeed, were not formed for business. His spirit 
 revolted against the selling of silks and satins behind a 
 counter. I do not think he could always have been very 
 pleasant to his customers. On one occasion, I know, he was 
 not. A lady whom he was serving made an uncomplimentary 
 remark upon his face or figure in French or German 
 ignorant of the Admirable Crichton who was rolling out the 
 goods; and Richardson, in his pride or vexation, replied to 
 her in the same language, and, doubtless, with a much purer 
 accent, and in much better grammar. Of course, that lady,
 
 144 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 the next time she wanted a dress, went for her silks or satins 
 to Mills's or Hannington's! He was very absent, too had 
 fits of abstraction, in which he did strange things and became 
 the butt of practical jokers, so that it was not to be wondered 
 at that the business left him which he was so desirous to get 
 rid of. He did not, indeed, get into his right place until 
 comparatively late in life, when Dr. Mantell opened his 
 Geological Museum at Brighton; and then there was no man 
 so fit to explain and preside over its treasures as George 
 Richardson, the ex-draper, the linguist, the lecturer, the writer 
 of verse and prose of touching lines and witty jeux d" 1 esprit 
 the reporter and journalist, the amateur actor and laborious 
 student of music and dancing! Yes, this self-educated man, 
 having carried his powers into all these and other lines 
 amongst them, conversation and mimicry found himself at 
 last a worshipper in the Temple of Science and a more 
 devoted one never entered it. For the first time his powers 
 were concentrated he had a fixed and sole aim and object, 
 and his wonderful memory and organ of acquisitiveness came 
 into full play. In a short time he had so mastered the facts 
 and theories of geology and the kindred science of crystal- 
 lography that he was able not only to edit in point of fact, 
 to write the latest work of Dr. Mantell, founded on the 
 Lectures which that talented man delivered in Brighton, 
 and which, being delivered extempore, were reported by 
 Richardson, but to write a work on the subject which has since 
 become a text-book of geology. So thoroughly, too, did he 
 master the contents of the Mantellian Museum that, when it 
 was bought by the State and transferred to the British Museum, 
 it was necessary to take its Curator with it, and he became a 
 Sub-Curator of the national institution. There he was in his 
 element, and was appreciated at his value by the savans, 
 native and foreign, who resorted to the geological department 
 of the Museum, and with the latter of whom, whether French, 
 German, Italian, or Spanish, he was able to hold converse in 
 their own tongues. He was on the way to higher things when 
 his career was suddenly brought to a calamitous close. I have
 
 Self -Educated Sussex Men. 145 
 
 said that in business matters he was never an adept, trusting 
 to others and neglectful himself. He now had to pay the 
 bitter penalty of this indifference to common things to 
 pounds, shillings, and pence. He had put confidence in a 
 friend, who, at a moment of need, betrayed him went oft 
 with a sum of money which poor Richardson depended on to 
 meet an engagement, and, in the despair of the moment, he 
 put an end to his existence. It was a melancholy termination 
 of a career which was to be admired in many respects, especially 
 in the love of knowledge, of literature and science and Art 
 indeed, of all that was intellectual it displayed, and in the 
 indomitable will with which the avenues to this knowledge 
 were stormed and captured by a man who had nothing but 
 his own resources to depend on who, in the many accomplish- 
 ments that he possessed, had had no instructor but himself. If 
 at any time the history of the Worthies of Brighton should be 
 written, the name of George Frederick Richardson, linguist, 
 author, poet, and a man of science, ought not to be omitted. 
 
 In many respects Samuel Simes, though equally a self- 
 educated man perhaps more so than George Richardson 
 for Simes was, I believe, originally only a journeyman tailor, 
 and Richardson was a master-draper and had some advantages 
 in the acquisition of knowledge which Simes had not was 
 the opposite of his contemporary. He, too, was literary in 
 his tastes; but his tastes lay towards politics and theology, 
 for neither of which had Richardson any inclination. Simes 
 was, in fact, a " free-lance " a Switzer of the Brighton 
 Press. He was, in his heart, I believe, a Radical, if not a 
 democrat; but he began by writing for a Tory journal, the 
 Brighton Gazette; he then passed on to a Whig or Liberal 
 one, the Brighton Herald; and he ended by editing a Radical 
 one, the Brighton Patriot. When he died he was on the staff 
 of the Brighton Examiner. But the prime of his intellect 
 was certainly given to the Brighton Herald. It was not 
 limited to politics, in which he was, of course, curbed in his 
 extreme opinions by the traditions of the journal, but took in 
 L
 
 146 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 a wide range of literature imaginative, historical, musical 
 and theological. He was an inordinate reader, and his 
 memory was a tenacious one, so that he could write and talk 
 (and talk well, too) on nearly all subjects. And, like Dr. 
 Johnson, he talked perhaps wrote too often for victory's 
 sake, and not from conviction. I almost doubt if he had 
 any settled convictions! He had had no grounding in know- 
 ledge had picked it up in snatches here and there, as birds 
 do their food, and so it lay all higgledy-piggledy in his head, 
 being handy for use in irregular guerilla warfare, such as is 
 often carried on in newspapers; very formidable to the 
 uneducated opponents whom he met in the " Free and Easies " 
 where he reigned, a "Triton among the minnows;" often- 
 times, too, very surprising and embarrassing to men more 
 highly and regularly educated than himself, but whose reading 
 had not been so wide, and whose intellect was not so robust 
 as Simes's. But still he was imperfectly educated, and never, 
 like Richardson, found the corner-stone on which he could 
 build up the multifarious materials he had collected into one 
 harmonious whole. For, of that gift of studying and acquiring 
 languages which was Richardson's forte in early life, Simes 
 had not a particle. He knew no language but English, and 
 though he wrote that in a nervous, racy, fluent style, yet even 
 there he occasionally tripped. He wanted some one to revise 
 his " copy," thrown off as it was at a white heat. Nor was 
 he a poet, though he could rhyme, and some of his political 
 squibs, in verse, were excessively happy. 
 
 But it was in prose strong, sterling English prose which 
 those who run could read, that Samuel Simes shone. He had 
 read Cobbett's political works his "Register," "Peter 
 Porcupine," &c. and studied Cobbett's grammar*, as a young 
 man; and they had not been thrown away on him. He had 
 much imagination, too, though not of a high class, and he 
 had a keen sense of humour. Some of his reports of meetings 
 were masterly. He did not use shorthand nobody did in 
 that day, and reports were often the better for it having more
 
 Self -Educated Sussex Men. 147 
 
 of the reporter and less of the speaker in them to the great 
 improvement of the speeches and not to the loss of the reader. 
 
 But Simes was not merely a litterateur. He had other and 
 refined tastes. He was an enthusiastic lover of music; and 
 here he had the advantage of Richardson. (It is curious how 
 the two men differed !) Whilst the latter laboured in vain over 
 " La ci darem," and murdered " Nott' e giorno " in particular, 
 and the music of Mozart in general, Simes, with a rich mellow 
 voice, could take a part in all the glees, madrigals, and part- 
 songs which are the glory of our English School. He 
 understood, too, something of thorough bass, and could put 
 together a few bars of music. He threw himself into the 
 Mainzer movement, and a work of his (taken from the columns 
 of the Brighton Herald], on the management of the voice, had 
 a considerable sale. Then he was a good fencer, at a time 
 when fencing was a rare accomplishment; could swim I don't 
 know how far (not quite over the Channel, certainly!), did 
 something with the gloves, and was generally an adept in 
 athletics, and physically, as well as intellectually, a fine speci- 
 men of an Englishman. His face and here, too, he had the 
 superiority over his contemporary was a very handsome one, 
 with a strong resemblance to that of the first Napoleon in his 
 later years: of classical mould and clearly cut, with curved 
 mouth, straight nose, and well-rounded brow. He was surely 
 intended by Nature for greater things than he ever accom- 
 plished. Had Fortune been kinder to him could he have 
 concentrated his powers, he might have left something behind 
 him that the world " would not willingly let die," or, with his 
 robust intellect, he might have sat on the Judicial Bench or 
 been another Warburton in theology. But the common wants 
 of life the bread and cheese necessities always pressed too 
 closely on him. He could not wait for his powers to ripen: 
 he wrote to demand; the Printer's devil was ever at his elbow. 
 " It is a work," he once said to the writer of these reminis- 
 cences, " which pulverises the brain." It exhausted his, and 
 brought him to the grave before his time, with nothing to
 
 148 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 mark his long and, in many respects, able day's work, 
 except what the columns of a local newspaper contain. And 
 yet I doubt if there be a man in Brighton, or many in all 
 England, at the present moment, who can compare with 
 Samuel Simes in the vigour and variety of his genius; in the 
 ability to sit down, as he would sit down, at a moment's notice 
 and dash off, ready for the printer, a stirring political leader, 
 or an amusing essay, or a pungent report, or a cutting squib, 
 or a clever musical or dramatic criticism. What, indeed, 
 could he not do? All that a newspaper man was called on to 
 do 50 years ago for a local journal he could do ; and that was 
 everything. 
 
 I will end by repeating what I said in starting: By and bye 
 there will not be an uneducated man in England; fools, 
 faineants, dull men, and all, will be "coached up" to the 
 educational standard. And then, perhaps, the self-educated 
 man will be missed, and even perhaps called for, though, so 
 far as he himself is concerned, I do not think it is to be 
 regretted that he will not answer to his name.
 
 The Last of the Sussex M.ds. 
 
 |HE Last of the Romans " " The Last of the 
 Mohicans" "The Last of the Barons" we 
 have all read of these famous ultimate person- 
 ages. And why, too, should not "The Last of 
 the M.C.'s" be enshrined in the mirror of the Past and 
 handed down to the wonder and admiration of succeeding 
 ages ? 
 
 But we must be quick, or the fleeting image will escape 
 us. There is so little of the solid, of the real and substantial 
 in it, that, as we write, we hardly know whether we are dealing 
 with a substance or with a shadow a thing that lived and 
 breathed and had a being, or an automaton answering to the 
 pull of a string and set in motion by a wire. 
 
 Let us try and fix our memories. Yes; Lieut. -Col. Eld, 
 the last of the M.C.'s of Brighton, was a substantial being, 
 and not merely vox et praterea nihil. He really did live and 
 breathe and have a being, though his virtual existence the 
 period during which he shone as a visible and luminous body 
 above the horizon was limited to a very small period of time, 
 namely, that which extended from the first of the M.C.'s 
 balls for the Brighton season to the last of those memorable 
 re-unions. For these two or three months Lieut. -Colonel 
 Eld came out of his chrysalis, wherever that might be, and 
 sported a butterfly existence. He was the curious centre of 
 a curious circle a fast dwindling one even then, and now 
 totally extinct of old maids, and dowager aunts, and antique
 
 150 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 belles, all marriageable and all unmarried, who flew and buzzed 
 and droned round the last of the M.C.'s as ghosts of moths 
 may be supposed to buzz round the ghost of a candle I For 
 wings they had none to burn they had been burnt off years 
 ago; and there was no flame to burn them! Yet to them he 
 was still a luminary, because all other luminaries had gone 
 out. He was a relic of that Past to which they, too, belonged ; 
 and he still kept a hold, feeble as it. was, on the Present, to 
 which they clung with a despairing grasp. For nobody could 
 gainsay his title to his position. He was M.C. He held it 
 by right of descent from a line of M.C.'s dating .back to 
 Heaven knows what point of History or Tradition; and he 
 carried his title in his look, his face, his figure, his every 
 movement! How recall these, except to the memory of those 
 who have beheld them with their eyes ? 
 
 Only to such as have gazed on the bodily presence of 
 Lieut. -Colonel Eld the last M.C. of Brighton who have 
 seen him walk down North Street or up the Marine Parade, 
 or down the Marine Parade and up North Street, would we 
 venture to limn that tall and erect and Quixotic-looking figure 
 that body poised so exactly upon those parallel legs, which 
 kept such perfect time upon the Brighton pavement ! If 
 Archimedes could have made a man, amongst his other 
 marvellous machines, it would have been such a man as our 
 last M.C. It would have so looked so moved so stood still ; 
 its head would have been so held, in a perfect geometrical 
 line, upon its shoulders; its arms would have so swung, and 
 oh! perfection of Art, its toes would so have pointed, at the 
 only correct angles for toes, right and left! For, as every 
 man has his strong as well as his weak points as the strength 
 of Samson lay in his hair, and the vulnerability of Achilles in 
 his heel, here in his toes lay the strength of Colonel Eld. 
 Here was the essence of the man. His soul, if he had one, lay, 
 not, as some philosophers aver, in the pia mater, nor the heart, 
 nor the pit of the stomach, but in the extremity of that member 
 of the body which determines, in the last degree, the most
 
 The Last of the Sussex M. C.'s. 151 
 
 important points in the life of a human being, namely, in 
 which direction he shall go, or to what altitude he shall elevate 
 himself. We mean the toe the big toe. Other men ignore 
 this great fact, and, consequently, it matters little which way 
 they do go, or whether they go or don't go at all. But in our 
 ultimus Arbiter Elegantiarum it was the all-in-all the real 
 starting-point in life the summum bonum the to kalon! 
 
 But to proceed with our portrait. As Lieut. -Colonel Eld 
 stalked into your sphere of vision there was a something a 
 je ne sais quoi that struck the imagination at once, and pro- 
 claimed to you, " Here is a character a curiosity a being 
 that stands by itself, is a law and an example to itself, and is 
 either the first or the last of its kind." It was a puzzle. And 
 you searched in vain for the key to it until, from resting on 
 that calm, imperturbable visage, that towered in the sky, and 
 seemed to seek its natural aliment in the air thin air your 
 eyes decended, by the waning medium of his attenuated waist, 
 and the long spindleshanks of legs, to the sharply projected 
 toes. And then you breathed again. Eureka! The problem 
 was solved. Aut Erasmus aut diabolus. It was either the M.C. 
 or a dancing-master ; and as dancing-masters do not, as a rule, 
 perform their pas seuls in the open air, why then it was the 
 M.C. of Brighton, and nothing more nor less! 
 
 Let it not be thought that we are gasconading, or going 
 beyond the fair limits of our subject. To show that we are 
 not, we will call into Court a witness, whose evidence on such 
 a point would be accepted by any Court in the world. Let 
 Sydney Smith, the witty Canon of St. Paul's, " come into 
 Court," and speak " the truth, the whole truth, and nothing 
 but the truth," concerning the party in this cause. 
 
 "'I never was in Brighton' (we quote from the Journal of 
 Julian Charles Young), ' till to-day; but, nevertheless, I have 
 made acquaintance with a great local power,' said he of St. 
 Paul's. 'Who may that be?' asked Anderson. ' Who he is 
 I know not ; but I am certain what he is. It is that distinguished 
 functionary, the Master of the Ceremonies. It could be no
 
 152 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 one else. It was a gentleman attired point device, walking 
 down the parade like Agag, ' delicately.' He pointed out his 
 toes like a dancing-master, but carried his head like a 
 potentate. As he passed the stand of flies he nodded 
 approval, as if he owned them all. As he approached the 
 little goat-carriages he looked askance over the edge of his 
 starched neckcloth and blandly smiled encouragement. Sure 
 that in following him I was treading in the steps of greatness, 
 I went on to the Pier, and there I was confirmed in my 
 conviction of his eminence; for I observed him look first 
 over the right side and then over the left, with an expression 
 of serene satisfaction spreading over his countenance, which 
 said, as plainly as if he had spoken to the sea aloud, ' That 
 is right. You are low-tide at present; but never mind, in a 
 couple of hours I shall make you high-tide again.' " 
 
 If the whole order of M.C.'s, from Petronius downwards, 
 had been called on to choose a man in whom, as the last of 
 the race, their characteristics should be summed up and most 
 visibly shine forth, they could not have made a better selection 
 than in Lieut. -Colonel Eld. There was the stamp of office in 
 his look and carriage an imposing air, " as one having 
 authority," that asserted his right to respect, and, in spite of 
 the eccentricity of his manners, daunted the profanum vulgus 
 and ensured him from insult. He carried, indeed, a good 
 stout stick (it was the only stout thing about him !)and it was 
 said that he was skilled in the art of using it. But it was not 
 to that stick that he owed his perfect immunity from anything 
 like impertinence. No! It lay deeper than that. It was his 
 perfect adaptation to the part he was playing the harmony 
 that existed between the man and the office. It is incongruity 
 a falling short of the true standard whether that standard 
 be high or low a hangman's or a king's that provokes con- 
 tempt and excites the laughter of "little vulgar boys." If a man 
 play his part, whatever it be, with due regard to the degree and 
 nature of that part, he is recognised as a real thing, and allowed 
 to go by unquestioned and unassailed. Now, this was the
 
 The Last of the Sussex M.C.'s. 153 
 
 case with Lieut.-Col. Eld. The man was made for the office. 
 His body was cast in the M.C. mould, and he had a soul to 
 match. So high, and no higher. You can but fill a vessel, 
 and when Lieut.-Col. Eld was elected to the office of M.C. 
 for Brighton he was filled, and he held all the liquor that there 
 was to pour into him, or that he could hold. The whole world 
 recognised it. How he existed previous to that moment, who 
 can say? We are sometimes inclined to doubt if he did exist 
 at all previous to it if the occasion did not give him birth 
 so that, when the moment came, he walked forth, like Minerva 
 from the brain of Jupiter, a complete and immaculate M.C. 
 Who ever saw him under any other aspect? in any other 
 relationship? He had no wife no sister, brother, cousins, 
 aunt, or uncle no relatives no friends no acquaintances 
 only his M.C. surroundings of spinsters, and widows, and 
 "maids forlorn, "and they only came forth on the occasion of 
 his balls, to flit round him for a weary night or two, make 
 their offerings (the price of a ball-ticket), and then fade away 
 into the regions of single unblessedness. 
 
 They were ghostly assemblages, those M.C. balls. They 
 began in nothing, except the announcement in the local 
 papers that " such things would be;" they brought nothing to 
 nothing they ended in nothing. Did a single ray of love 
 illumine them? Impossible. Did Hymen ever crown them ? 
 Incredible. Hope itself must have withered in such an 
 atmosphere. There were but two elements in them: the 
 M.C. element and the husband-hunting element; and the 
 necessary link was missing! But they were the Avatars of 
 the M.C. of Brighton the occasions on which he made 
 himself palpable to the senses of his followers, and was a 
 Being. Did any one ever see his name except when appended 
 to the yearly advertisements in the local papers which 
 announced to the Brighton world the fact of the recurring 
 M.C.'s ball? Did anyone ever hear of his doing, saying, 
 suffering anything except as M.C.? Did he ever change in 
 his " outward man ?" We never noted it. Did he ever laugh,
 
 154 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 cry, joke, rage do anything but walk? One would think 
 that it lay in his office to dance; but he did not. He was 
 the medium by which other people danced, flirted, fell in 
 love, married or tried to do so and repented. But none 
 of these things did he do himself. Was he ever merry, angry, 
 sorry, glad, depressed, exalted? We doubt it. He was 
 above, or beneath, " those natural shocks" that flesh is heir 
 to. He wrote on his door, and on his cards, " M.C.," and 
 they passed him by, as exempt from them by virtue of his 
 office. Was he ever ill? He must have died, or we should 
 still rejoice in an M.C. But, to ensure ourselves from error 
 on this point, we would prefer to say that he ceased to exist 
 that he disappeared that with him closed the dynasty of the 
 Brighton M.C.'s. If he did die, only such a. pen as that 
 which described the last moments of the Knight of La 
 Mancha could do justice to the scene. But as we have no 
 credible record of his coming in, neither have we any trust- 
 worthy report of his going out. Like Arthur, that flos regum, 
 our flower of M.C.'s may be only hiding his pedal extremities 
 in some Vale of Avilion behind the faded curtains of a 
 deserted ball-room until the propitious moment returns 
 when the glories of the olden times shall be revived. Until 
 then spinsters may wail and widows lament: ladies of a 
 certain age and uncertain position may look round with 
 despairing eyes for " help meet for them," and even younger 
 ones may learn the fatuity of balls without partners and take 
 to Rinks! For they have lost their last, best, truest friend, 
 who, for " a consideration," would run down their game and 
 bring to their arms a partner. Lieut. -Col. Eld, M.C., walks 
 on earth no more, and Brighton has seen " The last of the 
 M.C.'s."
 
 The Last of his Kind. 
 
 to physiologists, the sense for which 
 there is no need no field of exercise soon 
 grows feeble, and eventually dies out. There is 
 an analogy to this in society. Classes which 
 have lost their uses die out and disappear. Even within my 
 limited experience, I can recall individuals belonging to a 
 class formerly, I have no doubt, a numerous one, but which 
 has entirely disappeared in this part of the world as much 
 as the great bustards on our Downs. They have not been 
 destroyed like these; but they have ceased to exist because 
 there is no longer a place or a demand for them. 
 
 I do not know but that the last representatives of these 
 extinct social classes are as much to be pitied as the last Red 
 Man or Black Man of America or Australia perhaps more, 
 for their susceptibilities, as belonging to a higher and more 
 cultivated race, must be keener; and their fate is quite as 
 inevitable: there is no escaping from it. They must die out 
 and leave no trace behind them, or only such a trace as 
 survives in the memory of some old friend or acquaintance. 
 
 To such a doomed, and now, I believe, extinct class, did 
 Edmund Osmond belong. It would be impossible to find a 
 substitute for him in the present day; and yet he had no 
 place no defined, fixed place in society. He could fill up 
 an immense number of little gaps in the social life of his 
 day, but could supply no positive social want; and so Society
 
 156 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 gradually found that it could do without him, and did do 
 without him, and he pined and withered away like a disused 
 faculty. 
 
 And yet there are few men at the present day who can do 
 all the things that Osmond did. He belonged to an age, or, 
 rather, he ought to have belonged to an age for when he 
 was born it had gone by in which the division of labour 
 had not become a law of society in which it was not a 
 necessity of existence that a man should be proficient in at 
 least one thing useful or amusing, as the case may be, to 
 his neighbours no matter how simple or humble or even 
 how humiliating. Osmond was one of the most handy men 
 in the world, but it was in a way that was not positively 
 wanted. He could draw and paint he could handle the 
 plane and the saw, the axe and the hammer; he could fish 
 and shoot and skate; he could put a horse into a gig, and 
 drive it when it was in, or groom it when it was out; he could 
 dance and take a part in a glee even play a little on the 
 flute; was a first-rate ally of mothers in getting up a pic-nic, 
 and could do a little flirting with the daughters, when the 
 mothers were away, or nobody better was at hand. If a gala 
 was to be planned or an anniversary to be celebrated, or 
 honour done or pleasure given to somebody Osmond was 
 sure to be called in. He could "put his hand to anything," 
 and was ever willing to do so; and when all was over there 
 was no unpleasant reminder of his work in the shape of a 
 bill! It was all done for the love and pleasure of the thing. 
 
 It is quite certain that there was a day in England when 
 such a man as Osmond was a valuable member of society, 
 and there are still, doubtless, societies in which his various 
 gifts would come into play. He would have been able to 
 "shift for himself" in a new country, or in a half-civilised 
 country, much better than men more highly trained and 
 developed, but only on one side. He would also have been 
 invaluable as an appendage to a great family who could have 
 afforded to support such a man let him be called the Master
 
 The Last of his Kind. 157 
 
 of the Revels, or Jester, or what you will with nothing 
 particular to do no particular department to overlook, but 
 ready for anything or for nothing, as the occasion demanded, 
 or didn't demand. But times are altered, and men of this 
 kind are not needed now, even in " great houses," in which 
 every officer has his function sharply mapped out in the 
 household, or in the office, or in the field. Only the head of 
 the family and not always he is allowed to give a broad 
 look-out over the expanse of life, and say whether he will 
 work or play walk or ride or drive do much or little or 
 nothing, and in what style he likes. Few heads of houses, 
 perhaps, can do this now they are tethered down too strictly 
 to their duties. And so they have no need of anybody else 
 to assist them in doing well, I suppose I must say, in doing 
 nothing! 
 
 The world into which poor Osmond was born "an age 
 too late " persisted in regarding all that he did, much and 
 various as it was, as nothing, or next to nothing counting as 
 nothing, and worth nothing in exchange for it. He was 
 always active; and yet he had the reputation of being an 
 idle man. He was always in request; and yet he was never 
 wanted in the way in which now-a-days men expect to be 
 wanted " for a consideration." He had plenty of services 
 to give away, and was ready to give them, and people 
 accepted them; but he had nothing to sell, or exchange, 
 which people cared to pay or barter for. If they wanted to 
 play, or to do anything that was unprofitable, Osmond was 
 the first man to rise up in their thoughts. He had a profession 
 the shadow of a profession; but it never seemed to stand 
 in his way, and so his friends never thought of it as an 
 obstacle when they wanted him; and he seemed to think still 
 less of it when he was wanted. He was deemed to be a kind 
 of social flotsam and jetsam, carried by the tide of life here 
 and there, and which any man or woman could pick up and 
 turn to their use without cost to themselves. He was a 
 " gentleman at large," without a groove to run in, but with a 
 certain capacity for moving freely in every direction, as the
 
 158 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 wind listed or the fancy took him or his friends. He could 
 not "settle down;" it was not in him. He was like a child 
 in this respect, but, unlike a child, he could not be taught 
 and he did not grow older. In face and form he might age; 
 but his nature remained the same youthful, volatile, anti- 
 utilitarian. As different generations sprang up they seemed 
 to take him up, use him in their joy and flush of youth, and 
 then leave him where they had found him. They went on 
 to work, in thought or action to make money, perhaps 
 achieve fame. He remained behind in the play-ground 
 which they had left a boy-man. I never met with any of 
 his friends, whatever difference there might be in their years, 
 whose memories did not recall him in the self-same light and 
 form as the best of play-fellows the quickest to turn his 
 hand to all unprofitable kinds of labour. Who could organise 
 a gipsy-party like Osmond? Who could " get up" a cricket- 
 match or a boating-party, or an angling or shooting excursion 
 like him? Who could paint transparencies for general 
 illuminations (it was then the day of general illuminations), 
 or design pretty devices for coloured lamps, or light them 
 when they were up, or turn carpenter, or blacksmith, or 
 groom, or anything else, " for the nonce," if he were required 
 to do so? His presence was the signal that people were 
 enjoying, or going to enjoy, themselves that they were taking 
 a holiday a " red letter day " for themselves in life's almanac, 
 to which, in all probability, they would look back in future 
 years with a certain melancholy pleasure. " Ah, yes, I 
 remember him well. How we did enjoy ourselves that day ! 
 What fun we had! Poor Osmond (people got to call him so 
 after a time), poor Osmond was there. What a famous fellow 
 for a party! how handy he was! how clever, how good- 
 tempered! how ready to help everybody and do everything; 
 What's become of him?" 
 
 And then, without waiting for a reply, with a half-smile, 
 half-sigh, they put themselves into their groove again, and 
 " moved on " in the great daily journey of life.
 
 The Last of his Kind. 159 
 
 What to them had been a halt in life a pull-up a jaunt 
 a stroll was to Osmond life itself. It was a series of halts 
 and jaunts and strolls. He had no power of continuous work. 
 Light loads for the hour or the day he delighted to carry, 
 especially when they had to be taken to some pleasant spot, 
 where happy, merry faces were to meet him. But for the 
 heavy loads of life, such as men take up now, his shoulders 
 were quite unfitted. Life had no terrors scarcely responsi- 
 bilities for him ; he did not know them or seek to anticipate 
 them as we do. We combat the Future as a deadly foe, and 
 throw the Present to it as a bribe for its favours: because we 
 know it has no mercy for those who do not so propitiate it. 
 To him it ever seemed to wear the face of a friend. Certainly 
 he did not tax it heavily not, at least, at first. A bachelor, 
 with no encumbrances and a small independence besides what 
 his profession brought him in, perhaps he had no occasion to 
 "look a-head." He certainly did not do so, until it was too 
 late until he was amongst the breakers. He had been all 
 his life up to middle-age like a child playing on the edge 
 of a precipice. He might have gone on until the end, and 
 never known his danger never known that he was a man born 
 out of date a remnant of a by-gone class that ought to be 
 and must be extinguished a doomed man, as much as the 
 Mohican or the Iroquois of the New World ; lacking as he did 
 the power to keep up with the pace of the day. He might 
 have so escaped, as, perhaps, many another doomed man or 
 animal has done for a time, by a lucky chance. But it did 
 not so fall out. In middle-age, Osmond's foot slipped, and 
 he fell into matrimony. It was like a great bustard coming 
 from some remote spot, where there was just a chance of its 
 escaping the fowler, into the vicinity of a town, or, better, 
 like some old whip driving a stage-coach on to a railway, and 
 thinking to escape being run down. From out of his little 
 bye-way of butterfly life, Osmond came into the eager and 
 crowded highway of life, thinking to make his way like other 
 men. Had they not wives and children, and why not he ? 
 Why not, indeed? There were thousands and hundreds of
 
 1 60 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 thousands of men, his inferiors in many things, who "got on," 
 and lived, they and theirs, after a fashion. The only difference 
 was, that they belonged to the age in which they lived had 
 a place in the "great scheme," higher or lower, perhaps very 
 low and very unpleasant, but still a place, which they could 
 hold against the world, and which the world could not or did 
 not wish to deprive Ihem of, for it was of use to it. He did 
 and could not make such a place, not for one for himself 
 much less for two or three, dependent on him. He should 
 so an old naturalist friend of his comically put it have done 
 what the insects did which he somewhat resembled in his 
 light-hearted, erratic, day-for-day kind of life: he should have 
 spun a cocoon, beneath a pleasant shady tree, and gone to 
 sleep, to wake up again in a brighter world than this old 
 working-day one of our's has become. As to doing as other 
 men did taking unto himself a wife hoping to continue such 
 a race as his to take his place in the ranks of daily plodders, 
 and to provide for the growing wants of the morrow, it was 
 absurd to think of such a thing. Osmond had never known 
 what to-morrow was in its true sense in its beef-and-mutton 
 aspect only in its promise of fruit and flowers, play and 
 pleasure. The responsibilities of the future had never been 
 realities to him only to this extent: would the wind be in the 
 right quarter for the trout to rise? or would the sky be cloudy 
 enough for the harriers to run? or would the ice bear on 
 Falmer Pond ? or would the snow prevent his going to Mrs. 
 Such-an-one's ball? These were the contingencies which 
 chequered Osmond's future which made it bright or gloomy 
 gay or sad. It was the simple unreflecting life of a primitive 
 age and race, drawing all its joys and griefs from the surface. 
 Of the complex, artificial life that makes up Society of the igth 
 century of its numerous demands and necessities its checks 
 and safeguards its provisions and sacrifices, he knew little or 
 nothing. He had never cared much for himself his wants 
 had been few and inexpensive. He would do anything to give 
 pleasure to others, and there he had not been unsuccessful. 
 But to take up that position in Society which Society expects
 
 The Last of his Kind. 161 
 
 a man to take when he marries and has children to be the 
 head of a family the master of a household to have such 
 things as servants, tradesmen, landlord, bills, rent, tax-papers, 
 and all the multitudinous appendages of a man who " settles 
 down " in a respectable sphere of life all this to Osmond 
 was as strange as knives and forks, bolsters and pillows would 
 be to a Cherokee or a Pawnee, fresh from his forest or prairie! 
 He had left all these things during his holiday life to his poor 
 old mother (of course, he had been petted and spoilt by her), 
 and she was gone. His wife well, his wife was as inex- 
 perienced as himself and had to learn everything. Before she 
 could do so the lesson was useless: the children's doll-house 
 it was nothing more was broken up the last holiday of 
 Osmond was over. He did not die : it would have been better 
 had he done so : he went about the world some time longer, 
 with a bewildered, dazed look, as if he had just woke up, or 
 scarcely woke up, out of a sleep and was trying to remember 
 the dream he had dreamt. Had he been dreaming all his life ? 
 And was this the waking up ? He, who had always been so 
 trim in his attire of so smiling an aspect so cheery in speech 
 whose thoughts, if not deep, were so fresh and sweet with 
 the freshness and sweetness of the fields and the sky and the 
 water he now became, as at the touch of a wand, a seared 
 and shrivelled figure of dingy aspect, with a timid look that 
 shrank from recognition, and a hesitating speech that only 
 echoed with meaningless repetition the commonest sounds 
 that fell from the lips of those who accosted him. His life 
 such as it had been had gone out of him. He was now only 
 a shadow of a shadow. Coming from the pleasant bye-ways 
 of life in which he had played, into the crush of the highway, 
 he was at an utter loss what to do. His light wares had been 
 taken readily enough when he gave them, and looked for no 
 return ; but there was no one willing to buy them in the heavy- 
 goods market. Here he was out-bid fore-stalled ridden 
 down by stronger men brow-beaten, roughly-elbowed 
 finally, heart-broken. He must have felt, poor fellow, that he 
 was de trop in the way an impediment and an encumbrance 
 M
 
 1 62 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 even to those whose pillar and prop he should have been. 
 They left him, or he left them I don't know which. He 
 again reverted to his original state of bachelorship the life 
 of irresponsibility uselessness, if you will for which alone 
 he was fit. But it was stript of all its little joys and delights: 
 its ornaments and attractions. The boy-man of a former age 
 had attempted to become the full man of this, and had failed. 
 He, a mere skirmisher on the skirts of life, had sought to enter 
 the ranks of the heavy-armed disciplined army, and had found 
 that he could not wield its weapons or bear its armour or even 
 keep his place in its serried ranks. So, like the wounded deer 
 (his heart must have been wounded), he sought the old covert 
 and lay down and died. 
 
 The world did not miss him; and yet he was the last of a 
 class that made the world more pleasant; and those who knew 
 him in his early days may in vain look round for a successor 
 to him. At first, perhaps, they do so with a kind of regret 
 for did he not give and take much pleasure ? but, as they 
 recollect his fate, and how inevitable that fate was, they must 
 end with the hope that the world the busy, hard-working, 
 use-exacting world may never know another Osmond that 
 he may be " the last of his kind."
 
 The Sussex Regicides and their 
 Contemporaries. 
 
 |F we are to judge by the number of Sussex men, or 
 men from 'Sussex, whose names appear on the 
 High Court of Justice which tried and condemned 
 Charles I. for treason to his people, or even of 
 those whose names are attached to the warrant for his 
 execution, this county took its full share in the guilt or glory 
 of that act. In the Ordinance passed by the House of 
 Commons for the trial of Charles Stewart for a " wicked 
 design totally to subvert the ancient and fundamental laws 
 and liberties of this nation, and in their stead to introduce an 
 arbitrary and tyrannical Government," 131 persons were 
 nominated to sit at Westminster as a High Court of Justice, 
 and of these 131 persons (headed by Fairfax, Cromwell, and 
 Ireton) eleven were Sussex men, some of them members of 
 families which still stand high in the county. Thus we find 
 in the list Peregrine Pelham, Abraham Burrell, Roger Grat wick, 
 Herbert Morley, Anthony Stapley, James Temple, Gregory 
 Norton, John Fagg, William Cawley, William GofFe, and John 
 Downes, all either members of Sussex families or sitting for 
 Sussex Boroughs. The 131 members of the High Court of 
 Justice, as it was called, embraced a large proportion of the 
 then House of Conjmons itself a remnant of the famous 
 " Long Parliament " with a small infusion of the Upper 
 House, which, as a body, had refused to join in the vote for
 
 1 64 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 the trial of the King, and had been then set aside. Of these 
 131 Commissioners, however, a large number shrank from the 
 odium and the risk of such a daring act, and never took their 
 seats at all. Such a defection was provided for by making 
 twenty members of the Commission sufficient to form a Court ; 
 and the prudence of this step was soon seen. At the first 
 meeting of the Court, in the Painted Chamber, there were 
 only 52 members present; on the second occasion, when the 
 Court entered upon its functions when the King was 
 arraigned before it, and when every Commissioner present 
 rose to his name, there were 65 present. Upon this critical 
 occasion there was a considerable defection in the ranks of 
 the Sussex members; but six of them, namely, Peregrine 
 Pelham, Gregory Norton, William Goffe, William Cawley, 
 James Temple, and John Downes, answered to their names, 
 and Anthony Stapley and Herbert Morley joined on future 
 occasions. John Fagg rather assisted, we are told, in making 
 preparations for the trial than attending it as a Judge; and 
 his name does not appear in any of the sittings. 
 
 The highest number that sat on the Court at any time was 
 69. But the number of those who actually signed the warrant 
 for the execution of the King was 59; 44 signing their names 
 at once in the Painted Chamber, and 15 afterwards. These 
 59 were the Regicides: the men who took on themselves the 
 responsibility of an act which struck Europe with dismay and 
 called forth, perhaps, a greater amount of horror than any 
 deed involving the fate of an individual which stands recorded 
 in the history of this country. 
 
 Amongst these 59 Regicides seven Sussex Members are to 
 be found, namely, Peregrine Pelham, Anthony Stapley, James 
 Temple, Gregory Norton, William Cawley, William Goffe, and 
 John Downes. 
 
 As one of forty counties, and that by no means the largest 
 in extent or population, Sussex thus bore its full proportion 
 of responsibility for the execution of Charles the First,
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 1 65 
 
 Public opinion is still divided as to the justice or iniquity, 
 the wisdom or folly, of the act by which Charles was brought 
 to the block. But few, we take it, will now join in the hue 
 and cry raised against his judges after the Restoration, or 
 approve of the ruthlessness with which they were hunted 
 down and handed over some to the executioner, some to the 
 assassin's knife, and some to perpetual banishment from their 
 native country. As the acts and motives of men are weighed 
 in the impartial balance of history, and the consequences of 
 those acts stand out distinctly in relief, very different 
 judgments are pronounced upon them at different periods. 
 Without any desire, therefore, to include the Sussex Regicides 
 among the worthies of their county, they may, at least, in the 
 present day, claim to figure among its remarkable men and to 
 have that veil drawn aside beneath which it has been the 
 fashion to conceal them.* 
 
 The Regicides did not belong to the scum of the land. 
 In social position the majority of them were of the landed 
 gentry class. Indeed, as we read the Sussex records of the 
 struggle between King and Parliament, we are surprised to 
 find how large a section of the upper classes took part with 
 the latter, and how many of them even adhered to the fortunes 
 of Cromwell and the Commonwealth. Among those Sussex 
 Members of the Long Parliament who took the Covenant 
 one of the most decisive acts of resistance to the King or 
 were in the military or civil service of the Parliament were 
 a Pelham, a Shelley, a Stapley, a Temple, a Morley, a Parker, 
 an Onslow, a Goodwin, a Selden, a Gratwick, a Middleton, a 
 Courthope, a Fagg, a Gerrard, an Apsley, a Hay, a Baker, a 
 Marlott, a Springett, an Eversfield, a Trevor, a Boord, and a 
 Challoner. These, with others of the same rank, were a fair 
 representation of the gentry and richer burgesses of the 
 county. On the other side were the Gorings, the Lewkners, 
 the Alfords, the Lunsfords, the Coverts, the Bisshopps, the 
 
 * Not one of the Regicides finds a place in Lower's " Worthies of Sussex," although 
 Jack Cade stands among them !
 
 1 66 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Bowyers, the Culpeppers, the Fords, the Morleys (a different 
 branch from that of Colonel Herbert Morley, of Glynde), the 
 Sackvilles, the Howards, the Ashburnhams, the Carylls, and 
 the Campions. 
 
 As early as 1642 Sussex had sent up a petition praying 
 " for a thorough reform of religion." The middle-classes of 
 the county now coming to the front were decidedly with 
 the Parliament; Rush worth remarking of Sussex, as of other 
 counties in the south and east of England, that, though many 
 of the chief gentry were for the King, " Yet the freeholders 
 and yeomen being generally on the other side, as oft as they 
 (the chief gentry) attempted to show themselves, they were 
 crushed, and their endeavours defeated." For "chief gentry" 
 we might, perhaps, more correctly read " nobility " in the 
 above quotation.* The majority of the gentry, as also the 
 great body of yeomanry and townsmen, were with the 
 Parliament. Many, doubtless, like the Pelhams, the Gratwicks, 
 and the Eversfields, fell off from the popular cause as it partook 
 more of a Republican character. But others, like Col. Herbert 
 Morley, Sir John Trevor (who married Hampden's daughter), 
 Herbert Springett, Sir Gregory Norton, Anthony Stapley, and 
 Sir John Fagg, adhered to it to the last, and it is in the ranks 
 of these men that we must look for those who sat on the High 
 Court of Justice, and, still more, who signed the death-warrant 
 of Charles the First. 
 
 Perhaps the most prominent and active man on the 
 Parliamentary side in Sussex was Col. Herbert Morley, of 
 Glynde, and Member for Lewes and the county of Sussex. 
 Of a good family and large possessions, he was one of the 
 first to accept a Commission from the Parliament and to raise 
 a regiment in Sussex; he aided Waller in the capture of 
 Arundel and Chichester, and maintained the military 
 supremacy both of the Parliament and of the Commonwealth 
 in Sussex up to the era of the Restoration. Twice he was 
 
 * In the first Royal array there were only two Sussex names: Col. Ashburnham 
 and Capt. Ford.
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 167 
 
 nearly performing very memorable deeds. It was his soldiers 
 who stopped and questioned Charles the znd when that Prince 
 was on his flight from Worcester to Brighthelmstone a danger 
 from which the ready wit of the King assisted to deliver him 
 and Evelyn, his old schoolfellow and his friend to the 
 last, thinks Morley might, with a little more decision, have 
 anticipated the part of Monk in the restoration of Charles II., 
 or spoilt that General's game, if he had been so minded. 
 But, though an honourable and a consistent man, and a steady 
 friend to liberty probably because he was such Morley 
 shrank from extreme courses, and thus, though he was 
 appointed one of the High Court of Justice and attended 
 three of its sittings, he did not sign the warrant of execution. 
 It has also been surmised that he favoured the escape of 
 Charles II. from his soldiers. So, at the Restoration, he was 
 leniently dealt with, and got off with a fine of /^i,ooo. He 
 died in peaceable possession of his Sussex estates and lies 
 buried in Glynde Church. 
 
 Abraham Burrell and Roger Gratwick (Member for 
 Hastings) never attended the High Court of Justice at all, 
 though nominated on it, and, therefore, may be concluded to 
 have disapproved of it. 
 
 We now come to the Regicides Proper to those men who 
 did not shrink from putting their hands to that deed which 
 stands out so prominently in the history of England nay, of 
 Europe and which, they well knew, sealed their fate if the 
 tide of fortune ever turned against their cause. Both the 
 gentry and the burgess class were represented amongst these 
 men. To the former belonged Anthony Stapley and James 
 Temple, Peregrine Pelham and Gregory Norton, and to the 
 latter William Goffe, William Cawley, and John Downes. 
 
 William Cawley has many titles to be placed at the head 
 of the Sussex Regicides, whether they be looked upon with a 
 favourable or unfavourable eye. He belonged to the burgess 
 class. His father, John Cawley, was a brewer of Chichester, 
 was thrice Mayor, and his monument and effigy are still to be
 
 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 seen in St. Andrew's Church of that city. His son and heir, 
 William Cawley, who was born in 1602 (his father died in 1621) 
 was, there is no doubt, the most popular and influential man 
 of his day in Chichester. He sat both for Midhurst and 
 Chichester in Parliament, and his name appears as taking the 
 Covenant on the same day (June 6, 1633) as his fellow- 
 Sussexian, John Selden, and a still more famous man, Oliver 
 Cromwell. He was appointed by the House as one of the 
 Commissioners " for demolishing superstitious pictures and 
 monuments" in London, and he was selected to return thanks 
 to the Divines who preached before Parliament on August 28, 
 1644 a fast day "for their pains in their sermons." At a 
 later date he was empowered to pay to "three able preaching 
 ministers" in Chichester 100 a year each out of the estates 
 of the Dean and Chapter. In all probability he was, like 
 Cromwell, with whom he is said to have been on terms of 
 close friendship, an Independent in religion ; and, when war 
 broke out between King and Parliament, he, like Cromwell, 
 joined the army and received a Commission, though we hear 
 nothing of him in a military way. But he was active and 
 zealous in other directions. In 1642, when the Royalists of 
 Chichester rose and wrested the city from the newly-appointed 
 Parliamentary Mayor, imprisoning some of the train-band, 
 with an intention to make Chichester the rallying-point of 
 their cause in Sussex, it was Cawley who sent intelligence of 
 their doings to Colonel Morley, then in attendance on 
 Parliament, in London, and this led to the successful 
 expedition into Sussex of Sir William Waller, who, having 
 taken Arundel (the first time) by a coup de main, proceeded to 
 besiege Chichester, and captured the city after a not very 
 vigorous resistance by the Royalists of eight days. The fact 
 was, as Clarendon confesses, the Royal cause was unpopular 
 with "the common people of the county," and, to use his 
 own words, "their (the Royalists) number of common men 
 was so small that the constant duty was performed by the 
 officers and gentlemen of quality, who were absolutely tired 
 out." From this moment up to the Restoration William
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 169 
 
 Cawley's influence in Chichester was paramount, and it was 
 exerted steadily, first for the Parliament and then for the 
 Protector. Once, indeed, in 1647, he had occasion to ask for 
 military assistance, and Sir Arthur Haselrig, who had taken 
 part in the siege and capture of the city in 1642, was sent 
 down to him. But, on the whole, Sussex was staunch for the 
 Commonwealth, and gave little trouble to the Protector. 
 William Cawley was much trusted by the latter. He was 
 appointed one of the Council of State in 1650-1; he 
 acquiesced in the assumption by Cromwell of the Sovereign 
 power, and the Protector made him one of his Commissioners 
 for the county of Sussex. His name also appears with those 
 of Sir T. Pelham, Anthony Stapley, Colonel Morley, John 
 Downes, James Temple, &c., as one of the Sequestrators for 
 Sussex. The Chichester brewer was, without doubt, all- 
 powerful in that city during the Protectorate, and such was 
 the estimation in which Cawley was held in his native city 
 that he was one of the few Regicides able to obtain a seat in 
 the Convention Parliament called to smoothe the return of 
 the Stuarts. But the tide was now running strongly towards 
 Monarchy, and against the recent upholders of a Republic. 
 Cawley had to conceal himself; and being absolutely excepted, 
 with the other Regicides, from pardon both as to life and 
 estate, he fled first to France, and thence to Geneva and 
 Lausanne, where, under the protection of the Lords of Berne, 
 he passed the remainder of his days in, as Noble observes, 
 " the constant fear of detection, the loss of all society with 
 those he loved, and with a scanty income." " He and some 
 others implicated with him," continues the historian of the 
 Regicides, "lived as if they wished to be forgotten even 
 whilst on earth, and were spectators, as it were, of being cut 
 off from the land of the living. A more melancholy situation 
 cannot be conceived by the mind of man." 
 
 Bad enough, no doubt; but, most certainly, there are many 
 infinitely worse situations. For these men did not hold them- 
 selves to be criminals, but rather martyrs for what they looked
 
 1 70 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 upon as a great and holy cause; and some of them, at least, 
 lived to see the principles they had espoused brought to a 
 successful issue in the Revolution which placed William of 
 Orange on the Throne by a Parliamentary title.* This 
 Revolution, however, though it could not fail to bring consola- 
 tion to such of the judges of Charles I. as still lived, did not 
 better their condition. Macaulay tells us how one of them, 
 Edmund Ludlow, who, like Cawley, had found a refuge in 
 Switzerland and escaped the assassins by whom another of 
 Cawley's companions, John Lisle, fell, made the experiment 
 of the public feeling towards the Regicides in 1689 the year 
 following the Revolution by coming over to England, and 
 with what result. He was compelled to make a speedy flight 
 to his old asylum on the banks of the lake of Geneva, and 
 there, in the churchyard of Vevay, he lies buried. 
 
 William Cawley" is characterised by Ludlow as " an able 
 and ancient Member of Parliament." He was certainly a 
 consistent politician, and, it would also seem, a charitable and 
 pious man, for he founded and endowed a hospital for ten 
 poor persons in his native city, and had a Chapel erected in 
 it and duly consecrated. The hospital still stands, but is now 
 converted to the use of a Workhouse. A portrait of its 
 founder, at the age of 18, is still preserved there, and the 
 house which he occupied in that part of Chichester called the 
 Pallant is to this day called " Cawley Priory." It is a proof 
 of Cawley's sagacity and insight into the character of men 
 that he alone opposed the proposition to give Colonel Monk, 
 when a prisoner as a Royalist in the Tower, a Commission in 
 the Parliamentary Army. 
 
 Cawley left a son, who, in 1660, petitioned for himself and 
 wife to have the estate of his late father restored to him, on 
 
 * Macaulay says, " The leaders of the Roundhead party in 1642 and the statesmen 
 who, about half a century later, effected the Revolution, had exactly the same object in 
 view. That object was to terminate the contest between the Crown and the Parliament, 
 by giving to the Parliament a supreme control over the executive administration. The 
 statesmen of the Revolution effected this indirectly by changing the dynasty. The 
 Roundheads of 1642, being unable to change the dynasty, were compelled to take a 
 direct course towards their end."
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 171 
 
 the grounds that most of it had been settled on him at his 
 marriage, and that his wife's father had been sequestrated for 
 loyalty, and himself threatened with disinheritance because 
 he, with tears and prayers, attempted to dissuade his father 
 from " entering the detestable plot " (the King's trial). Of 
 Cawley's wife all we learn is from a letter written by one 
 Robert Johnson, and dated Jan. 7, 1663, stating that " Mrs. 
 Cawley, whose husband was one of the King's judges, and is 
 not yet discovered, lodges at her brother's in Red Cross-street, 
 London, and is intimate with the wives of Ludlow, GofFe, and 
 Whalley." So that at this time at least these unfortunate men 
 were alone in their hiding-places; and it is very doubtful if 
 Cawley ever saw his wife again. John Lisle, his companion, 
 we know, did not; for his wife, Dame Alice Lisle, remaining 
 in England, was sentenced to death by the infamous Jefferies, 
 and cruelly executed murdered for concealing in her house 
 some of the unfortunate fugitives from Sedgmoor. 
 
 Cawley's property, including some land at Rumboldswyke, 
 near Chichester, still known (says Mr. Blaauw) as " Cawley's 
 Lane," was granted to the Duke of York afterwards James 
 II., and who, by another turn of fortune, had to taste, in his 
 turn, the bitterness of exile, and died, like Cawley, in a foreign 
 land. 
 
 John Downes, Member for Arundel, sat by the side of 
 William Cawley during the whole of the King's trial, and 
 voted and signed the death-warrant with him. He was 
 evidently closely connected with the Cawley family, for, in a 
 petition to Charles II. from Henry, Bishop of Chichester, the 
 Bishop states that since April, 1643, he has been deprived of 
 his whole estate, the chief actor being Henry Cawley (a 
 brother, perhaps, of William) and John Downes. The latter 
 is described by Noble as a Londoner of mean family, which, 
 very likely, he may have been, but his connection with the 
 Cawleys and with Chichester and Arundel would lead to the 
 assumption that he came of a Sussex stock. Certainly he 
 was a Sussex Member, and as such sat on the High Court of
 
 172 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Justice and signed the death-warrant. His name, like those 
 of other Regicides, was excepted from pardon, and, giving 
 himself up, he was tried in October, 1660, and condemned to 
 death, but pleaded so hard for his life that he was reprieved, 
 and died in prison. 
 
 Anthony Stapley was a Sussex man tout pur, and belonged 
 to the landed gentry class. He was the son of Anthony 
 Stapley, of Framfield, by a daughter of another Sussex family, 
 the Thatchers. He is sometimes described as of Patcham 
 (near Brighton), to which place the family removed from 
 Framfield between 1620 and 1630. Another branch of the 
 Stapleys was settled at Hickstead Place, Twineham, and the 
 diaries left by some of its members have been alieady referred 
 to in this volume. But the Twineham Stapleys inclined to the 
 Royal cause. Anthony Stapley, of Framfield and Patcham, 
 early took sides with the opponents of the King in the Long 
 Parliament; refused to contribute to the war against the Scots ; 
 and, on the breaking out of hostilities, received a colonel's 
 commission in the Parliamentary army. His standing in Sussex 
 must have been high, for he was returned both for Lewes (with 
 Herbert Morley) and for the county, and elected to sit (in the 
 Long Parliament) for the latter. Appointed one of the High 
 Court of Justice, he attended nearly all its sittings, and signed 
 the death-warrant. He was appointed on the Councils of 
 State that preceded the Protectorate in 1649-50-53, and was 
 for some time Governor of Chichester. His wife was a 
 Goring a sister of that Goring Earl of Norwich who took 
 so active a part for the Royal cause. Dying before the 
 Restoration, he escaped both the fate of the other Regicides 
 and the shame that the conduct of his two sons would doubt- 
 less have caused him. Both these young men, John, the eldest, 
 and Anthony, had tendered their service to the Protector and 
 were put by him on the Commission of Sussex. But in 1658 
 they engaged in a plot (referred to, but very cautiously, in the 
 diary of Anthony Stapley, of Hickstead Place), with the 
 Marquis of Ormond, for the restoration of Charles II. The
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 173 
 
 plan was, that the King should land on the Sussex coast, and 
 that that county, and Kent and Surrey, should rise and march 
 upon London, and six blank commissions were received by 
 John Stapley to fill up and distribute as he pleased. But, 
 whilst this plot was going on, Cromwell's Secretary of State, 
 Thurloe, was kept informed of every step of it, and at the 
 very moment when the parties to the plot thought all was ripe 
 for action, and the Marquis of Ormond had crossed over to 
 France to persuade Charles to make a landing, the bubble 
 burst and the Stapleys were arrested John at Whitehall, 
 where he was in personal attendance upon Cromwell. Nothing 
 could then exceed the baseness of these brothers. Anthony 
 was a witness against John, and John, to save his life, gave 
 such evidence as ensured the conviction and execution of his 
 chief confederates, Sir Harry Slingsby (the head of an ancient 
 Yorkshire family) and Dr. John Hewitt, of Norfolk. Not 
 only did John Stapley betray his friends to death, but he wrote 
 a pitiful letter to Cromwell. "For the future," he said, "I do 
 promise, by the assistance of the Almighty, I will not only 
 live peaceably, but will, with the utmost of my endeavours, 
 stand by your Highness with life and fortune, to preserve your 
 Highness's person, interest, and dignity, and if ever Charles 
 Stewart should in my dayes make any attempt against your 
 present Government, I will personally appear against him, 
 though it be but in the capacity of a private trooper, if I may 
 not be intrusted by your Highness, or your successors, with 
 better preferment." Cromwell granted the traitor his life; 
 but, we may be sure, gave him no " better preferment." At 
 the Restoration, however, he met with better luck. Not only 
 was the paternal estate at Patcham, which had been forfeited 
 by the attainder of his father, restored to him, but he was 
 first knighted and then created a Baronet by Charles II., and, 
 to borrow the words of Mr. W. H. Blaauw, in his " Passages 
 of the Civil War in Sussex" "Sir John Stapley, Baronet, 
 lived to a good old age, very loyal, and very well satisfied to 
 have expiated the sins of his regicide father by such prosperous 
 loyalty." It was fortunate for him that the letter he had
 
 1 74 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 written to Cromwell was not discovered till later days. His 
 wife was a daughter of Sir Herbert Springett, of Broyle Place, 
 Ringmer, and he left four children, who, we are told, all 
 married well. So treachery, it would seem, sometimes does 
 prosper! 
 
 Peregrine Pelham, like Anthony Stapley, belonged to the 
 class of landed gentry. He was a scion of the great Pelham 
 family, several of which sat in the Long Parliament, and took 
 part with the great leaders of liberty, Eliot, Pym, Hollis, and 
 Hampden; but he was the only one who followed the cause 
 to the "bitter end," and sat on the High Court of Justice. 
 He was absent from only one of its sittings, and signed the 
 warrant of execution. But little is known of him personally, 
 though he was a man of family, fashion, and fortune, 
 descending from that Sir William Pelham who was Lord 
 Deputy of Ireland in the reign of Elizabeth, and being one 
 of the Commissioners for conserving the peace between 
 England and Scotland in 1646. Fortunately for him, he died 
 previous to the Restoration, but his name was inserted in the 
 exception clause of the Bill of Indemnity. 
 
 Sir Gregory Norton, Bart., was another of the Regicides 
 residing in and connected with Sussex, though he came 
 originally from Hants. He sat for Midhurst in the Long 
 Parliament, and his name appears on nearly all the sittings of 
 the High Court and on the warrant of execution. Noble, in 
 his History of the Regicides, accuses him of being actuated 
 by sordid motives doubtless from the fact that he bought a 
 portion of the furniture of Richmond Palace at a low price; 
 but Noble never fails to put the worst construction on the acts 
 and motives of the men whose lives he attempts, from very 
 imperfect materials, to chronicle. Sir Gregory Norton died 
 before the Restoration. His name was attainted and his 
 property escheated to the Crown. 
 
 James Temple sat for Bramber in the Long Parliament, 
 and, like so many of its younger and more active members, 
 became a Colonel of the Parliamentary army. Though a
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 175 
 
 member of a noble family, several of which took part with 
 the King, he, like Peregrine Pelham, steadily adhered to the 
 popular cause, and being put on the High Court was present 
 at all its sittings and signed the warrant of execution. When 
 the Regicides were excepted from the Bill of Indemnity, 
 James Temple surrendered himself and was tried at the Old 
 Bailey, October 16, 1660. At first he pleaded "Not Guilty," 
 but eventually acknowledged his crime and begged for mercy. 
 He was sentenced to death, but was not executed, and is 
 supposed to have died in the Tower. His relation, Peter 
 Temple, who served, it is said, an apprenticeship to a London 
 draper, but who sat in the Long Parliament, served as a 
 Captain in the army, sat on the King's trial, and signed the 
 death-warrant, shared the fate of the Member for Bramber. 
 He was sentenced to death, but died in prison. 
 
 William Goffe was a man springing from another class. 
 He was a son of the Rev. Stephen Goffe, the Puritan Rector 
 of Stanmer, Sussex, and, it is clear, imbibed the rigid principles 
 of his father. His original vocation was that of a dry-salter 
 in London, but, on the breaking out of the war between King 
 and Parliament, he left trade and became a soldier, and was 
 doubtless a brave and able one, for he rose to the rank of 
 Major-General, and was one of the officers most trusted by 
 Cromwell, and who adhered faithfully to his fortunes and those 
 of his son. His name occurs frequently in the long struggle 
 between the Royalists and Cavaliers, and he was sent into 
 Sussex by Cromwell, in 1665, to report on the state of feeling 
 in that county, writing frequently to Thurloe, Cromwell's 
 Secretary, on the reception he met with from Morley, Fagg, 
 &c. He married a daughter of his fellow-Regicide, General 
 Whalley. He sat on the High Court of Justice (though not 
 as a Sussex Member), and signed the death-warrant. When 
 Cromwell resuscitated the Upper House, General William 
 Goffe was named as one of the new Lords, and was a person 
 of weight and authority until the return of the Stewarts. He 
 then fled, with his father-in-law, Whalley, to North America,
 
 176 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 where Noble represents them to have spent " 40 years of as 
 great misery and wretchedness as can be paralleled." In a 
 very maudlin strain, Noble proceeds: "Dreadful as their sin 
 had been, none can read their sufferings without commisera- 
 tion, and the endearing softness the firm yet gentle constancy 
 of his amiable wife to her parent and her husband, in their 
 years of captivity, must melt any heart that is not impenetrable 
 to pity, and ought to be a lesson written in brass to deter men 
 from enormous vices that have only the wretched alternative 
 of a painful and ignominious death or a life of infamy, dread, 
 and misery, separated from all those connections that render 
 existence desirable, that here have no hopes, that hereafter 
 can have no prospect but of still greater infliction, unless 
 their crimes are redeemed with the severest and sincerest 
 repentance." 
 
 Modern history looks at what Noble calls " the enormous 
 vices" of Goffe and Whalley that is, their opposition to and 
 punishment of regal tyranny in a different spirit from his: 
 and, whether we approve or disapprove of some of their acts, 
 it is not as men expiating infamous lives that we contemplate 
 them in the forests of North America or their hiding-places 
 in Holland and Switzerland, but rather as political martyrs 
 the victims of their efforts to carry out principles in advance 
 of their day, but which are recognised in the present age as 
 constituting the very basis of our liberty and our national 
 greatness. The tribute to the "gentle constancy" of Goffe' s 
 wife and Whalley's daughter is in better taste; and we shall 
 see by-and-bye that there were other women of the Puritan 
 class who could bring to their cause as many feminine virtues 
 as any Royalist could claim for his. The real life of Goffe 
 and Whalley in North America is not to be found in Noble. 
 Hardships, doubtless, they endured, like other early emigrants 
 to those Colonies like the Pilgrim Fathers themselves. But 
 they had their freedom of thought and action; and doubtless 
 in that, and in the knowledge of the ultimate overthrow of 
 the Stewarts and their despotic notions of government, they 
 found some solace for the privations which they had to endure.
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 177 
 
 We have exhausted the list of the Sussex Regicides proper. 
 Of those Sussex men who sat on the High Court of Justice, 
 but did not sign the death-warrant, Herbert Morley and John 
 Fagg were the most prominent. We have already spoken of 
 the former. After the death of Cromwell, he was one of the 
 most influential officers of the army which held the fate of 
 the kingdom in its hands. His services to the popular cause 
 during the previous conflict with the King had been great; 
 he was the first to form a regiment in Sussex, doubtless 
 out of his own tenants at Glynde and his friends and his 
 constituents at Lewes, of which he was the Member in the 
 Long Parliament, and he rendered valuable service to Sir W. 
 Waller in the siege and capture both of Arundel and of 
 Chichester. In 1643, he beat back the forces of Lord Hopton, 
 who was laying siege to Lewes, and preserved that town to 
 the Parliamentary cause. He assisted his fellow-Sussexian, 
 Col. Norton, at the siege of Basing House, and, as we know 
 by an interesting correspondence between himself and SirW. 
 Campion, he was with Fairfax when that General took Borstall 
 House, of which Campion was the Governor. His treatment 
 of Campion's young wife was most honourable to him, and, 
 indeed, in every passage of his life he always behaved like a 
 soldier and a gentleman. He sat three days on the High 
 Court of Justice, but refused to sign the death-warrant, and 
 in the ensuing Protectorate he was somewhat of a malcontent, 
 and retired from active life to his house at Glynde. 
 
 Writing from Lewes, to Thurloe, in November, 1655, 
 General Goffe, Col. Morley's old fellow-soldier, says, "I intend 
 (if the Lord please) to give Colonel Morley a kind visit this 
 day, his house being within two or three miles. I hope such a 
 civility, whatever he thinkes of my business, will doe no hurt." 
 It appears that Morley told Goffe he would assist him in any 
 matter as a Justice of the Peace, but hinted that in any other 
 things he wished not his name to appear. Col. Morley was 
 returned for Sussex, and also for Rye, in the Parliament which 
 Cromwell called in September, 1654, and which, after it had 
 resolved, by 200 to 60, not to make the Protectorate hereditary, 
 N
 
 178 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 was dissolved on July 22, 1655. He was also again elected 
 for the county and for Lewes in the Parliament of September, 
 1656, and which, refusing to recognise the "other House," 
 was dissolved by the Protector in February, 1658. It was the 
 last Parliament called by Cromwell, who died in September, 
 
 1658. Again, in Richard Cromwell's Parliament, of January, 
 
 1659, Col. Morley was returned both for the county and for 
 Lewes, and, on its dissolution, and the revival of "the Rump," 
 that is, the remains of the Long Parliament he acted as 
 the champion of that resuscitation of the more moderate party, 
 now verging towards Royalism, and, when the Rump was 
 violently dispersed by General Lambert in the interests of the 
 more extreme party in the Army, Col. Morley and Sir Arthur 
 Haselrig, who, with three others, had been appointed to 
 organise the Army, in order to guard against Lambert's 
 violence, restored it (December 26, 1659),* and, at this stage 
 of affairs, he seemed to hold, and perhaps for a few days did 
 hold, the fate of the country in his hands. He was appointed 
 Lieutenant of the Tower, which gave him the command to a 
 great degree of London, and Evelyn, his old school-fellow, 
 believed he might, if he had chosen, at this period have played 
 the part of Monk. " I went this afternoon," writes Evelyn, 
 on January 22, 1660, "to visit Col. Morley. After dinner, I 
 discoursed with him ; but he was jealous, and would not believe 
 that Monk came to do the King any service. I told him he 
 might do it without him, and have all the honour. He was still 
 doubtful, and would resolve on nothing yet, so I took leave." 
 
 It is probable that Morley shrank from betraying the men 
 with whom he had been associated all his life.f And whilst 
 
 * Whitelock says Haselrig, Walton, and Morley came into the House in their riding 
 habits, and Haselrig was very jocund and high. They all received the public thanks of 
 the House, and its cordial approval of their conduct. 
 
 t Ludlow characterises Morley as "of a temporising spirit," which, in a resolute 
 Republican like Ludlow, meant, perhaps, a man of moderate opinions. Ludlow owed 
 his escape at the Restoration to Colonel Herbert Morley. After a period of hazardous 
 concealment in London, he made his way to Lewes, where an open vessel was waiting 
 for him, but from which, on its passage down the Ouse the wind blowing hard he 
 removed to another which had just returned from conveying over Richard Cromwell, 
 ex-Protector, to France. The change of vessels was a most fortunate one for him, for 
 the one he had just quitted was searched soon afterwards for fugitives, whilst the one 
 he was in escaped suspicion because it had stranded ; and getting off the next morning 
 it got safely to Dieppe, whence Ludlow hastened to Switzerland and joined Cawley.
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 179 
 
 he hesitated Monk was acting. This General had come up 
 to London from the North on February 3, 1660, and Morley, 
 with whom he was joined in the control of the Army, being 
 unable to penetrate his intentions, broke off his correspon- 
 dence with Evelyn, and inclined to the party of the Common- 
 wealth. Ludlow, a thorough Republican, assured of his 
 support, proposed that 2,000 soldiers " should be ordered 
 to march to the Tower, to join with Colonel Morley's 
 regiment, which was already there and would be ready to 
 receive them ; " adding, " he (Morley) having sent to me to 
 let me know that the Tower should be at my command 
 whensoever I please to desire it." Yet, at this very time, 
 Whitelock declares that "Col. Morley, Lieutenant of the 
 Tower, concurred with Monk," so that both sides believed 
 that he inclined to them, the truth being, perhaps, that he, 
 like many an honourable man at that time and since, felt it 
 impossible to approve altogether of either party, and would, 
 if he could, have adopted a middle course. But that was 
 impossible. The current was always running too violently in 
 this or in that direction now against and now in favour of 
 Monarchy. At this moment, when Morley hesitated, it was 
 running in favour of the King, and Monk took it at its flow, 
 and, by one bold stroke, handed the country over to the 
 Royalists. There was no longer a choice for Colonel Morley. 
 He did not even attempt resistance, like his old companion 
 in arms, Col. Cockeram, whose regiment rose in mutiny at 
 Gravesend, and had to be put down by Monk's troops. He 
 submitted, gave up the Tower, and in the ensuing May 
 besought the intercession of his old school-fellow for his 
 life. " Came to me," writes Evelyn, " Colonel Morley, about 
 procuring his pardon, now too late seeing his error, and 
 neglect of the counsel I gave him, by which, if he had taken 
 it, he had certainly done the same work with the same ease 
 that Monk did it, who was then in Scotland, and Morley in a 
 post to have done what he pleased, but his jealousie and feare 
 kept him from that blessing and honour. I addressed him 
 to Lord Mordaunt, then in great favour, for his pardon, which
 
 1 80 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 he obtained at the cost of 1,000, as I heard. O the sottish 
 omission of this gentleman ! what did I not undergo of 
 danger in this negotiation, to have brought him over to his 
 Majesty's interest, when it was entirely in his hands ! " 
 
 Yet it may well be doubted, with all due deference to 
 Evelyn, whether the part taken by Col. Morley was not more 
 honourable than that of Monk. He at least did not buy rank 
 and wealth at the price of his colleagues' lives and the risk of 
 his country's liberties. 
 
 Having procured his pardon, Morley retired to Glynde, 
 and there ended his days peaceably in 1667, dying in the sznd 
 year of his age, and being interred in the Parish Church. 
 His only son had married a daughter of Sir John Trevor, a 
 grand-daughter of Hampden, and by this alliance the Glynde 
 estate came to the Trevors, and, through them, to its pre- 
 sent holder, Sir Henry Brand, Speaker of the House of 
 Commons. Sir John Trevor himself, it may be added, who 
 married Hampden's daughter, Ruth, supported both Oliver 
 and Richard to the last, but was, in spite of this, taken into 
 favour by Charles, and sent as Ambassador to France in 1667. 
 
 John Fagg, though not so active a soldier as Col. Morley, 
 ran, in many respects, a parallel course with him. They were, 
 indeed, closely connected, Fagg marrying Morley's sister, 
 Mary. He represented Rye, of which he was a native, in the 
 Long Parliament; received a Colonel's commission in the 
 Parliamentary Army ; and sat on the High Court of Justice, 
 but rather assisted in making preparations for the trial than 
 acted as a Judge; above all, he did not sign the death-warrant. 
 He was made one of the Commissioners for Sussex by 
 Cromwell, but does not appear to have been a zealous 
 supporter of the Protector, for Gen. Goffe, writing fr.om 
 Lewes to Secretary Thurloe, on Nov. 7, 1655, tells him that 
 he had not put in Mr. Fagg's name, " as he appeared gracious 
 with disaffected men, and would not stir a hair's breadth 
 without Col. Morley." And in the following year (1656) he 
 was precluded from sitting in the Parliament then summoned
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 1 8 1 
 
 by Cromwell, as not approved by the Protector's Council. At 
 the death of Cromwell he, like Col. Morley, came again to 
 the front. He was put in command of the Sussex Militia by 
 the Council of State, directed to secure Chichester and 
 Arundel, and to hold correspondence with the forces in 
 Surrey, Kent, and Wilts. During the struggle between the 
 Presbyterian party in the Rump and Lambert at the head of 
 the Republicans, Fagg was made Governor of Portsmouth, 
 and, probably, his acquiescence in Monk's plans for the 
 Restoration obtained for him that immunity which he subse- 
 quently enjoyed for the past, and even favour in the future; 
 for he was made first a Knight and then a Baronet by Charles 
 II., and was secured in all his possessions. Amongst these 
 was Wiston House, the old residence of the Shirleys, in 
 West Sussex, which the father of "the three Shirleys" had 
 been compelled to sell from poverty, and which Dr. Thomas 
 Shirley, a descendant, attempted to recover by law from 
 Sir John Fagg, but failed, and was unlucky enough to be 
 committed for breach of privilege in proceeding against 
 the new Courtier and old Republican, Sir John. We are 
 told that Sir John Fagg had a family of 16 children; but the 
 male line seems soon to have failed, and Wiston passed, by 
 the marriage, in 1743, of the heiress, Elizabeth Fagg, to Sir 
 Charles Matthews Goring, to the Gorings. The name of 
 Fagg is not now to be found amongst the gentry of Sussex, 
 any more than are those of Culpepper, Challoner, Covert, 
 Caryll, Springet, Boord, and a score more of once familiar 
 Sussex names. 
 
 The close connection of Sir John Trevor, and, through 
 him, of Col. Morley and Sir John Fagg with the great 
 patriot, John Hampden, explains to some extent the support 
 they gave to the Parliamentary cause, and, though not in the 
 same degree, to the Protectorate. Hampden himself, it will 
 be borne in mind, was a cousin of Cromwell, and so Cromwell 
 was connected by family ties as well as political sympathies 
 with these leading men of Sussex. The blood of Cromwell 
 and of Hampden still flows in Sussex veins.
 
 1 82 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 We have named the Springets as one of our extinct Sussex 
 families. Their seat was Broyle Place, Ringmer, near Lewes, 
 and here we have an instance, amongst many others, of the 
 extent to which the rigid opinions of the Puritans had 
 penetrated the ranks of the English gentry as well as of the 
 bourgeois and yeoman class in the earlier part of the iyth 
 century. One of the brothers of Sir Thomas Springet in the 
 first Charles's day was a lawyer, but very strict in religion, 
 and dying early of consumption, his widow (a sister of Sir 
 E. Partridge, of Kent) brought up his son in the father's 
 principles, sending him to Cambridge to " a Puritan College 
 called St. Katherine's Hall, for he declined Bishops and 
 Common Prayer very early." At home he was not less 
 carefully looked after, his mother having a "Minister" to 
 preach thrice a week to her friends and spending half her 
 fortune in daily compounding and dispensing medicines to 
 the poor. All these particulars we learn from the lady whom 
 young William Springet married at the early age of 20, in Kent 
 " without a ring," as she tell us, " and many of their formal 
 dark words left out." She was a daughter of Sir John 
 Proude, Knight ; and she is worthy to take her place by the 
 side of Lucy Hutchinson and with the daughter of Whalley 
 and wife of Goffe for the devoted affection she showed to her 
 husband and for her constancy to the principles in which it 
 is evident she, like her husband, had been brought up in one 
 of those " God-fearing households " then so common in 
 England. On a son being born to them, her husband, she 
 tells us, carried the child five miles off in order to avoid 
 baptism in a Church, and to obtain it from the chosen hands 
 of Master Wilson, of Otham, one of the Orthodox Divines 
 of Kent. 
 
 On the breaking-out of hostilities between King and 
 Parliament, the young Sussex Puritan was not long in choosing 
 sides. He took the Covenant and received a commission to 
 raise a regiment of horse. He must have done his work 
 promptly, for he was soon at the head of 800 horse and was 
 employed with it in suppressing a Royalist rising in the vale
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 1 83 
 
 of Kent, and afterwards, in Surrey, besieged and took Lord 
 Craven's house, fought at Edgehill, and was wounded at 
 Newbury, for which and other services he was thanked by 
 Parliament. He is supposed to have been early knighted by 
 Essex, for, in a despatch from Arundel, Sir William Waller 
 entitles him " Sir William." It was here at Arundel that 
 his short career (he was but 22 years of age) was brought to 
 a close. After the capture of the place by Waller, the custody 
 of the Castle was committed to Sir William Springet and to 
 Colonel Morley. Soon afterwards the garrison was attacked 
 by a fatal sickness called calenture, or sun-fever, brought on 
 by exposure to unwholesome night air,* and Col. Springet 
 was one of the sufferers. His wife, then in London, was sent 
 for, and, though far advanced in pregnancy, she immediately 
 set out. The reputation of the Sussex roads in those days, 
 and for many a long year afterwards, was very bad, and it was 
 with great difficulty that Lady Springet succeeded in hiring a 
 coach, at a very high price. She took a physician with her, 
 and her husband's messenger escorted her on horseback. 
 But the frost, which had been so useful in the siege of 
 Arundel, was now broken up, and the poor lady was " forced 
 to row in the highways in a boat, and take the things in the 
 coach with her, and the horses to be led with strings tied to 
 their bridles, and to swim the coach and horses in the high- 
 ways." She was afterwards " benighted and overthrown in 
 the dark into a hedge," close to a very deep precipice. The 
 colonel of a garrison which she passed invited her to stop 
 for repose, but she gallantly says, " I was resolved not to go 
 out of the coach, unless it broke, until I came so near the 
 house that I could compass it on foot. . . . When we 
 came to Arundel we met with a most dismal sight, the town 
 
 In the delirium peculiar to this fever, says Mr. Blaauw, "surrounding objects 
 assumed the aspect of verdant meadows to the eyes of the sufferer, who, when at sea, 
 would madly throw himself into it, as if seeking the refreshment of a cool walk on 
 land." Dryden and Swift have made fine poetical use of this delusion. Probably 
 Falstaff died of it, for Mrs. Quickly, describing his last symptoms, after lamenting that 
 he was " so shaked of a burning quotidian tertian," as Springet also was, says : " After 
 I saw him fumble with the sheets and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers* 
 ends, I knew there was but one way, for his nose was sharp as a pen, and 'a babbled 
 of green fields." Hen. V., Act, a.
 
 1 84 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 being depopulated, all the windows being broken with the 
 great guns, and the soldiers making stables of all the shops 
 and lower rooms." After passing through the dreary town, 
 she was at last obliged to fulfil her resolution of walking, for, 
 within a quarter of a mile of her husband's residence, " the 
 horses came to a stand, the wheel of the coach being pitched 
 in the root of a tree." This unexpected arrival at midnight 
 did not allay the feverish excitement of the overjoyed husband, 
 who had been now sleepless for five days. When his friends 
 insisted upon quiet, he had covenanted with them for the 
 liberty " to shoot birds with his cross-bow out of window, 
 which he did till the fever took his head." . . "He was 
 an artist in shooting and fishing," and had been employed 
 from his boyhood with horses, dogs, guns, cross-bows, bullets, 
 feathering arrows, and, a curious amusement, " pulling his 
 watch to pieces." 
 
 The devoted wife now watched him incessantly for two 
 more days of ebbing life, hanging upon his parched lips, to 
 cool them with her own, unterrified by the danger of infection, 
 and rewarded by his faint entreaty, " Oh, don't leave me." 
 The next morning, after he had thus breathed away his love 
 and life, in his 23rd year, Feb. 3, 1644, his body was carried 
 in his own ammunition-waggon to Ringmer, his native place. 
 Having always provided at his own expense both his tents 
 and ammunition, and having kept a table at Arundel open to 
 the volunteers of his own regiment, it was not surprising that 
 only/^12 was now found in his chest, and he left debts of 
 2,000, partly by having advanced loans for what he thought 
 the good cause. 
 
 In addition to this he had spent the whole of his wife's 
 fortune (^1,600) in fitting out his regiment, and, it is evident, 
 was one of the most earnest spirits of that earnest age. He 
 would never lodge in the sequestrated mansions of the 
 Royalists, not even in that of his uncle, Sir Thomas Culpepper, 
 and, as Mr. Blaauw (to whom we are indebted for these 
 particulars) remarks, "his character, cherished in the fond
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 185 
 
 memory of his widow, and traced by the hand of love forty 
 years afterwards, may serve as a type of the strong feelings 
 of that turbulent age, though, indeed, even she quietly laments 
 his not having embraced the whole truth, as she complacently 
 considered herself to have done." 
 
 Mr. Blaauw refers to the adoption by Sir W. Springet's 
 widow of the tenets of the Quakers. This she did on her 
 marriage with Isaac Pennington, son of the Regicide of the 
 same name; and it was, doubtless, owing to this connection 
 that her daughter, Gulielma, became the wife, in 1672, of 
 the celebrated William Penn. But, though thus weaned (and 
 wedded) from the vanities of the world, the widow of Sir 
 William Springet never forgot her first love; and in her letters 
 to her grandson, which she wrote in 1680, and which have 
 been published, she dwells upon his virtues, and does not 
 fail to initiate the young man into the secret of his Sussex 
 and Springet ancestry. 
 
 Two Chaloners, Thomas and James, were nominated 
 upon the High Court of Justice, and one of them, Thomas 
 Chaloner, signed the death-warrant. But neither of these 
 was a member of the Sussex family. The head of the Sussex 
 Chaloners, Robert Chaloner, of Kenwards, Lindfield, was, 
 however, engaged in the same cause. He was a Major in the 
 Parliamentary army and an active supporter of the Protector. 
 In the Parish Register of Lindfield, about 1655, his name 
 frequently appears attached to the entries of marriages which 
 were performed by " Ye Major," not at the Parish Church, 
 but at Kenwards, his mansion at Lindfield. His possessions 
 in East Sussex were very extensive; but the Restoration was 
 fatal to him and his family, and from this period the Sussex 
 Chaloners declined, till they disappeared altogether from the 
 gentry of the county. Of the fate of Robert Chaloner, "Ye 
 Major," of Kenwards, Lindfield, we are ignorant, but the 
 tradition in the neighbourhood of his estate is, that he had to 
 fly the country and died abroad. His house at Lindfield was 
 dismantled, and the only part of it that now remains is the
 
 1 86 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 stables, which have been converted into a farmhouse. It 
 seems to have been the fashion of the officers of the Puritan 
 army to perform the marriage ceremony, for in the Framfield 
 Register there is an entry to the same effect as those in the 
 Lindfield Register, to which the name of Capt. Stapley is 
 appended. Doubtless, however, in each of these cases, the 
 military performer of the contract was a Justice of the Peace. 
 
 Samuel Gott, who sat for Winchelsea in the Long Parlia- 
 ment; for Rye in the Parliament summoned by Cromwell, in 
 1656 ; and for Hastings in the " Rump" Parliament of 1658, 
 was a staunch upholder of the Republic, but he did not sit 
 on the High Court of Justice, and we are ignorant how he 
 closed his career. Perhaps, like many of the men who took 
 an active part in the Protectorate, he was happy to seek safety 
 in obscurity. 
 
 It will be remarked that, though several of the Sussex 
 Regicides, like James Temple and John Downes, were tried 
 and condemned to death, none of them was actually executed. 
 James Temple and John Downes died in prison ; William 
 Cawley and William GofFe in exile ; Anthony Stapley, Gregory 
 Norton, and Peregrine Pelham died before the Restoration. 
 Of those who sat upon the Court, but did not sign the death- 
 warrant, Sir John Fagg was forgiven and came to honours and 
 dignity under the Stewarts ; and Colonel Morley died in peace 
 at Glynde. 
 
 It is impossible to go through the records of families 
 engaged in the conflict of King and Parliament, and follow 
 all their vicissitudes, without being struck by the contrast of 
 those troubled days with the present age, when " Harry follows 
 Harry" in such peaceful succession, and the most exciting 
 events of country life, in the way of war or peace, are a law- 
 suit or an alliance a review or a ball ! How easy, then, is it 
 for us now-a-days to scatter praise and blame on the actors in 
 the great events of the iyth century! how impossible to 
 realise the sacrifices made by the men who fought in those 
 days for what they held to be the right and truthful cause !
 
 The Sussex Regicides, &c. 187 
 
 Good men and true there were, most certainly, on both sides, 
 as well as, without doubt, men of a lower character. But as 
 for the theory which sets down all the men on one side as 
 rogues and rascals, knaves and hypocrites, we have passed 
 beyond that ; and it is no longer necessary to make an excuse 
 for giving some particulars of the men in this county, who, like 
 Colonel Herbert Morley and Sir William Springet, entered 
 zealously into the conflict with the King, or even of those who, 
 like Anthony Stapley and William Cawley, went a step further 
 and put their names to the death-warrant of that unfortunate, 
 but not the less most unscrupulous and untruthful King. Let 
 us rather thank the good fortune which has reserved happier 
 days for us, when the principles of hereditary Monarchy and 
 of national freedom are reconciled to each other, and when 
 the most zealous advocates of liberty may accept Constitutional 
 Government and the Commonwealth as synonymous terms. 
 We owe it not a little to the men who fought and suffered, in 
 Sussex and elsewhere, for liberty in the iyth century.
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 
 
 USSEX is not distinguished, like Yorkshire, as the 
 scene of a tragedy;* but, like most other parts of 
 the world, it has had its share of the tragic acts 
 of men, and one of the earliest, if not the earliest 
 of these on record, is the trial and execution for murder of 
 Lord Dacre, of Hurstmonceux Castle. The title still survives 
 in a Sussex family the Brands a member of which is the 
 "first Commoner of England" in other words, Speaker of 
 the House of Commons, and the picturesque ruins of Hurst- 
 monceux Castle still form a feature of the eastern part of 
 Sussex. 
 
 The trial and execution of Lord Dacre for murder is one 
 of the strangest stories of the Tudor times, and stands out as 
 prominently in English jurisprudence as does the execution 
 of Earl Ferrers, the head of the Shirleys, another Sussex 
 family, at a later era, and for a similar crime. 
 
 The family name of the unfortunate nobleman was Fynes 
 or Fiennes an ancient Norman family who had acquired 
 Hurstmonceux in Sussex by marriage with the equally ancient 
 family of Monceux; but the title by which he is known in the 
 history of crime was derived from the famous Lords Dacre, 
 of Gillesland, the heiress of which family was married in 
 1440 by Sir Roger Fynes, and brought by him to the fine 
 Castle he had built at Hurstmonceux, in Sussex. In right of 
 
 * "The Yorkshire Tragedy," a play of the i6th century, sometimes assigned, but 
 incorrectly, to Shakspeare.
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 189 
 
 his wife he was summoned to Parliament as Baron Dacre 
 "of the South," in contradistinction to the Lords Dacre "of 
 the North," then still flourishing in Cumberland. He was 
 succeeded, in 1484, by his grandson Thomas, who, though 
 Constable of Calais and distinguished for his services in the 
 field against the Scots, got into trouble, and was imprisoned 
 in the Fleet and fined for " harbouring of suspected felons," 
 and " for remysness and negligence in ponyshement of them." 
 But the delinquencies of this Lord Dacre, whatever they may 
 have been, shrink into insignificance when compared with 
 those of his grandson, another Thomas, Lord Dacre of the 
 South, the hero of our story. This Lord Thomas, like his 
 grandfather, was left an orphan in 1525, at the age of 17, 
 and came into possession of one of the finest estates and 
 Baronies of the kingdom. He married, too, a lady of noble 
 birth, a Neville, daughter of another Sussex nobleman, Lord 
 Abergavenny, and had every advantage which wealth, rank, 
 and connection could give him. But his education had been 
 neglected; his habits were dissolute; his companions were, it 
 is evident, of rank far below his own, and, doubtless, selected 
 by him for the congeniality of their tastes and habits. What 
 these were can be guessed from the deed which involved him 
 and three of them in the terrible fate which overtook them. 
 
 It would seem, from the legal documents found in the 
 Record Office in our days, and published by the Deputy- 
 Keeper of the Records, that, on the zoth of April, in the 
 3znd year of the reign of Henry the 8th, a party of fourteen 
 men, including Lord Dacre himself, met at his mansion at 
 Hurstmonceux, "and did there illegally conspire in what 
 manner they could best hunt in the Park of Nicholas Pelham, 
 Esq., of Laughton, in the county of Sussex, with dogs and nets 
 called buckstalls, and bound themselves by oaths, &c., for 
 such illegal purpose, and also to stand against all the lieges 
 of the King, and to kill any of the King's lieges who might 
 oppose them." 
 
 A list is given of the names, occupations, and late
 
 igo Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 residences of these so-called conspirators, and whilst none 
 of them was above the rank of gentleman, several are entitled 
 yeomen, and one was a smith, of Fletching. With the 
 exception of two, who are. "late of London," and two others 
 late of places in Kent, all are set down as being lately of 
 places in Sussex, several of Hurstmonceux, and, doubtless, 
 in the service of Lord Dacre ; one (Thos. Duffield), of 
 Framfield, and another (John Shelley, a well-known Sussex 
 name), of Patcham. The meeting on the zoth of April broke 
 up, we may presume, without any definite result. It led, at 
 all events, to no immediate action ; for ten days afterwards, 
 on the 30th April, the same parties met again at the same 
 house, and on this occasion the meeting was followed up by 
 decisive acts. The conspirators, or, as we should call them 
 in the present day, poachers, divided themselves into two 
 bands; one led by Lord Dacre, and the other by Henry 
 Fitzherbert (of Ringmer, Sussex), and so entered the Park of 
 Sir Nicholas Pelham, at Hellingly, on two sides, with intent, 
 doubtless, to drive the deer, as Earl Percy did at Chevy Chase 
 in " the brave days of old." The only difference between the 
 Percy and the Dacre driving was, that the deer in the latter 
 case were those of a neighbour, and that it was not in the 
 border line of Chevy Chase, but in an enclosed Sussex Park 
 that they lay; and, above all, that these were the days of the 
 Eighth Harry, who kept a strict hand over his Barons, and, 
 if they over-stept the limits of the law, made very little 
 difficulty of cutting off their heads ! 
 
 It would seem that Sir Nicholas Pelham, like his prototype, 
 Earl Douglas, had been warned of young Lord Dacre's design. 
 At all events, his keepers were on the look-out for intruders, 
 and at a spot called " Pykehay," in the parish of Hellingly, 
 the party headed by Lord Dacre had the misfortune to come 
 upon three of these men, named John Busbrydgge, James 
 Busbrydgge, and Richard Somener. What words passed 
 between them (and, doubtless, there were some, for a quarrel 
 is said to have ensued) is not stated, but it is declared in the
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 191 
 
 old pleading that " for fear lest they (the poachers) might be 
 known by them " (the keepers), they attacked and wounded 
 them, and gave certain mortal wounds to John Busbrydgge, 
 in consequence of which he died^on the 2nd May then next 
 following. 
 
 For this tragical act an indictment for murder was laid 
 against three of the party John Mantell, John Frowds, and 
 George Roidon, described as " gentlemen," in the ordinary 
 course of law, and they were found guilty by a Grand Jury, 
 which is described as meeting first at Hellingly the place 
 where the crime was committed and afterwards, by adjourn- 
 ment, at Maresfield, in the vicinity of it, before Sir Humphrey 
 Brown, Knight, Sergeant-at-Law, and Robert Oxenbridge 
 and Thomas Darell, keepers (Justices) of the Peace, and 
 they were sentenced to death and executed by hanging, we 
 presume at a spot called " St. Thomas Waterings," the usual 
 place of execution within the Sheriffdom of Sussex and Surrey, 
 situated near the 2nd milestone on what is now called the Old 
 Kent Road, by which, in former days, pilgrims travelled to 
 the shrine of St. Thomas-a-Beckett, at Canterbury. 
 
 Thus three of the conspirators were soon called to a 
 bloody reckoning for their night's frolic. Nor was the head 
 and chief of it at whose great house it was planned, and 
 under whose direction it was carried out to escape. A few 
 years before, such an act would doubtless have excited little 
 or no attention, amidst the license and disorder of the Civil 
 Wars, or in the times preceding them, when great men did 
 pretty well as they pleased. But the Tudors had brought in 
 a new state of things ; and a striking example was now to be 
 given that laws were made both for high and low for Peer 
 and peasant. As a Peer of the Realm, the legal procedure 
 against Lord Dacre was different from that taken against the 
 three commoners. On the 27th June (33 Henry VIII) a Com- 
 mission was issued, by which the Lord Chancellor Audley 
 was appointed Lord High Steward and Judge, and, upon his 
 precept, a jury of Peers was summoned for the trial of Lord
 
 1 92 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Dacre, at the head of which was Henry, Marquis of Dorset, 
 and on which also sat the Earl of Sussex, the Earl of Derby, 
 the Earl of Rutland, Lord John Russell (High Admiral of 
 England), and others of the highest nobles of England. 
 Before these Peers, on tne 27th June, the hapless young 
 Noble, brought from the Tower (the Constable of which was 
 his Sussex neighbour, Sir John Gage, of Firle) for the pur- 
 pose, was arraigned on a charge of murder. To this he at first 
 pleaded " Not Guilty," as not being the actual murderer, and 
 put himself upon his Peers ; but " sufficient and probable 
 evidence" having been adduced, he reversed his plea to 
 " Guilty," and put himself upon the King's mercy. The 
 judgment of the Court was that "he was to be hanged" 
 neither time nor place, however, being named ; and this 
 judgment was carried out, at the instance, it is said, of certain 
 Courtiers, "who gaped after his estate" not an improbable 
 thing, though there is no proof of its truth. 
 
 The execution took place two days after the judgment on 
 St. Peter's Day, the 2gth day of June so quick a despatch of 
 justice that the King could, indeed, have had little inclination 
 for "mercy." Was he not the 8th Harry, who " spared no 
 man in his wrath and no woman in his lust ? " There was 
 something terribly painful as well as ignominious in Lord 
 Dacre's death; for to the last, it would seem, he was tantalised 
 with a hope of escape. In the words of the old chronicler, 
 Holingshed, " And afterward, the nine and twentith of June, 
 being St. Peter's daie, at eleuen of the clocke in the forenoon, 
 the shiriffs of London, accordinglie as they were appointed, 
 were ready at the Tower to have receiued the said prisoner, 
 and him to haue led to execution on the Tower hill ; but, as 
 the prisoner should come forth of the Tower, one Heire, 
 a gentleman of the Lord Chancellor's house, came, and in 
 the King's name commanded to staie the execution till two 
 of the clocke in the afternoone, which caused manie to thinke 
 that the King would have granted his pardon. But neuer- 
 theless, at three of the clocke in the same afternoone, he was
 
 Sussex, Tragedies and Romances. 193 
 
 brought forth of the Tower and deliuered to the shiriffs, who 
 led him on foot unto Tiburne, where he died. His bodi was 
 buried in the church of Saint Sepulchers. He was not past 
 foure and twentie yeeres of age, when he came through this 
 great mishap to his end, for whom manie sore lamented, and 
 likewise for the other three gentlemen, Mantell, Frowds 
 and Roidon. But for the said yoong Lord, being a right 
 towardlie gentleman, and such a one as many had conceiued 
 great hope of better proofe, no small mone and lamentation 
 was made ; the more, indeed, for that it was thought he was 
 induced to attempt such follie, which occasioned his death, 
 by some light heads that were then about him." 
 
 When,- indeed, the character of the times is considered, 
 the punishment seems out of proportion to the offence, which 
 was rather that of homicide than of murder; and in these 
 days the penalty of manslaughter would, probably, be deemed 
 sufficient for the purposes of justice. But in Henry the 
 Eighth's day the kingly hand weighed heavily on the noble; 
 noble heads were cut off for very venial acts; and the mere 
 pretext of " standing against all the lieges of the King," even 
 if only to kill a buck, was sufficient to bring down the most 
 dread vengeance of the law. 
 
 In his paper on this tragical event, the late Mr. M. A. 
 Lower says the scene of it is still known. Pick-hay, as it is now 
 called, is an arable field of ten acres on the Horselunges Farm, 
 in the parish of Hellingly, adjoining a field called " The 
 Cabins," on the Broad Farm, rather less than a quarter of a mile 
 south-west of Hellingly Church on the road to Horsebridge. 
 The river Cuckmere is the boundary of the two fields. The 
 actual scene of the murder (writes a local archaeologist, Mr. T. 
 Horton) is near the bottom of the two fields and near the 
 river. " In my youth (he adds) the tradition of the murder 
 was current; and I may add that a ghost has always been 
 about the place." Whether of Lord Dacre, " of the South," 
 or of John Busbrydgge, "deponent sayeth not." 
 
 This is the earliest on record of what may be called our 
 Sussex domestic tragedies. 
 O
 
 194 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 We pass over a long space of time before we come to 
 anything like a parallel to it ; for Sussex is not a county of 
 great crimes. Poaching and smuggling have both flourished 
 among us, and Lord Dacre may be included among the 
 victims of the former class of misdeeds; but more heinous 
 crimes have been " few and far between." The Jack Shepherds, 
 Dick Turpins, and Claude Duvals belonged to other parts 
 of the kingdom. Still we have had our highway robbers, or, 
 as Sir John Falstaff lovingly calls them, " Diana's foresters, 
 Gentlemen of the Shade, Minions of the Moon." In this class 
 figure very prominently two brothers of the name of Weston, 
 Joseph and George, who, in the years 1781-2, astonished the 
 good people of Rye and Winchelsea by taking the mansion 
 at the latter place known as "The Friars," and living there 
 in great style and at lavish expense under the names of 
 William Johnson and Samuel Weston. They passed them- 
 selves off as persons of standing, and dressed, rode, and, 
 above all, eat and drank like gentlemen. They were, in fact, 
 forgers, horse-stealers, and highwaymen, carrying on their 
 operations over a wide extent of country, and bringing their 
 booty to the remote Sussex town of Winchelsea, to live a 
 "jolly life." They were at length apprehended in London 
 for robbing the Bath and Bristol mail on the morning of 
 January 25th, 1781, between Maidenhead and Hounslow, and 
 for this they were committed for trial to Newgate on the i7th 
 of April, 1782. But, the day before the trial came on, they 
 succeeded, with three other felons, by the aid of their wives, 
 in breaking out of gaol. It says something for the rascals 
 that the Mistress Westons thought they were worth saving! 
 But it was not for long. George was soon after re-captured 
 in Smithfield, and his brother Joseph in Cock Lane. This 
 latter defended himself desperately, and wounded one of his 
 captors in the cheek with a pistol. Strange to say, on being 
 arraigned, four days afterwards, for the robbery of the mail, 
 they were acquitted. They were, however, immediately tried 
 on other charges : George for forgery and Joseph for firing 
 the pistol ; and this time they were convicted and sentenced
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 195 
 
 to death. They were identified on this occasion by a witness 
 from Draycott, Staffordshire, who had known them from their 
 birth as the sons of a farmer named George Weston. They 
 were executed at Tyburn on September jrd, 1782, and, 
 according to a writer in the Gentleman 's Magazine, "made a 
 good ending," receiving, as Catholics, the consolation of their 
 faith. But the same account fails not to tell us that they were 
 "two of the most artful villains that have ever appeared at 
 any time in this country, and have robbed the country of an 
 immense sum." It was the career of these men that supplied 
 Thackeray with some of the incidents of the novel which he 
 was writing when his life and the story were suddenly ended. 
 The scene of it, it will be recollected, was laid at Rye, and 
 an attempt to rob the London coach of a large sum of tax- 
 money gives the hero an opportunity to distinguish himself at 
 the expense of the highwayman, who receives the contents of 
 the lad's pistol in his face. 
 
 It seems " a little too bad " to give Lord Dacre " of the 
 South " such companions as these; but crime, like poverty, 
 " has strange bed-fellows." 
 
 We have said that Sussex had no Dick Turpin or Claude 
 Duval. But the foot-pad who, early in the present century 
 (1807), infested the roads between Arundel and Chichester, 
 and eased graziers and farmers of their heavy purses as they 
 returned home from market, until he became a word of fear 
 to the western part of the county, may well compare with any 
 highway notoriety in daring acts and in his tragic end. His 
 name was Allen, and he had been a footman in the service of 
 the Lennox family; but this was not known until he had 
 made the country so " hot " by his numerous robberies that, 
 at length, the militia were called out to effect his capture. 
 He was pressed so closely that at length he took refuge in a 
 pond at Graffham, near Midhurst. There, however, he was 
 followed, and espied by some of his pursuers among them 
 a son of Mr. Sargent, a neighbouring gentleman of large 
 property. Unfortunately young Sargent a fine young man
 
 196 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 a captain in the gth Regiment of Foot recognised the 
 highwayman, and called upon him by his name to give 
 himself up. The only reply was a shot from Allen's gun or 
 pistol, which laid the unfortunate young man dead on the 
 spot. The soldiers who accompanied him immediately fired 
 on the robber, and so gave him a better end than he deserved. 
 The nieces of young Sargent were co-heiresses of the 
 Lavington Estate, and it was their fate to become the wives 
 of two remarkable men: Samuel Wilberforce, Bishop of 
 Oxford and of Winchester, and Henry Manning, Cardinal of 
 Rome. 
 
 Sussex soil, we have said, is not stained by many atrocious 
 crimes. But one of the most atrocious crimes ever committed 
 on it, and which, by the wholesale extermination of a house- 
 hold, closely resembles the Mars and Williams tragedies 
 which terrified London at the commencement of this century, 
 and have been so terribly described by De Quincey, was 
 committed at Ditchling in 1734. The perpetrator of it was 
 a Jew pedlar named Jacob Harris, who, whilst travelling the 
 country with his wares, put up his horse at a public-house in 
 that lonely part of the country, Ditchling Common, and 
 whilst his host, named Miles, was engaged in cleaning the 
 animal in the stable, seized the opportunity to attack him, 
 and, as he thought, deprive him of life by cutting his throat 
 with a razor. Leaving him for dead, he entered the house, 
 and, meeting the servant-maid, who, it is supposed, had been 
 alarmed by the noise of the struggle in the stable and was 
 descending the stairs to see what was the matter, he attacked 
 her too and murdered her. Then, mounting the stairs, he 
 entered the room where the wife of the landlord was lying on 
 a sick bed and destroyed the poor woman by cutting her 
 throat. He then plundered the house, which, it would seem, 
 was the motive for these wholesale murders, and made his 
 escape. But only for a short time. We have said that he 
 left Miles for dead ; but he had not carried out his barbarous 
 act so effectually in this instance but that Miles was able,
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 197 
 
 with the little life left to him, to give information which led 
 to a speedy pursuit and to the capture of his murderer, at 
 Turner's Hill, and also to his identification. Harris was tried 
 at Horsham Assizes in the following August the murders were 
 committed in May and being convicted and condemned to 
 death, he was hung at Horsham and his body then transported 
 to the place of the crime, Ditchling Common, and hung on 
 a gibbet near to the house in which the murders had been 
 committed. A portion of the gibbet still remains it is, we 
 believe, the only relic of the kind in Sussex and is known 
 as "Jacob's Post." 
 
 Whilst in the Ditchling tragedy a pedlar was the perpetrator 
 of the crime, in the succeeding instance he was the victim. 
 The scene of it lay in the adjoining parish. 
 
 One of the many woods which lie scattered on every side 
 of Lindfield is known by the name of Costell's Wood. It 
 lies on the left-hand side of the road from Lindfield to Lewes, 
 in the Manor of Southmalling, and forms part of a large 
 farm called Wallstead. Above 400 acres of this farm are 
 covered with oaks once famed for their girth and height. 
 But these old giants of the forest have fallen before the axe, 
 and Costell's Wood now consists chiefly of young trees, 
 planted pretty closely together, in order that they may attain 
 a greater height than oaks do when growing singly in hedge- 
 rows. The space between them is grown over with fern and 
 underwood, but not so thickly as to bar a passage through the 
 trees. 
 
 There are, however, too many woods round Lindfield, and 
 too few people in it, to make Costell's Wood a common 
 place of resort, as it would be near a town. With the 
 exception of the woodreeve, who occasionally goes in to lop 
 off an exuberant branch or so, perhaps months pass without 
 anyone being tempted to get over the gate which leads into 
 it from the Lewes road. It holds forth no attractions even to 
 school boys in the shape of nuts or blackberries, or to the 
 sportsman in the shape of game. In Costell's Wood the
 
 198 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 trees are left pretty much to themselves to grow in peace and 
 quiet, with only the sun and the breeze to keep them company. 
 
 But at the time we are about to refer to some 38 years 
 ago they had another visitor: a poor idiot boy was their 
 constant frequenter, and would wander about among them all 
 the day. Being perfectly harmless, to himself and to others, 
 his mother was in the habit of giving him his day's food, and 
 with this he wandered forth, hiding himself in the woods all 
 the day long, amusing himself in his own unintelligible way, 
 and returning home at night mumbling forth his adventures 
 in his own gibberish, which few could understand and nobody 
 ever paid attention to. So, when, after his usual rambles, 
 one evening he came home to his mother with a scared face 
 and an agitated manner, and made strange motions with his 
 hand across his throat and uttered something in his imperfect 
 language about " man man dead," " man in the wood," and 
 pulled at her dress as though he wished her to go somewhere 
 with him, she paid no more heed to him than she had a 
 hundred times before, when he had returned home after 
 seeing a pig killed a sight, it seems, of which he had a 
 peculiar horror ; and it was her belief that a spectacle of 
 this kind had caused the terror under which the boy was now 
 evidently labouring. So no attention was paid to his gestures 
 and mumblings, and the next day he was allowed to go out 
 again upon his rambles ; but still, day after day, it was 
 remarked that he went in the direction of Costell's Wood ; 
 and from time to time, too, on coming home to his mother, 
 he returned to the old subject, only with some variation in 
 his tale, and, instead of its being "man dead," "man in the 
 wood," it was now "birds birds peck man's eyes" "dogs 
 dogs eat man," and other strange expressions of this kind. 
 
 At length a neighbour, who had noticed the boy's visits 
 to the wood, and had heard him utter some of his strange 
 expressions, took the trouble to follow him in one of his- 
 rambles, and having got over the gate and entered the wood 
 some twenty or thirty yards from the road, following in the
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 199 
 
 wake of the idiot boy, a spectacle presented itself which 
 was sufficient to stagger the stoutest nerves ; for there, in a 
 comparatively open spot, among the long grass, lay the body 
 of a man, but so decomposed by the elements, and so torn 
 and mangled by birds and beasts, that, but for its clothing, 
 there was nothing to denote humanity about it. The skull 
 was separated from the trunk, and the coat only hung on 
 a heap of bones. The man instantly reported his fearful 
 discovery to the authorities, who went to the spot and took 
 possession of the remains, and of an open razor that was 
 found lying beside them. Active enquiries were set on foot 
 to ascertain the identity of the body, and by what strange fate 
 it had come in such a spot, and lain there so long; for the 
 opinion of the medical men who examined it was, that the 
 body had been in the wood some four months. Had no one 
 disappeared about that time ? or was there no recollection of 
 any stranger having been seen in the neighbourhood passing 
 by or through it, or stopping at a village inn or beer-shop ? 
 None. Every inquiry was made in the neighbourhood, but 
 no traces of a missing man were found. The clothes were 
 searched, and three half-pence in copper and a bunch of keys 
 were found in the pockets. The clothes themselves indicated 
 that the deceased had been at one time at least in a 
 respectable sphere of life, for the coat on his back (he had 
 no waistcoat) and the boots on his feet were well made. 
 His linen was marked "T. H." Then came the question, 
 had he destroyed himself, or had he been murdered ? The 
 evidence produced at the inquest was inconclusive on this 
 point. The razor found beside him might have been the 
 means of destruction in his own hands, or those of others. 
 Decomposition left no traces for medical science to raise even 
 a surmise upon. All that could be done at the time was to 
 return an open verdict of " Found Dead," to take possession 
 of the keys, clothes, &c., and to advertise the facts as 
 extensively as possible. These steps were taken ; but they 
 never led to the identification of the dead man. From the 
 time he was found in the wood by the idiot boy (who was
 
 2oo Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 examined at the inquest, but from whom nothing intelligible 
 could be gathered as to the state in which he first found the 
 body though that must have been early after death) up to 
 the present moment, his name, country, occupation, whence 
 he came or whither he was going, are a mystery. No eye had 
 marked his approach to the spot on which he was so suddenly 
 and so mysteriously to close his existence; by what terrible 
 means there can be little doubt, for upon this evidence did 
 rise up sufficient to remove all moral doubt that the man was 
 foully dealt with. "Just after the inquest," said a party who 
 had taken an official part in the inquiry, in answer to our 
 questions, "just after the inquest, I was telling an old man, 
 who is very deaf, all about it; and when I had done, 'Ah, 
 yes,' he said, ' I remember very well seeing the blood along 
 the road about that time;' and," continued my informant, 
 " no sooner had he uttered the words than I, too, recollected 
 seeing a line of blood along the road by the gate, and others 
 even said they recollected seeing blood on the gate itself." 
 " How long," we enquired, " was this before the body was 
 found?" "About four months, which must have been the time 
 of the man's death. I supposed," continued our informant, 
 " at the time that somebody had cut himself, or had bled at 
 the nose, and took no further notice. But of the fact I had 
 a perfect remembrance, and it left no doubt upon my mind 
 that the man had been murdered attacked in the road most 
 probably, and dragged over the gate to the spot where he was 
 found." 
 
 Another circumstance strengthens this opinion, and at one 
 time seemed to give a clue to the discovery of the murderer. 
 A pedlar's box, stripped of its contents, was found in a low 
 part of Southover, and was sent to the Lindfield authorities, 
 who still have it. The keys of the deceased did not fit this 
 box ; but it seems to point to the occupation of the man and 
 to explain both the motive for the crime, and the reason why 
 the body was never owned. The man was a wanderer 
 perhaps a foreigner ; he travelled from place to place, late and 
 early. In his journey to Lindfield he was either tracked, or
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 201 
 
 had had companions. The road by Costell's Wood is lonely 
 there is no house within a quarter of a mile in any direction, 
 and high trees on each side darken the path. He was doubt- 
 less attacked at disadvantage, robbed and murdered, or partly 
 murdered, and left in the wood, with the instrument of death 
 by his side. And there he lay for four long months, not forty 
 yards from the high road, yet hid from all but the wondering 
 eyes of the poor idiot boy. He, doubtless, had seen the 
 murdered man as he lay fresh in his newly-shed blood some 
 think, before life had fled ; but, however that may be, there is 
 no doubt that day after day he came and gazed upon the 
 terrible sight, and marked how the birds pecked at its eyes 
 and the jats or dogs fed on its flesh, and how it mouldered 
 away beneath the rains and the dews, until it had become the 
 thing of bones that it was found. 
 
 In some respects this undiscovered crime will remind the 
 local reader of a murder likewise undiscovered which was 
 committed only a few years ago in the same district, but nearer 
 to Cuckfield. In this case, too, the body of a man unknown 
 was found who had been struck down by a murderous blow, 
 evidently dealt from behind as he was crossing a "gully" in 
 a meadow near Cuckfield Church the path across this "gully" 
 being a short cut, by which, in going from Hayward's Heath 
 to Brighton, the town of Cuckfield may be avoided. To do 
 this was, no doubt, the object of the murdered man, for it was 
 afterwards ascertained that he had been concerned in some 
 burglarious robberies near London and was flying from the 
 pursuit of the police. The shoes he was wearing were 
 identified as part of the booty of one of these robberies. 
 He was also, it was afterwards discovered, in the neighbour- 
 hood of Cuckfield for another purpose. He had had an 
 accomplice in some of his burglaries, and he had threatened 
 this man, who lived at Croydon, with exposure unless he gave 
 him some " hush money." An appointment had been made 
 for an interview in a lonely part of Sussex, and here, at an inn 
 at Balcombe, the murdered man passed some hours on the
 
 2O2 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 evening of the night (Saturday, the ayth November, 1869) on 
 which he was to meet his accomplice. Whether he met him 
 or not, who can say? but on the following Monday morning 
 the fugitive burglar for such he was was found lying dead 
 in a ditch at the back of Cuckfield with a fractured skull, and 
 the instrument with which the blows were inflicted, called a 
 "jemmy," and used by burglars, was afterwards found in an 
 adjacent pond, into which it was doubtless flung immediately 
 after the committal of the crime. 
 
 The police were unable to find any clue to the murderer 
 any, at least, sufficient to charge him with the crime. Both 
 the murdered man (whose name was Greenhead) and the 
 murderer had concealed their movements so veil that they 
 were never seen together. The accomplice referred to a 
 man named Rowland was subsequently apprehended and 
 convicted, at the Sussex Assizes, of a robbery at Croydon, 
 where he lived, and was sentenced to a year's imprisonment. 
 
 Here, again, in the presence of an undiscovered crime, we 
 may say, in the powerful language which Hood places in the 
 mouth of Eugene Aram whose crime was committed under 
 somewhat similar circumstances to the above one more 
 murderer 
 
 Walks the earth 
 Beneath the curse of Cain, 
 
 With crimson clouds before his eyes, 
 And flames about his brain ; 
 
 For blood has left upon his soul 
 Its everlasting stain ! 
 
 The late Editor of the Sussex Archaeological Collections, 
 the Rev. E. Turner, in one of his latest contributions, 
 expresses his satisfaction and surely all humane persons will 
 join with him in doing so at the disappearance from our 
 highways and byeways of those gibbets which used to mark 
 the spot where a crime had been committed and where justice 
 had exacted its most fearful penalty. To make it more 
 durable and more terrible, the culprit used sometimes to be 
 hung in what was called " chains" that is, in a framework
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 203 
 
 constructed of iron hooping, to which the rotting flesh and 
 clothes and the bleaching bones long hung after wind and 
 rain had done their worst upon them. In this way the body 
 of Tapner, the Chichester smuggler, who took a leading part 
 in the cruel murders of Galley, the Revenue Officer, and his 
 witness, Chater, was exposed at the Old Broyle, in the 
 immediate vicinity of Chichester, and another of the same 
 gang, named Carter, was hung near Rake, on the Portsmouth 
 road, in 1749. One of the last exhibitions of this kind, 
 which, not improbably, by accustoming men to the spectacle 
 of horrors, did more to harden than to appal them, took 
 place in Sussex in the instance of two brothers, named 
 Drewitt,. convicted in 1799 of robbing the Portsmouth mail 
 on North Heath Common, near Midhurst, and sentenced to 
 be hung in chains. The first part of the sentence was carried 
 out at Horsham, where the men were tried, and then, in 
 accordance with custom, their bodies were brought to the 
 place where the crime was committed and exposed in the 
 way we have described. One of the Drewitt' s, the younger 
 brother, died protesting his innocence, and the belief is still 
 prevalent at Midhurst and its neighbourhood, to which they 
 belonged and where they were well known, that he was guilt- 
 less of the crime for which he suffered, but that he could not 
 clear himself without implicating his father, and, rather than 
 do this, went a victim to the gallows for the crime of a parent. 
 It is remarkable that the last instance in this county of a 
 barbarous custom should be thus coupled with a noble act of 
 self-devotion on the part of one of the so-called culprits. 
 
 Poisoning has never been looked upon as an English 
 crime; and it is remarkable, therefore, that a country town 
 like Lewes should, so early as 1679, have been the scene of 
 a deed of this nature, which would have been more in keeping 
 with the soil and manners of Italy. The story, as told by a 
 Lewes chronicler, has all the elements of a tragic romance. 
 
 A close intimacy had long existed between two young men 
 of the town, Robert Brinkhurst, a cutler, and William Moor,
 
 204 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 "bred a draper" (to adopt the phraseology of our local 
 authority), but heir to a considerable landed property. After 
 some years' friendship a petty difference sprang up between 
 them, but was soon adjusted, leaving them, apparently, with 
 the old feelings of regard for each other. Shortly afterwards, 
 Moor (who suffered from a tainted breath) received, through 
 the London carrier, a packet signed with the initials of a 
 friend, and containing a powder, which was strongly recom- 
 mended as a remedy for the complaint he suffered from. 
 The contents of the paper were arsenic, and had been sent by 
 Brinkhurst. The victim did not fall into the snare at once. 
 He was uncertain whether he was to take all the powder in 
 one dose or in parts. He therefore wrote to his supposed 
 friend in London to ascertain this point. Unfortunately, he 
 commissioned Brinkhurst himself to carry the letter to the 
 London carrier who then, it would seem, stood in lieu of 
 a Post Office and the false friend, destroying the letter, 
 contrived, by the agency of an acquaintance in London, to 
 send a reply to it, purporting to come from the sender of the 
 former parcel, and directing his victim to swallow the powder 
 in one dose. He did so on the Tuesday and, after suffering 
 four days' great agony, died on the succeeding Saturday; 
 Brinkhurst waiting on him during that time (as Palmer did on 
 his friend Cooke), and putting on all the show of grief and 
 sympathy. How complete was his hypocrisy, and how real 
 the affection of Moor was for him, was now shown in a way 
 which ought to have overwhelmed him with remorse. By his 
 friend's will he wa.s not only forgiven a debt of $o (in all 
 probability one of the incentives to the murder), but was left 
 a legacy of that amount, together with Moor's watch and 
 other tokens of friendship. 
 
 So far, all had gone well for the murderer. The burial 
 took place, and, to quote our authority for these facts, 
 " Brinkhurst returned home, in seeming security, to exult in 
 the consummation and profit of his crime." His triumph, 
 however, was but short-lived. Moor had not destroyed the
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 205 
 
 two forged letters that he received from London, and these, 
 falling into the hands of his friends, raised a suspicion of 
 foul play. The London carrier was questioned, and he now 
 recollected that he had, some time before, brought down a 
 parcel to the deceased, which had been given to him in 
 Southwark by a person unknown; also, that he had somewhere 
 by him a letter addressed to this party in Southwark, which, 
 being refused to be taken in, he the carrier brought back 
 again to Lewes, but, not knowing the writer of it, had laid it 
 by. On the very day of Moor's interment this letter, by a 
 remarkable coincidence, was found by the carrier; and, on 
 being opened, it was found that Brinkhurst was the writer 
 of it, and its purport left little or no doubt that the other 
 communications received by Moor had come from or been 
 suggested by him. He was accordingly apprehended and 
 taken before the Lewes Justices, to whom, we are told, he 
 partly confessed his guilt. Being interrogated as to the 
 nature of the powder he had procured, he pretended not to 
 know its name, but said that, if he saw it again, he should 
 recognise it. The Magistrates, unsuspicious of any design 
 on the prisoner's part, directed an apothecary of the town to 
 bring samples of different poisons, that Brinkhurst might 
 point out the one he had used. This was done, and the 
 prisoner, to the horror of the lookers-on, snatched up a parcel 
 of yellow arsenic and swallowed a considerable quantity of it 
 before he could be prevented. 
 
 This desperate act stopped all further judicial proceedings. 
 We are not told if any attempts were made to obviate the 
 action of the poison by an emetic or otherwise only that he 
 "languished from the Tuesday till the Saturday evening" 
 exactly the same time that his friend had suffered " tormented 
 alike by bodily pangs and remorse" and then died. His 
 body was refused Christian burial. It was taken in a dung 
 cart, without a coffin, to the cross roads near Spittle Barn, 
 and there flung into a hole dug north and south, " from some 
 absurd, superstitious notion," says the local historian, "a stake
 
 206 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 having been first driven, with moral barbarity (!), through the 
 uncovered corpse." 
 
 To find a local parallel to this Lewes tragedy of the iyth 
 century, we must pass on to our own town of Brighton in the 
 1 9th century, where, on the 23rd of May, 1866, a Dr. Warder 
 arrived from Scotland, and took lodgings for himself and wife 
 in Bedford-square. He had only been married ten months ; 
 he was in the prime of life 45 or 46 years of age and yet 
 the lady was his third wife. He had married her five months 
 after the death of his second wife, a Scotch lady a widow 
 who had only survived her union with Dr. Warder eight 
 months. Her life had been insured by her husband. This 
 second marriage took place in 1865. The death of the first 
 wife had occurred two years before, in 1863, and followed 
 quickly after a temporary separation ; so that with Dr. Warder 
 marriage and death had followed in quick succession. 
 
 And now again he had a sick wife. It was partly on that 
 account that she came to Brighton, where she had a brother, 
 like Dr. Warder, in the medical profession, but who had never 
 met his brother-in-law until he came to Brighton. The 
 marriage, indeed, of his sister with Dr. Warder had been a 
 great surprise to him and all the members of her family. 
 But she had been a friend of the second wife, and this, 
 doubtless, facilitated the union; and she possessed a small 
 fortune of some ^500. The symptoms of Mrs. Warder's 
 illness set in more strongly after her arrival in Brighton, and 
 were of a nature to baffle all the skill of her brother; of a 
 skilful Brighton physician called in Dr. Taaffe; and of her 
 own husband. The care and affection bestowed by this 
 latter on the suffering lady were worthy of all praise ; he 
 rarely left her bedside, and he performed all the duties of a 
 nurse. Still, the ailment baffled both skill and care; the 
 patient grew weaker and weaker, and was sinking rapidly 
 without any apparent cause. 
 
 This did not escape the notice of the Brighton physician; 
 it was abnormal, and at last it aroused a dreadful suspicion in
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 207 
 
 his mind. The form in which he gave effect to this was to 
 request that a nurse should be called in; that another medical 
 man should be associated with himself; and that for some days 
 the husband should not be with his wife. This advice was 
 given to the brother on the 30th of June. On the following 
 day Dr. Taaffe and he were to meet at the house of the latter 
 to arrange their future line of action. Early on the morning 
 of that day a Sunday Mrs. Warder died. Her husband 
 had been with her all the Saturday night. How he employed 
 it who can doubt? It was the last time that he would, in all 
 probability, be allowed to act as nurse to the poor lady. 
 Suspicion, he must have felt, was awake, and what he had to 
 do, if done at all, must be done quickly. On the landlady, in 
 answer to his summons, entering the room on Sunday morning, 
 Dr. Warder, addressing her, exclaimed, "She is dying." Mrs. 
 Warder was, indeed, already unconscious, and, before her 
 brother or Dr. Taaffe could be summoned, she was a corpse. 
 The grief of her husband, after death, was as marked as his 
 attentions to her during life had been unremitting. 
 
 But Dr. Taaffe refused to certify to the cause of death. 
 Hence an inquest was necessary, and, as a matter of course, 
 a post-mortem examination was ordered by the Coroner, and 
 the enquiry adjourned to await the result of an analysis by 
 Dr. Taylor. The inquest was held on the Wednesday. The 
 burial of Mrs. Warder took place on the Saturday. It was 
 attended by Dr. Warder and Dr. Taaffe with what feelings 
 by the former who can realise ? Those of the latter were 
 subsequently avowed; he looked upon the husband as the 
 murderer of the wife whose remains he was following to the 
 grave. Suspicion was so far aroused that a watch was set by 
 the police on the movements of Dr. Warder. But, after 
 returning to his lodgings from the funeral, he managed to 
 evade this and went up to London. In the evening of Monday 
 he returned to his lodgings cool and collected, according to 
 his landlady, whom he requested to make out her bill, and on 
 the following morning she found the full amount on the table,
 
 208 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 with "$ in excess as compensation for loss caused by the 
 illness, inquest, &c. But Dr. Warder himself was gone. He 
 had not passed the night at his lodgings. 
 
 The scene of the tragedy is now shifted to the Bedford 
 Hotel, where, at a quarter to twelve on the Monday night, a 
 traveller presented himself, with a black leather bag, and 
 desired to be shown at once to a bedroom. His manner was 
 quite cool and collected. The day was far advanced before 
 the chambermaid thought of calling the late arrival, and when 
 she did so there was no reply. She tried the door. It was 
 unlocked. She entered the room and looked in; and she 
 saw Dr. Warder for it was he lying dead on the bed. He 
 was undressed, but the bed-clothes were undisturbed. On 
 the drawer by the side of the bed stood a small blue bottle, 
 capable of holding 10 drachms and still containing 4 drachms 
 of prussic acid. Whoever swallowed these 6 drachms could 
 only have had time to put the bottle where it stood; he could 
 not even draw the bed-clothes over his face before death 
 seized him. 
 
 Of course, an inquest was held on the body, and a post- 
 mortem examination of the brain shewed it to be healthy and 
 its structure normal; there was nothing to indicate insanity, 
 from which, it was said, some of his family had suffered. A 
 verdict of felo de se was returned, and the body was interred 
 in the Parochial Cemetery without any religious ceremony 
 and with no inscription to say who lay beneath. The wife 
 had been interred on the yth July; the husband was buried 
 on the lath. 
 
 At the adjourned inquest on Mrs. Warder, Dr. Taylor 
 attended to report the result of his analysis. There was no 
 vestige of poison in the organs, but they showed no other 
 cause of death, and, from their appearance and the evidence 
 already adduced, Dr. Taylor had no doubt that death had 
 been caused by poison, and the jury returned a verdict 
 that Ellen Vivian Warder died from the effect of aconite, 
 administered wilfully by her late husdand, Alfred William 
 Warder.
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 209 
 
 The letters left by Dr. Warder at his lodgings on the night 
 of his quitting them for the Bedford, addressed to friends, 
 contained a virtual confession of his crime. After giving 
 some directions about his property and his children by the 
 first marriage, he wrote, " There is no escape for me, as you 
 will find when you know all." There was, indeed, none. 
 Success in former cases (for the second wife died under 
 similar symptoms to those of the last, and of the fate of the 
 first there can be no doubt) had made the poisoner rash, and 
 when he put the finishing stroke to his last crime he rushed 
 on inevitable detection. It seems strange that he should 
 have returned from London after, doubtless, procuring there 
 the means of suicide. But who can explain the workings of 
 a mind enmeshed in such a terrible net ? That he fully 
 realised his situation after the holding of the first inquest 
 was demonstrated by the evidence of his landlady as to his 
 frantic action in rushing to the window, from which she 
 thought he would have thrown himself, and by the blow with 
 which he fractured the mirror in the room and cut his face 
 and throat with the broken fragments of glass. But this 
 impulse towards despair and self-destruction was restrained 
 for a time only to gather force and be carried out in a more 
 terrible, if a more collected, manner. 
 
 There is a general resemblance in the circumstances of 
 the two events at Lewes in the iyth and at Brighton in the 
 igth century in the deadly means employed ; the chance of 
 escape; and then the sudden flashing out of the truth and 
 the self-inflicted punishment of the culprit. But the relations 
 of the parties in the modern crime were closer and the 
 circumstances surrounding it more terrible. 
 
 Passing over the twin tragedies of Celia Holloway and 
 Hannah Hobbs the one brought home so completely to the 
 guilty party, the other still shrouded in the mystery which 
 involved it from the very first as too revolting in their 
 details to be told again, we come upon another undiscovered 
 crime, connected with, though not committed in, Brighton, 
 P
 
 2 io Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 which stands out from the ordinary class of " bloody deeds," 
 not only by the social position of the victim, and the utter 
 failure to discover his " takers-ofF," but by the strange 
 circumstance which preceded the deed, and by the puzzling 
 fact which, after a considerable lapse of time, recalled the 
 memory of it. 
 
 We refer to the death of Mr. George Stonhouse Griffith, 
 the owner of the Rock Brewery, in Brighton, on the night of 
 Tuesday, February 6th, 1849. 
 
 At the time of his death few men were better known at 
 Brighton than Mr. Griffith. He was indeed a new comer; he 
 had resided in Brighton little more than three years, and he 
 was a stranger when he came ; but his manners were open, 
 frank, and pleasant, and his countenance was in harmony with 
 his manners. It was a pleasant and good-looking one. Then 
 his position as the head of a brewing establishment (he 
 had previously been connected with the law) was a good 
 one, and he had taken the popular side in local politics, and 
 distinguished himself as a Commissioner by his spirited 
 opposition to the Clerk of that body, Mr. Lewis Slight, then 
 exercising a predominant influence over that body, but with a 
 growing opposition to his rule in which Mr. Griffith took a 
 leading, if not a very successful, part. 
 
 Such was Mr. Griffith's position ; a man happy in his 
 domestic circumstances with a wife and children at the 
 head of a large and, it is to be presumed, prosperous business 
 enjoying good health, good spirits, and the good opinion of 
 his fellow-townsmen on the day in February, 1849, on which 
 he set out on that journey from which he never returned alive. 
 
 It was customary with the "house" to visit its customers 
 in the north-west of Sussex at Horsham, Henfield, &c. on 
 the first Tuesday of the month ; and at one time Mr. Griffith 
 made the journey himself; but for the twelve months preceding 
 this February of 1849 he had discontinued it; his head clerk, 
 Mr. Martin, taking his place. A circumstance, however, now 
 occurred which induced him once more to make the journey.
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 211 
 
 A warning letter was received early in January by Mr. Martin, 
 couched in the following terms : 
 
 " SIR, Some parties intend to rob you next time you goes to Horsham, 
 so bee on your gard." 
 
 This singular epistle was directed to " Mr. Mertens, Griffis 
 Bruery," and the post-mark showed that it had been put into 
 the box of the Trafalgar-street receiving house of the Brighton 
 Post Office. The handwriting was evidently a disguised one; 
 in the opinion of those expert in such matters it was written 
 with the left hand, and the bad spelling was evidently assumed, 
 it being altogether unlikely that a person who could spell such 
 a word as "parties" correctly, would stumble at "bee" and 
 "gard."' 
 
 The letter was, of course, shown to Mr. Griffith by his 
 clerk, and its effect was, to induce him again to make the 
 journey himself, taking with him a pair of pocket pistols, which 
 Mr. Martin had borrowed of a friend in case he had gone. 
 An offer made by the Chief Officer of the Brighton Police 
 (Mr. Chase), to whom the letter was also shown, to accompany 
 Mr. Griffith on the return journey by night was declined by 
 him, as was also the company of Mr. Martin. He wished, he 
 told the latter, to give a young friend staying with him a drive. 
 However, he eventually went alone, in a light gig hired for 
 the occasion. He was a fine, athletic man, in the prime of 
 life, between 42 and 43 a formidable antagonist for any single 
 assailant, and, with fire-arms, it might have been thought, a 
 match for many. He seems to have had no fears; he did not 
 even tell his wife of the anonymous letter. And yet he was a 
 cautious and prudent man, as is testified by the fact that not 
 long before he had insured his life for a large sum. 
 
 The out-journey was made in safety. Horsham, West- 
 grinstead, Henfield were called at and accounts collected. 
 At the former place the wife of the landlord, Mrs. Ansell, 
 remarked on the lateness of the hour and the fact that some 
 robberies had been recently committed in that vicinity, where- 
 upon, according to her statement at the subsequent inquest,
 
 212 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Mr. Griffith took out of his pocket a red bag containing 
 fire-arms. Never having seen such a weapon before, she 
 asked him if it was a pistol? He replied "Yes," and 
 proceeded to unscrew it, putting in first a round ball, and 
 then, at the trigger part, some powder. As he was replacing 
 the loaded weapon in the bag the string broke, and he put 
 the pistol in the right-hand pocket of his great coat. He 
 then took out another bag, also containing a pistol, on which 
 a neighbour of Mrs. Ansell who was present asked if that too 
 was loaded ? Mr. Griffith replied, " No. I'll warrant the 
 other will be enough for one man. I shall not give up my 
 money easily." He did not take the second pistol out of the 
 bag; but Mrs. Ansell saw the end of the weapon in it. 
 
 Mr. Griffith was now on his return journey to Brighton, 
 and night had set in. But it was not dark; for the moon, 
 though obscured by a hazy atmosphere, cast a bright light, 
 almost as strong as day, upon the surrounding country. 
 When he reached Henfield it was half-past eight. He took 
 tea with the landlady of the White Hart, who afterwards 
 spoke of him as being in high spirits and as playing with her 
 children in his usual kind way. She paid him a $ Brighton 
 Union Bank note, the number of which, with the business 
 habits peculiar to him, he entered in his memorandum-book. 
 He left Henfield at ten minutes to nine and at five minutes 
 past nine he passed through Terry's Cross Gate, a mile and a 
 half further on the road to Brighton. He was then driving 
 steadily at about six miles an hour. The gatekeeper was 
 expecting him and exchanged salutations with him as he 
 passed through without stopping. The next turnpike was 
 Dale Gate, about three miles further on, and here, too, the 
 gatekeeper was expecting him between nine and ten o'clock. 
 But he never came. The road between Terry's Cross Gate 
 and Dale Gate is very lonely, but open. To the right, coming 
 towards Brighton, the country slopes up to the Southdowns 
 in wide open fields, with "occupation roads," lined by low 
 hedges, running down from the hills to the highway. Mr.
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 213 
 
 Griffith was now skirting one of these sloping fields, called 
 the " Deadway's Field." After leaving Terry's Cross Gate 
 there is a strong rise in the road, up which the horse must 
 have walked, and here, one would have thought, would have 
 been the spot selected for a robbery, for from neither side is 
 a habitation to be seen. This, however, was passed in safety, 
 and then, on arriving at the top of the ascent, Newtimber 
 Church comes into sight, and, on the same side, the left, a 
 farm-house and a cottage. This point, too, was passed without 
 obstruction; and now, after a short fall in the road, there is 
 another rise not so sharp as the former one, but still sufficient, 
 with the heavy state of the road and the long journey of the 
 horse, to bring it to a walking pace. Here the attack must 
 have been made, for at this spot about 600 yards from Dale 
 Gate the lifeless body of Mr. Griffith was found, between 
 one and two o'clock in the morning, by a party of gentlemen 
 returning home late from a shooting party at Newtimber, to 
 whom Mr. Griffith was well known. He was lying on his 
 back, with his great coat torn open (a button was off it), and 
 the knees of his trousers and the front part of his dress 
 stained with mud, but no other sign of violence beyond the 
 immediate cause of death. This was a pistol shot in the 
 centre of the chest, high up, and so close to the body when 
 fired that it had scorched Mr. Griffith's shirt and a piece of 
 chamois leather which he wore beneath it, and a parfof the 
 wadding had gone into the wound. This must have been 
 instantly fatal ; for the bullet, after passing the breast bone, 
 took a side direction and went right through the heart, in 
 which it was found lodged. The conclusion was that, after 
 receiving it, the unfortunate gentleman fell on his back and 
 was so suffered to remain while he was robbed, his pockets 
 being turned inside out. But in that case he must either 
 have alighted or been dragged from his vehicle, and then 
 shot, for the medical man examined at the inquest, Mr. Harry 
 Mills Blaker, was decided on the point that he was standing 
 when shot, and immediately fell backwards and died. He 
 might have uttered, said Mr. Blaker, one shriek or moan, and
 
 214 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 such a death-shriek was heard by the keeper's wife at Dale 
 Gate at half-past nine. 
 
 But, however instantaneous the death of Mr. Griffith, it 
 was obvious that he was not surprised by his assailants, and 
 did not die without a struggle. It would have been impossible, 
 in such an open country, and on so light a night, to come 
 upon him unawares, forewarned as he had been and prepared 
 as he was for the attack; and then, too, as a proof that he was 
 not so surprised, he had had time to take off his right-hand 
 glove and to draw and discharge, or attempt to discharge, a 
 pistol. The weapon was found on the road two yards and a 
 half from his body. Then, too, his whip was broken, as 
 though by a blow given with it, and the reins had been cut, 
 and a portion of them was found lying on the road, with a 
 clasped knife, by which, no doubt, it had been done ; and 
 Mr. Griffith's hat and empty purse, and with them the frame of 
 a pair of spectacles, with some crape attached to it, intended, 
 it may be presumed, to conceal an assailant's face, were also 
 lying in the road near the dead body. When, too, the gig 
 which had been turned round towards Henfield was 
 examined, it was found that the step had been forced round 
 in a way that could only have been effected by great violence. 
 There were no marks of blood or other signs to denote a 
 struggle in the gig, only the cut reins and the broken whip 
 and the twisted step; nor did the ground, where Mr. Griffith 
 was lying, show any signs of a struggle. But the above facts 
 are conclusive that there must have been a struggle between 
 Mr. Griffith and his assailants before the fatal shot was fired. 
 
 The booty resulting from the deed could not have been 
 great. It was supposed that Mr. Griffith had upon him 
 about 20 in cash; he had taken a cheque of \i on the 
 Chichester Bank, and a $ Brighton Union Bank note. 
 These were missing, and his watch a gold one had been 
 wrenched off the gold chain by which it hung round his neck; 
 but a considerable part of the chain itself was found attached 
 to the back part of his neck, as if fl,ung round by the violence
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 215 
 
 of the rupture, and a gold mourning ring was still on his 
 finger. 
 
 The excitement caused by the event in Brighton and in 
 the county generally, when made known, cannot easily be 
 described. If such a man, so armed and forewarned, could 
 thus be attacked and murdered on a highway so much 
 frequented as that between Dale Gate and Henfield, who 
 could be safe ? A reward of ^300 was offered /~ioo by the 
 Government and 200 by private subscription to anyone 
 who could give evidence that would lead to the conviction 
 of the murderers, and a free pardon to any party who did 
 not actually commit the crime. Both the East Sussex and 
 the Brighton Constabularies put forth their utmost efforts to 
 obtain some clue. But without avail. The Coroner's Inquest, 
 held at the Plough Inn, at Piecombe, brought out the above 
 facts, and ended in a verdict of " Wilful murder against some 
 persons unknown," the jury giving it as their decided opinion 
 that more than one person must have been concerned in the 
 crime. But not the slightest evidence was forthcoming as to 
 the guilty parties. The question was asked by a juror whether 
 the fatal shot might not have been fired by deceased himself, 
 either in a struggle or otherwise? But to this a decided nega- 
 tive was given by Mr. Blaker. It was impossible, he said, that 
 deceased could have inflicted such a wound on himself. The 
 bullet came straight from the orifice of the pistol. This put 
 the hypothesis of a suicide out of Court, and it was never 
 raised by the parties whom it most concerned to do so: the 
 Insurance office. 
 
 It has been named that one of Mr. Griffith's pistols was 
 found lying near him on the road. The pan was open and 
 the trigger down, so that it had been pulled. But, upon 
 being examined by the police, it was found that the barrel 
 was clean, and the constable who took charge of it after it 
 was picked up expressed his belief that it had not been 
 discharged, and, therefore, could not have been loaded by 
 Mr. Griffith. A loaded pistol was found in the right hand
 
 2 1 6 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 pocket of his great coat where he had been seen to place 
 one by Mrs. Ansell at Horsham and at that time, it will be 
 recollected, Mr. Griffith said the other pistol, which was in a 
 bag, was unloaded. The inference then is, that when Mr. 
 Griffith saw he was about to be attacked, he drew forth the 
 unloaded weapon, and that the one shot heard for several 
 witnesses spoke distinctly to hearing the report of one shot, 
 and one only, at the time, half-past nine, at or about which 
 Mr. Griffith must have reached the " Deadway's Field," and 
 that it came from that direction must have been that fired 
 by his murderers. That Mr. Griffith should have made such 
 a strange and so fatal a mistake, and that such a powerful 
 man should have been pulled from his vehicle and have 
 suffered a pistol to be discharged so close to him as to burn 
 his clothes, does seem strange, and certainly bears out the 
 conclusion of the jury that more than one person were 
 concerned in the crime. In which case detection should 
 have been easy, especially when the anonymous letter points 
 to the probability, if not certainty, that the criminals were 
 known to the writer of it, and thus brings a third party into 
 the field. Yet neither the writer of that strange letter, nor any 
 other party to the crime, came forward to claim the reward 
 offered, coupled as it was with a promise of forgiveness to 
 any except the actual murderer. 
 
 If the motive to the deed had been personal revenge, this 
 could be understood. But the anonymous warning was against 
 robbery, and a robbery was perpetrated, though here, again, a 
 remarkable circumstance comes to throw additional mystery 
 over the affair. Seven years after the death of Mr. Griffith, 
 when all hope had died out of any further light being thrown 
 on it, an important part of the booty the gold watch, with 
 a fragment of the broken chain attached to it was found in 
 a pond which was being "mudded" at Nutknowl, which lies 
 by the side of the highway between Henfield and the spot 
 where Mr. Griffith's body was found. How did it come there? 
 Did the murderer, fearful of being found in possession of so
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 217 
 
 damning a piece of evidence, fling it away almost as soon 
 as he had got it? Then why did he take it at the peril of his 
 life? Robbers especially highwaymen do not act in this 
 way, unless in immediate danger of apprehension, and nobody 
 ran this risk as a murderer of Mr. Griffith. A few people of 
 doubtful character were questioned as to their whereabouts 
 on the night in question ; but nobody was ever taken into 
 custody or even lay under suspicion. There was a rumour 
 about two men being seen in the neighbourhood on the day 
 of the murder; but they could not have been Brighton men, 
 or they would have been marked and known; and if strangers, 
 how is the warning letter to be explained? This points to a 
 long-planned robbery, and if so, it must have been planned 
 by men living in the same town as the writer of the letter 
 and the intended victim resided in that is, Brighton. It 
 must not be forgotten, too, that the warning letter was sent, 
 not to Mr. Griffith, but to Mr. Martin, his clerk that he was 
 the party who, in the ordinary course of events, would have 
 made the journey, and he, therefore, must have been the 
 object of attack, and not Mr. Griffith. This does away with 
 the idea of personal revenge as a motive to the crime. 
 
 There is one circumstance in this mysterious crime to which 
 we have not referred, namely, the presumptive evidence of a 
 desire for concealment on the part of one of the murderers, 
 in the shape of the mask formed by the spectacle frame and 
 the crape. Was, then, the assailant known to his intended 
 victim ? If so, he could not have been unknown to Mr. 
 Griffith's friends and dependents to Mr. Martin especially, 
 whom he must have expected to meet and he could scarcely 
 have avoided suspicion. None such ever fell on any individual. 
 How singular, too, that this piece of disguise (which might 
 have led to detection) and the knife with which the reins were 
 cut should have been left in the road, when they might have 
 been, in a comparatively clear night, so easily carried off! for 
 it was some hours before any passer-by came to discover the 
 body. Yet the men who did not do this took the precaution
 
 2 1 8 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 to turn round the horse and gig to prevent an alarm at Dale 
 Gate! 
 
 From first to last, then from the receipt of the anonymous 
 and warning letter to the finding of the lost watch the death 
 of Mr. Griffith is involved in a strange mystery. That an act 
 so foreseen and so guarded against should have been success- 
 ful, is not the least extraordinary part of it. The chances 
 were a hundred to one against the success of the attack : 
 against the journey being made at all, after the warning given ; 
 against its being made alone, or on that day or at that time 
 of night without which the crime could not have been 
 committed also against the party attacked being unarmed, 
 or rather against the weapon he used being unloaded, and 
 against the one shot fired at him being fatal; and with more 
 than one shot the chances of an alarm being given would 
 have been more than doubled. Even that one report was 
 heard by several persons. Then, when the crime had been 
 successfully perpetrated, that the escape from detection, or 
 even suspicion, should have been so complete, is most 
 remarkable. That there should have been a person of some 
 education and intelligence cognizant of a criminal intention, 
 ready to give a warning, and yet, when a great crime had been 
 committed, deaf to all the appeals and rewards of justice, does 
 excite our wonder, and lead us to question the truth of the 
 old adage that " Murder will out," or, " though it have no 
 tongue, will speak with most miraculous organ." 
 
 Sussex has not furnished many contributions to the romance 
 of county history. Its county families have, for the most part, 
 led a quiet, secluded, respectable life, pursuing their bucolic 
 pleasures, and discharging their Magisterial duties, with a 
 homely kind of ambition that has preserved them from those 
 temptations and dangers, not to say crimes, that attend on a 
 more brilliant mode of life. There have, of course, been 
 exceptions to this rule. The tragical fate of Lord Dacre, " of 
 the South," in the reign of Henry the Eighth, was one of 
 these, and has already been recorded in these pages. The
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 219 
 
 adventurous careers of the three Shirley's, whose love of 
 wandering took them into the East and made one of them 
 the favourite of Shah Abbas, are another instance of departure 
 from the home-staying habits of Sussex gentry. But, as 
 a rule, the biography of our Sussex county families furnishes 
 few materials for that romance in which many other counties 
 are so rich; and where the novelist or romance-writer has, 
 like Horace Smith, in his " Brambletye House," or Harrison 
 Ainsworth, in his " Rookwood," made Sussex the scene of 
 his story, it is to his invention rather than to historical or 
 biographical fact that he has been indebted for any exciting 
 or tragical events that may have figured in it. 
 
 There is, however, one incident in the history of a Sussex 
 family overlooked by novelists and romancists, and, so far as 
 our knowledge extends, unnoticed by our county annalists, 
 which makes good the saying that " fact is strange stranger 
 than fiction," and, as it casts no slur on any survivors of those 
 who took part in it, may be told without offence. 
 
 In July, 1820, a trial came on in the Court of Queen's 
 Bench, before the Lord Chief Justice and a Special Jury, 
 upon the direction of the Lord Chancellor, to try whether 
 the plaintiff, Eliza Ann Harriet Sergison, was the daughter 
 of the late Colonel Francis Sergison, or whether she was 
 a supposititious child imposed upon the family by the con- 
 trivance of his wife. 
 
 The Colonel Francis Sergison in question was the second 
 son of Francis Jefferson, Esq., a native of Yorkshire, and who 
 had taken the name and arms of the Sergisons of Cuckfield 
 Place, Sussex, on marrying the heiress of that family, and also 
 of the Wardens. His second son Francis entered the army, 
 and must, in those active times, have seen some service, for 
 he rose to the Colonelcy of the 6znd Regiment. But in the 
 year 1806 he was residing in Dublin upon half-pay, having, 
 we are told, dissipated the greater part of his fortune, and 
 being, in fact, so reduced in circumstances, that he was thrown 
 into the Dublin Gaol for debt. Here he met with a companion
 
 22O Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 in misfortune a widow named Cronin a woman of great 
 personal attractions, but not of the most reputable character, 
 for it was admitted that since the death of her first husband, 
 a journeyman coach-builder, she had borne two illegitimate 
 children, one of whom had been born on the i8th of March, 
 1 806, as her marriage with Colonel Sergison took place, within 
 the walls of the Dublin Prison, on the joth of April following ! 
 The Colonel's first wife, too, had only died a few weeks 
 previous to the ceremony, so that little else is needed to bear 
 out the statement made on the trial that Colonel Francis 
 Sergison was a hasty, passionate man, very fond of having his 
 own way ! 
 
 The newly-wedded couple soon after contrived to gain 
 their liberty, but lived for some time in embarrassed circum- 
 stances in Dublin; and it was during this period that the 
 events took place which were the subject of the trial at the 
 Court of Queen's Bench in 1820 13 years afterwards. 
 
 During the temporary absence of Col. Sergison sent out 
 of the way, it would seem, by design, on a visit to one of his 
 wife's illegitimate children Mrs. Sergison represented that 
 she had been confined, and presented to him, on his return, a 
 female child as his own offspring. It was, to all appearance, 
 accepted by him as such without suspicion, for he had believed 
 his wife to be in the family way, and the child was brought up 
 by him as his heiress. In the following year, 1 808, the Colonel 
 and his wife came to live in England, and in 1 8 1 1 , by the death 
 of his elder brother, Mr. Warden Sergison, of Cuckfield Park, 
 without issue, he came into the fine family property at Cuck- 
 field, Sussex. And here he lived, with his wife and his 
 reputed daughter, Eliza Ann Harriet, up to the time of his 
 death, in 1812. Not only was the girl acknowledged as his 
 heiress, but she also inherited a considerable fortune by 
 the death of his mother, the heiress of the Wardens and 
 Sergisons. For some years the widow of the late Colonel 
 must have continued in the enjoyment of this, for the trial 
 to decide the question of birth did not, as we have said,
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 221 
 
 take place until July, 1820, when the child must have been 
 nearly 13 years of age. How long the proceedings lingered 
 in Chancery whence they issued by the writ of the 
 Lord Chancellor, Lord Eldon (not the most expeditious of 
 Judges!) we do not know; but they were instigated at the 
 instance of the Rev. Mr. Pritchard,who had married a younger 
 sister of the Colonel, and who, by his death, became the only 
 surviving representative of the Sergison and Warden families, 
 that is, in case of no issue being left by the Colonel. The 
 legitimacy, therefore, of Eliza Ann Harriet Sergison became 
 a vital question to the family. Doubtless some suspicious 
 rumours had got abroad, which had reached the ears of 
 the Pritchards, and caused them to set enquiries on foot 
 in Ireland. And these at length ripened to a point which 
 justified legal steps, and brought about the trial in England. 
 They must have been conducted with great ability, for Mrs. 
 Sergison, the pseudo-mother of the girl who was made 
 plaintiff in the case, went into Court with the greatest con- 
 fidence, and her cause, as it really was, was conducted by the 
 Solicitor-General of the day. Mrs. Sergison, described as 
 being a very fine woman, swore positively that the child 
 was hers by her late husband, Colonel Francis Sergison, and 
 appealed to the testimony of several persons who were present 
 at the birth ; naming one Fitzsimmons as the accoucheur. 
 Several of these persons were called as witnesses, and swore, 
 some to the pregnancy of Mrs. Sergison previous to the birth, 
 and some to the actual birth of the child. 
 
 But, at the very time these witnesses and Mrs. Sergison 
 were thus giving their evidence, the most conclusive proof 
 was in the hands of the opposite party of its falsehood, and 
 not a small portion of this proof was furnished by the acts 
 of Mrs. Sergison herself. 
 
 Mr. Scarlett (the first Lord Abinger), who conducted the 
 defence, began his speech by telling the Solicitor-General 
 that he (the Solicitor-General) was not aware of the case 
 which he supported and that the lady who had sworn so
 
 222 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 firmly before the Court had perjured herself in every word 
 she had uttered. He proceeded to prove this by reading 
 letters from Mrs. Sergison to witnesses on the other side, 
 imploring them to go abroad or otherwise keep out of the 
 way, and to communicate with her for that purpose, unknown 
 to her solicitor. He then called these people, including a 
 female a Mrs. Gibson whom Mrs. Sergison had called in 
 to aid and assist her in the fraud also the accoucheur, 
 Fitzsimmons, and the real mother of the child, one Ann 
 Magin, a servant at a Dublin public-house. From their 
 statements it appeared that in January, 1807, whilst Colonel 
 Sergison was away, his wife went to Mrs. Gibson, with whom 
 she had previously been acquainted whilst the wife of Cronin, 
 and said she had supposed herself to be with child, and 
 dreaded the Colonel's violence when he should discover her 
 mistake and his disappointment. She had, therefore, in 
 conjunction with her servant, Nelly Cunningham, formed a 
 plan for imposing a supposititious child upon him. This 
 plan she disclosed to Mrs. Gibson, and they proceeded to 
 put it in execution. It had been previously acertained, by 
 Mrs. Sergison's servant, Nelly Cunningham, that a servant, 
 at a public-house, named Ann Magin, had been delivered 
 four days before of an illegitimate child, and this woman was 
 induced to part with the child a female one, with black 
 eyes and dark hair for three half-crowns. It was taken by 
 Nelly Cunningham to a house in Angier-street, where Mrs. 
 Sergison and Mrs. Gibson were waiting for it; and there 
 Mr. Fitzsimmons, an accoucheur, was sent for, and, after a 
 conversation with Mrs. Sergison, consented to play his part 
 in the deception. The child was then taken by Mrs. Sergison 
 and Mrs. Gibson in a coach to the lodgings of the former 
 in Parliament-street, and was carried upstairs by Mrs. Gibson 
 in her muff; something having been given it to make it sleep. 
 In half-an-hour after Mr. Fitzsimmons came. Mrs. Sergison 
 then went to bed, and the child was laid on the bed by her. 
 The trick was never suspected by Colonel Sergison, who 
 looked upon the child as his own, and died in that belief.
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 223 
 
 In all respects it was brought up and treated as the heiress 
 of the Sergison family. Yet, as Mrs. Gibson told Mrs. 
 Sergison in 1819, when the latter went to Dublin with her 
 supposed daughter, in order to induce her (Mrs. Gibson) to 
 go to America, at that very moment the real mother of the 
 child was selling apples at the corner of the street in which 
 they were ! 
 
 In addition to this viva voce evidence, letters were produced 
 from Mrs. Sergison to Nelly Cunningham (dead at the time 
 of the trial) to show that Nelly was acquainted with the 
 secret of the so-called Miss Sergison's birth and extraction, 
 and that she received an annuity as the price of her silence. 
 In fact, there could be no doubt of the fraud, and the jury 
 had no difficulty, under the direction of the Lord Chief 
 Justice, in coming to a verdict for the defendant, the effect 
 of which was to establish the illegitimacy of Eliza Ann 
 Harriet Sergison and to transfer the Sergison and Warden 
 estates to the rightful heirs, the Pritchards, by whom the 
 surname and arms of Sergison were forthwith assumed, and 
 by whose descendants they are now borne. 
 
 What became of Mrs. Colonel Francis Sergison and the 
 poor girl who was made the innocent instrument of her fraud, 
 we are not able to say. In all probability, the former had 
 a provision for life, as the widow of Colonel Sergison, and 
 no further proceedings seem to have been taken against her, 
 for perjury or fraud. The child of the Dublin applewoman 
 was, it is to be hoped, either maintained by her or some 
 provision made for it by the Sergison family. The escape of 
 the latter from being made the victims of a cunningly-devised 
 scheme was a narrow one; if successful, it would have 
 been a singular, but perhaps not unique, mode of keeping 
 up the line of descent of two ancient families ! As it is, the 
 sang azule of the Wardens and Sergisons flows unsullied in 
 the veins of its head, Captain Warden Sergison, of Cuckfield 
 Park, and, seeing how numerous are the branches to the 
 family-tree, there is little likelihood of its being exhausted.
 
 224 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Another romantic incident and of a more touching 
 character unstained, too, by any associations of crime, is 
 furnished by the local history of Maresfield, and is told so 
 unaffectedly by the late rector of that parish, the Rev. E. 
 Turner, that we give it in his language. When touching 
 on the family mansion, at Maresfield, of the Relphes, of 
 " Marshalls," he says : 
 
 "The melancholy circumstances attending the death of a 
 female of this family, resident in Buxted, and of a gentleman 
 named Atkinson, to whom she was affianced, was deemed by 
 Mr. Mitchell, the then rector of Maresfield, of sufficient 
 interest to merit more than a mere formal register of their 
 burial. He has therefore recorded them in a Latin note; 
 and they are certainly, as Mr. Mitchell commences by saying, 
 worthy of being delivered down to posterity. The entries of 
 their burial are : 
 
 " 1742. Dec. I4th, buried Mrs. Mary Relfe, of Buxted. 
 " 1742. Dec. 1 5th, Mr. James Atkinson, of London." 
 
 "A mutual attachment, he continues, had for some time 
 existed between them, and the day fixed for their marriage 
 was close at hand, when a special messenger unexpectedly 
 arrived in London, where Mr. Atkinson appears to have held 
 some public appointment, for the purpose of announcing the 
 sad intelligence of the dangerous illness of the lady. He 
 hastened to Buxted, and found the object of his dearest 
 affections at the point of death. Gratified by the sight of 
 her lover, and at this proof of his sincere attachment to her, 
 she revived a little at the sight of him, and lived, contrary 
 to all expectations, two days after his arrival, during which 
 time he continued by her bedside, administering to her wants, 
 and refusing to take food, or to be in any way comforted. 
 She died on the evening of Sunday, on which day, sick in 
 body, but much more sick in mind, he took to his bed, and 
 there lay, overpowered by the intensity of his grief, and 
 praying continually for relief by death, until the following 
 Sunday, when he died, at the very same hour in the evening
 
 Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 225 
 
 that she expired; his death having taken place the day she 
 was buried, and he himself being buried the very day they 
 were to have been married. They are interred, side by side, 
 in the churchyard of this parish, at the east end of the 
 chancel. As the name of Atkinson occurs frequently in the 
 registers about this time, the broken-hearted-swain in this 
 case was probably a native of Maresfield, as well as the lady 
 to whom he was so devotedly attached." 
 
 We think it is Dr. Johnson who doubts if such a thing 
 as a broken heart is to be found within the range of patho- 
 logical science. But, if the above facts be true and there 
 is every reason to receive them as such the strong sympathy 
 between two human beings which we call love has been the 
 cause of death, and it little matters in what region of the 
 body the cause of dissolution lay. In figurative speech, if 
 not in actual fact, James Atkinson died of a broken heart. 
 
 Q
 
 Sussex Poets. 
 
 T may be questioned if any County can produce 
 four greater names in English literature than 
 those of John Fletcher, Thomas Otway, William 
 Collins, and Percy Bysshe Shelley. These are 
 the Dii majores of Sussex. We have also many poets of the 
 second and third class, not unknown to fame, but better 
 known in their own day than they are now. Amongst these 
 are Hayley, Hurdis, Charlotte Smith, Clio Rickman, George 
 Frederick Richardson, Charles Crocker, and Charles Verral. 
 
 To the four great names that head our roll of Sussex 
 Poets it would be impossible for any writer, short of the 
 highest order, to do full justice. To make use of Fletcher's 
 own magnificent language, in which he makes Caesar mourn 
 over the murdered Pompey 
 
 Nothing can cover their high fame but Heaven; 
 No pyramids set off their memories, 
 But the eternal substance of their greatness, 
 To which we leave them. 
 
 But, before referring to these great poets, three of whom 
 were dramatists (for Shelley is entitled to take rank with 
 Shakspeare, Marlowe, Webster, Fletcher and Otway, by virtue 
 of his " Cenci "), we ought not to forget that the precursor 
 of all these sons of fame the first Englishman who wrote 
 a tragedy worthy to be so called was a native of Sussex: 
 Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, afterwards Earl of Dorset. 
 "The earliest tragedy," according to Hazlitt, in his lectures on 
 the Elizabethan Dramatists, "that we have that of Ferrex
 
 Sussex Poets. 227 
 
 and Porrex, or Gordubuc, as it has been generally called," 
 was his production, and was in that blank verse which, 
 as subsequently used by Marlowe and then by Shakspeare, 
 became the most powerful vehicle for passion and pathos 
 since the days of Eschylus and Sophocles. "Gordubuc" 
 was first acted, and with applause, before Elizabeth in 1561, 
 when its author was still a young man. Hazlitt, judging it by 
 comparison with what came later, is severe upon it. "As a 
 work of genius," he says, " it may be set down as nothing, 
 for it contains hardly a memorable line or passage. As a 
 work of art, and the first of its kind attempted in the language, 
 it may be considered as a monument of the taste and skill of 
 the author." He quotes some passages which go far to over- 
 throw his unfavourable judgment. Certainly there is poetic 
 genius in the following lines, in which the heroine laments 
 over the untimely death of her lover, Ferrex : 
 
 Ah ! noble prince, how oft have I beheld 
 Thee mounted on thy fierce and trampling steed, 
 Shining in armour bright before the tilt, 
 And with thy mistress* sleeve tied on thy helm, 
 And charge thy staff to please thy lady's eye, 
 That bowed the head-piece of thy friendly foe ! 
 How oft in arms on horse to bend the mace, 
 How oft in arms on foot to break the sword, 
 Which never now these eyes may see again ! 
 
 Does not this passage recall as well as anticipate those of 
 a great poet of our own days : 
 
 So like a shattered column lay the King 
 Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest, 
 From spur to plume a star of tournament, 
 Shot thro' the lists at Camelot, and charged 
 Before the eyes of ladies and of Kings. 
 
 The thought and feeling are the same in both, and even 
 in the imagery there is resemblance enough to make the 
 parallel a striking one. Both have the true touch of pathos, 
 and the ring of chivalry, in them. 
 
 But we must leave Thomas Sackville in his glory as the 
 first writer of English tragedy, to come to a greater than he : 
 John Fletcher, the author of "The Faithful Shepherdess," 
 one of the sweetest and richest Pastoral Poems ever written
 
 228 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 worthy of Arcadia itself in its most palmy days and the 
 writer, first in conjunction with his friend, Francis Beaumont, 
 and afterwards by his unaided pen, of a large number of plays, 
 of almost every style, from that of Seneca to that of Plautus. 
 In speaking of "The Faithful Shepherdess," Hazlitt says it 
 comes near to Spenser in a certain tender and voluptuous 
 sense of natural beauty, whilst in the playful and fantastic 
 expression of it he approaches Shakspeare; and he quotes 
 some passages which bear out the eulogy. Here is one : the 
 description of a spot well fitted for love, described by Chloe 
 
 to Thenot : 
 
 Here be woods as green 
 
 As any, air likewise as fresh and sweet 
 As where smooth Zephyrus plays on the fLet 
 Face of the curled stream, with flow'rs as many 
 As the young Spring gives, and choice as any ; 
 Here be all new delights, cool streams and wells, 
 Arbours o'ergrow with woodbine; caves and dells; 
 Chuse where thou wilt, while I sit by and sing, 
 Or gather rushes, to make many a ring 
 For thy long fingers ; tell thee tales of love, 
 How the pale Phcebe, hunting in a grove, 
 First saw the boy Endymion, from whose eyes 
 She took eternal fire that never dies ; 
 How she conveyed him softly, in a sleep, 
 His temples bound with poppy, to the steep 
 Head of old Latmos, where she stoops each night, 
 Gilding the mountain with her brother's light, 
 To kiss her sweetest. 
 
 The invocation of Amaryllis to Pan, the God of Shep- 
 herds, to save her from the violence of the Sullen Shepherd, 
 
 for Syrinx' sake 
 
 For her dear sake 
 
 That loves the rivers' brinks, and still doth quake 
 In cold remembrance of thy quick pursuit 
 
 this has the magic touch of Shakspeare in it; and in some 
 passages it is obvious that Fletcher set a copy which Milton 
 was not loath to follow in his Comus Ex. gr.: 
 
 Yet I have heard (my mother told it me, 
 And now I do believe it), if I keep 
 My virgin flow'r uncropt, pure, chaste and fair, 
 No goblin, wood-god, fairy, elf or fiend, 
 Satyr, or other power that haunts the groves, 
 Shall hurt my body, or by vain illusion 
 Draw me to wander after idle fires ;
 
 Sussex Poets. 229 
 
 Or voices calling me in dead of night 
 To make me follow, and so tole me on 
 Thro' mire and standing pools to find my ruin ; 
 Else, why should this rough thing, who never knew 
 Manners, nor smooth humanity, whose heats 
 Are rougher than himself, and more misshapen, 
 Thus mildly kneel to me ? Sure there's a pow'r 
 In that great name of Virgin, that binds fast 
 All rude uncivil bloods, all appetites 
 That break their confines : then, strong Chastity, 
 Be thou my strongest guard, for here I dwell 
 In opposition against fate and hell ! 
 
 " The lady " in Comus does but repeat this pure sweet strain 
 of our great Sussex poet. 
 
 When we consider that the hand that writ this sweetest 
 of Pastaral Poems was also the author (in conjunction, it 
 is thought, with Shakspeare himself) of " The Two Noble 
 Kinsmen," and that he soars in it to Shakspearian heights 
 also that he wrote the play of "Philaster, or Love lies a 
 Bleeding," in which, as Hazlitt says, "The passages of 
 extreme romantic beauty and high-wrought passion are out 
 of number" ought we not to think much of our Sussex 
 poet ? Ought not Rye to be very proud of having given 
 birth to him? It did so, it would seem, in 1579. His father, 
 Dr. Fletcher, was then vicar of Rye, and subsequently held 
 in succession the Sees of Bristol, Worcester, and London 
 owing them, apparently, as much to his good looks (Queen 
 Elizabeth ever liked a handsome face in a man) as to his 
 piety or learning. Marrying, however, a second time once 
 too often for his Royal and fickle mistress he fell into her 
 displeasure, and so pined away and died most unbishoplike! 
 It was, probably, this reverse of fortune to his father that 
 caused the son, like so many young men of the day, to take 
 to play-writing. Upon leaving the University, and finding a 
 congenial spirit in Francis Beaumont, also fresh from College, 
 these twin-Poets set up a partnership which aimed at nothing 
 less than rivalry of Shakspeare, and the produce of which was 
 accepted by a later age as superior to his work. This decision 
 has, of course, long been reversed, and the space which 
 separates Shakspeare from all other poets becomes greater
 
 230 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 and greater as Time rolls on. Yet, so far as Shakspeare can 
 be approached, he is approached by Fletcher. Speaking 
 of him and Shakspeare's other great contemporaries, Hazlitt 
 says : 
 
 They are a mighty phalanx of kindred spirits closing him (Shakspeare) 
 round, moving in the same orbit, and impelled by the same causes in their 
 whirling and eccentric career. They had the same faults and the same 
 excellencies ; the same strength and depth and richness, the same truth of 
 character, passion, imagination, thought and language, thrown, heaped, 
 massed together without careful polishing or exact method, but poured out 
 in unconcerned profusion from the lap of nature and genius in boundless 
 and unrivalled magnificence. The sweetness of Deckar, the grace of 
 Fletcher and his young-eyed wit, Jonson's learned sock, the flowing vein 
 of Middleton, Heywood's ease, the pathos of Webster, and Marlow'sdeep 
 designs, add a double lustre to the sweetness, thought, gravity, grace, 
 wit, artless nature, copiousness, ease, pathos and sublime conceptions of 
 Shakspeare's Muse. They are, indeed, the scale by which we can best 
 ascend to the true knowledge and love of him. Our admiration of them 
 does not lessen our relish for him ; but, on the contrary, increases and 
 confirms it. 
 
 Fletcher died unmarried in 1625 it is supposed of the 
 plague then raging in London, and was buried at St Mary's, 
 now St. Saviour's, Southwark. Little or nothing is known 
 of his habits of life, except that he and Beaumont were gay 
 young men, " about town," " noble-swelling spirits," affecting 
 a more aristocratic, or, as we should saynow-a-days, fashion- 
 able tone and air than their great contemporaries. With 
 these, however, we know, from Beaumont's poetic description 
 to Jonson of what they did at the Mermaid, they mingled, 
 and the very talk of the two friends is said to have been a 
 "comedy." Sometimes, too, it must have been something 
 higher, for how richly stored must have been the minds of 
 which such gems as these were the out-flow : 
 
 MELANCHOLY. 
 
 Hence, all you vain delights, 
 As short as are the nights 
 Wherein you spend your folly ; 
 There's nought in this life sweet, 
 If man were wise to see't, 
 But only melancholy. 
 Oh, sweetest melancholy ! 
 , Welcome folded arms and fixed eyes, 
 
 A sight that piercing mortifies :
 
 Sussex Poets. 231 
 
 A look that's fasten'd to the ground, 
 
 A tongue chain'd up without a sound ; 
 
 Fountain heads and pathless groves, 
 
 Places which pale passion loves : 
 
 Moon-light walks, when all the fowls 
 
 Are warmly hous'd, save bats and owls ; 
 
 A midnight bell, a passing groan, 
 
 These are the sounds we feed upon: 
 
 Then stretch our bones in a still, gloomy valley ; 
 
 Nothing so dainty sweet as lonely melancholy. 
 
 MAN. 
 
 Like to the falling of a star, 
 Or as the flights of eagles are, 
 Or like the fresh Spring's gaudy hue, 
 Or silver drops of morning dew, 
 Or like a wind that chafes the flood, 
 Or bubbles which on water stood : 
 E'en such is man, whose borrow'd light 
 Is straight call'd in and paid to-night : 
 The wind blows out, the bubble dies ; 
 The Spring intomb'd in Autumn lies ; 
 The dew's dried up, the star is shot, 
 The flight is past and man forgot. 
 
 There is a honeyed sweetness in this verse which has 
 never been surpassed. And yet we question if many Sussex 
 ears have feasted on it before. And Rye, has she any memorial 
 of her greatest son ? We wot not. Otway has not long had 
 one at his birth-place, and Horsham knows nothing of Shelley. 
 But poets like these need no monuments beyond their own 
 works. They alone are indestructible. 
 
 Thomas Otway was born in 1651, in the little village of 
 Trotton (West Sussex), of which his father was curate, and 
 subsequently rector of the adjacent parish of Woolbeding. 
 The spot is well-fitted by its rural beauty and picturesque 
 scenery for a Pastoral Poet. But Otway's genius did not 
 lie, like Fletcher's, in this direction; nor was there, in the 
 licentious age of the second Charles, much demand for that 
 kind of poetry. A new taste and a new style of literature had 
 been imported from France, and a license was permitted 
 nay, demanded of writers for the stage that even the later 
 dramatists of James's days would have scarcely satisfied. 
 The Rochesters, the Davenants, and the Ethereges were now
 
 232 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 in the ascendant; and even men of true genius, like Dryden 
 and Otway, had to swim with the stream. 
 
 At the age of 18 years Otway, like Fletcher, was sent 
 (from Winchester School) to the University of Oxford, which 
 he left in 1670 without a degree, and betook himself, not to 
 his Sussex home, but to London, " to seek his fortune." The 
 reason for this step was pointed out by us in the Brighton 
 Herald 20 years ago. An examination of the parish register 
 of Woolbeding* at that time led to the discovery, not only of 
 the entry of Otway's birth, but of the death of his father, 
 then Rector of Woolbeding, in February, 1670. The death 
 of the father, in Otway's as in Fletcher's case, threw the son 
 on his own resources, at the early age of 19, and his tastes, 
 probably, as well as his necessities drew him to the stage. 
 In one of his minor poems, "The Poet's Complaint of his 
 Muse," he thus describes his own situation at this time : 
 
 I am a wretch of honest race : 
 My parents not obscure, nor high in title were : 
 
 They left me heir to no disgrace : 
 tMy father was (a thing now rare) 
 Loyal and brave : my mother chaste and fair. 
 Their pledge of marriage-vows was only I ; 
 Alone I liv'd, their much-lov'd fondled boy ; 
 They gave me generous education high, 
 They strove to raise my mind, and with it grew their joy. 
 The sages that instructed me in Arts, 
 
 And knowledge, oft would praise my parts, 
 And cheer my parents' longing hearts. 
 When I was called to a dispute, 
 My fellow-pupils oft stood mute : 
 Yet never envy did dis-join 
 Their hearts from me, nor pride distemper mine. 
 Thus my first years in happiness I past, 
 
 Nor any bitter cup did taste ; 
 But oh ! a deadly potion came at last. 
 
 As I lay loosely on my bed, 
 
 A thousand pleasant thoughts triumphing in my head, 
 And as my senses on the rich banquet fed 
 A voice (it seem'd no more, so busy I 
 Was within myself, I saw not who was nigh) 
 Pierc'd thro' my ears ; Arise, thy good Senandcr's dead. 
 It shook my brain, and from their feast my frightened senses fled. 
 
 Made by the courtesy and with the assistance of the Rev. F. Bourdillon, then the 
 Incumbent of Woolbeding.
 
 Sussex Poets. 233 
 
 From thence sad discontent, uneasy fears, 
 And anxious doubts of what I had to do, 
 
 Grew with succeeding years. 
 The world was wide, but whither should I go ? 
 I, whose blooming hopes all wither'd were, 
 Who'd little fortune and a deal of care ! 
 To Britain's great Metropolis I stray'd, 
 
 Where fortune's general game is play'd ; 
 Where honesty and wit are often prais'd, 
 But fools and knaves are fortunate and rais'd. 
 My forward spirit prompted me to find 
 
 A converse equal to my mind : 
 But, by raw judgment easily misled 
 
 (As giddy callow boys 
 
 Are very fond of toys), 
 
 I miss'd the brave and wise, and in their stead 
 On every sort of vanity I fed. 
 Gay coxcombs, cowards, knaves, and prating fools, 
 Bullies of o'ergrown bulks and little souls, 
 Gamesters, half-wits, and spendthrifts (such as think 
 Mischievous midnight frolics bred by drink 
 
 Are gallantry and wit, 
 Because to their lewd understandings fit), 
 
 Were those wherewith two years at least I spent, 
 To all their fulsome follies most incorrigibly bent : 
 
 'Till at the last, myself more to abuse, 
 
 I grew in love with a deceitful Muse. 
 
 To put this in plain prose, the ex-collegian of 19 joined 
 the Duke of York's company of players, and became an actor. 
 But, like so many other playwrights, his success on the stage 
 was small. It gave him, however, that knowledge of stage 
 business which is so essential to the dramatist. At the age of 
 25 he produced his first drama, the tragedy of "Alcibiades" 
 a remarkable work as the first attempt of so young a man, 
 though with many faults. This was quickly followed, if we 
 are to credit Otway's own preface to it, by the tragedy of 
 "Don Carlos, Prince of Spain" a much higher effort, and 
 containing passages of great beauty; many of them in those 
 triplets which Dryden afterwards adopted and made such 
 good use of in his translation of Virgil. This was succeeded 
 by a translation of Moliere's " Fourberies de Scapin," and by 
 a comedy called " Friendship in Fashion." The character of 
 this latter may be inferred from the fact that when it was 
 revived at Drury Lane in 1749 it was hissed off the stage for 
 its grossness and immorality. Even when originally produced
 
 234 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 it could not have had much success. Otway's genius did not 
 lie towards comedy, which became mere buffoonery in his 
 hands, or worse than that. 
 
 A break now takes place in Otway's career as a dramatic 
 author; he accepted a commission as cornet in some troops 
 sent by the English Government into Flanders, and under- 
 went some of the hardships of a soldier's life, without reaping 
 any of its glory or more solid fruit. On returning to England, 
 which he did a beggar, he turned his military experience to 
 account by writing a play, "The Soldier's Fortune," which 
 had a successful run ; and any reader of it in the present day 
 will be astonished that it should have done so. It is marked 
 by a coarseness of language and of action which stamps the 
 age that could accept such a piece for a picture of its manners 
 as one of gross licentiousness. How a man of feeling and 
 of genius, as Otway undoubtedly was, could produce such a 
 piece amazes us. His excuse must be, that he was starving, 
 and that he wrote for the age. And this is but a poor one 
 for such trash. 
 
 In the play that followed " The Soldier's Fortune " Otway 
 returned to tragedy, and to that vein of pathos in which his 
 strength lay. This was " The Orphan," one of the two plays 
 on which his fame rests for that mastery of pathos and tender- 
 ness in which he has never been surpassed, and only equalled 
 by Shakspeare himself. There are some passages in " The 
 Orphan" which rise to the highest point of passion, especially 
 that in which Polydore, after his treachery to his brother 
 and his discovery that Monimia has been secretly married to 
 Castalio, bursts into the following " fine frenzy : " 
 
 Then thus let's go together, 
 Full of our guilt, distracted where to roam, 
 Like the first wretched pair expell'd their Paradise. 
 Let's find some place where adders nest in Winter, 
 Loathsome and venemous : where poisons hang 
 Like gums against the walls ; where witches meet 
 By night and feed upon some pamper'd imp, 
 Fat with the blood of babes : There we'll inhabit, 
 And live up to the height of desperation ;
 
 Sussex Poets. 235 
 
 Desire shall languish like a withering flower, 
 And no distinction of the sex be thought of. 
 Horrors shall fright me from those pleasing harms, 
 And I'll no more be caught with beauty's charms, 
 But when I'm dying take me in thy arms. 
 
 After an interval unworthily employed in giving a new 
 shape to Shakspeare's "Romeo and Juliet," which was pro- 
 duced under the classical form of " Caius Marius," Otway 
 again asserted his native genius and produced the nearest 
 approach to Shakspeare that the English, or, perhaps, any 
 stage, has seen since the days of Elizabeth and James. This 
 was the tragedy of "Venice Preserved," the chief characters 
 of which have ever been selected by our greatest actors and 
 actresses -our Keans and Kembles, Siddons and O'Neils 
 as a vehicle for their histrionic powers. This was the highest 
 and ripest fruit of Otway's genius. It was also the last. 
 The life he led in London alternated between excess and 
 starvation and it is a tradition of literature that his death 
 was owing to the latter. His means may be guessed at from 
 the fact that he only received 1$ for the copyright, of 
 "Venice Preserved!" He was in his 34th year, and in the 
 full maturity of his powers: he had genius, experience, the 
 ear of the public, and, if we may believe his dedications to 
 the Duke and Duchess of York, &c., he enjoyed the favour 
 of the Court. But all were thrown away in that reckless and 
 riotous life which was the fashion of the second Charles's 
 days. The closing catastrophe of the Sussex dramatist's 
 career had now come. He was hiding so runs the story 
 from his creditors at a public-house on Tower Hill, in a 
 penniless condition, when, meeting a friend, who gave him a 
 guinea, he hurried to buy a roll of bread, eating which with 
 the voracity of a starving man, he was choked by the first 
 mouthful. So perished, miserably and obscurely, a writer, 
 who, according to Johnson, has caused more tears to be shed 
 on the stage for his Belvidera and Monimia than even Shaks- 
 peare has for Juliet and Desdemona, and who, in an age when 
 bombast and obscenity divided the stage between them, went 
 to Nature for his materials, and knew how to wring the
 
 236 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 human heart with sympathy for human suffering. He had 
 great faults, but he had still greater beauties, and these latter 
 were his own, whilst the former were those of the age in 
 which it was his hapless lot to be cast. When it is considered 
 that at the age of 19 years he was thrown upon his own 
 resources for a living, and in such a city as London, in such 
 a reign as that of Charles the Second, it is wonderful that 
 he retained such vigour and freshness of thought such 
 healthiness of feeling, as enabled him to picture the virtues 
 and sorrows of a wife such as Belvidera. He never apparently 
 re-visited, as Shakspeare so often did, his rural home the 
 little village of Trotton, with its church and river and pic- 
 turesque scenery, nestling under the beautiful hills of Sussex 
 and Hampshire to drink in the fresh air and draw inspiration 
 from the fair sights of the country. The home-ties snapped 
 by the death of his father were never re-knit. Otway seems 
 to have drifted about, a waif of London life now in luck, 
 now out of it, but oftener the latter than the former until 
 a wretched death closes the struggle. Yet his mother still 
 lived and in the old Sussex home of Woolbeding she did 
 not die until 1703, and, with a heart capable of such intense 
 feeling as Otway's was, his thoughts must have sometimes 
 travelled to her, and to that beautiful village in which the 
 early part of his life was passed. Perhaps he looked forward 
 to achieving fortune as well as fame before returning "home." 
 For it is obvious that, demoralising as Otway's mode of life 
 may have been, his genius had been ripening. His last 
 production, "Venice Preserved," is far above all his other 
 works. Strike out one or two attempts at comic scenes, 
 and both the incidents and the verse of the remainder have 
 a strength which soars into the highest region of poetry and 
 passion. Love was the natural element of Otway, but whilst 
 in Monimia and other characters there is a dangerous volup- 
 tuousness in the pictures drawn of it, in Belvidera it is pure 
 as well as impassioned, and the whole play gave promise that, 
 had Otway lived, he would have reached a still higher point 
 of excellence.
 
 Sussex Poets. 237 
 
 As it was, he sank, at the age of 34, into a nameless grave 
 his remains were interred in a vault under the Church of St. 
 Clement Danes and it is only within the last 30 years that a 
 tribute to his memory has been erected (by W. Jolliffe, Esq.) in 
 his birth-place, in the shape of a brass-plate let into the wall 
 of the Parish Church at Trotton, and bearing the following 
 inscription : 
 
 " Hoc monumentum, quantumvis simplex, 
 
 Memoria sacratum sit 
 
 THOMAS OTWAY, Armigeri, 
 
 Poetamm Tragicorum qui in Britannia enotuerunt, 
 
 Facile Princeps. 
 
 Hoc Pago natus anno 1651. 
 
 Eheu ! egestate acerrima gravatus 
 
 Naturae concessit 1685. 
 
 Abi, Lector Amice ! 
 
 Et vicibus praecellentis ingenii prospectis, 
 Quamcunque Deus tibi fortunaverit horam, 
 ^Eternitatem cogita." 
 
 The third great name on our Sussex roll of poets is that 
 of William Collins. He also belongs to the western part of 
 the county. He was a native of Chichester, and, like Otway, 
 a Winchester boy, and a graduate of St. Magdalen's, Oxford. 
 But here the parallel ends. The family of Collins, though 
 of the trading class, were in good circumstances; his father 
 was thrice Mayor of Chichester, and, when he died, his 
 brother-in-law, Lieut. -Colonel Martyn, a distinguished officer 
 in the army, took his nephew, William, under his protection. 
 At his uncle's invitation, after taking his degree as a Bachelor 
 of Arts, Collins went over to Flanders, where Col. Martyn 
 was then serving with his regiment it is a curious coincidence 
 that both Otway and Collins should have had a taste of that 
 unpoetical country, Flanders but he was pronounced "too 
 indolent" for a military life, and was sent back to England to 
 see if a clerical one would suit him better. For this, too, he 
 was either disinclined, or "there was metal more attractive." 
 Indeed, his tastes from early youth were strongly towards 
 literature; and having, by the death of his mother, become 
 the owner of a little property and the master of his own 
 actions, he gave the bent to his inclination, and became a
 
 238 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 man of letters. He had been the school-fellow of the 
 Wartons, Whitehead, Hampton, &c., and he now made the 
 acquaintance of Dr. Johnson, at that time the head of the 
 London world of wit and learning. The great Doctor, who 
 afterwards became Collins's biographer, speaks highly of 
 him. "His appearance," he says, "was decent and manly; 
 his knowledge considerable; his views extensive; his con- 
 versation elegant; and his disposition cheerful." This latter 
 quality contrasts strangely with what we know of the after- 
 life of Collins, for "melancholy had marked him for her 
 own." Even in his school-days he was remarked for being 
 depressed, and once, when questioned by a companion as to 
 the cause, he replied that he had had a dream: he had dreamt 
 that, while walking in the fields, he saw a lofty tree, which he 
 strove to climb, but, when he had nearly reached the top, a 
 great branch gave way and he fell to the ground. On his 
 school-fellow laughing at him for being out of spirits at 
 such a cause, Collins said he looked upon the tree as "the 
 tree of Poetry;" betraying at the same time his poetical 
 aspirations and his constitutional melancholy. The anecdote 
 has some resemblance to the story of Swift also a prey to 
 mental depression who, seeing a tree struck by lightning, 
 and its topmost branches leafless, exclaimed, "Ah, I am like 
 that tree. I shall die at the top first." 
 
 The dream of the one poet and the prophecy of the other 
 were both fulfilled. Collins climbed high, and reached one of 
 the highest branches of poetry. But here he fell not, like 
 Otway, by the stroke of Fortune, but by even a harder Fate. 
 Fortune, in the ordinary meaning of the word, was kind to 
 him. When Johnson knew him, he was, indeed, in distress, 
 and, with his usual kindness to literary brethren in trouble, 
 the great Doctor assisted him out of his temporary difficulty 
 by helping him to sell to the booksellers the commencement 
 of a translation of Aristotle's Poetics. This work, however, he 
 never finished, for soon afterwards his uncle, Colonel Martyn, 
 died, leaving him a legacy of /^z,ooo, and this sufficed for
 
 Sussex Poets. 239 
 
 the wants of the remaining years of his life. Taking lodgings 
 at Richmond, he seems to have indulged in that vein of 
 indolence which was noticed in early life by his uncle. He 
 wrote little, but that little was highly polished, and his " Ode 
 to the Passions " placed him on a level with the finest lyric 
 poets of that, or, indeed, of any other age. It brought him 
 little profit it was sold for io\ but it gained him the 
 acquaintance of Thomson, Armstrong, Mallet, and other 
 poets and dramatists of the day, and with some of these it 
 is to be feared that Collins, by free living and late hours, 
 increased that natural debility which lay at the root of his 
 subsequent malady. Perhaps, of all gifts, that of competency 
 the means of living in idleness is the most dangerous that 
 a man predisposed to melancholy can receive. If Collins had 
 had his living to earn, he might have preserved his reason for 
 many years. As it was, the cloud which was "no bigger than 
 a man's hand" in youth grew and grew until it clouded the 
 whole of his intellect. Had he had some fixed occupation 
 had he been compelled to translate the Poetics of Aristotle, of 
 which Johnson speaks, or to write the History of the Revival 
 of Learning, which he planned with Warton, it might have 
 changed his fate, and he might, like Johnson himself, have 
 striven successfully against this morbid melancholy which 
 assailed them both. But his uncle's liberality had relieved 
 him from immediate pressure, and though he afterwards pro- 
 jected many works, prose and poetical, he completed little or 
 nothing and the only poem he published was his Dirge for 
 Cymbeline, "To Fair Fidele's grassy tomb," printed in the 
 Gentleman's Magazine of 1749. He had now left Richmond, 
 and resided for a time, first in his native place Chichester 
 and then in Bath. The clouds were gathering around him. 
 To scatter them he tried a tour in France, but without success; 
 and, returning to England, was seized, whilst with some friends 
 at Oxford, with the first attack of insanity, and became for a 
 time an inmate of a private asylum. Hence he was removed 
 by his sister to her residence near the Cathedral of Chichester, 
 and in the cloisters of this edifice he was wont, it is said, to
 
 240 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 wander, giving vent to the distresses of his mind in lamenta- 
 tions and sobs. But, though the branch of the tree he essayed 
 to climb was broken though no longer able to write, or even 
 to study, all light was not shut out. At this period of Collins's 
 career he was seen once by his old friend, Dr. Johnson. It 
 was after his return from France, and when awaiting his sister 
 at Islington. " There was no apparent insanity (we quote 
 from Mr. M. A. Lower's admirable piece of biography in his 
 'Worthies of Sussex') but he had given up study and 
 travelled with no other book than a New Testament, such 
 as children carry to school. Johnson took it into his hand, 
 from simple curiosity as to what book a classical scholar (for 
 Collins, besides being a thorough classical scholar, was master 
 of Italian, French, and Spanish) had chosen for his vade mecum. 
 ' I have but one book,' said the poor stricken poet; ' but that 
 is the best.' " 
 
 It is to this incident that Hayley refers, in those lines 
 (beneath Flaxman's monument to Collins in Chichester 
 Cathedral) which are, perhaps, the finest he ever wrote : 
 
 Ye who the merits of the dead revere, 
 
 Who hold misfortune sacred genius dear 
 
 Regard this tomb, where Collins' hapless name 
 
 Solicits kindness with a double claim. 
 
 Though Nature gave him, and though Science taught, 
 
 The fire of Fancy and the reach of Thought, 
 
 Severely doomed in penury's extreme 
 
 He passed in maddening pain Life's feverish dream ; 
 
 While rays of genius only served to show 
 
 The thickening horror and exalt his woe. 
 
 Ye walls, that echoed to his frantic moan, 
 
 Guard the due records of this graceful stone ; 
 
 Strangers to him, enamoured of his lays, 
 
 This fond memorial to his talents raise ; 
 
 For this the ashes of the Bard require 
 
 Who touched the tenderest notes of Pity's lyre ; 
 
 Who joined pure faith to strong poetic powers ; 
 
 Who, in reviving Reason's lucid hours, 
 
 Sought on one Book his troubled mind to rest, 
 
 And rightly deemed the Book of God the best. 
 
 In penning these fine lines, Hayley rose to the level of 
 his theme, and proved, if his age erred in thinking him a 
 poet, that he could at least write poetry. Collins lived until
 
 Sussex Poets. 241 
 
 1759 (he was born in 1721) and then expired in the arms of 
 his sister, and was buried in the churchyard of St. Andrew's, 
 Chichester, immediately behind the house in East Street, 
 where he was born. To the world he had long been dead, 
 and though his genius was recognised even then by the 
 higher order of minds, it was not until some years after his 
 death that it received full acknowledgment as of the highest 
 order in one, and that a high, class of poetry the Ode. 
 
 There could scarcely be a stronger contrast in moral 
 character and course of life than between Otway and Collins. 
 Though the former was the son of a clergyman and educated 
 at Winchester and Oxford, he only refers to the clerical pro- 
 fession (as in "The Orphan") in order to load it with insult 
 and contempt. With regard to religion, he evidently shared 
 in the latitudinarianism of the day. His morals were of the 
 loosest, and some of his plays, as we have seen, were too gross 
 and licentious even for an age which tolerated the works of 
 Afra Behn and Wycherley. Even in "Venice Preserved" 
 there are some scenes which no modern stage would allow. 
 Collins, on the other hand, was temperate and deeply religious, 
 and his writings were pure and moral. " He was," writes one 
 who knew him, "passionately fond of music, good-natured and 
 affable, warm in his friendship, and visionary in his pursuits; 
 and, as long as I knew him, very temperate in his eating and 
 drinking." That his temper was equable, is demonstrated 
 by the following anecdote, told by the same friend: "It 
 happened, one afternoon, at a tea visit, that several intelligent 
 friends were assembled at his rooms to enjoy each other's con- 
 versation, when in comes a member of a certain College, as 
 remarkable at that time for his brutal disposition as for his 
 good scholarship,* who though he met with a circle of the 
 most peaceable people in the world, was determined to quarrel, 
 and though no man said a word, lifted up his foot and kicked 
 the table and all its contents to the other side of the room. 
 
 * Hampton, the translator of Polybius. 
 
 R
 
 242 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Our poet, though of a warm temper, was so confounded at 
 the unexpected downfall, and so astonished at the unmerited 
 insult, that he took no notice of the aggressor, but, getting 
 up from his chair, calmly began picking up the pieces of 
 bread and butter and the fragments of his china, repeating, 
 very mildly, 
 
 " Invenias etiam disjecta membra Poetce" 
 
 This, by the bye, is not unlike the story told by Boswell of 
 another scholar of the day, who, receiving a glass of wine in 
 his face from a discomfited opponent, coolly remarked, "That 
 is a digression ; let us proceed with the argument." 
 
 Collins never married never, indeed, seems to have been 
 deeply in love. In this and in other respects, in his piety and 
 mental suffering, he bears some resemblance to his fellow- 
 Poet, Cowper, who was one of his fervent admirers. 
 
 There is a peculiar pleasure in finding one great Poet 
 recognising the beauties, and sympathising with the mis- 
 fortunes, of another, and this pleasure is doubled when, as 
 in the case of Collins, such recognition comes from a Poet 
 of the same locality. Collins refers both to Otway and to 
 Fletcher. In his " Ode to Pity" he asks, after invoking the 
 memory of " Pella's bard," Euripides, 
 
 But wherefore need I wander wide 
 To old Ilissus" distant side 
 
 Deserted stream, and mute ? 
 Wild Arun too has heard thy strains, 
 And Echo, 'midst my native plains, 
 
 Been soothed by Pity's lute. 
 
 There first the wren thy myrtles shed 
 On gentlest Otway's infant head, 
 
 To him thy cell was shown ; 
 And while he sang the female heart, 
 With youth's soft notes unspoil'd by art, 
 
 Thy turtles mix'd their own. 
 
 And, in the poetical epistle he addressed to Sir Thomas 
 Hanmer, on his edition of Shakspeare's works, he thus places
 
 Sussex Poets. 243 
 
 the Sussex-born dramatist, Fletcher, next in order to the 
 " Swan of Avon," 
 
 No second growth the western isle could bear, 
 
 At once exhausted with too rich a year : 
 
 Too nicely Jonson knew the critic's part ; 
 
 Nature to him was almost lost in art. 
 
 Of softer mould, the gentle Fletcher came, 
 
 The next in order, as the next in fame ; 
 
 With pleased attention 'midst his scenes we find 
 
 Each glowing thought that warms the female mind ; 
 
 Each melting sigh and every tender tear ; 
 
 The lover's wishes and the virgin's fear. 
 
 His every strain the Smiles and Graces own ; 
 
 But stronger Shakspeare felt for man alone : 
 
 Drawn by his pen, our ruder passions stand 
 
 Th ; unrivall'd picture of his early hand. 
 
 A long dreary night in poetry has to be passed (but feebly 
 lighted up by three Sussex luminaries, Hayley, Charlotte 
 Smith, and James Hurdis), before the close of the i8th 
 century, with its French Revolution, and the breaking forth 
 of new hopes, new ideas, new passions, called forth a new 
 race of poets first Coleridge, Southey, Wordsworth all 
 Revolutionists, or, as they called themselves, Pantisocratists, 
 in their " salad days " then Byron, Keats, Leigh Hunt, and, 
 last and greatest of all, the Sussex boy-poet, Percy Bysshe 
 Shelley. These later poets took up the opinions of the 
 earlier ones of the igth century at the point they had cast 
 them off for more sober and orthodox views. Hence the 
 bitter feud between them. But literary quarrels are for a 
 generation poetry is for "all time." Shelley expelled 
 from Oxford, driven from his home and country even 
 deprived of his children for his theological opinions, now 
 takes his place beside Coleridge and Wordsworth, and is 
 looked upon as one of the brightest names and purest natures 
 that adorn the literature of England. He did not live to see 
 the change. The clouds were still over him when he went 
 down into that watery element with which, even in life, his 
 nature seemed to mingle, and which he loved more than the 
 tame land. 
 
 Never, surely, did the storms of life beat more fiercely
 
 244 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 than on that girl-like and ethereal being; girl-like in its fragile 
 mould in its intense sympathies; also in its capacity for 
 suffering. It sounds like a contradiction in Nature when we 
 are told that Shelley was the son of a Sussex "Squire" a 
 man of broad acres and narrow opinions one Timothy 
 Shelley living in the heart of that Bo3otia of England, the 
 Weald of Sussex, which was only known to the rest of the 
 kingdom 100 years ago by the fatness of its fowls, the white- 
 ness of its wheat, and the clayey adhesiveness of its soil. 
 Of course, Timothy Shelley was a Tory of the Pitt School 
 a hater of Bonaparte in particular and of Frenchmen in 
 general; a staunch upholder of "Church and State," as that 
 was understood 100 years ago. How came this man to 
 christen his son Percy Bysshe Shelley of which it may as 
 truly be said that " it doth poetically sound," as it has been 
 said of Shakspeare that " it doth heroically sound." How 
 came he to have such a son? How could such a Pegasus all 
 " fire and air " all tenderness and love more Greek than 
 English more spiritual than mortal spring from such fox- 
 hunting, change-hating loins ? Expound the mystery, shade 
 of Tristram Shandy ! We can only record the fact. 
 
 The life of Percy Bysshe* Shelley (he was born on the 
 4th of August, 1792, at Field Place, near Horsham) was a 
 long conflict martyrdom, it will, perhaps, one day be called 
 with the Powers of the day, one by one, as he came in 
 contact with them: the power of the Bully at School of the 
 Tyrant at home of the Dogmatiser at the University of 
 the High and Dry spirit of Toryism in Law, Church, and 
 Senate of the "slashing" and slandering Reviewer in Litera- 
 ture. With the organization of a woman, but with the heart 
 of a hero, and the intellect of a being something higher than 
 man, the Sussex boy turned at bay upon these Powers of the 
 day and did battle with them. Discreetly ? Temperately ? 
 Wisely ? No. He was but a boy when the struggle began, 
 
 * Bysshe was the name of the poet's grandfather.
 
 Sussex Poets. 245 
 
 and they were mature Powers, consolidated by ages of victori- 
 ous battle, and walled round by towers and battlements of 
 rank, wealth, prejudice, caste, dogmas, with all the experience 
 of antiquity and all the prestige of authority. Of course, in 
 his childish hatred of abuses which he felt rather than 
 understood, he blundered struck wide, and comprehended 
 in his words of hate what in his spirit he loved. And they 
 the Powers of the day took advantage of the error and 
 punished him according to the code of the day. He attacked 
 " constituted authorities " " time-honoured Institutions " 
 dogmas, social, political, and theological, consecrated by cen- 
 turies of acceptance; and their champions and defenders did 
 their best, not to convert or convince, but to crush him. 
 
 There is but little left of the abuses with which Shelley 
 did battle at the beginning of this century; one by one, they 
 have gone down before more skilful, but not braver or purer 
 adversaries; and the clouds of calumny in which he passed 
 his life, and which settled down so densely on his tomb, are 
 beginning to clear off and to disclose what was pure and 
 strong and beautiful, as well as what was weak and faulty, in 
 his character. 
 
 Few lives have, indeed, been made the subject of greater 
 misrepresentation and vilification than that of Shelley, and 
 yet few have been more free from the stains and weaknesses 
 of ordinary natures. His morals were pure his tastes simple 
 his habits void of those foibles which often attend youth in 
 the upper circles of life. 
 
 " To all sensual pleasures," writes his widow, " Shelley was a stranger. 
 His usual food was bread, sometimes seasoned with a few raisins ; his 
 beverage was generally water ; if he drank tea or coffee he would take no 
 sugar with it, because the produce of the cane was then obtained by 
 slave labour ; and the unanimous voice of those who knew him acquits 
 him of any participation in the lax habits of life too common among 
 young men." 
 
 It was by his opinions that he gave offence, and he was 
 a mere boy when the announcement of them, at Oxford, 
 induced the authorities there to drive him from its walls, and, 
 as a consequence, to close against him the doors of his father's
 
 246 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 house. The paper in which Shelley set forth those opinions 
 often spoken of as a pamphlet consisted of two pages 
 and was a mere thesis a challenge to discuss certain abstract 
 points, after the fashion of those theologians of .the Middle 
 Ages who used to pin their propositions to the gates of a 
 Monastery or University. The author of it was 18 years of 
 age and younger even in experience than in years; for, 
 though he had spent the usual time at school and at College 
 (Eton), to which latter he went at 13, he had never associated 
 much with his fellow-students, and, opposing himself to the 
 practice of fagging, then in full vigour at that place of educa- 
 tion, he became an object of suspicion to the Masters and of 
 dislike to those boys who did not understand him, though he 
 won the affection and admiration of another and a higher 
 class. What his feelings were at this period he himself has 
 described in the dedication of his poem, " The Revolt of 
 Islam:" 
 
 Thoughts of great deeds were mine, dear friend, when first 
 The clouds which wrap this world from youth did pass. 
 I do remember well the hour which burst 
 My spirit's sleep : a fresh May dawn it was, 
 When I walk'd forth upon the glittering grass, 
 And wept, I knew not why ; until there rose 
 From the near school-room voices that, alas ! 
 Were but one echo from a world of woes 
 The harsh and grating strife of tyrants and of foes. 
 
 And then I clasp'd my hands and look'd around ; 
 But none was near to mock my streaming eyes, 
 Which pour'd their warm drops on the sunny ground ; 
 So, without shame, I spake : " I will be wise, 
 And just, and free, and mild, if in me lies 
 Such power ; for I grow weary to behold 
 The selfish and the strong still tyrannise 
 Without reproach or check." I then con troll' d 
 My tears ; my heart grew calm ; and I was meek and bold. 
 
 And from that hour did I, with earnest thought, 
 Heap knowledge from forbidden mines of lore ; 
 Yet nothing that my tyrants knew or taught 
 I cared to learn ; but from that secret store 
 Wrought linked armour for my soul, before 
 It might walk forth, to war among mankind. 
 Thus, power and hope were strengthen'd more and more 
 Within me, till there came upon my mind 
 A sense of loneliness, a thirst with which I pined.
 
 Sussex Poets. 247 
 
 The expulsion from Oxford, and, as a consequence, from 
 his own home, where he was beloved by mother, sisters, 
 servants all except his father led to another misfortune. 
 His sisters, in sending to him such assistance as they could 
 save from their own school allowance, chose for their agent 
 one of their school-fellows, named Harriet Westbrook, whose 
 parents lived in London. She was a beautiful girl, and the 
 occasions which led her to Shelley's lodgings did not diminish 
 her attractions in his eyes. He became a visitor to her father's 
 house; an attachment naturally sprang up; and the result 
 was, that, before he was 20 years of age, Shelley was married, 
 and to a girl of 16, whose principal charm seems to have 
 lain in her personal beauty. Previous to this step he had, 
 however, come to an arrangement with his father as to the 
 settlement of the family property, by virtue of which he was 
 to receive an allowance of 100 a year; and on this the 
 young couple lived for some years, until the growing differ- 
 ences of their character, aggravated by the presence in their 
 little household of an elder sister, led to a separation by 
 mutual consent. Previous to this the young poet (for Shelley 
 had now, after writing several minor poetical pieces and some 
 prose works of fiction, of little merit and which have perished, 
 composed, at the age of 18, his " Queen Mab,") had made the 
 acquaintance of Godwin, the author of "Political Justice" 
 and " Caleb Williams," who was, in fact, to that day what 
 John Stuart Mill was to a later one and this led, after his 
 separation from his wife and her death by suicide (from 
 causes unconnected with her husband), to his marriage with 
 Godwin's only daughter, Mary Woolstonecraft. When Shelley 
 first disclosed his feelings to her, Mary Godwin was only 
 sixteen years of age, and the scene is thus described in the 
 "Memorials" published by the Shelley family and edited by 
 Lady Shelley (the wife of the poet's son), which are the only 
 trustworthy records of his career, and from which we take 
 our facts: 
 
 " To her Mary Godwin as they met one eventful day in St. Pancras 
 Churchyard, by her mother's gravs, Bysshe, in burning words, poured
 
 248 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 forth the tale of his wild past how he had suffered, how he had been 
 misled, and how, if supported by her love, he hoped in future years to 
 enrol his name with the wise and good who had done battle for their fellow- 
 men and been true through all adverse storms to the cause of humanity. 
 Unhesitatingly she placed her hand in his and linked her fortune with his 
 own; and most truthfully was the pledge of both redeemed." 
 
 Soon after this the death of his grandfather, Sir Bysshe 
 Shelley, and the succession of his father, Sir Timothy, to the 
 Baronetage, placed the young poet in easier circumstances, 
 by his allowance being increased to^"i,ooo a year. At this 
 period, in order to qualify himself for those offices of kind- 
 ness and charity to the poor for which he destined himself, 
 and some of which he had already discharged when living in 
 Wales, he " walked " one of the London Hospitals, though 
 suffering intensely from the delicacy of his own health. 
 This, in fact, drove him from London, and, after a temporary 
 sojourn on the borders of Windsor Forest, where " Alastor " 
 and other poems were composed, induced him to go abroad. 
 Returning to England in 1816-7, he formed the acquaintance 
 of Keats, doomed, like himself, to so brilliant and yet to so 
 melancholy a career, and a friendship with Horace Smith, so 
 long an esteemed resident in Brighton, which only ended 
 with his life. It was at this period of Shelley's life that 
 another of those blows fell upon him which seemed intended 
 to crush out his fragile life, but against which his indomitable 
 spirit rose with the strength of a martyr. During the life of 
 his first wife their two children a boy and a girl lived with 
 her. On her death, their father claimed them. The claim 
 was opposed by the mother's father, on the ground of Shelley's 
 religious and moral opinions, and, on the case being taken to 
 Chancery, the Lord Chancellor (Eldon) pronounced against 
 the father being custodian of his children, and they were 
 committed to the charge of an utter stranger. Against this 
 decision, which, it is needless to say, in the present day would 
 be scouted, Shelley protested with all the vehemence of his 
 nature, wounded in the tenderest part, but he was impotent 
 against the law, as it was then administered, and, in order to 
 put the children of his second wife beyond its arm, he left his
 
 Sussex Poets. 249 
 
 native country and never returned to it. He went to Italy, 
 and there, in a climate which suited his delicate constitution 
 and amidst scenery which excited his imagination, he com- 
 posed those great poems and dramas, " Prometheus Unbound," 
 "The Cenci," "Adonais" (the elegy to Keats), "The Witch 
 of Atlas," "The Sensitive Plant," " The Ode to the Skylark," 
 &c., &c., on which his poetic fame rests. " Queen Mab," 
 the crude and premature, though marvellous, fruit of his 
 youth, he never intended to publish. He himself condemns 
 it, in stronger language than, perhaps, many of his critics 
 would apply to it, as " a poem written by me at the age of 
 1 8 I dare say in a sufficiently intemperate spirit but even 
 then it was not intended for publication, and a few copies 
 only were struck off to be distributed amongst my personal 
 friends. I doubt not that it is perfectly worthless in point of 
 literary composition, and that in all that concerns moral and 
 political speculation, as well as in the subtle discriminations 
 of metaphysical and religious doctrine, it is still more crude 
 and immature." 
 
 Most certainly, Shelley lived to modify many of the extreme 
 opinions which find expression in "Queen Mab;" and his 
 later writings prose and poetical indeed, his whole life 
 clear him from that odious charge of atheism which his 
 enemies sought, with a malice worthy of the irreligion they 
 attributed to him, to fix on him. If anything were wanting to 
 rebut such a calumny, it would be supplied in the unfinished 
 "Essay on Christianity" found amongst Shelley's papers after 
 his death, and attached by his daughter-in-law, Lady Shelley, 
 to the " Shelley Memorials " published by her. It breathes 
 the very spirit of Christianity, and vindicates its principles, 
 though drawing a line between the great Master who pro- 
 mulgated them, and those who followed Him and proposed 
 to interpret and embody them. 
 
 Passing from the vexed subject of Shelley's religious 
 opinions, never very fixed, and which most certainly were 
 greatly modified in his later years, let us turn to the closing
 
 250 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 scenes of the poet's life in Italy. After many trials and suffer- 
 ings some from those unavoidable attendants on humanity 
 ill-health, death of children, and depression of spirits, to 
 which Shelley was peculiarly subject and some from the 
 persecution and detraction by which he was pursued to the 
 last, Shelley seemed to be floating, after a storm-tost career, 
 into smoother waters. His " Prometheus Unbound " and 
 " Cenci" compelled the world to acknowledge him as a great, 
 though not a popular, poet; in Leigh Hunt, Horace Smith (the 
 custodian of his monetary interests in England), Trelawny, 
 Williams, and many others, he had found a knot of true friends, 
 who stood between him and the outer world; and in Lord 
 Byron, whom he met in Italy, he had found a congenial spirit 
 in poetry, though in the pure and lofty spirit of Shelley there 
 was a barrier between them which both felt, and which could 
 not be over-passed by either, so as to lead to friendship. In 
 all these circumstances there seemed to be a brighter and 
 calmer future opening upon the young Sussex poet not yet 
 30 years of age. In his own mind there was brooding the 
 performance of something greater than anything he had yet 
 done though how gigantic is that work, if measured by his 
 years, compared to the works of most other men ! when the 
 fatal event took place which closed his labours, and quenched 
 one of the brightest, and, if sometimes erring, yet, surely, 
 one of the purest spirits that ever lit up the later ages of 
 this world. 
 
 The tale has been often told, and will be told and re-told 
 thousands of times yet; for it is full of a terrible charm. 
 
 Shelley, with his young wife and only surviving child by 
 her, christened Percy Florence, had, in conjunction with his 
 intimate friend, Williams also accompanied by his wife and 
 children taken a villa in a wild and romantic site, called 
 Lerici, on the shores of the Bay of Spezzia. Here he was 
 visited by Trelawny, who acted as captain of Lord Byron's 
 yatch, " The Bolivar," and here he was expecting a visit from 
 Leigh Hunt and his wife. These latter were, in fact, already
 
 Sussex Poets. 251 
 
 arrived at Byron's Palazza, at Pisa, and hither, to meet them, 
 Shelley and Williams, with a young English sailor, named 
 Vivian, set out in their little yacht, which they had had built 
 for them at Genoa, and in which they had been making 
 excursions in the Italian seas. They reached Leghorn in 
 safety, and spent several days with their friends at Pisa; but 
 Shelley receiving a gloomy letter from his wife, who seems 
 to have had the cloud of an impending calamity hanging over 
 her, hastened his departure from Leghorn; Williams and he 
 and the sailor-boy Vivian embarking again in their little yacht 
 on the 8th July (1822) for their home at Lerici. 
 
 The weather was very sultry, and clouds were gathering 
 in the south-west when they set sail from Leghorn; but a 
 profound stillness overspread the Bay. By and bye a sea-fog 
 came on which concealed Shelley's boat from the watching 
 eyes of his friends, Trelawny and Roberts. At half-past six 
 (they had started at 3 p.m.) it was almost dark, and the wind 
 began to rise, in short, panting gusts; and big drops of rain 
 struck the water. " There was a commotion in the air," says 
 Mr. Trelawny, who records these particulars, "made up of 
 many threatening sounds, coming upon us from the sea." 
 The vessels in the harbour were all in hurried movement, and 
 the tempest soon came crashing and glaring, in the fury of 
 thunder, wind, rain and lightning, over the port and the open 
 waters. The storm only lasted about twenty minutes, and 
 during its progress Captain Roberts watched Shelley's vessel 
 with his glass from the top of the Leghorn lighthouse. The 
 yacht had made Via Reggio when the storm began. " When 
 the cloud passed onward," writes Mrs. Shelley, " Roberts 
 looked again, and saw every other vessel sailing on the ocean 
 except the little schooner, which had vanished." Mr. Trelawny 
 thought for some time that his friends would return to port; 
 but he waited for them in vain. 
 
 They were never to return alive. After an agonising 
 suspense of some days for wives and friends, the terrible 
 truth was made certain by the casting ashore of the bodies,
 
 252 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 first of Shelley and then of Mr. Williams. The latter was 
 nearly undressed, having evidently made an attempt to swim. 
 Shelley had probably gone down at once, for he was unable 
 to swim, and had always declared (according to Mr. Trelawny) 
 that, in case of wreck, he would vanish instantly, and not im- 
 peril others in the endeavour to save him. His right hand 
 was clasped in his breast, and he appears to have been 
 reading Keats's last volume of poems at the time of the 
 catastrophe; as the book, doubled back, was found thrust 
 away, seemingly in haste, into a side pocket. In another 
 pocket was a volume of Sophocles. The copy of Keats had 
 been lent to Shelley by Leigh Hunt, who told him to keep it 
 till he could give it to him again with his own hands. As the 
 lender would receive it from no one else, it was burnt with 
 the body. 
 
 A great deal of unnecessary scandal was caused by the 
 burning of the bodies on the sea-shore. It was, in fact, a 
 police necessity. According to the Italian laws of that day, 
 every thing cast by the sea on the shore had to be burned, to 
 prevent the possible introduction of the plague. It was only 
 through the influence of the English Consul at Florence that 
 Mr. Trelawny was permitted to superintend the cremation 
 and to convey the ashes of the deceased to their two widows. 
 He discharged this painful duty with a devotion to which 
 Mrs. Shelley does full justice. He himself collected the 
 ashes in his scorched hands (Leigh Hunt and Byron look- 
 ing on from the latter's carriage) and afterwards deposited 
 them, where they now lie, in the Protestant burial-place at 
 Rome, by the side of Shelley's own son, William, and of his 
 brother-poet, Keats. To the two words " COR CORDIUM" 
 and a Latin inscription of the cause of death, &c., are added 
 the lines from Shakspeare's Tempest (one of Shelley's favourite 
 
 plays) 
 
 Nothing of him that doth fade 
 But doth suffer a sea change 
 Into something rich and strange. 
 
 Subsequent enquiries left no doubt that the boat had been
 
 Sussex Poets. 253 
 
 run down, though there is no reason to believe that it was 
 done designedly. On its being raised up from where it lay, 
 15 fathoms deep, all was in her books, telescope, ballast 
 lying on each side of the boat, without any appearance of 
 shifting or confusion: the topsails furled, topmast lowered; 
 the false stern broken to pieces, and a great hole knocked in 
 the stern timbers. When she was brought to Leghorn, every 
 one went to see her, and the same exclamation was uttered 
 by all: " She was run down." 
 
 In the " Shelley Memorials," to which reference has 
 already been made, some extracts are given from Mrs. 
 Shelley's " Private Journal " which were written in the 
 October succeeding the death of her husband. They are 
 most touching, but also of an exalted character, and point to 
 the spiritual belief of both husband and wife. " You will 
 be with me," she exclaims to his spirit, " in all my studies, 
 dearest love. Your voice will no longer applaud me, but in 
 spirit you will visit and encourage me: I know you will. 
 What were I, if I did not believe that you still exist ? It is 
 not with you as with another. I believe that we all live here- 
 after; but you, my only one, were a spirit caged, an elemental 
 being, enshrined in a frail image, now shattered. Do they 
 not all with one voice assert the same ? Trelawny, Hunt, 
 and many others. And so at last you quitted this painful 
 prison, and you are free, my Shelley ; while I, your poor 
 chosen one, am left to live as I may." 
 
 In a subsequent passage she thus bursts forth, in the agony 
 of separation: "Mine own Shelley! the sun knows of none 
 to be likened to you brave, wise, gentle, noble-hearted, full 
 of learning, tolerance, and love. Love ! what a word for me 
 to write ! Yet, my miserable heart, permit me yet to love to 
 see him in beauty, to feel him in beauty, to be interpenetrated 
 by the sense of his excellence ; and thus to love, singly, 
 eternally, ardently, and not fruitlessly; for I am still his still 
 the chosen one of the blessed spirit still vowed to him for 
 ever and ever ! "
 
 254 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 No being ever bore stronger testimony to the worth of 
 another than did Shelley's wife to him; and the testimony 
 was sealed by a widowhood of 29 years, consecrated to him 
 and his child, during which she was left by his father to bear 
 the full weight of the burthen; for she indignantly spurned 
 the only condition on which Sir Timothy would continue to 
 the mother and son the allowance made to the husband and 
 father, namely, that she should give up the custody of her 
 only child! She also declined to take part in the work to 
 which she was invited by some of her friends the apostle- 
 ship of the Rights of Women, for which she felt she had no 
 mission; but she devoted her time and talent to literature, 
 and so, like the worthy daughter of Godwin and wife of 
 Shelley, maintained herself and son until the death of Sir 
 Timothy, in 1842, put Shelley's son, Sir Percy Florence 
 Shelley, in that position as to fortune and title which he still 
 fills.* Mrs. Shelley died in 1851, in the 54th year of her age. 
 
 We have referred to the delicate, and almost feminine 
 organisation of Shelley. Here is a picture of him by Captain 
 Kennedy, a friend of the Shelley family, who saw him during 
 a stolen visit which he paid to his mother, at her request and 
 his sisters' it was his last visit to Field Place in 1813, 
 whilst his father was away: 
 
 " I fancy I see him now, as he sat by the window, and hear his voice, 
 the tones of which impressed me with his sincerity and simplicity. His 
 resemblance to his sister Elizabeth was as striking as if they had been 
 twins. His eyes were most expressive, his complexion beautifully fair, his 
 features exquisitely fine ; his hair was dark, and no peculiar attention to its 
 arrangement was manifest. In person he was slender and gentleman-like, 
 but inclined to stoop ; his gait was decidedly not military. The general 
 appearance indicated great delicacy of constitution. One would at once 
 pronounce of him that he was something different from other men. There 
 was an earnestness in his manner, and such perfect gentleness of breeding, 
 and freedom from everything artificial, as charmed everyone. I never met 
 a man who so immediately won upon me." 
 
 " He was," says Capt. Kennedy, in closing his description 
 of him, "an amiable, gentle being." Such, indeed, was the 
 
 * Sir Percy Florence Shelley filled the office of High Sheriff of Sussex in 1865.
 
 Sussex Poets. 255 
 
 testimony of all who knew him intimately, and it is a remark- 
 able illustration of the hardness of the age in which he lived 
 an age of iron in many respects that such a spirit so gentle, 
 so loving, so filled with sympathy for his fellow-men and for 
 every breathing creature for, as Captain Kennedy tells us, "he 
 had a horror of taking life and looked upon it as a crime" 
 that such a spirit should have been so cruelly buffeted by the 
 world and almost driven from it to the communion of Nature, 
 in which, indeed, when not assisting in some act of charity 
 or resisting some act of oppression or injustice, it was his 
 greatest delight to live. In one of his letters to his wife, 
 after a more than usually vile attack by some journal upon her 
 as well as him, he 1 thus writes to her: 
 
 " My greatest comfort would be utterly to desert all human society. I 
 would retire with you and our children to a solitary island in the sea ; would 
 build a boat and shut upon my retreat the flood-gates of the world. I 
 would read no reviews and find talk with no authors. If I dared trust my 
 imagination it would tell me that there are one or two chosen companions, 
 besides yourself, whom I should desire. But to this I would not listen. 
 Where two or three are gathered together, the devil is among them ; and 
 good, far more than evil, impulses love, far more than hatred has been 
 to me, except as you have been its object, the source of all sorts of mischief. 
 So, on this plan, I would be alone, and would devote, either to oblivion or 
 to future generations, the oveiflowings of a mind which, timely withdrawn 
 from the contagion, should be kept fit for no baser object. But this it does 
 not appear that we shall do." 
 
 What such a mind as Shelley's might have produced had 
 his life been prolonged, it is, of course, impossible to say. 
 But, by the admission of all judges of poetical genius, if 
 measured by what he did in the ten short years of his life of 
 authorship, between 20 and 30, he was the greatest poet that 
 England has produced since Milton, whom, in some respects 
 in the purity of his life, in the extreme to which he carried 
 his opinions, in his mastery and love of Greek literature, and 
 also in the feminine beauty of his face he resembled. He 
 is the greatest of the four great Sussex poets, and, though no 
 trace of any reference to his native county is to be found in 
 his works, we may be sure that the beautiful woods round 
 Horsham, in which he loved to wander, and often lost himself 
 as a boy, had their effect upon him, and that even Horsham,
 
 256 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 though oblivious, as it was and is, of him in the pursuit of 
 its bucolic pleasures and profits, had yet a place in that " Cor 
 Cordium." 
 
 In looking back over the careers of Fletcher, Otway, 
 Collins, and Shelley, the reflection is provoked how little they 
 were connected with the places, or even the county, in which 
 they were born ! Collins, indeed, returned to die in Chichester, 
 and alone, of our four great poets, rests in his native soil. 
 Even he passed the greater part of his life away from it; and 
 as for Fletcher, Otway, and Shelley, they all left Sussex in 
 early youth, never to return to it, and all lie amongst strangers. 
 Nor do their works contain the slightest evidence that their 
 thoughts ever reverted to their native soil. They gave them- 
 selves up, heart and soul, to the wider sphere to which they 
 were attracted, and merged their provincialism in the larger 
 atmosphere of literature. 
 
 Not so the lesser Poets of Sussex. They linger about the 
 old familiar ground, as though they drew from it part of their 
 strength and depended upon it for their after-fame. Perhaps 
 they lacked the strength of wing to fly far from the parent- 
 nest. Be that as it may, it is a fact that Hurdis, Hayley, 
 Charlotte Smith, and Charles Crocker, all linger in Sussex, 
 and take delight in singing of the beauties of Nature and 
 of Art to be found in it beauties for which their greater 
 brethren had no eye or ear. 
 
 The sphere and the themes of James Hurdis were purely 
 local. He was born (in 1763) at Bishopstone; Bishopstone 
 was the living to which he was appointed after a previous 
 curacy at Burwash ; at Bishopstone he passed the greater part 
 of his life; at Bishopstone he is buried; and the subject of 
 his chief poem, " Favourite Village," is Bishopstone. Only 
 in one thing does his quiet placid life resemble the turbid ones 
 of his fellow-poets. He died young at 37 years. But he lived 
 long enough to be appointed Professor of Poetry at Oxford, 
 and perhaps this fact will suffice to prove that, though an 
 accomplished, amiable man, he was not, in the true sense of
 
 Sussex Poets. 257 
 
 the word, a poet. Certainly, the axiom of Shelley, in his 
 "Julian and Maddalo," as echoed by him from Byron, that 
 
 Most wretched men are cradled into poetry by wrong : 
 They learn in suffering what they teach in song, 
 
 did not apply to Hurdis. He had no such cradling, and 'no 
 such lesson is conveyed in his poems. He was content with 
 singing the external attributes of men and Nature ; he never 
 dived into the depths of the human heart or sought to fathom 
 the higher mysteries of Nature. Mr. M. A. Lower quotes, in 
 his " Sussex Worthies," a passage from the " Village Curate " 
 as one of "startling beauty," "amidst much that is prose-like 
 and unattractive." Here it is : 
 
 It wins my admiration 
 To view the structure of that h'ttle work, 
 A bird's nest. Mark it well, within, without; 
 No tool had he that wrought, no knife to cut, 
 No nail to fix, no bodkin to insert, 
 No glue to join: his little beak was all; 
 And yet how neatly finished ! What nice hand, 
 With every implement and means of Art, 
 And twenty years' apprenticeship to boot, 
 Could make me such another? Fondly then 
 We boast of excellence, whose noblest skill 
 Instinctive genius foils. 
 
 With every deference to the talented author of "The 
 Worthies of Sussex," we fail to see the " startling beauty," 
 of this. To us it is the perfection of common-place the 
 antipodes of Poetry ! 
 
 There was one poetical incident in the life of Hurdis. 
 He met Cowper at Eartham, the country seat of Hayley, near 
 Chichester. There, in 1792, says Mr. Lower, "the three poets 
 met," of whom one certainly was a poet. "But as for the 
 other two " 
 
 But this meeting was at the close of the 1 8th century 
 that sterile period in English poetry and Coleridge, Southey, 
 and Wordsworth, like young eagles, were as yet purging their 
 eyes in the light of that poet-awakening event, the French 
 Revolution. At no other period could such platitudes as are 
 contained in the foregoing lines have been sent forth as 
 poetry. 
 
 S
 
 258 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Hayley was almost as local in his poetic sphere and themes 
 as Hurdis. He was born at Chichester (in 1745); his two 
 principal places of residence were at Eartham and Felpham, 
 spots within half-a-dozen miles of that city; and round them 
 and London his life revolved. It took in a wider range than 
 that of Hurdis, and also embraced a longer period of time ; 
 Hayley lived until 1820, and thus witnessed the rise of that 
 young, varied, and vigorous race of poets the fruit of a new 
 age and new thoughts in which such pretensions as he had 
 to poetic fame were to be utterly extinguished. It was a 
 melancholy career opening as it did with so much promise, 
 and closing in such a "starless night;" for "The Triumphs 
 of Temper," Hayley's principal poem, produced about 1780, 
 was received with a shout of applause, and the fact itself 
 serves to mark the lowest point in the long and glorious line 
 of English poets. It is a fitting commentary on it that the 
 post of Poet Laureate (vacant by the death of Richard Wharton 
 only one degree above the standard of Hayley as a Poet) 
 was offered to the Sussex versifier, and refused ! If it be true 
 that Hayley declined the honour and the benefit attached to 
 the post (at that time ^Q a-year and a pipe of malmsey), 
 because he wished Cowper to enjoy them, it is honourable to 
 him. It was, indeed, to Hayley's credit that he recognised 
 the genius of Cowper, and paid homage to it as that of the 
 greater poet. Himself a man of the world, moving in excellent 
 society, enjoying an independent fortune, and all the delights 
 of such a country as that round Eartham, and such a coast as 
 that of Felpham acknowledged as the poet of the day, and 
 the friend of such artists as Romney and Flaxman it is 
 to the credit of Hayley that, in the midst of these gifts of 
 fortune, he bowed to the superior genius of the author of 
 "The Task," and throwing aside all idea of rivalry, sought 
 for his acquaintance, visited him in his seclusion, drew him 
 from it to become an honoured guest at Eartham, retained 
 his friendship to the close of the unhappy poet's life, and 
 became his biographer. This shows that Hayley had none of 
 that spirit of jealousy which has so often been the bane of
 
 Sussex Poets. 259 
 
 literary men and the disgrace of literature. He was, indeed, 
 an amiable and accomplished man; intended by Nature to be 
 rather a patron and a friend of poets than a poet himself; and 
 it was his misfortune, not his fault, to be born in an age so 
 barren of poetic genius, and so unable to distinguish between 
 good and bad, that it mistook him for a poet. He did all he 
 could to undeceive it ; going so far as to write an " Essay on 
 Old Maids " and " Ballads on Animals," the very acme" of 
 bathos. And at last he succeeded ! No man ever more com- 
 pletely outlived his reputation than Hayley. From having 
 been at the top of the tree of poetry (to adopt Collins's figure) 
 he fell, branch by branch, to the bottom, until there is scarcely 
 a bough so low as to give him a resting-place. If allowed one, 
 it is to mark zero on the poetical thermometer ! 
 
 And yet he could write poetry the epitaph to Collins 
 proves it and his prose was elegant, and his plays (he wrote 
 three comedies in rhyme and two tragedies), were acted with 
 success. His knowledge of Art was considerable, and his 
 conversation and manners were pleasing. In fact, he was an 
 accomplished gentleman, such as are to be met with by thou- 
 sands in the present day, and was only remarkable in his own 
 age because, during the close of the i8th century, the cultiva- 
 tion of literature and of the polite Arts did not enter into the 
 education of the English gentleman as it does now. They 
 were limited almost entirely to a narrow professional clique 
 in London : the smaller descendants of Johnson, Goldsmith, 
 Reynolds, and Gibbon. It needed such a thunderclap as the 
 French Revolution, and the new ideas it excited, to dissipate 
 this artificial atmosphere to let in the fresh air of Nature 
 the passions of humanity and begin a new school of poetry. 
 Hayley lived to witness this change and to be forgotten in his 
 retirement first at Eartham and then at Felpham, where it 
 was a singular fact, which has something of the irony of Fate 
 in it, that Blake, the Poet and Painter the child of Nature 
 and imagination the very antipodes of Hayley in art, in 
 literature, in thinking, and in living this forerunner of a new
 
 260 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 and greater era, came to live side by side with the representative 
 of a by-gone age and effete literature. It was like Nature 
 coming to live on the threshold of Fashion. What they 
 thought of one another we do not know; but they exchanged 
 civilities; Blake even illustrated some of Hayley's poems, and 
 when Blake got into some trouble by chastising the insolence 
 of a disbanded soldier, who invaded his little garden at 
 Felpham, and had to answer a charge of disloyalty before 
 the Chichester Magistrates, Hayley stood his friend, and Blake 
 was not sent to gaol as a sans culotte. 
 
 Hayley died at Felpham (where his house and Blake's 
 humble cottage still stand in their integrity), and was buried 
 at Eartham. The offices that he had so often performed for 
 others were now performed for him; his epitaph (in Felpham 
 Church) was written by his friend, Mrs. Opie, and his auto- 
 biography was published in two quarto volumes by a Reverend 
 friend. His name lives, and always will live, in the history of 
 English literature, because it fills up a niche of time, like that 
 of a rot faineant in French history; but his works are entirely 
 forgotten. 
 
 Charlotte Smith (nee Turner) is the only poetess of note 
 Sussex can boast of.* And she was not Sussex born. She 
 first saw the light in London (in 1749). But her family were 
 Sussexian; the family seat was Bignor Park, near Arundel; 
 and her grandfather filled the office of High Sheriff of Sussex 
 in 1714. The chief part of her life, too, was passed in Sussex. 
 She went to school at Chichester; her holidays were spent 
 at Bignor; and when she married it was at Storrington and 
 at Woolbeding that she chiefly lived and wrote. She was a 
 contemporary and a friend of Hayley, and, like him, she was 
 unhappy in her matrimonial life, separating from her husband, 
 as Hayley had separated from both his wives. It seems, 
 
 * We refer to poetesses of the past. Our own days have been richer in this respect. 
 Mrs. William Sawyer (nee Andrews) (and the wife of a gentleman, a native of Brighton, 
 who has made a literary reputation in London, both for his poetry " Ten Miles from 
 Town," &c. and for his prose) is only one instance of Sussex ladies, still living, who 
 have wooed the Muses with success. [Since this note to the first edition Mrs. Sawyer 
 has passed away, at a comparatively early age, and her poems have yet to be collected.]
 
 Sussex Poets. 261 
 
 indeed, to be left to the present day to prove that poets and 
 poetesses can enjoy conjugal felicity ! The experience of 
 preceding ages was almost uniformly in the other direction, 
 and our Sussex Poets, when they married and Fletcher, 
 Otway, and Collins never married were no exception to 
 the rule. 
 
 In the case of Charlotte Smith, however, it was the husband 
 who was to blame. He spent his fortune in extravagance 
 and thoughtless speculations, and when he had to take up 
 his abode in the Queen's Bench his wife accompanied him 
 thither, and it was to her exertions that he chiefly owed his 
 liberation. It was to support herself and her children that 
 she turned to literature. She was a voluminous writer, pro- 
 ducing no less than 38 volumes, chiefly in works of fiction 
 (the most popular of which was " The Old Manor House "), 
 but also in other ways in works for the young and in Essays 
 and Elegiac Sonnets. In was in this latter line that she 
 won her place in literature a place which she retains, and is 
 likely to do so, for no collection of English Sonnets could be 
 perfect without some specimens of the Muse of Charlotte 
 Smith. They are, perhaps, a little over- strained in their 
 melancholy ; they border on the sentimental as distinguished 
 from the passionate. But still they are full of tender music, 
 and the love of Nature comes to soften and divide the sorrows 
 that struggle for utterance. 
 
 It was in Sussex that Charlotte Smith chiefly found the 
 subjects of her verse, and the sonnet addressed by her to the 
 Moon, and another written in Middleton churchyard (long 
 since swept away by the encroaching sea) may be taken as 
 samples of the smoothness, the sweetness, as well as of the 
 sentimentality of her verse : 
 
 TO THE MOON. 
 
 Queen of the silver bow ! by thy pale beam 
 Alone and pensive I delight to stray, 
 
 And watch thy shadow trembling in the stream, 
 Or mark the floating clouds that cross thy way.
 
 262 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 And, while I gaze, thy mild and placid light 
 
 Sheds a soft calm upon my troubled breast, 
 And oft I think, fair Planet of the Night, 
 
 That in thy orb the wretched may have rest ; 
 The sufferers of the earth perhaps may go, 
 
 Released by death, to thy benignant sphere, 
 And the sad children of despair and woe 
 
 Forget in thee their cup of sorrow here. 
 Oh ! that I soon may reach thy world serene, 
 Poor wearied pilgrim in this toiling scene ! 
 
 WRITTEN IN THE CHURCHYARD AT MIDDLETON IN SUSSEX. 
 
 Press'd by the Moon, mute arbitress of tides, 
 While the loud equinox its power combines, 
 The sea no more its swelling surge confines, 
 
 But o'er the shrinking land sublimely rides. 
 
 The wild blast, rising from the Western cave, 
 Drives the huge billows from their heaving bed; 
 Tears from their grassy tombs the village dead, 
 
 And breaks the silent sabbath of the grave ! 
 
 With shells and sea-weed mingled, on the shore, 
 Lo! their bones whiten in the frequent wave; 
 But vain to them the winds and waters rave; 
 
 TTiey hear the warring elements no more : 
 
 While I am doom'd by life's long storm opprest, 
 
 To gaze with envy on their gloomy rest. 
 
 Other sonnets of Charlotte Smith are addressed to the 
 Southdowns and the river Arun, in which latter she couples 
 Hayley as a fellow-poet with Otway and Collins ! It was in 
 these local effusions that her strength lay; out of Sussex and 
 the sonnet her Muse droops. 
 
 We may almost apply the same words to Charles Crocker, 
 who, in our own days, sustained the reputation of Chichester 
 as a birth-place of poets. He was born there in 1797, of 
 humble parents; received his education at the Grey-coat 
 School; and was apprenticed before he was 12 years of age 
 to a shoemaker. It was whilst he was earning his living at 
 this handicraft that he made the discovery first of his taste 
 for poetry, and then of his own power to compose verse at 
 first, " in his head," and, after a time, on paper. Some of 
 his effusions coming to the knowledge of his fellow-townsmen,
 
 Sussex Poets. 263 
 
 they were printed and published, and established the title of 
 Charles Crocker to the fame if not of a poet, at all events, 
 of one who could write poetry. One piece, at least, will live 
 in our English Parnassus, viz., the Sonnet to the Oak, which 
 Southey,when including Crocker amongst the poets of the day, 
 declared to be one of the finest ever written. Few English- 
 men, we think, will be disposed to dispute the dictum of the 
 then Laureate : 
 
 TO THE OAK. 
 
 When, sacred plant, the Druid sage of old, 
 
 With reverential awe, beheld in thee 
 
 The abode or emblem of Divinity, 
 Methinks some vague prophetic vision rolled 
 Before his wondering eyes, and dimly told 
 
 Thy future fame thy glorious destiny. 
 
 Haply, e'en then, deep musing, he might see, 
 Within thy trunk revered, that Spirit bold 
 
 Which sprang from thence in aftertimes, and stood, 
 
 Rejoicing in his might, in Ocean's flood, 
 The guardian genius of Britannia's Isle; 
 
 At whose dread voice admiring nations bow, 
 
 In duteous homage tyrants are laid low 
 And fierce Oppression's victims learn to smile. 
 
 As might be expected, the themes which inspired Crocker 
 were purely local : Kingley Vale, The Lavant, Kingshame 
 all within a walk of his native city. Chichester was his world. 
 We almost doubt if he ever slept out of it. If ever poetic 
 power was unaccompanied by ambition, it was in the case of 
 Crocker. He was contentedness itself. In his placid look and 
 calm expression it shone out unmistakeably, and it found ex- 
 pression in his unpretending address and unadorned language. 
 It was, to his unambitious spirit, a great step in advance when 
 he left the shoemaker's board for the bookseller's counter, 
 being selected for this more congenial post by his friend and 
 patron, the late Mr. William Hayley Mason, a godson of 
 Hayley, and the owner and occupier of the house in which 
 Collins was born (now Mr. Wilmshurst's) in East Street, so 
 that he was brought, as it were, into a literary atmosphere and 
 kindred associations. Here he remained, quiet and contented, 
 and little troubled by visitations of the Muse, until a bit of
 
 264 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 ecclesiastical patronage fell to the poet (may we say " from 
 the rich man's table ? ") in the very unpoetical shape of the 
 office of sexton to Chichester Cathedral, afterwards sup- 
 plemented by that of Bishop's verger. In this office he 
 reached, to use Massinger's language, " the ne plus ul:ra of 
 his proudest hopes." He now passed the greater portion 
 of his time in the Cathedral, which he loved with a love 
 that only those who have been born under the shadow of a 
 Cathedral can understand. His latest literary work was a 
 descriptive hand-book of it, written in as prosaic and matter- 
 of-fact a style as though by the veriest Penny-a-liner. In 
 fact, Crocker's prose style was singularly bald and trite. His 
 fancy seemed to desert him when he ceased to rhyme. He 
 was, indeed, in everything, except his love of poetry, as marked 
 a contrast to Collins as one poet could be to another: happy, 
 contented, seeking his joys in domestic life, and finding 
 delight in that building amidst which Collins wandered and 
 raved in agony of spirit. 
 
 One great misfortune Crocker was doomed to, arising out 
 of his love and pride for the chief ornament of his native 
 city, and that was in the fall of the spire and tower of his 
 much-loved Cathedral. This occurred on February 2ist, 
 1 86 1, and Crocker's death followed in the same year, hastened, 
 his fellow-townsmen believed, by the shock it gave him. He 
 was followed to the grave by Dean Hook, and by many of 
 the clergy, magistrates, and principal citizens of his native 
 place; and never did the grave close over a man with any 
 pretensions to poetic genius and most certainly Charles 
 Crocker had such his sonnet to the British Oak attests it 
 whose life disproved more completely the notion that the gift 
 of poetry is fraught with danger to him or her on whom it is 
 bestowed. 
 
 In Crocker we are brought down to our own times. 
 We knew him well, and, like all who knew him, loved and 
 respected him. He represents a class of men by no means 
 uncommon in this country, who, born in humble life and
 
 Sussex Poets. 265 
 
 with very unpoetical surroundings, possess a natural taste for 
 literature and pursue it with an ardour that amazes men of 
 higher culture and to whom there are other roads of distinction 
 open. The secret of this devotion lies, perhaps, in the fact 
 that letters are a Republic, and that the veriest drudge or 
 outcast of society a slave like Epictetus, a tradesman like 
 Defoe, a tinker like Bunyan can win the highest literary 
 honours and inscribe his name amongst the Immortals. The 
 lists are open to all the weapons are easily caught up it is 
 a melee in which king, noble, squire, yeoman, peasant, all 
 fight with little or no advantage of rank or position; and if 
 the prizes come "tardy off," they are, in the end, most 
 equitably distributed by that ultimate Court of Appeal, the 
 voice of Fame. The names of many Sussex competitors in 
 this " gentle passage of Arms," which, like that of Ashby-de- 
 la-Zouche, has its list of killed and wounded, might be added 
 to the instances we have given, male and female. The columns 
 of the Brighton Herald have for the last 70 years borne weekly 
 testimony to the large amount of poetical talent that floats 
 about the world, and, like other "airy nothings," seeks to give 
 itself "a local habitation and a name." We have already 
 tried to do a little justice to three lesser Sussex poets in Clio 
 Rickman, a native of Lewes; Charles Verral, of Seaford; and 
 George Frederick Richardson, of Brighton. 
 
 With this latter we might associate two other Brightonians, 
 both of whom gave promise of distinction, but passed away 
 and "writ their names in water." The ties of friendship, in 
 the one case, and of near relationship in the other, must be 
 our excuse if we are guilty of partiality in singling out the 
 names of Charles Stanhope Busby and William Henry Fleet 
 as having given token in early life of more than average 
 literary, and especially poetical, ability. The first was the 
 author of the papers which, under the title of "RANDOM 
 THOUGHTS," appeared weekly in the Brighton Herald from 
 January izth, 1833, to December zyth, 1834, and which in- 
 cluded not only Essays, Criticisms, and Sketches of Character,
 
 266 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 in which extensive reading, good taste, and considerable 
 powers of fancy and invention are displayed, but some poems 
 rising above the average. Such, we think, the reader will 
 admit, was the following one, entitled 
 
 DREAM. 
 
 . Airy vision ! thou'rt to me 
 
 The spirit of tranquillity 
 Whispering to the sleeping-breast 
 Tales of all it loves the best ; 
 Lulling sorrow's pensive note 
 With a soothing antidote ; 
 Bringing hither friends we love 
 Friends that o'er the wide world rove, 
 Like some lovely falling star, 
 Leaving all its mates afar. 
 Oh ! I woo thee, gentle dream, 
 As a wanderer woos the beam 
 Of moonlight o'er the troubled stream, 
 When all around his trembling bark 
 Is doubtful, desolate and dark. 
 Would that the spirit could awake, 
 And not thy bright illusion break, 
 But dream through life so sad as this 
 In one fair harmony of bliss ! 
 Dear Spirit ! in thy wide domain, 
 Misery drops her fetter-chain 
 Envy's tumult-voice is still 
 Raging passions cease to thrill 
 Hope is there with laughing eye, 
 Beaming in her extasy; 
 Every feeling, every sense, 
 Is mingled with benevolence. 
 How should hatred e'er invade 
 The silence of thy spirit-shade ? 
 There, within thy twilight realm, 
 No jarring shouts of strife o'erwhelm; 
 But thought and action blend and shine 
 Like Nature at the day's decline. 
 I know not if thou always art 
 As soothing to the troubled heart ! 
 Some say that terror's fitful gleams 
 Hover o'er the land of dreams ; 
 That fearful phantoms wildly frown 
 That sorrow there usurps a crown! 
 That all the woes of life appear 
 Doubly deep within thy sphere ! 
 Dear Spirit! can it, can it be? 
 Thou never hast seemed thus to me ! 
 If ever, in day's beam of gold, 
 Fickle friendship's heart was cold,
 
 Sussex Poets. 267 
 
 Within the hour of thy reign 
 All was warm and bright again ! 
 If wandering love forgot her vow, 
 Who led her back as soon as thou ? 
 But if, indeed, thou canst assume 
 Terror's image, terror's gloom- 
 E'en then, when rous'd by anger's will, 
 Enchantress, I would woo thee still! 
 What are thine airy woes or strife 
 To the realities of life ? 
 The fickle sons of guile forsaking 
 The wanderer when his heart is breaking 
 The eye of love, when chill' d by pride, 
 Turning its azure glance aside 
 The pomp, the pride, the seeming free, 
 Pleasure all false, all vanity! 
 'Mid things that so delusive shine, 
 Where, Spirit, can be joys like thine ? 
 And who that ever felt thy kiss 
 Would grudge the penalty of bliss ? 
 I know not if it be my fate 
 To meet thy terror, or thy hate 
 As yet thou hast but been to me 
 A refuge from reality ! 
 And surely they who sorrow share, 
 Can well surmount thine airy care 
 For tho' slumber yield no more 
 Her balmy visions, as before, 
 Her pictur'd ills are far less deep 
 Than daylight's woes. O maid of sleep! 
 I love thee now ! Thou art to me 
 The spirit of tranquillity! 
 
 Mr. C. S. Busby was the son of the talented architect of 
 that name who designed Brunswick Square, Brunswick Terrace, 
 and other of the best parts, architecturally, of Brighton. The 
 son was brought up to the law and left Brighton to follow 
 that profession successfully, we are glad to say in another 
 part of England. If still alive, and if they meet his view, he 
 will doubtless smile as he reads the above verses and thinks 
 that he, too if Blackstone and Chitty had not come between 
 him and the Muses might have been a Poet! 
 
 William Henry Fleet was the eldest son of the then 
 proprietor of the same Brighton journal in which the 
 compositions of Mr. Busby appeared, but in the columns 
 of which his name appears only once attached to his pro- 
 ductions. His poems were thrown undistinguished into the
 
 268 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 stream which sweeps the contents of a newspaper into the 
 Pool of Oblivion. Yet there were some pieces that deserved 
 a better fate. From a large number of fugitive poems which 
 appeared in the Brighton Herald, the Merthyr and Cardiff 
 Chronicle, and the Montreal Courier (of which two latter 
 William Henry Fleet was the Editor for some years before 
 entering upon a legal career in Canada, which was closed by 
 a too early death), we take, almost at hazard, two samples of 
 his work: the one of a serious, the other of a humorous 
 character, for he excelled in both : 
 
 THE WANDERER'S RETURN. 
 
 Years had flown his hair was grey, 
 
 Who sought again the much-lov'd spot, 
 Where youth's first hours had passed away 
 
 'Mid friends who ne'er might be forgot. 
 The path he trod he knew it well, 
 
 The ancient oak its shade still shed ; 
 But those he sought no one could tell, 
 
 But, wondering, answered " They are dead." 
 
 He sought the cot of one he'd left 
 
 A laughing, merry-hearted thing; 
 Who near his youthful heart had crept, 
 
 As tendril round a flower of Spring; . 
 Where is she now ? the laughing voice, 
 
 The happy, tripping, blithesome tread, 
 No longer bid his heart rejoice, 
 
 But echo whispers " She is dead!" 
 
 His sisters, say, ah, where are they 
 
 Companions of his youthful hours ? 
 He sought them where they used to play, 
 
 But sad and cheerless were the bowers. 
 The trees they'd planted side by side, 
 
 Now proudly waved above his head ; 
 He asked, " Where are they?" They replied, 
 
 "Thy sisters, Wanderer they are dead!" 
 
 He turned away his brother dear, 
 
 The bud his mother doated on; 
 How is it that he is not here, 
 
 To welcome back the wandering one ? 
 He called him by his well-known name, 
 
 But echo answered in his stead 
 Again the chilling response came, 
 
 " Thy brother, Wanderer he is dead! "
 
 Sussex Poets. 269 
 
 His sire was full of manhood's pride 
 
 When he had left, a boy, his home; 
 His mother's cheek had time defied, 
 
 He fondly thought, for years to come. 
 He sought them both, but there, alas, 
 
 Within the churchyard's narrow bed 
 A tombstone told him as he passed, 
 
 " Thy parents, Wanderer they are dead!" 
 
 He sought again the ancient hall, 
 
 Where desolation held her sway, 
 And heard the owls' dull croaking call 
 
 And bats against the casement play. 
 His footsteps on the marble floor 
 
 Aroused th' intruders and they fled; 
 Shrieking, "Thy friends, they are no more; 
 
 Maid, brother, sisters all are dead!" 
 
 The following lines were a mere j'eu d 'esprit; but they 
 showed an ability, which is rare, to deal airily with a bubble : 
 
 THE CHINESE LOVERS. 
 
 I'll tell you a tale of a young Chinese 
 Who wore her petticoats up to her knees, 
 And put her feet, so pretty and small, 
 Into a walnut-shell, heels and all 
 There never had been such a prize to win 
 Before in the town of old Pekin! 
 
 There lived a youth in the very same town, 
 Whose tail to the heels of his shoes came down, 
 And he met the maid as she walked one day, 
 With a servant to fan the flies away; 
 And, stopping a moment near to sneeze, 
 Walked off with the heart of the young Chinese ! 
 
 That very same night, as in bed she lay, 
 
 There came a note from her Pa to say 
 
 As how as what a person had been 
 
 To ask her hand for a Mandarin 
 
 A very great merchant who dealt in teas, 
 
 And who was coming next day for the young Chinese. 
 
 Then many a tear the maiden shed, 
 
 As she put on her clothes and jumped out of bed; 
 
 The moon shone cold on the river's stream 
 
 As the maid plunged in one feeble scream 
 
 Is borne along on the passing breeze 
 
 'Tis the dying moan of the young Chinese ! 
 
 And ever since that time, they say, 
 Those who by the spot do stray 
 See the form of a skeleton maid 
 Dancing along 'neath a willow's shade ; 
 And they know it to be the young Chinese, 
 For it wears its petticoats up to its knees!
 
 270 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 By a singular coincidence, two other Sussex names, with 
 claims to be called poets, passed over in early manhood to 
 the other side of the Atlantic, after issuing volumes in which 
 decided proofs of their talent were given, viz., Edmund 
 Parsons, a member of a well-known and highly respected 
 Brighton family; and Richard Realf, the son of an Uckfield 
 peasant, and whose remarkable career will doubtless some 
 day be writ down. He was once " Secretary of State " to 
 "Old John Brown," the Champion of Freedom in the South, 
 and whose spirit still " marches on." He was taken prisoner 
 at the abortive rising against Slavery at Harper's Ferry, and 
 nearly shot by the Southerners, but escaped, to fight through 
 the War of Freedom, and to rise to the rank of Colonel in 
 the Northern Army also to write such stirring verses as 
 won for him a high name in the States, where he was in a fair 
 way of arriving at a still higher position, literary and political, 
 when some unfortunate domestic circumstance took place 
 which drove him to close his life and career a singularly 
 chequered one in an act of suicide. 
 
 These three young men carried their poetical talents with 
 them to the New World; and thus it is that England flings 
 her intellectual "superflux to the poor." Of those Sussexians 
 who still "confess the soft impeachment" and sacrifice to the 
 Muses we will say nothing, but leave some future scribe, 
 when they and ourselves and all who belong to the breathing 
 Present shall come under the venerable denomination of 
 "Ancestors," to glean such "Glimpses" of them and their 
 poetical productions as may have floated down the stream of 
 time.
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 
 
 SERVANTS AND THEIR WAGES. 
 
 [HERE are few things in existence at the present 
 day in which the revolution has been so great, 
 even within living memory, or which has been 
 brought home so completely to us, as the relations 
 of servants to masters. We mean more especially domestic 
 servants the servants of indoor life, whose office it is to 
 wait on the person or minister to the daily wants of their 
 masters or mistresses: such as the cook, the housemaid, the 
 footman, &c. To listen to the lamentations of a modern mater- 
 familias, we might infer that the age of domestic service in 
 England had come to an end, or was about to do so. There 
 is no such thing as a decent cook or well-conducted house- 
 maid to be got for love or money, or, if got, they cannot be 
 kept. " Love," indeed, as a means of retaining domestic 
 servants, has passed away altogether. That once-powerful 
 tie between master and man, maid and mistress, personal 
 attachment, has ceased to be felt at all. Money is the sole 
 consideration, and in a market where the demand seems to be 
 continually increasing and the supply to be falling off, this 
 money-value rises so fast that it threatens to limit the luxury 
 of domestic servants to the higher classes altogether that is, 
 to those who can alone afford to give very high salaries. 
 
 Perhaps, after all, this disappearance of domestic servants 
 in our households would only be a return to the normal state
 
 272 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 of things, as regards the larger part of society. It can only 
 have been since the rise of the middle classes in England 
 into wealth and the introduction of a luxurious style of living 
 that domestic service, as we know it, came into existence at 
 all. Three or four hundred years ago perhaps less than 
 that the wives and daughters of our farmers and traders did 
 their own domestic work, with the help, perhaps, of a poorer 
 neighbour, if in the country, or of an apprentice in towns. 
 As to hiring men and women at large fixed salaries, for 
 domestic services, as cooks, housemaids, butlers, footmen, 
 coachmen, &c., &c., that must have been unknown to the 
 middle classes of England in the days of the Plantagenets. 
 It was confined altogether to the establishments of the great 
 nobles. In these, indeed, domestic service was of a severer, 
 more stately, and more ponderous character than anything 
 that is known in the present day, even in the abodes of 
 Royalty. The " Book of Orders and Rules," drawn up by 
 Anthony, Lord Montague, who lived at Cowdray, Midhurst, in 
 the reign of Elizabeth, for the government of his household, 
 gives us a lively idea of this. Hundreds of servants of all 
 kinds and degrees, from the "Principal Officers" and "Gentle- 
 men Ushers," who waited on the person of the great man, down 
 to "the groomes of the Great Chamber," and " the Scullery 
 men," helped to fill the house and empty the purse of the 
 great noble in the Tudors' day, and to give occupation to the 
 sons and daughters (for, of course, My Lady the Countess 
 had her gentlewomen, chambermaids, " lavenderers," &c.) of 
 the inferior classes. 
 
 The enormous expenses, not to say inconveniences, 
 attendant upon such a style of living doomed it to extinction, 
 in an age when the price of labour was rising, and when the 
 vast estates of the old families were being broken up by civil 
 war, the attacks of the Crown, and other causes. Amidst 
 these troubles to the higher ranks, the middle classes grew up 
 in the days of the Tudors and the Stewarts ; and the Great 
 Revolution of the iyth century put its seal on their victory. 
 They were now the masters of the political situation, and we
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 273 
 
 may be sure that there was an accompanying development in 
 the social situation. The merchant's wife and the scrivener's 
 wife nay, the draper's wife, the clerk's wife, and the 
 yeoman's wife " looked up " in the world, and called in that 
 help and aid for their increasing family wants and comforts 
 which their more homely mothers had not needed, or managed 
 to do without. Their "good men" wanted their dinners to 
 be more varied and better cooked than they were wont to be, 
 and the fittings-up of the hall and refectory and withdrawing- 
 room required to be looked after with more care and by more 
 skilful hands. So cooks and housemaids, and, as things went 
 on, footmen and coachmen became part and parcel of the 
 more well-to-do middle-class establishments, whilst, at last, 
 scarcely a household above the mechanic or labourer's rank 
 could do without a " general servant." 
 
 And for a time all went on well. The supply was equal to 
 the demand. The drain of war had ceased to be felt by the 
 labouring classes; food was cheap, or, in a time of scarcity, 
 there were the Poor-law and out-door relief to fall back upon; 
 no Malthusian doctrines were yet promulgated to check the 
 force of the divine command to " increase and multiply," 
 and so there was a class of labourers increasing in number, 
 and decreasing in means, on which domestic service could 
 draw almost without limit for its supply. It was the golden 
 age of masters and mistresses, to which the present genera- 
 tion looks back with regretful eyes. These were the days of 
 long and faithful servitude, when the relations of man and 
 master, maid and mistress, extending as they did over long 
 periods of time, were of that kind that Shakspeare speaks of, 
 " when service sweats for duty, not for meed " when there 
 was something like a personal friendship between the served 
 and the server, and when the discovery had not been made 
 that " service was not inheritance," for the servant scarcely 
 thought of closing the service except by death or marriage. 
 
 Of these days which, perhaps, the laudator temporis acti is 
 apt to over-colour does the late Rev. Edward Turner speak in 
 T
 
 274 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 his paper on "The Mode of Life of a Sussex Gentleman" in 
 the last century, when he says, " My grandfather's principal 
 man-servant lived nearly half a century with him ; and it was 
 his boast to the day of his death, that he had waited at dinner 
 upon twelve squires at once without being anyways da'nted. 
 And in later days I have often visited at a house in the western 
 division of the county where the cook of the family was nearly 
 90, and had never lived as a servant in any other house. My 
 estimable friend was her second master, she having lived with 
 his uncle previously; and after he had passed his seventieth 
 year she generally spoke of him as her young master." 
 
 Referring, too, to the servants of the Stapleys, of Hickstead, 
 he observes that " the men-servants were not like the pampered 
 menials of the present day, but men who, though they could 
 wait upon their masters and their mistresses, their families and 
 their friends, at their usual meals, could also, when not so 
 employed, turn their hands to anything that might be required 
 of them, either indoors or out, and who became so attached to 
 the families in which they lived that the thought of ' bettering 
 themselves ' rarely entered their heads." 
 
 As we have said, those were the golden days of masters 
 and mistresses, when they had "the pick" of the girls and boys 
 of the labouring class, and there was neither the recruiting- 
 sergeant, nor the manufacturer, nor the milliner, nor National 
 or State Elementary Schools to interfere with them. It was, 
 in many cases, a choice between service out, or hard work, 
 and sometimes starvation, at home. 
 
 We propose to take a peep at these early days of domestic 
 service in Sussex. The earliest record that we find of it in the 
 Archaeological Collections of Sussex is in the journal of the 
 Rev. Giles Moore, Rector of Horsted Keynes, who settled 
 there in the days of the Commonwealth and lived to see the 
 Restoration of Charles II. He had a wife and a daughter, 
 and he was, it is evident, a man of some property independently 
 of the revenue he derived from his living, and seems to have 
 lived in a comfortable, if not liberal, style. One of his
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 275 
 
 earliest entries (in 1656) is as follows : " I entertained for my 
 yearly servant John Dawes at Old Lady-day, promising to 
 make his wages as good as they were under Mr. Pell [his 
 predecessor in the Rectory]. I payed him his half-scares 
 wages on the znd of Oct., ^. los. Rose Colman came to me 
 on the 7th Sept. I bargained to give her ^ per annum." 
 
 We need hardly say that money was worth more in 1656 
 than it is now ; but even double or treble ' $ a-year for a 
 man-servant, or/^3 a-year for a female, and what house-wife 
 would not rejoice ? 
 
 Sometimes, too, lower wages than the above were taken. 
 Thus, in 1666-7 (writes Mr. Moore), "Anne Sayers, of Lind- 
 field, came to live with me as mayd servant, with whom I 
 bargained not, for under 4.0$. a-year she said she would not serve. 
 I gave her 6d." 
 
 What an unreasonable personage Anne Sayers, of Lind- 
 field, must have been ! We wonder if there are any " of that 
 ilk " still in the parish ! Not to come for a mayd servant 
 under ^ a-year! Domestic wages must have been rising to 
 justify such ideas ! 
 
 A little further on we read as follows : " Mary Ward packed 
 up and went her way, having lived with me i quarter and a 
 weeke, for which I payd her 125. i8th Feb., being Shrove 
 Tuesday, Anne Grove, from Mr. Wyatt's [a neighbouring 
 farm-stead, we presume] came to live with mee, for whom I 
 bargained at the rate of 453. per an." So Mary Ward got an 
 advance of $s. a year on Anne Sayers ! 
 
 It seems curious to us that Mr. Moore, and not Mrs. Moore, 
 "bargained with " female as well as male servants. But so it 
 was. .And the Rev. Gentleman does not seem to have been 
 particularly lucky in his choice. Ex. gr. : " Thos. Dumbrell 
 came to mee as servant, to dwell with mee, with whom I 
 agreed to give after the rate of $ a yeare. On the 22nd 
 Dec. I payed him up to that time/"i. 8s.: that same night I 
 found him sleeping with my mayd Mary, and I packed them 
 off."
 
 276 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 So that masters and mistresses had their domestic troubles 
 even in the days of the Commonwealth! It speaks to the 
 kindheartedness of the Rev. Giles Moore that, immediately 
 after the above, he records, " I marryed Thos. Dumbrell and 
 Mary his wyfe gratis; and I gave him on his wedding 8 stone 
 of beefe (i6s. 8d.), a hind qr. of mutton (35. 4d.), and a lambe 
 (73. 6d.), besides butter, wheatt, and fewell." So that Thos. 
 Dumbrell and " my mayd Mary " had made their peace. 
 There were, doubtless, " extenuating circumstances." 
 
 As the Rector of Horsted Keynes married one of his men, 
 so did he bury another. "I payd John Dawes his halfe 
 yeare's wages, ^ IDS. On the yth of March he dyed, and I 
 buryed him on the loth in the ground on the south side next 
 to the yew tree." 
 
 The above, we presume, were in-door servants. Out-door 
 labour was better paid. Ecce signum : " I payd John Warde 
 for 4 days work about the garden in setting it to rights, 
 6s. 8d., and for 5 dayes worke in clearing out 5 trees growing 
 about the glebe, 95." This rate of payment, taking into 
 account the higher value of money at the time, was as high 
 as that of the present day, and much higher than that to 
 which it fell in the succeeding century. 
 
 There is one kind of labour which the Rector of Horsted 
 Keynes had to pay from which we are free in the present 
 day at least, in the form in which he was mulct. Ex. gr.: 
 "I payed John Ward in ready money at the Parsonage, ios., 
 hee having gone out in my arms for 4 days. For the harm he 
 received in my service at the muster I gave him 53." 
 
 The latter part of the foregoing entry explains the earlier. 
 John Ward was not carried out for an airing by the Rev. Giles 
 Moore, as the phraseology might imply, but took his place in 
 the yearly muster of the Militia. Thus even the clergyman, 
 in those days, was obliged to attend drill, or find a substitute. 
 This entry occurs periodically in the journal. Nor were 
 humbler people exempt, as we see by the following: "8th
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 277 
 
 May, 1677, John Divall came to live with me. I bargained 
 with him for $ wages per an., besydes my kindnesses, I 
 being to give him 6 weekes warning and hee mee also as 
 much. I must remember out of my man John's wages to 
 deduct i2S., payed to his brother for supplying his absence while 
 he souldiered" 
 
 Here we will take leave of the Rev. Giles Moore and his 
 servant-bargainings and troubles, and pass on to Mr. Timothy 
 Burrell Councillor Burrell, as his neighbours called him' of 
 Ockenden, Cuckfield. -His journal touches closely in point 
 of time on that of the Rector of Horsted Keynes, the first 
 entry in it bearing date April, 1686 the reign of James the 
 Second. Wages had not risen in the meanwhile, for, writes 
 Mr. Burrell in 1689, " Thos. Godsmark came to me as foot- 
 man at the wages of 305. per annum, with coat, breeches, and 
 hat;" and, in the following year, "John Piccomb came as 
 footman at 303. per an. and a livery. Anne Baker came as 
 cook at 553." 
 
 Thomas Godsmark, therefore, did not stay very long at 
 Ockenden. His successor seems to have done better, for, in 
 1691, we find this further reference to him: "I payd Jack 
 Piccomb in full of his quarter's wages 73. 6d. To mend his 
 coat and breeches, is., and to buy stockings, is. 6d." Just 
 previously, "Two hats for my fellows liveries, IDS." 
 
 As he speaks of his " fellows " in the plural, perhaps Mr. 
 Burrell had two footmen. He was, we must bear in mind, a 
 gentleman of family and property as well as a barrister-at-law. 
 And yet he did not disdain to pay his servants in kind; ex. 
 gr.: " I paid John Coachman (John the coachman) part of 
 his wages in money and i4lbs. of wool, IDS." A modern 
 gentleman, or, for the matter of that, a modern coachman, 
 would think it rather strange to pay or be paid in wool! 
 
 Mr. Timothy Burrell had a wife indeed, he had three, 
 for he was thrice married and yet he, like Mr. Giles Moore, 
 seems to have done the "bargainings" with his servants, 
 male and female. Nor did he, any more than the Rector of
 
 278 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Horsted Keynes, escape the troubles consequent thereon. 
 Here, under date March 26th, 1693, is an illustration: "I 
 paid Frances Smith all her wages due to this day, 2, and 
 discharged her, she being a notorious thief." 
 
 These, and other corresponding entries, may console 
 modern housekeepers for their little domestic troubles, which, 
 as we see, may occur in the " best regulated families," under 
 Cromwell and William of Orange, as well as under the 
 Stewarts or Guelphs. Nor, it is evident, by Mr. Timothy 
 Burrell's entries, had those golden days of servants yet been 
 reached of which Mr. Turner speaks so enthusiastically, when 
 boys and girls grew into old men and women in the service 
 of their masters and mistresses. For we have only to pass 
 on to April, 1694, to come to a new footman to Mr. Burrell: 
 " Marian Hall (it is a singular Christian name for a man), 
 footman, came at the wages of 303. per an. and a livery once 
 in two years. I laid out for him, in part of his wages, linen 
 sleeves, shoes, hat, and frock, 175. 8d." 
 
 The Ockenden coachman, however, kept his place better: 
 "1700, May. Paid John the coachman, in full of his 
 year's wages, 4.. 33. I payd him 2s. 6d. for Thos. Gates for 
 a goos, but he kept it for ale, and to widow Goldsmith, for 
 mending his stockings, is. 6d." 
 
 Wages, it is evident, had not risen much at Cuckfield. 305. 
 a-year and his livery for a footman and ^4. 35. for a coach- 
 man are not very high rates of payment. What would the 
 present generation of footmen and coachmen say to them ? 
 
 Yet we have a proof, in the following entry, that the men 
 who took, or rejected, these wages might " go further and 
 fare worse:" " i4th Sept. Goldsmith departed my service, 
 by consent, this day. On the zgth October he repented, and 
 returned, half-starved." 
 
 And here we arrive at one of those facts which would 
 have made the late Mr. Turner's heart rejoice, and at which 
 modern masters will shake their heads in melancholy guise:
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 279 
 
 "1704. Will. Gates came to me as footman at 505. per 
 annum; he is to have a hat, coat and breeches once in two 
 years. If I turn him away the first year I am to give him 55. 
 more and take his livery. He died in 1713." 
 
 That is, after a service, and doubtless a faithful one, of 
 nine years. If we mistake not, it is the master or mistress 
 who, now-a-days, holds out the bait of higher wages to 
 servants if they remain in their places. In Timothy Burrell's 
 time it was the servant who sought to guard against the 
 chances of dismissal. 
 
 Yet masters still had their troubles, and in 1706, as in 
 1877, it is, the drinking that is l\iefonset origo malorum. Ex. 
 gr.: "Aug. For a periwigg for John, 143. So he has had 
 in all (>. zs. 5d. in full of his year's wages, and zs. $d. over; 
 and I gave him notice that I would not allow him any longer 
 for the livery being worn two years, since 'twas to be all spent 
 in drunkenness" 
 
 The next entry gives us a glimpse of female servants' 
 wages: " Paid Nanny West her wages in full, due 25th, z 
 and more is. lod. Paid Sarah Wade two years' wages, $" 
 
 Thus 2 and ^. IDS. were still the salaries of female 
 servants in a gentleman's family 170 years ago. 
 
 Later on, in 1710, he pays W. Gates $. IDS. as his year's 
 wages; to Mary Chaloner (how low had the Chaloners, once 
 the first people in the county, sunk!) $ for two years' 
 wages; and to Mary, the cook (in 1715), for her year's wages, 
 
 *. iss." 
 
 This is the last entry of Mr. Timothy Burrell as to pay- 
 ments to servants, and it shows that during his life the wages 
 of domestics had not risen much; for in 1686 above 30 
 years previously he paid his cook 2. IDS. a-year. A rise 
 of 53. in 31 years! As much in as many days would be 
 expected now-a-days! 
 
 The Stapley Diaries, extending from 1682 to 1743, come 
 next in order of succession to those of the Rev. Giles Moore
 
 280 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 and Timothy Burrell, Esq., as documents throwing light on 
 the wages of domestic servants in Sussex in past days. The 
 social position of the Hickstead Stapleys was something 
 between that of squire and yeoman. They farmed their own 
 land and did a good deal in what may be called the retail 
 business of farming, such as selling of wood and of meat as 
 well as of stock. The first of the diarists, however, Anthony 
 Stapley, was, like Timothy Burrell, a councillor or barrister- 
 at-law, and he was also a Justice of the Peace. 
 
 The Hickstead Stapleys (they were settled in other parts 
 of Sussex) kept a good establishment, and their house or 
 kitchen staff consisted of three maid-servants and three men- 
 servants. Let us see ht>w they paid them. "The wages of 
 domestic servants," Mr. Turner remarks, a propos of the 
 Hickstead establishment, " both male and female, were then 
 marvellously low;" and the figures that he proceeds to quote 
 from Anthony Stapley's account-book leave no doubt upon 
 this point. The earliest of these entries refer to a period 
 anterior to the Rev. Giles Moore's that is, to the earlier 
 part of the reign of Charles the First, before the troubles of 
 the Civil War. Thus, in 1636, "To William Dennett, for 
 half-year's wages, \. IDS. To my own man, Robert, for 
 one year, $. ics. To William Matthew, for ditto, 3. zs. 6d. 
 To Elizabeth, for half-year's wages, \. To Rachel, for ditto, 
 i. To Mary, for ditto, 8s. To the Nurse, for a quarter's 
 wages, i." 
 
 These entries, it is clear, embrace all classes of in-door 
 servants ; and they are all equally low. $ a-year for men- 
 servants, z a-year to women, and i6s. a-year to girls these 
 were the wages of domestic servants in a country gentleman's 
 house in the time of Charles the First. It was a prosperous 
 time for the country, though, politically, a very troublous one, 
 as the Stapleys, who took sides both with King and Parlia- 
 ment, well knew. Food was abundant and, of course, cheap. 
 Wheat (in 1662), ^. IDS. a load; cows and steers, $ to/\f 
 each; oxen,/' 5 or/^6 each; 30 ewes selling for/~zo. os. 6d.;
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 281 
 
 lambs, 73. 6d. each; and 30 ewe lambs for $. 55.! So that 
 it was not expensive to feed servants. 
 
 In the next 20 years to 1656 there was a slight rise in 
 wages. " My man," writes Mr. Anthony Stapley, " came 
 with me to dwell and is to have \. 53. per annum wages. 
 Martha Earle came to me April loth and Elizabeth Lancaster 
 May 5th. The former is to have ^2 and the latter z. IDS. 
 per annum." And again, in 1657, "My man George came 
 June ist, and I am to give him 5. 155. a-yeare, and he is to 
 brew besides his other work. George Virgoe came to me as 
 helper in the garden and is to have \ per annum and to live 
 in the house." 
 
 Anthony Stapley, Justice of the Peace, was gathered to 
 his fathers and was succeeded by his son, also an Anthony, 
 who continued the diary. But for the next 50 or 60 years 
 there is little or no change in the rate of domestic wages at 
 Hickstead. Passing on to 1730 we learn that "Mary White 
 began her year May, 1731. Hannah Morley came and is to 
 have ^ if she stay to Lady Day next. Paid Edward Harland 
 and George Virgoe half-a-year's wages each, $. 53. James 
 Hazlegrove came to live with me at 6. 53. per annum." 
 
 From these entries it may be inferred that, whilst women's 
 wages had remained stationary, or had even fallen, men's had 
 risen a little. But then we must bear in mind the lower value 
 of money. Perhaps 6. 55. in 1730 would not command 
 much more of the necessaries of life than $ in 1630. But 
 even the former sum sounds very small compared with a man- 
 servant's yearly wages in 1882. 
 
 There is no reference in the Stapley Diaries to such 
 domestic troubles as disturbed the peace of mind of the Rev. 
 Giles Moore and Mr. Timothy Burrell. Servants came and 
 went, of course; but no moral delinquencies are recorded. 
 One motive for their leaving was that they might not gain a 
 settlement in the parish by a twelvemonths' service; and so 
 they left their service just before the year was completed and 
 returned in a few days' time. Ex. gr.: " 1743, March 25th,
 
 282 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Richard Mitchell left my service and I paid him $. zos. 
 He came to me again on the zq/h" This was the consequence 
 of one of those provisions of the old Poor Laws which have 
 been swept away in the present century with so many other 
 fetters on the labour-market. It was a matter of policy not 
 to allow a man to get a settlement that is, a right to be 
 relieved out of the Poor-rates in a parish, and so he was dis- 
 charged previous to the completion of a twelvemonths' service 
 and then taken back again. 
 
 To all appearances things went smoothly at Hickstead 
 Place in respect to indoor service. There was no want of 
 good servants, and these seem to have known when they had 
 good masters and mistresses. The latter part of the Stapley 
 Diaries reaches to the times of which Mr. Turner had 
 experience the golden age of masters and mistresses, and 
 the fabulous one of servants, or, shall we say, the age of 
 fabulous servants? 
 
 Pan passu with the later Stapley Diaries runs the diary of 
 Richard Marchant, of Little Park, Hurst, beginning in 1714 
 and ending in 1728. But Mr. Marchant's references to 
 servants and wages are few and far between. One point of 
 interest, however, is touched upon, under date March 2 8th, 
 1716: "Bargained with Edward Morleyat 353. until Michael- 
 mas, and if his vailes be not 53. 1 have promised to make them 
 so." 
 
 This matter of "vailes," as douceurs to servants were 
 called, was one of no small importance in the last" century, 
 both to those who received and to those who paid them. 
 These latter were the visitors and guests of the master. They 
 were expected to " tip " handsomely to the servants, and at 
 length the practice grew into a system of extortion which 
 made hospitality a grievous tax to the recipient of it and a 
 disgrace to the host. The "vailes" which Edward Morley 
 expected to receive at Little Park were, it is obvious, not very 
 formidable; but at the houses of the great, and especially in 
 London, nothing less than gold was taken by the " pampered
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 283 
 
 menials," and sums of $ and 10 were expected at some 
 noble houses! Pope often refused invitations because the 
 price of the dinner, in the shape of " vailes" to servants, was 
 too high a price for the honour or the enjoyment. To whom 
 the world (and especially the dining-out world) is indebted 
 for putting down this system of vailes we do not know. 
 Doubtless the abuse of it brought its own cure, as the same 
 extortionate system, transplanted from private houses to hotels, 
 has led in our days to a remedy in the shape of a fixed charge 
 for attendance. How grievously must the thought of " vailes " 
 have interfered in the 1 8th century with that " good digestion " 
 which ought to " wait on appetite!" 
 
 After all, Edward Morley did not come to Little Park. 
 On Easter Monday Richard Marchant wrote, "Edward 
 Morley's mother was here, and made some scruples about 
 her son's service. So away they both went together." 
 
 Perhaps the "vailes" of Little Park were not tempting 
 enough ! 
 
 Except that on Christmas Day " the workmen [that is, 
 the farm labourers] dined in the house as usual," there is 
 no further reference to servants in the Marchant Diary. 
 Servants, it is evident, were more easily procured in those 
 days than now, and not so difficult to be kept. Very regular 
 hours were observed in most families, especially in the 
 country. Dinner at i or 2 ; tea at 5 or 6 ; a little card- 
 playing or smoking and drinking, and then to bed at 9 or 
 10 to b'e up again "with the lark." The servants were not 
 worn out by late hours, or spoilt by over-dainty, ignorant 
 mistresses ; they were kept to their house-work, and, when 
 that was done, were put to needle-work, or, in earlier days, 
 to the spinning-wheel, the drone of which was the music of 
 the old farm-house. Then, as we have already pointed out, 
 there was little competition for female labour. There were 
 not two mistresses running after one maid, or columns of 
 advertisements in newspapers tempting young women from 
 their places by higher wages. In thousands of households
 
 284 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 even the " servant-of-all-work " was not yet known the wife 
 did the housework with the help of her daughters or a poor 
 relative or dependent, and the domestic labour-market was 
 rather over than under supplied. It was a good thing then 
 for a young woman from the country to get into a good 
 family even as a servant. 
 
 In illustration of this period, when there was little to 
 separate the middle classes of society from that class imme- 
 diately beneath them, which was the nursery of domestic 
 servants that is, the agricultural labourers we may turn 
 to the journal of Thomas Turner, general dealer, of East- 
 hoathly. It takes in the middle of the i8th century, from 
 1754 to 1765 ; and it is evident that at this time not only did 
 all classes below the highest aristocracy mix and mingle 
 much more easily than they do now, but that the trading 
 classes in country-places, at least and the serving class 
 approached very closely to each other so closely, indeed, 
 as to touch and mingle. Such was the case in the household 
 of Thomas Turner himself. He was a man of education 
 and a prosperous tradesman, associating on equal terms with 
 the parson and the doctor of the parish, and yet he and his 
 maid and shop-boys all took their meals together and went 
 to church together, and he tells us of all this as of an 
 ordinary matter-of-course thing. Videlicet: "I and the maid 
 staid the Communion ;" a kind of association which we do 
 not think is common in the present day ! There was, it is 
 obvious, no great social gap between Mr. and Mrs. Thomas 
 Turner and their housemaid or shop-boys. They all 
 dined together in the kitchen, and, doubtless, passed the 
 evening in the same apartment. The trading classes had 
 not yet taken at least, not in country-places that bound 
 upwards which has carried them to the very top of the 
 tree, and the labouring classes had not begun that downward 
 march which did not cease until the great mass of them had 
 become paupers. Thomas Turner himself, though with good 
 blood in his veins and a coat of arms in the family, does not 
 seem to have been conscious of any great disparity between
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 285 
 
 him and the serving class. When he lost his first wife, and 
 was looking about for another help-mate, he advisedly 
 selected Molly Hicks, servant to Luke Spence, Esq., of 
 South Mailing, and he so describes her in his diary. " She 
 comes," he further tells us, "of respectable parents, and 
 may, perhaps, one time or other, have some fortune." 
 
 In fact, a little further on, he tells us that " her fortune 
 seems to be rather a flowing stream." "As to her education, 
 I own," he adds, "it is not liberal; but she has good sense, 
 and a desire to improve her mind, and has always behaved 
 to me with the strictest honour and good manners." Molly 
 Hicks was, in fact, as the editor of Thomas Turner's Diary 
 (Mr. Blencowe) informs us, the daughter of a substantial 
 yeoman at Chiddingly ; and it was frequently from this class 
 that servants were drawn in the last century, and no shame 
 thought of it. Their position was that of one of the family 
 not mere menials and, as we see, they often became the 
 wives of men in the middle ranks, and made good wives too. 
 This only lasted for a time. The middle class rose rapidly; 
 the labouring class as rapidly sank ; the drawing and dining 
 room received the one ; the kitchen was left solely to the 
 other; and a very wide gap grew up, or rather down, between 
 them, which there seems to be no modern Curtius capable 
 of filling up. 
 
 It was about this time the rising period of the tradesman, 
 the declining one of the agricultural labourer that the 
 general servant, or " maid-of-all-work," came into existence. 
 Like most other classes, she was created by circumstances 
 adverse to her own peculiar class, that of the farm labourer ; 
 flourished for a time during the struggle upward of the 
 middle classes and then disappeared with their initiation 
 into wealth and luxury, and the increasing demand for 
 servants of all kinds. For we ask such of our readers as 
 can look back a few years, Has not the "servant-of-all-work" 
 passed out of existence as one behind the times ? Only 
 such as have arrived at a certain age can recall that patient,
 
 286 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 hard-working, uncomplaining what shall we call her slave? 
 No, she was too active and willing for that but certainly a 
 domestic serf, a drudge a hewer of wood and a drawer of 
 water who used, in the times of our grandmothers, to last 
 a mistress a whole life-time, and whose whole being seemed 
 to be summed up in one word housework. Patient, hardy, 
 cheerful, loving too with a very high feeling of respect for 
 their " masters " and "missises," and with a strong feeling 
 of affection for their children was this race of " servants-of- 
 all-work." Of course, their cooking abilities were limited 
 confined chiefly to roast and boiled suet puddings and 
 apple turnovers. But it was careful and cleanly cooking, and 
 they " cleared as they went." They were up early always 
 on their feet got their dinner when they could, but managed 
 to " tidy up " by tea-time, and then did a bit of work for 
 themselves or their mistresses, and could even sometimes find 
 time for a romp with the children before they put them to 
 bed. Cannot you, reader, remember such a household 
 creature as this a very part of the house and family 
 scarcely ever quitting it from year's end to year's end only 
 to go to church on Sunday evenings or do a "little shopping" 
 once or twice in the year and not leaving " for good " 
 except to marry, and then in a shower of tears ? Cannot 
 you remember some such faithful, simple, active-handed 
 creature as this, who knew nothing and did everything? They 
 are gone " clean gone." They did their work, or rather 
 the work of their mistresses, in their generation, and went 
 and left no successors. It was quite right, perhaps, that they 
 should pass away, for they marked a very low point in the 
 fortunes of the working classes, and many of them came from 
 starving homes, and some even from the workhouses in 
 which their parents had died. They could, as a rule, neither 
 read nor write, and do nothing but the simplest household 
 work. But they did it with a will, and carried into the 
 homely families which they entered a strength of affection as 
 well as of body which may in vain be looked for now-a-days 
 in a better-instructed class. Cooks we have now, and
 
 Social Changes in Sussex.. 287 
 
 housemaids, and parlour-maids, and scullery-maids, and we. 
 don't know how many classes of domestic servants, who 
 make or mar each other's work. But the general servant or 
 "maid-of-all-work" is extinct, and some lachrymose house- 
 keepers go so far as to say that in a few years there will be 
 no servants at all in England only " lady-helps ! " But we 
 hold to the adage that "What has been will be," and 
 looking back and seeing that service is of very long standing 
 in the country, and that it has never been without its 
 troubles each age, perhaps, thinking its troubles the 
 greatest we incline to believe that, until the advent of 
 the Millennium, there will be servants in the land, and 
 masters and mistresses to complain of them !
 
 Sussex Roads. 
 
 R. BURTON, of Cambridge (from whose journal 
 we have already quoted) had some experience of 
 Sussex roads in the middle of last century; and 
 his evidence is not of a favourable character. 
 He entered the county from the Surrey side, by way of Stone 
 Street, a relic of the ancient Romans and their road-making 
 (whence the name of the village), which called up all his 
 classic enthusiasm. " As to the Romans," he exclaims, " I 
 praise them for many of their high-souled and magnificent 
 ideas, but not least for their public establishments and works; 
 and on this very day most especially do I praise them, while 
 travelling on this stone causeway ; for, from the moment I left 
 it, I fell immediately upon all that was most bad upon a 
 land desolate and muddy whether inhabited by men or beasts 
 a stranger could not easily distinguish and upon roads 
 which were to explain concisely what is most abominable 
 Sussexian" 
 
 He had previously described Sussex as "a muddy, fertile, 
 and pastoral country, smooth and flat, indeed, when seen from 
 afar, but not easy to ride or drive through ; so that, having 
 thereby earned a bad name, it has passed into a by-word, and 
 any difficulty hard to get through or struggle against, may, by 
 a simile, be called ' the Sussex bit of the road.' " 
 
 This is hard, indeed, upon Sussex; but "worse remains 
 behind." Going into details (which in this case, we take it, 
 meant rucks and quagmires and "fondering roads"), the 
 learned Doctor declares that " No one would imagine them
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 289 
 
 to be intended for the people and the public, but rather the 
 by-ways of individuals, or more truly the tracks of cattle- 
 drivers ; for everywhere the usual footmarks of oxen appeared, 
 and we, too, who were on horseback, going on zigzag almost 
 like oxen at plough, advanced as if we were turning back, 
 while we followed out all the twists of the roads. Not even 
 now, though in summer time, is the wintry state of the roads 
 got rid of; for the wet, retained even till now in this mud, is 
 sometimes splashed upwards all of a sudden to the annoyance 
 of travellers. Our horses could not keep on their legs on 
 account of these slippery and rough parts of the roads, but 
 sliding and tumbling on their way, and almost on their 
 haunches, with all their haste got on but slowly." 
 
 At the time this was written Horsham was the metropolis 
 of the Weald, and is described as " ancient and populous ;" 
 the Assizes being held there, and salesmen from London 
 resorting thither "to buy with ready money so many 
 thousand of the chicken race." 
 
 Travelling thence through the forest of St. Leonard's, 
 "we fell again," says the Doctor, "upon the especially 
 impassable Sussex roads." "The surface of the earth 
 deceived and impeded us in our advance, for, although 
 apparently dry and looking firm, yet it entrapped us, so we 
 went on, into tumbles and much muddiness, so that the day 
 was already fading away when we arrived at the long-desired 
 dwelling" (the Rectory House, Shermanbury). 
 
 We cannot omit Dr. Burton's description of the natives 
 of Sussex at this period (1751), for it is obvious that he 
 looked upon their manners as smacking of their soil. "The 
 men there, as not being accustomed to quit their homes for 
 the sake of traffic, or any other purpose, generally live by 
 themselves, and, being born on the soil, continue unrefined. 
 Nor does it seem at all strange, if mixed up with so much 
 mud, some sordidness should also stain in some degree the 
 frame of their minds. Their manners, therefore, are not the 
 most gentlemanlike or agreeble, but neither are they quite 
 V
 
 2 go Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 barbarous. In their persons not corpulent, but rather spare 
 and thin-shanked ; in their diet generally frugal ; and in 
 their cookery, being neither dainty nor expensive, they care 
 most for pork, which, indeed, they prepare skilfully, by 
 steeping in brine." 
 
 To the Sussex ladies he was a little more lenient; but 
 upon that head we have already quoted him. And now we 
 come to the fans et origo of that often-repeated witticism 
 which assigns to the stiffness of Sussex clay the length of 
 Sussex legs : "Come now, my friends," exclaims Dr. Burton, 
 "I will set before you a sort of problem in Aristotle's 
 fashion : Why is it that the oxen, the swine, the women, and 
 all other animals, are so long-legged in Sussex ? May it be 
 from the difficulty of pulling the feet out of so much mud 
 by the strength of the ankle that the muscles get stretched, 
 as it were, and the bones lengthened ?" 
 
 The association of the fair sex with men and swine, "and 
 all other animals," somewhat detracts from the merit of the 
 learned traveller's preceding eulogy on Sussex women. But 
 we must allow something for the manners and language of 
 the times, and for a learned and unreclaimed bachelor ! 
 And then he does not spare himself; for, after com- 
 passionating the status of his step-father, the Rector of 
 Shermanbury, "a man in slender circumstances, stuck and 
 buried in that irresistible Sussex mud, in a poor spot," he 
 exclaims, " How disgusted I immediately felt with myself 
 when looking on him ! How, in comparison of him, I 
 despised myself, sleek and fat, with a well-fed body, like a 
 pig from the reverend herd." 
 
 Verily, the clerical estimate of the Doctor was not a very 
 high one ! 
 
 So much for the Sussex roads in 1750. ' 
 
 At a still earlier date, in 1731, an Itinerary of the roads 
 in England and Wales was edited by John Owen, gent., of 
 the Inner Temple, and in the Sussex map, which he gives,
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 291 
 
 there are only three high roads laid down from London to 
 the sea-coast, and of two of these Shoreham was the 
 terminus ! The other one passed along the coast to 
 Brighthelmstone and Newhaven, and from thence through 
 Lewes to London. It was traversed by one stage-coach, 
 which started at a very early hour on the Monday morning, 
 and arrived late in London on Tuesday evening ; returning 
 in the same way on Friday and Saturday. 
 
 The work thus edited by Mr. Owen, " Britannia depicta," 
 was undertaken in the preceding century by a Mr. Ogilby by 
 the express command and at the expense of Charles II. ; 
 and, of the 73 roads there described, only five are assigned 
 to Sussex; i, from London to Arundel ; 2, from London to 
 Newhaven, with a continuation to Shoreham ; 3, from London 
 to Rye ; 4, from London to Chichester ; 5, from Oxford to 
 Chichester. Ogilby anticipates the complaints of Dr. Burton 
 as to the character of the Sussex roads, and more than once 
 advises the traveller to break off the road either to the right 
 hand or to the left, to avoid the mud. These are samples 
 of his warnings to travellers : " Backward turnings to be 
 avoided : at the end of Maudlin, the left to Petworth ; in 
 Amberley, the left," &c. He also takes note of " the 
 gallows" being a frequent direction post to the traveller; as 
 they were doubtless intended to be a warning to ill-doers not 
 to persist in the path leading to them. 
 
 De Foe, who published his tour through Great Britain 
 in 1724, says he has seen a tree drawn on a "tug" by 22 
 oxen, and even then it was sometimes two or three years 
 before it got to Chatham ! Not far from Lewes he had seen 
 a sight "I never saw in any part of England before, namely, 
 going to a church at a country village I saw an ancient 
 lady and a lady of very good quality, I assure you drawn 
 to church in her coach by six oxen ; nor was it done in 
 frolick or humour, but from sheer necessity, the way being 
 so stiff and deep that no horses could go in it." 
 
 Judith, the widow of Sir Richard Shirley, of Preston, was
 
 29 2 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 a wise and provident woman ; and also, no doubt, a loving 
 one. She desired, when she died, to be laid by the side of 
 her first husband, at Preston ; but she knew what Sussex 
 roads were, and that the possibility of her being so buried 
 the home of her second husband being in Kent depended 
 upon the season of the year at which that event took place. 
 So, in her will, dated the loth of January, 1728, she directed 
 that her body should be buried at Preston, if she should die 
 at such a lime of the year as that the roads thereto were passable; 
 else, where her Executors should think fit. Dying in June, her 
 wishes were complied with. 
 
 The earliest legislative action with respect to Sussex 
 roads appears to have taken place in the reign of Henry 
 VIII. (quoted by Mr. Dodson in a paper to the Sussex 
 Archaeological Society), but its object was simply for the 
 diversion of roads, not their improvement. The extension 
 of the iron-works in the Sussex Weald made some steps 
 towards this latter object necessary by reason of the heavy 
 traffic to and from the mills, and an Act was accordingly 
 passed with this view in the 2yth year of Elizabeth's reign, 
 entitled "An Act for the preservation of Tymber in the 
 Wildes of the Counties of Sussex, Surrey, and Kent, and for 
 the amendment of High Waies decaied by carriage to and 
 fro Yron Mylles there." The " occupiers of all manner of 
 yron workes whatsoever as Owners or Farmours of the same 
 which shall at any time hereafter cariee, or caused to be 
 caried, any coales, mine, or yron to or for anie their yron 
 workes," &c., are, for every six loads of coal or one ton of 
 iron, to lay down one cart-load of " sinder, gravel, stone, 
 sande, or chalke " for the repairing and amending of the said 
 highways. 
 
 This payment in kind not succeeding in its purpose, in 
 the 39th year of the same reign a money-payment was 
 substituted of 33. for every three cart-loads of coal or mineral 
 and every ton of iron conveyed a mile along any roads within 
 the county. This statute was not repealed until the Act of
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 293 
 
 i George 3, c. 42, which consolidated and amended the then 
 existing Highway Acts, and by which time the iron-works of 
 Sussex were nearly extinct. 
 
 It was, however, the introduction of turnpike-gates, by 
 which tolls could be levied under private Acts of Parliament, 
 that those roads so much needed in Sussex were supplied. 
 These were chiefly passed between 1756 and 1780, and in a 
 list of them given by Mr. G. Slade Butler in Topographica 
 Sussexiana (Vol. 15 of S.A.C.) we find an Act for repairing 
 and widening the road from Lewes to Brighthelmstone, and 
 another from Brighthelmstone to the County Oak on Lovell 
 Heath. - 
 
 Whilst, to people out of Sussex, the roads of that county 
 were a reproach and an abomination " Souseks full of dyrt 
 and myre" was the description of it in a rhyme of the 8th 
 Harry's time by people in it they were regarded as a safe- 
 guard and protection both from the rogues and cut-throats 
 of the metropolis and the attacks of an invading enemy. 
 There were, however, two sides to this question. If bad 
 roads were obstacles to criminals and invaders, they also 
 stood in the way of the opponents of these gentry, who, if 
 they once got a footing in the country, were more difficult to 
 be got rid of. Highwaymen and smugglers, less than 100 
 years ago, set the local authorities at defiance, and it was 
 necessary to call out the militia to apprehend one of the 
 former, and to besiege towns and to fill them with troops in 
 order to check the latter. Speedy lines of inter-communica- 
 tion are now looked upon, and with good reason, as one of the 
 best safeguards of a country, both from internal and external 
 foes, and it is the ill-doer who has most cause to curse the 
 well-kept highway which ensures a rapid pursuit and the 
 electric telegraph which cuts off escape. These may at times 
 facilitate crime or aggression ; but, if put to their right use, 
 they are instruments in the hands of order and safety, and 
 the better the roads of a country the easier it is to protect 
 and defend it. In this respect, both as to highways and to
 
 294 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 railways, Sussex now stands as well as any other county of 
 England ; its country roads are also, as a rule, a credit to it, 
 especially in the Western Division, and where formerly there 
 was nothing but a horse track, or a "fondering" road, good 
 hard, though narrow, roadways now connect village with 
 village, homestead with homestead, facilitating traffic, econo- 
 mising labour, and giving denizens of towns easy access to 
 the pleasant places of the country. So Sussex is no longer 
 open to the reproach of being "full of dyrt and myre;" or, 
 at all events, its dirt is to be found in the right place, in its 
 fields, not in its roads, and the proverb of Dr. Burton, in the 
 way of " the Sussex bit of the road," signifying an especially 
 disagreeable bit, may be erased as having lost its meaning.
 
 Music in Sussex. 
 
 HUNDRED years hence, whoever looks back upon 
 our age as we are looking back upon the century 
 that preceded us, will have no reason to note the 
 absence of evidence of the love and practice of 
 music amongst the people of Sussex, not only in towns, but 
 in the smallest country villages. In this respect the igth 
 century will contrast most remarkably and most favourably 
 with the 1 8th and the lyth; indeed, with all the centuries, 
 for aught we know, that preceded it. For if there be one 
 thing more conspicuous than another by its absence in the 
 archaeological records of Sussex, it is all reference to Music. 
 As a Science it certainly had no existence out of the 
 Cathedral at Chichester, in which, as in all Cathedrals, the 
 practice and the traditions of an ecclesiastical school of 
 music, dating from the Tudors, were kept up with more or 
 less ability, according as the Cathedral dignitaries were more 
 or less inclined to music, or their organist was more or less a 
 musician. 
 
 But, setting aside this ecclesiastical class of music, as an 
 exceptional and esoteric growth, scarcely touching the people, 
 music had no existence in Sussex, as a Science, and scarcely 
 as an Art, 100 years ago. There were, of course, both in 
 towns and villages, musical instruments, and people who 
 played upon them, and here and there, of course, there 
 was a man of genuine musical taste and knowledge, who, in 
 happier days for music, might have acquired fame as a 
 musician. But they were rar& aves, and their musical taste 
 and talent obtained little fame for them, and not much profit
 
 296 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Still, there was a certain demand for music, and, in this as 
 in other cases, the demand brought a supply. There were 
 then, as now, festive occasions on which music was required, 
 if only for dancing, or processions, or "waits" at Christmas. 
 In almost every village, at the commencement of this century, 
 what was called " a case of viols " was to be found, con- 
 sisting of the treble viol (or violin), the tenor (or alto), and 
 the bass viol ; the latter a title by which the violoncello is 
 still known in country places. And there were persons who 
 could play on these instruments after a certain fashion, singly 
 or in concert. The "fiddle" has always served for the 
 votaries of Terpsichore, and a fiddler was seldom wanting in 
 country places. It may be questioned, indeed, whether 
 greater difficulty would not be found in getting one that is, 
 a local fiddler, " to the manner born " now than there was 
 50 or 100 years ago. And for this reason: the pianoforte 
 has superseded the fiddle, and there are few houses now 
 above the cottage class in which a pianoforte is not to be 
 found, and also some one (of the feminine gender, as a rule) 
 able to sit down and play a quadrille or a waltz. The 
 pianoforte is to the woman of the present generation what 
 the violin was to the man of the last. In our grandfathers' 
 days there was really no instrument for a woman to play 
 upon. A Queen, like Elizabeth, might play on the virginal, 
 and, after the virginal, the spinet might be found in a few 
 "great houses," and, at a later date, the harpsichord became 
 more common. But these were the rare luxuries of the rich 
 and great. The middle classes, and even the classes above 
 them, the gentry and clergy, knew little or nothing of them, 
 and, though Fielding might make Sophia Western play her 
 father to sleep upon one, and Scott depict Flora Macdonald 
 as fascinating Waverley with her harp-playing, yet to play on 
 any instrument 150 years ago was a rare accomplishment for 
 an English woman of the middle classes, because musical 
 instruments for women were almost unknown. The only 
 music heard in the cottage, the farm-house, and even the 
 manor-house, was that of the spinning-wheel.
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 297 
 
 So, in the diaries of the Gales, and the Stapleys, and the 
 Marchants, we find no mention of music; it did not enter as 
 it now does into domestic life, or form a common source of 
 public entertainment. Even in churches it was of a very rude 
 kind. Organs are of modern date in Sussex country churches, 
 and there was either no instrumental music at all only a 
 pitch-pipe to give the key-note to the choir or congregation 
 or it was a rude kind of orchestra, made up of the before- 
 mentioned treble, tenor, and bass viol, with, perhaps, a 
 hautbois or flute. This served our forefathers well up to the 
 end of the last century, and, indeed, to a much more recent 
 period in many places. We ourselves have listened to the 
 dulcet tones of a village band in a West Sussex Church within 
 the last thirty years. We believe they are all now extinct. 
 One of the last to hold its ground was in Sidlesham, near 
 Chichester, where the village band and choir (with their 
 "Anthem," as it was called) flourished up to about 30 years 
 ago; and when the then Vicar, the late Rev. E. Goddard, 
 proposed the introduction of simply psalmody, the whole of 
 the performers, with their instruments and books, rose and 
 indignantly left the church ! 
 
 The only reference we have found to the vocal perform- 
 ances of our Sussex forefathers in the Archaeological records 
 of the last century is in the journal of Dr. Burton (1750), who, 
 a propos of the church-psalmody at Shermanbury, writes: 
 "The more shrill-toned they (the Sussex people) may be the 
 more valued they are, and in church they sing psalms, by pre- 
 ference, not set to the old and simple tune, but as if in a 
 tragic chorus, changing about with strophe and antistrophe, 
 and stanzas, with good measure; but yet there is something 
 offensive to my ear when they bellow to excess and bleat out 
 some goatish noise with all their might " (!) 
 
 One might suppose the learned Doctor was talking of a 
 set of savages in some newly-discovered land and not of his 
 fellow-subjects in an almost adjoining county. But, in fact, 
 to the polished clergyman of Oxford these Sussex boors were 
 savages.
 
 2gS Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 A few words of explanation are needed as to the " chorus " 
 (" anthems" they called it) sung by the choir of Shermanbury 
 instead of " the old and simple tunes." The old and simple 
 tunes, introduced chiefly from Germany in the days of the 
 Reformation, and of which " the Old Hundredth " (that was 
 its numerical place in the Psalm Book) is almost the sole 
 remnant, were superseded in the Stuarts' days by a more 
 florid and pretentious kind of hymn, " with," as Dr. Burton 
 says, " strophe and antistrophe and stanzas," and these were 
 often " bleated out," to use his language, with more vigour 
 than taste or discretion. They have, in their turn, been 
 superseded by a simpler and higher class of hymn in our own 
 days. 
 
 In few things, indeed, affecting social life and manners, 
 has there been such a change in England, and for the better, 
 as in instrumental music. Vocal music, in some form, must 
 always have held its ground, and we know that in Elizabeth's 
 and the ist James's days it was widely cultivated, and hence 
 the rich inheritance of madrigals, glees, rounds, catches and 
 other part-songs that we boast of, and which used to be sung, 
 and still occasionally are sung, without accompaniment. But 
 in instrumental music there was almost a blank up to the 
 invention of the piano. Even Handel's scores were only 
 written for violin, alto, bass, and hautbois, with an occasional 
 flute accompaniment that was, the English flute and now 
 and then a bit for the French horn. The more recent intro- 
 duction of the German flute gave an impetus to the study of 
 music by men, and, 50 years ago, there was scarcely a house 
 of the middle classes without a German flute. But it was the 
 improvement of the harpsichord into the pianoforte that, by 
 giving an instrument suited for women, caused music to be 
 introduced into the homes of the English people, and has 
 done more to soften, refine, and polish their manners than, 
 perhaps, anything else. If it has not made us a musical 
 people, like the Germans, the Bohemians, the Hungarians, 
 and other Sclavonic races and only Nature could have done 
 that it has made us fond of music, which is next door to it.
 
 Social Changes in Sussex. 299 
 
 The rest may come in good time! Poets, and great poets 
 too, we have had in Sussex, but there has been no Sussex 
 composer yet,* nor is there that we are aware of such a thing 
 as a genuine Sussex air. 
 
 There can be little doubt that, at one period of our history, 
 music in Sussex, as known and practised by the people, had 
 all but died away; and it is still a belief with some that 
 Sussex people lack both ear and voice f6r music. Certainly 
 the singing at sheep-shearing feasts and other rural meetings 
 gives little token of either; it is a dreary monotonous sing- 
 song of two or three notes, repeated through interminable 
 verses of -equally dreary rhyme. Some specimens of these 
 rude rhymes are given in the paper on " The Sussex Sheep- 
 shearer," and Mr. M. A. Lower, in his "Old Speech and 
 Manners in Sussex," after stating that there are still in exist- 
 ence " two or three rhythmical composition's once familiar to 
 Sussex men," quotes, as one of these, a Sussex whistling 
 song, " which, he says, " was formerly popular and is not yet 
 entirely forgotten." Here it is : 
 
 A SUSSEX WHISTLING SONG. 
 
 There was an old Fanner in Sussex did dwell, 
 
 [Chorus 
 
 There was an old Farmer in Sussex did dwell, 
 And he had a bad wife, as many knew well. 
 
 [Chorus of Whistlers. 
 
 Then Satan came to the old man at the plough 
 " One of your family I must have now." 
 
 " It is not your eldest son that I do crave, 
 But 'tis your old wife; and she I will have." 
 
 " O! welcome, good Satan, with all my heart; 
 I hope you and she will never more part ! " 
 
 This reproach might have been removed from Sussex forty years ago but for the 
 premature death of a young musician (Alfred Bennett, the eldest son of the then 
 
 1^1 cw ^unege, wxiora, ana naa coiuposcu ocrviccb aiiu finiaemB wmtii eirc &uii pia.ycu 
 in our Cathedrals, besides other compositions. But his career was cut short by a fatal 
 coach accident whilst proceeding from Oxford to the Worcester Musical Festival. So 
 the advent of a great Sussex composer was deferred may we predict till our own 
 days?
 
 300 Glimpses of Our Ancestors. 
 
 Now Satan he got the old wife on his back, 
 And he lugged her along like a pedlar's pack. 
 
 He trudged away till he came to his gate, 
 
 Says he "Here take an old Sussex man's mate." 
 
 O ! then she did kick all the young imps about ; 
 Says one to the other, " Let's try turn her out!" 
 
 She spied seven devils all dancing in chains ; 
 
 She up with her pattens and knocked out their brains. 
 
 She knocked old Satan against the wall: 
 
 " Let's try turn her out, or she'll murder us all." 
 
 Now he's bundled her up on his back amain, 
 And to her old husband he's took her again. 
 
 " I've been a tormentor the whole of my life; 
 But I ne'er was tormented till I took your wife! " 
 
 Certainly, when the musical knowledge of the people was 
 reduced to whistling, it could not descend much lower; but 
 still it sufficed to prove that the taste for music was not 
 quite extinct, and, in course of time, that musical knowledge 
 which has grown so rapidly within the last half-century in the 
 middle classes of England will doubtless extend to the lower 
 especially through the instruction of the children at school 
 and England nay, even Sussex may wake up some fine 
 morning and find that it is musical ! 
 
 Farncombe & Co., Printers, Lewes.
 
 AD VERTISEMENTS. 
 
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 Now Ready, Price 253. 
 
 Thick 4to, 400 pages, with numerous Rare Illustrations, Portraits, Maps, Copious 
 
 Chronological Index, &c., bound in handsome cloth and gilt cover, specially 
 
 designed for the work. 
 
 A PEEP INTO THE PAST: 
 
 BRIGHTON IN THE OLDEN TIME, WITH GLANCES 
 AT THE PRESENT. 
 
 BY JOHN GEORGE BISHOP, 
 
 Author of "The Brighton Pavilion and its Royal Associations," "Strolls in the Extra- 
 Mural Cemetery," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS : 
 THE BRIGHTHELMSTON DIRECTORY FOR 1800 Introduction The Town The Professional 
 
 and Trading Community Lodging Houses and Lodging Letting. 
 FASHIONABLE AND POPULAR AMUSEMENTS Introduction The Assembly Rooms: The 
 
 "M.C." Dynasty The Old Theatres: "Near the Stein;" The Theatre in North 
 
 Street; The Theatre in Duke Street; The Theatre in New Road The Promenade 
 
 Grove Loyal Festivities, Sports, &c. Horse Racing: Brighton Races Cricket 
 
 Cock Fighting, Bull Baiting, &c. 
 THE STEINE AND ITS ASSOCIATIONS. 
 NOTABLE HOUSES ON THE STEINE The Manor House: The York Hotel Russell House: 
 
 The Albion Hotel Marlborough House "Single Speech" Hamilton's Lady Ann 
 
 Murray's the Mansion of Mrs. Fitzherbert. 
 THE INNS OF BRIGHTON IN 1800 AND THEIR ASSOCIATIONS SEA BATHING THE COACHING 
 
 ERA THE RAILWAY AND ITS GROWTH THE POST OFFICE TELEGRAPHY IN BRIGHTON 
 
 NORTH STREET RELIGIOUS EDIFICES IN NORTH STREET : The Friends' Meeting 
 
 House The Chapel Royal The Countess of Huntingdon's. 
 A PIONEER IN LOCAL JOURNALISM Mr. William Fleet. 
 A RETROSPECT OF TWENTY YEARS Brighton, 1850 and 1870. 
 HOVE AND PRESTON. 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 " Mr. Bishop possesses all the qualities of an antiquary ; and though the production 
 of this work must have been most laborious, we feel from the freshness and simple 
 vigour o(i the text that the author's heart was in his work." Brighton Gazette. 
 
 " Every chapter shows evidence of patient investigation, careful selection and 
 excellent arrangement, and the author will, we are confident, have his work regarded as 
 one of the 'local classics.' " Brighton Guardian. 
 
 "A local history of special interest to all who have recollections of old Brighton, as 
 well as to readers generally." Brighton Examiner. 
 
 " Mr. Bishop has evidently spared no pains in gathering the materials for his 
 graphic picture of old Brighton. The illustrations, consisting of fac-similies of rare old 
 pictures and prints, old maps and sketches, are carefully executed, and add interest to 
 the work." Sussex Daily Ne-ws. 
 
 " The work is more than complete ; and if it does not satisfy those who profess to 
 take an interest in local history, they must indeed be difficult to please." Brighton 
 times. 
 
 " This interesting work is a welcome addition to our local history. It will be read 
 with interest by Sussex men generally and not a few who reside out of its boundaries. 
 The rapid development of the Queen of Watering Places, from an obscure seaside 
 resort to London-super-Mare, has absorbed and defaced many of its most interesting 
 early associations, and Mr. Bishop brings them back to us in vivid word-pictures aided 
 by the pencil of the artist." East Sussex News. 
 
 "The book is one which should rind a place in the libraries of all who take any 
 interest in the early history of the rapidly-formed town of Brighton." Sussex Ad-v ertiier. 
 
 " The work should rind a place in every local book-case." The Brighton Record. 
 
 May be had of J. G. BISHOP, "Brighton Herald" Office, and of the 
 principal Local Booksellers.
 
 FARNCOMBE & CO., Publishers, LEWES. 
 
 Demy 8vo, cloth extra, 310 pp. Price, los. 6d., Post Free. 
 
 CHARTERHO USE. 
 
 A LIST OF CARTHUSIANS 
 
 From 18OO to 1879. 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 W. D. PARISH, 
 
 Chancellor of Chichester Cathedral, Vicar of Selmeston -with Alciston, 
 Sussex. 
 
 This work contains a List of Names of all Carthusians of the present 
 century up to 1879, arranged in chronological order, with as many facts as 
 can be ascertained as to the career of each individual. It has been very 
 highly spoken of as a standard book of reference. 
 
 ONLY A FEW COPIES LEFT. 
 Royal 410, cloth elegant, bevelled boards. Price, 155. 
 
 NOOKS AND CORNERS OF OLD SUSSEX 
 
 PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED WITH WOODCUTS AND PLATES. 
 BY REV. P. DE PUTRON, M.A. 
 
 (Rector of Rodmell) . 
 
 This elegant work, of which only a few copies remain, contains nearly 
 100 pages of illustrations of all the principal objects of interest in Sussex, 
 with brief descriptive letter-press opposite each page of engravings, and 
 thus, in the shape of an Album, form a valuable and concise epitome of 
 Sussex Antiquities. 
 
 All communications to be sent to the Editor, Rev. P. DE PUTRON, 
 Rodmell, or to the Secretaries of the Lewes School of Science and Art, 
 for the benefit of which Institution the work is published.
 
 FARNCOMBE & CO., Publishers, LEWES. 
 
 SECOND EDITION, 
 8vo, cloth extra. Free by Post, 75. 6d. 
 
 A DICTIONARY OF THE SUSSEX DIALECT 
 
 AND 
 
 LIST OF PROVINCIALISMS IN USE IN THE COUNTY OF. SUSSEX. 
 
 BY REV. W. D. PARISH 
 
 (Vicar of Selmeston). 
 
 " An entirely new feature appears in this glossary. Most 
 people suppose that there is something very repulsive in the study 
 of provincialisms. Mr. Parish's volume ought for ever to dispel 
 this most foolish notion. We do not suppose that Sussex folk 
 are wittier than their despised brethren in the " Sheeres," but 
 simply that Mr. Parish is a better observer, with a keener sense 
 of humour than most glossarists. Mr. Parish's glossary is more 
 entertaining than Punch." Westminster Review. 
 
 EDUCATIONAL WORKS BY REV, W. D, PARISH. 
 
 OCHOOL ATTENDANCE SECURED WITHOUT 
 O COMPULSION. An account of a plan of school management 
 adopted for nearly ten years at Selmeston, Sussex. Post free, 6d. 
 
 The Selmeston plan has secured the approval of the Education 
 Department. The income of the school has been doubled. The 
 Government Grant is more than three tunes as much as it used to 
 be and every child in the (scattered) school district averaged 
 over 370 attendance during the last year. 
 
 OTANDARD POETRY FOR ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 
 
 O Adapted to meet the requirements of the Revised Code. 
 
 No. i. " HORATIUS," adapted from Lord Macaulay. 300 
 lines. Two-pence. 12 copies post free. 
 
 The children learn this with facility. The lines are short and 
 the story attractive. 
 
 THE TELEGRAPHIST'S EASY GUIDE to the Code of 
 the Single Needle. A manual for Learners. Price Two-pence.
 
 FARNCOMBE & CO., Publishers, LEWES. 
 
 JUST PUBLISHED. 
 
 NEW AND ELEG-ANT EDITIONS, 
 
 Price 6d. Each. Post Free. 
 
 TOM CLADPOLE'S 
 
 JURNEY to LUNNUN. 
 
 Written 
 
 by Ms 
 
 Uncle Tim, 
 
 AND 
 
 JAN CLADPOLE'S 
 
 TRIP to 'MERRICUR. 
 
 LEWES: FARNCOMBE & CO., "EAST SUSSEX NEWS" WORKS.