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Glimpses of our Ancestors in Sussex.

GLIMPSES

OUR ANCESTORS in SUSSEX;

SKETCHES OF SUSSEX CHARACTERS,
REMARKABLE INCIDENTS, &c.

CHARLES FLEET,
Author of "Tales and Sketches," "The City Merchant," &>c.

' I have some rights of memory in this 'County,'
Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me."
— Shakspeare.

SECOND EDITION.

LEWES :
FARNCOMBE & CO., PRINTERS, "EAST SUSSEX NEWS" OFFICES.
1882.

FARNCOMBE AND Co., PRINTERS, LEWES.

By s. 1181

*

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.
I. 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 . . . . 18S
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.

RE AT 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 ioo
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
B

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 Pastons (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" (sic),
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 17th 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 £io. 16s. 7d."
If this was dear, house labour was cheap. To his man
servant, Mr. Moore paid/" 5 a-year; and to his maid-servant,
Rose Coleman, £1. 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 loo 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 30s. ;
the two flitches of bacon, when dryed, weighed 641b. I gave
her, to buy a qr. of lambe, 3s. 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
180 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 £1. 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 16s. 8d. a hind qr. of mutton 3s. 4d. and a lambe 7s. 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 : —
" 13th October I marryed Henry Place and Mary Holden, my two ser
vants, and spent at theyr wedding 20s. ; 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 40s. 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

Glimpses of Our Ancestors.

Protector gav^_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 166x14 -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 ^"i.2s. 6d. This single time I payd 12s. 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 the^."
" 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. 12s. 6d." Three years later —
in 1668 — the King's taxes paid by the Rector amounted to
£y. 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 18s."
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 2s. 9d. in the £, and in 1831 they
amounted to £t. 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 — qne 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 lb. 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, 2s. 7d.; for nibs, of beef, 2s. 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: " 1st
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 12s. For a pint of old sack 6d.,
2 quarts of muscadine 3s., 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 I "
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 /~i2 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
^12 a year (!), was, doubtless, a member of the great Chaloner
family, whose Sussex seat in the 1 7th 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 lb. 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 Wamett, of Horstead Keynes, yeoman, who is turned of 90,
but in full possession of his faculties, says that before the year 1 765, 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 I ' 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 thefirst 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 hsemorroyadal 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 1 qr. newesbookes,
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 2s. 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 : —
" 26th 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, £1. 4s.; for beer, bread
and tobacco, 7s. 7d. ; 3 bottles of sack, 5s.; 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 £ir. 1 6s., and for 7 yards of calaminko to make a
cassock £1. 4s. 6d., and 1 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 £1 ; 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 1 607
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 £<). 10s., and 2s. 3d. 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 30s. per quarter; peas, 24s. per ditto;
lime, 12s. per load — so that even in the half century which
followed 161 0 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. rj
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,
£-]. 6s. rod." Doubtless for the year : for at the same period,
we are told, " Sarah Stapley went to William Best's to board
c

i 8 Glimpses of Our Ancestors.

at 3s. 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 20th, 1735) "Carried my son John to
Mr. Browne, of Lindfield, to be boarded by him at 3s. 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,
£1. 10s." As much is now often paid for a single lesson on
the pianoforte.
Domestic servants were a different class of persons in the
17th 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 £1. 5s.
if she stay until May, 173 1. 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. 5s. James Hazelgrove came to live with me at
£6. 5s. per annum.
" 1740. Sarah Chandler came to live with me, and she is to have
£2. 10s. 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. 15s. 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. 16th. 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 ^"5. is.
" 1 742. Sarah Juppe came to live with me March 25th, and is to have
£2. 10s. 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 onthei6th 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, £ \. 15$."
This expression calls to mind the beautiful lines uttered by
Theseus in A Midsummer Night's Dream : —
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 tear.
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."

20 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. 9th. 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
2 1 st, 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. 10s.,
and I gave him is. for bringing her." Again; in 1739,
" Bought a black mare for John Stapley to ride ; she cost £5,
with bridle and saddle in." 1740 : " Bought a mare of John
Daulton, for which I gave him/V"
Sometimes, however, a higher figure was reached, as in
1 741, when he " bought a mare of John Lindfield, of Dean
House, for which I paid him /"is"
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 zlbs., 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 stuff 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, 12s. 6d." "Had a
dozen of white wine and one gallon of sack, which cost me
£1. 17s. 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, £1. 4s. 2d. To William Dumbrell, for tax,
;£l.l5s.2d. To the Parliament, £ 1. To Goodman Erie, for a six months'
tax, £2. 7s. 6d.
" 1645. To the Parliament, £1. 7s. 6d.
" 1646. Taxes for the Parliament, April 8th. To Arthur Luxford, for
four months' tax, 10s. To William Dumbrell, for eight months' tax,
£1. os. 4d. To do. for twelve months' tax, £1. 10s. 6d.
" 1649. To William Dumbrell, for a tax, 13s. 5d. To Thomas Averie
for a do., 14s. 6d. To Thomas Marchant, of Hurst, for a tax for the Par
liament, ^3. To Arthur Luxford for the use of the King and Parliament,
14s. To William Dumbrell, for an eight months' tax, £2. 10s. 6d. For
the King's Provision, 14s. 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 2s. 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 1 7th and 1 8th
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 ate — 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 25s. and 30s. 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/
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 A ncestors.

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 1 8th
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 rfot 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. 25
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, 17 14; 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 finding 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, 17 14, is not a bad 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 1 guinea. Went by Henfield to

The Sussex Diarists. 27

Steyning fair : and received 31s. 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 £7. 10s. — 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
mowbumt. 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 £6 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 2nd 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 20s. 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, 17 14), 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 td 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 ioo 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 speeking of his warlike virtues, in the 4th Book, is very good.
Read the 13th 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 Tatler; 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 20th. This is my birthday, in which I
enter the 29th 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 2 1st. 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. 1 8th. 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 storm 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, " 1 751, 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 25 th 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;
sol 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 7th, 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

40 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
h'e 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. 4 1
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
19th 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 29th 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
ioo 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 26th, 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/*7o,ooo 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. 11, 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 genfieman's estate, they
was married this day by a licence, which styled her Mary Margison,
otherwise 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
hill." 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 mindi " 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 quserist'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 15th. 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

.50 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 1 8th 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. 51
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 19th 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 ^"16 a-year, until increased by the
bequest of a house and garden which let for £i 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 fulf 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 loth, 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 ioth, 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 ioth 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 not 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 4s. 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 school, 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 2d. 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 18th 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.
19th 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 18th 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 ioth 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 1 8th 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) byhis 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
Archseological 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 16s., and then
two bushels more for 17s. The two bushels, with the bag,

60 Glimpses of Our Ancestors.
weighed 1 34-lbs. Since that wheat has fallen to 8s. a bushel."
And then he adds: " Query, what returned from the miller?
1 21 -lbs. So the toll paid was 13 -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 2d., 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, 10s. 9d.
(half-a-guinea) ; chambermayd, 10s.; cook, 10s.; coachman,
5s.; butler, 5s.; chief gardener, 5s.; under-cook, 2s. 6d.; boy,
2s. 6d.; under-gardener, 2s. 6d.; nurse, 2s. 6d. Total,
£3. 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, 3s." "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
BurrelPs 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: —
" 1st 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.

I 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 pussessed by him in the forest of Worth, Sussex, with the number
of men — " founders, ffylers, coleyers, miners, gon-founders,1' &c, who worked them.
One item will show the warlike nature of the manufacture : — " Ffyrste, a duble
(Furnace 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 thens 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 ower at the furnace, redye receved, xvjc. 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 _£~2oo, and in two years and a half
"ran out £1 50 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 £15° 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
£100 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 ^40 and £50, 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,ooo
or ^"6,000, 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 oneyear'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 £1 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 as 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 £^00 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,ooo, 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 17 10. 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

70 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,ooo, and had £1,200 a-year settled on her
and her heirs, " of which ^600 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 ^1,110 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 £is°< 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 find coal by boring at Netherfield, in East
Sussex, leading to no result.

The Sussex Smugglers.

I 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 Pix 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 18 18 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 14th 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 Susstx 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. 8 1
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 coo] audacity of these men is illustrated by a piece of intelligence communicated
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 200, 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." Ihis was, indeed, turning the tables! Only try
to conceive the state of things when smugglers apprehended and tried for their lives
Excise officers I

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, nearBexhill.
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 183 1, 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 I 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 I

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 life 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 their 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

The Southdown Shepherd. gr
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
Temp6 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 jiltings 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.

g2 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 21st
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 afterwards 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 14s. or 15s. 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 1 798-9, during a snow, my flockwas 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 3s. a
dozen ; at the beginning of the season sometimes catching three dozen in
a day, but not often. At Midsummer, 1 799, I removed to Kingston, near
Lewes, where I was under-shepherd for three years. The flock was very
large ( 1,400 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 filed 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.

96 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 hawlh 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.

j 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. gg

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, they ceased to work for a few minutes, drank their

ioo 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

102 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 14th 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 wooden 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.

104 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."

V^\ pTff/i s^S

Sussex Characters, sketched from Life.

THE SUSSEX COTTAGE-WIFE.

j 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.

106 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

108 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 ^"ioo
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. iog
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 /'loo 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 £100,
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*
Vife, 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 I
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. in
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 fellow-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, ioo 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 Our 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 Csesar ! 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 Csesar! 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

r 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 " fo 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.

I HE present age knows no such being as the Old
Tor^ — 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 modem
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 suck'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 ioo 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 railways 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. 1 23

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 nut 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 wert 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 unretumed —
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 df 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 Mm.

|N 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 tim e 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 naturce ; 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 nettele and 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 Iago 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 following jeu d 'esprit: —
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 Ecartg,
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 !
"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 Jane.

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 shortly 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 knaw, 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 '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.C.'s.

I 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! 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 if 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
ullimus 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 1 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.

JCCORDING 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?"
t 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

160 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 1hem 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 19th
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 Gratwick,
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 Commons — 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. 165
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

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 2nd 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 ^1,000. 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

1 68 Glimpses of Our Ancestors.

seen in St. Andrew's Church of that city. His son and heir,
William Cawley, who was born in i6oz (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 /"ioo 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 1 642, 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 164a 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 164a, 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 already 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 zoo 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. / 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. I7g
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 52nd
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 from
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 17th
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. 183
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. l.

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_^i2 was now found in his chest, and he left debts of
/*2,ooo, 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 (/*i,6oo) 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 1 How easy, then, is it
for us now-a-days to scatter praise and blame on the actors in
the great events of the 17th century I — 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 17th 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,"
incorrectly, to Shakspeare.

play of the 16th century, sometimes assigned, but

Sussex Tragedies and Romances. 1 89

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 20th of April, in the
32nd 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

i go 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 20th 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. igi
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 Robeit 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 9 2 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 the 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 29th 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.
0

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 17th
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. ig5
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 3rd, 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

ig6 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 wai 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. igg
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

200 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 rats 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

202 Glimpses of Our Ancestors.

evening of the night (Saturday, the 27th 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 well 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 was not only forgiven a debt of /"50 (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 deceasedj 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 17th
century, we must pass on to our own town of Brighton in the
19th 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 /'soo. 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 £y 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 7th July; the husband was buried
on the 1 2th.
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. 2og
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 17th and at Brighton in the
19th 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 10 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 £5 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 part of 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 ^13 on the
Chichester Bank, and a £5 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 flung 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 £100 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. 2ig
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 62nd 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

220 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 1 8th of March,
1806, as her marriage with Colonel Sergison took place, within
the walls of the Dublin Prison, on the 30th 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 18 19, 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. 14th, buried Mrs. Mary Relfe, of Buxted.
" 1742. Dec. 15th, 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.

O.

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 fleet
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 Pastoral 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 goocLlooks (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 rojls 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's deep
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,
how 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 say now-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 j
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 :
My father was (a thing now rare)
Loyal and brave : my mother chaste and fair.
Their pledge of marriage-vows was ordy 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 Senander'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 £15 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,
Poetarum Tragicorum qui in Britannia enotuerunt,
Facile Princeps.
Hoc Pago natus anno 1651.
Eheu ! egestate acerrima gravatus
Naturae concessit 1685.
Abi, Lector Amice !
Et vicibus pracellentis 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 /~2,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.

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 Poete."
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 18th
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 19th 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 Bceotia 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 ioo 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 1 8 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 controll'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 /"200 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 grave, 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 1 816-7, 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
18 — 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 18 13,
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 i86j.

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 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 little 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 £20 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 acm<§ 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 18th 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 roi faineant in French history; but his works are entirely
forgotten. Charlotte Smith (nie 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 1 7 14. 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 (ne'e 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
lias 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.

2.62 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 ;
They 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 ultra 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-facti 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 21st,
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 12th, 1833, to December 27th, 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 deadl"

Sussex Poets.

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 jeu d'espril; 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 resp'ected
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 fe"w 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 17th 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-yeares
wages on the 2nd of Oct., £2. 10s. Rose Colman came to me
on the 7th Sept. J bargained to give her £1 per annum?
We need hardly say that money was worth more in 1656
than it is now; but even double or treble £1 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 4.0s. 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 £2 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 1 quarter and a
weeke, for which I payd her 12s. 18th 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 45s. per an." So Mary Ward got an
advance of 5 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 £5 a yeare. On the 22nd
Dec. I payed him up to that time £1. 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 (16s. 8d.), a hind qr. of mutton (3s. 4d.), and a lambe
(7s. 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, £2 10s. On the 7th of March he dyed, and I
buryed him on the ioth 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, 9s." 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, 10s.,
hee having gone out in my arms for 4 days. For the harm he
receivfed in my service at the muster I gave him 5 s."
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 £5 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 12s., 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 30s. per annum, with coat, breeches, and
hat;" and, in the following year, "John Piccomb came as
footman at 30s. per an. and a livery. Anne Baker came as
cook at 55s."
Thomas Godsmark, therefore, did not stay very long at
Ockenden. His successor seems to have done better, for, in
1 69 1, we find this further reference to him: — "I payd Jack
Piccomb in full of his quarter's wages 7s. 6d. To mend his
coat and breeches, is., and to buy stockings, is. 6d." Just
previously, "Two hats for my fellows liveries, 10s."
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, 10s." 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 30s. 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, 17s. 8d."
The Ockenden coachman, however, kept his place better:
— "1700, May. Paid John the coachman, in full of his
year's wages, £4. 3s. 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. 30s.
a-year and his livery for a footman and £\. 3s. 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:" — " 14th Sept. Goldsmith departed my service,
by consent, this day. On the 29th 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 50s. 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 5s.
more and take his livery. He died in 171 3."
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 the fonset origo malorum. Ex.
gr.: — "Aug. For a periwigg for John, 14s. So he has had
in all £6. 2s. sd. in full of his year's wages, and 2s. sd. 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, £2
and more is. iod. Paid Sarah Wade two years' wages, £5."
Thus £2 and £2. 10s. were still the salaries of female
servants in a gentleman's family 170 years ago.
Later on, in 1710, he pays W. Gates £3. 10s. 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,
£*¦ 15s."
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. 10s. a-year. A rise
of 5s. 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 how 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, £1. 10s. To my own man, Robert, for
one year, £3. 10s. To William Matthew, for ditto, £3. 2s. 6d.
To Elizabeth, for half-year's wages, £1. To Rachel, for ditto,
£1. To Mary, for ditto, 8s. To the Nurse, for a quarter's
wages, £1."
These entries, it is clear, embrace all classes of in-door
servants; and they are all equally low. £1 a-year for men-
servants, £2 a-year to women, and 16s. 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), £j. 10s. a load; cows and steers, £3 to £\
each; oxen,£s or £6 each; 30 ewes selling for/~2o. os. 6d.;

Social Changes in Sussex. 281
Iambs, 7s. 6d. each; and 30 ewe lambs for £$. 5s.! 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 £\. 5 s. per annum wages.
Martha Earle came to me April ioth and Elizabeth Lancaster
May 5th. The former is to have/^2 and the latter £2. 10s.
per annum." And again, in 1657, "My man George came
June 1st, and I am to give him £3. 15s. 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 £4. 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, 173 1 . Hannah Morley came and is to
have £2 if she stay to Lady Day next. Paid Edward Harland
and George Virgoe half-a-year's wages each, £3. 5s. James
Hazlegrove came to live with me at^~6. 5s. 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. 5s. in 1730 would not command
much more of the necessaries of life than £3 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 £3. 10s.
He came to me again on the 29M." 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 ?
Pari passu with the later Stapley Diaries runs the diary of
Richard Marchant, of Little Park, Hurst, beginning in 17 14
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 28th,
1 7 1 6 : — "Bargained with Edward Morley at 35s. until Michael
mas, and if his vailes be not 5s. I 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 £5 and _^io 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 1 or 2 ; tea at 5 or 6 ; a little card-
playing or smoking and drinking, and then to bed at 9 or
10 — to be 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 18th 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.

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 90 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 fons 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 173 1, 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; 1, 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

292 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 ioth of January, 1728, she directed
that her body should be buried at Preston, if she should die.
at such a time 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 27th 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 3s. 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
1 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 19th
century will contrast most remarkably and most favourably
with the 1 8th and the 17th; 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 rara 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
Marchanls, 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 (175°), 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.

298 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 for 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 compositions 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 Farmer in Sussex did dwell, \Chorus of Whistlers.
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
Organist of Chichester Cathedral), who promised fair to keep up the succession of great
composers of Church music. At 24 he was chosen (in public competition) Organist of
New College, Oxford, and had composed Services and Anthems which are still played
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, bo
the advent of a great Sussex composer was deferred— may we predict— till our own
days?

30O 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 !

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AT THE PRESENT.
By JOHN GEORGE BISHOP,
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A LIST OF CARTHUSIANS
From 1800 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.
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NOOKS ADD CORKERS OF OLD SUSSEX
Profusely Illustrated with "Woodcuts and Plates.
By REV. P. DE PUTRON, M.A.
(Rector of Rodmell) .

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LIST OF PROVINCIALISMS IN USE IN THE COUNTY OF SUSSEX.
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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.

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TOM CLADBOLE'S
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—' f t^ygz-

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