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+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
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+
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #63805 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/63805)
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-The Project Gutenberg eBook, Old Sports and Sportsmen, by John Randall
-
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions 
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at 
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-
-Title: Old Sports and Sportsmen
-       or, the Willey Country
-
-
-Author: John Randall
-
-
-
-Release Date: November 18, 2020  [eBook #63805]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-
-***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD SPORTS AND SPORTSMEN***
-
-
-Transcribed from the 1873 Bunny and Evans edition by David Price.
-
-                   [Picture: Portrait of Lord Forester]
-
-
-
-
-
-                              OLD SPORTS AND
-                                SPORTSMEN
-
-
-                          Or, the Willey Country
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                     WITH SKETCHES OF SQUIRE FORESTER
-
-                            AND HIS WHIPPER-IN
-
-                                TOM MOODY
-
-             (“You all knew Tom Moody the Whipper-in well”).
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                         BY JOHN RANDALL, F.G.S.
-                   AUTHOR OF “THE SEVERN VALLEY,” ETC.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                 LONDON:
-                        VIRTUE & CO., 26, IVY LANE
-
-                   SALOP: BUNNY and EVANS; and RANDALL,
-                           BOOKSELLER, MADELEY
-                                   1873
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                  LONDON
-                        PRINTED BY VIRTUE AND CO.,
-                                CITY ROAD.
-
-
-
-
-PREFACE.
-
-
-IT is too much to expect that these pages will altogether escape
-criticism; my object will have been gained, however, if I have succeeded
-in collecting and placing intelligibly before the reader such noticeable
-facts as are interesting matters of local history.  Should it appear that
-there has been imported into the work too many details touching the
-earlier features of the country, the little that is generally known on
-the subject, the close connection of cause and effect, and the influences
-the old forests may have had in perpetuating a love of sport among some
-members of a family whose name appears to have been derived from pursuits
-connected therewith, must be my excuse.  Dr. Arnold once remarked upon
-the close connection existing between nature and mankind, and how each in
-turn is affected by the other, whilst a living writer, and a deeper
-thinker, has gone still further, in saying that “He is great who is what
-he is from nature.”  Of course it is not intended to claim greatness for
-Squire Forester in the sense in which the word is ordinarily used, or
-qualities, even, differing very much from those bearing the impress of
-the common mould of humanity; but simply that he was what he was from
-nature, from pre-disposition, and from living at the time he did.  Also,
-that he was in many respects a fair representative of the squirearchy of
-the period, of a class of squires in whom we recognise features
-discoverable in those in the enjoyment of the same natural vigour in our
-own day, but who may have chosen different fields for its development.
-
-It did not appear to come within the scope of the work to enter to the
-same extent upon the doings of other sportsmen of Squire Forester’s time,
-or to dilate upon those of gentlemen who subsequently distinguished
-themselves.  It would have required many additional pages, for instance,
-to have done justice to the exploits of the first Lord Forester; or to
-those of the present right honourable proprietor of Willey, who upon
-retiring from the mastership of the Belvoir hounds was presented with a
-massive piece of plate, representing an incident which happened in
-connection with the Hunt.  Of both Nimrod has written in the highest
-terms.  The names of several whose deeds the same felicitous writer has
-described in connection with Shropshire will occur to the reader, as Mr.
-Stubbs, of Beckbury; Mr. Childe, of Kinlet; Mr. Boycott, of Rudge—who
-succeeded Sir Bellingham Graham on his giving up the Shifnal country;
-Lord Wenlock; Squire Corbett, and the Squire of Halston; names which, as
-Colonel Apperley has very justly said, will never be forgotten by the
-sporting world.  As the reader will perceive, I have simply acted upon
-the principle laid down in the “Natural History of Selborne” by the Rev.
-Gilbert White, who says, “If the stationary men would pay some attention
-to the district in which they reside, and would publish their thoughts
-respecting the objects that surround them, from such materials might be
-drawn the most complete county history.”  This advice influenced me in
-undertaking the “Severn Valley,” and I have endeavoured to keep the same
-in view now, by utilising the materials, and by using the best means at
-command for bringing together facts such as may serve to illustrate them,
-and which may not be unlooked for in a work of the kind.
-
-Since the old Forest Periods, and since old Squire Forester’s day even,
-the manners and the customs of the nation have changed; but the old love
-of sport discoverable in our ancestors, and inherited more or less by
-them from theirs, remains as a link connecting past generations with the
-present.
-
-It matters not, it appears to me, whether either the writer or the reader
-indulges himself in such sports or not, he may be equally willing to
-recall the “Olden Time,” with its instances of rough and ready pluck and
-daring, and to listen to an old song, made by an aged pate,
-
-    “Of a fine old English gentleman who had a great estate.”
-
-Shropshire and the surrounding counties during the past century had, as
-we all know, many old English gentlemen with large estates, who kept up
-their brave old houses at pretty liberal rates; but few probably
-exercised the virtue of hospitality more, or came nearer to the true type
-of the country gentleman of the period than the hearty old Willey Squire.
-Differ as we may in our views of the chase, we must admit that such
-amusements served to relieve the monotony of country life, and to make
-time pass pleasantly, which but for horses and hounds, and the
-opportunities they afforded of intercourse with neighbours, must have
-hung heavily on a country gentleman’s hands a hundred years ago.
-
-It is, moreover, it appears to me, to this love of sport, in one form or
-another, that we of this generation are indebted for those grand old
-woods which now delight the eye, and which it would have been a calamity
-to have lost.  The green fertility of fields answering with laughing
-plenty to human industry is truly pleasing; but now that blue-bells, and
-violets, foxgloves and primroses are being driven from the hedgerows, and
-these themselves are fast disappearing before the advances of
-agricultural science, it is gratifying to think that there are wastes and
-wilds where weeds may still resort—where the perfumes of flowers, the
-songs of birds, and the music of the breeze may be enjoyed.  That the
-love of nature which the out-door exercises of our ancestors did so much
-to foster and perpetuate still survives is evident.  How often, for
-instance, among dwellers in towns does the weary spirit pant for the
-fields, that it may wing its flight with the lark through the gushing
-sunshine, and join in the melody that goes pealing through the fretted
-cathedral of the woods, whilst caged by the demands of the hour, or kept
-prisoner by the shop, the counter, or the machine?  Spring, with its
-regenerating influences, may wake the clods of the valley into life, may
-wreathe the black twigs with their garb of green and white, and give to
-the trees their livery; but men who should read the lessons they teach
-know nothing of the rejoicings that gladden the glades and make merry the
-woods.  Nevertheless, proof positive that the love of nature—scourged,
-crushed, and overlaid, it may be, with anxious cares for existence—never
-dies out may be found in customs still lingering among us.  In the
-blackest iron districts, where the surface is one great ink-blotch, where
-clouds of dust and columns of smoke obscure the day, where scoria heaps,
-smouldering fires, and never-ceasing flames give a scorched aspect to the
-scene, the quickening influences that renew creation are felt, teaching
-men—ignorant as Wordsworth’s “Peter Bell”—to take part in the festival of
-the year.  When the sap has risen in the tree when the south wind stirs
-the young leaves, and the mechanism of the woods is in motion, when the
-blackbird has taken his place in the bush, and the thrush has perched
-itself upon the spray, in the month of pelting showers and laughing
-sunshine, when the first note of the cuckoo is heard from the ash in the
-hedge-row or the wild cherry in the woods, an old custom still proclaims
-a holiday in honour of his arrival.  When the last lingering feature of
-winter has vanished; when brooks, no longer hoarse, sink their voices to
-a tinkling sweetness, flooding mead and dingle with their music; when the
-merry, merry month, although no longer celebrated for its floral shows
-and games as formerly, arrives, the May-bush may be seen over the door of
-the village smithy and on the heads of horses on the road.
-
-It would have been of little use passing acts of Parliament, like the one
-which has just become law, for the preservation of members of the
-feathered tribes, if their native woods had not been preserved to us by
-sportsmen.  To have lost our woods would have been to have lost the
-spring and summer residences of migratory birds: to have lost the laugh
-of the woodpecker, the songs of the blackbird and the thrush, the
-woodlark’s thrilling melody, and the nightingale’s inimitable notes, to
-say nothing of those faint soothing shadowings which steal upon one from
-these leafy labyrinths of nature.  As some one taking deeper views has
-said:—
-
-          “There lie around
-    Thy daily walk great store of beauteous things,
-    Each in its separate place most fair, and all
-    Of many parts disposed most skilfully,
-    Making in combination wonderful
-    An individual of a higher kind;
-    And that again in order ranging well
-    With its own fellows, till thou rise at length
-    Up to the majesty of this grand world;—
-    Hard task, and seldom reached by mortal souls,
-    For frequent intermission and neglect
-    Of close communion with the humblest things;
-    But in rare moments, whether memory
-    Hold compact with invention, or the door
-    Of heaven hath been a little pushed aside,
-    Methinks I can remember, after hours
-    Of unpremeditated thought in woods.”
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS.
-
-                                                                  PAGE
-                              CHAPTER I.
-                    THE MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS.
-The Hawk an Acquisition to Sportsmen—Hawk aeries—Hawks               8
-according to Degrees—Brook and other kinds of
-Hawking—Hawking and Hunting—A Shropshire Historian’s charge
-against the Conqueror—Bishops and their Clergy as much
-given to the Sport as Laymen—The Rector of Madeley—The
-Merrie Days, &c.
-                             CHAPTER II.
-                            MORFE FOREST.
-Morfe Forest one of the Five Royal Forests of                       17
-Shropshire—Its History and Associations—Early British,
-Roman, Danish, and Norman Mementoes—Legends and Historical
-Incidents—Forest Wastes—Old Names—Hermitage Hill—Stanmore
-Grove—Essex Fall—Foresters—Old Forest Lodge, &c.
-                             CHAPTER III.
-                       ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT.
-Royal Chase of Shirlot—Extent—Places                                31
-disafforested—Hayes—Foresters—Hunting Lodge—Priors of
-Wenlock—Curious Tenures—Encroachments upon Woods by
-Iron-making Operations—Animals that have
-disappeared—Reaction due to a love of Sport—What the
-Country would have lost—“The Merrie Greenwood”—Old Forest
-Trees, &c.
-                             CHAPTER IV.
-                 THE WREKIN FOREST AND THE FORESTERS.
-The Wrekin Forest and the Foresters—Hermit of Mount St.             54
-Gilbert—Poachers upon the King’s Preserves—Extent of the
-Forest—Haye of Wellington—Robert
-Forester—Perquisites—Hunting Matches—Singular Grant to John
-Forester—Sir Walter Scott’s Anthony Forster a Member of the
-Shropshire Forester Family—Anthony Forster Lord of the
-Manor of Little Wenlock, and related to the Foresters of
-Sutton and Bridgnorth—Anthony Foster altogether a different
-Character to what Sir Walter Scott represents him
-                              CHAPTER V.
-                               WILLEY.
-Willey, Close Neighbour to the Royal Chase of                       70
-Shirlot—Etymology of the Name—Domesday—The Willileys—The
-Lacons—The Welds and the Foresters—The Old Hall—Cumnor Hall
-as described by Sir Walter Scott—Everything Old and
-Quaint—How Willey came into possession of the Foresters
-                             CHAPTER VI.
-                          THE WILLEY SQUIRE.
-The Willey Squire—Instincts and Tendencies—Atmosphere of            77
-the times favourable for their development—Thackeray’s
-Opinion—Style of Hunting—Dawn of the Golden Age of the
-Sport, &c.
-                             CHAPTER VII.
-                         THE WILLEY KENNELS.
-The Willey Kennels—Colonel Apperley on Hunting a hundred            83
-years ago—Character of the Hounds—Portraits of
-Favourites—Original Letters
-                            CHAPTER VIII.
-                        THE WILLEY LONG RUNS.
-The Willey Long Runs—Dibdin’s fifty miles no figure of              93
-speech—From the Wrekin to the Clee—The Squire’s
-Breakfast—Phœbe Higgs—Doggrel Ditties—Old Tinker—Moody’s
-Horse falls dead—Run by Moonlight
-                             CHAPTER IX.
-                           BACHELOR’S HALL.
-Its Quaint Interior—An Old Friend’s Memory—Crabbe’s Peter          102
-at Ilford Hall—Singular Time-pieces—A Meet at Hangster’s
-Gate—Jolly Doings—Dibdin at Dinner—Broseley Pipes—Parson
-Stephens in his Shirt—The Parson’s Song
-                              CHAPTER X.
-         THE WILLEY RECTOR AND OTHER OF THE SQUIRE’S FRIENDS.
-The Squire’s Friends and the Rector more fully                     113
-drawn—Turner—Wilkinson—Harris—The Rev. Michael Pye
-Stephens—His Relationship to the Squire—In the Commission
-of the Peace—The Parson and the Poacher—A Fox-hunting
-Christening
-                             CHAPTER XI.
-                        THE WILLEY WHIPPER-IN.
-The Willey Whipper-in—Tom’s Start in Life—His Pluck and            124
-Perseverance—Up hill and down dale—Adventures with the
-Buff-coloured Chaise—His own Wild Favourite—His Drinking
-Horn—Who-who-hoop—Good Temper—Never Married—Hangster’s
-Gate—Old Coaches—Tom gone to Earth—Three View Halloos at
-the Grave—Old Boots
-                             CHAPTER XII.
-                         SUCCESS OF THE SONG.
-Dibdin’s Song—Dibdin and the Squire good fellows well              140
-met—Moody a character after Dibdin’s own heart—The Squire’s
-Gift—Incledon—The Shropshire Fox-hunters on the Stage at
-Drury Lane
-                            CHAPTER XIII.
-                THE WILLEY SQUIRE MEMBER FOR WENLOCK.
-The Willey Squire recognises the duty of his position, and         147
-becomes Member for Wenlock—Addison’s View of Whig Jockeys
-and Tory Fox-hunters—State of Parties—Pitt in
-Power—“Fiddle-Faddle”—Local Improvements—The Squire Mayor
-of Wenlock—The Mace now carried before the Chief Magistrate
-                             CHAPTER XV.
-                    THE SQUIRE AND HIS VOLUNTEERS.
-The Squire and his Volunteers—Community of Feeling—Threats         154
-of Invasion—“We’ll follow the Squire to Hell, if
-necessary”—The Squire’s Speech—His Birthday—His Letter to
-the _Shrewsbury Chronicle_—Second Corps—Boney and
-Beacons—The Squire in a Rage—The Duke of York and Prince of
-Orange come down
-                             CHAPTER XV.
-               THE WILLEY SQUIRE AMONG HIS NEIGHBOURS.
-The Squire among his Neighbours—Sir Roger de                       173
-Coverley—Anecdotes—Gentlemen nearest the fire in the Lower
-Regions—Food Riots—The Squire quells the Mob—His Virtues
-and his Failings—Influences of the Times—His career draws
-to a close—His wish for Old Friends and Servants to follow
-him to the Grave—To be buried in the dusk of the
-evening—His Favourite Horse to be shot—His estates left to
-his cousin, Cecil Weld, the First Lord Forester—New Hunting
-Song
-Appendix                                                           189
-Index                                                              201
-
-
-
-
-LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
-
-                                                       PAGE
-LORD FORESTER                                _Frontispiece_
-THE VALLEY OF THE SEVERN                                  1
-TRAINED FALCON                                            8
-HOODED FALCON                                             9
-MORFE FOREST                                             17
-STAG                                                     17
-BOAR HUNT IN MORFE FOREST                                21
-FALLOW DEER                                              31
-DEER LEAP                                                36
-CHAPTER HOUSE OF WENLOCK PRIORY                          38
-WATERFALL                                                44
-FOREST SCENERY                                           46
-LADY OAK AT CRESSAGE                                     50
-THE BADGER                                               53
-GROUP OF DEER                                            54
-NEEDLE’S EYE                                             56
-DEER AND YOUNG                                           59
-ATCHAM CHURCH                                            62
-RICHARD FORESTER’S OLD MANSION                           65
-WILLEY OLD HALL                                          70
-THE OLD SQUIRE                                           77
-FAVOURITE DOGS                                           83
-PORTRAIT OF A FOX-HOUND                                  93
-BUILDWAS ABBEY                                          100
-MOODY’S HORN, TRENCHER, CAP, SADDLE, &c.                122
-GONE TO EARTH                                           122
-A MEET AT HANGSTER’S GATE                               140
-THE FIRST IRON BRIDGE                                   147
-VIEW OF BRIDGNORTH                                      154
-WILLEY CHURCH                                           173
-
-
-
-INTRODUCTION.
-
-
-               [Picture: Valley of the Severn, near Willey]
-
-A SIMPLE reading of the history of the earth is sufficient to show that
-hunting is as old as the hills—not figuratively, but literally; and that
-the hunter and the hunted, one furnished with weapons of attack, and the
-other with means of defence, have existed from the earliest periods of
-creation to the present.  That is, the strong have mastered the weak, and
-in some instances have fallen side by side, as we see by their remains.
-In the economy of Nature, the process of decay appears to have been the
-exception, rather than the rule; with beak or tooth, or deadly claw, the
-strong having struck down the less defended in a never-ending arena.
-What a hunting field, in one sense, the Old World must have been, when
-creatures of strange and undefined natures infested the uncertain limits
-of the elements, and what encounters must have taken place in the ooze
-and mud periods, when monsters, enormous in stature and stretch of wing,
-were the implacable hunters of the air, the water, and the slime!  Nor
-can the inhabitants of the earth, the water, and the air, taking the term
-in its broad rather than in its technical sense, be said to be less
-hunters now, or less equipped with deadly weapons.  Some have
-supernumerary teeth to supply the loss of such as might get broken in the
-fray.  One strikes down its prey at a blow, another impales its victims
-on thorns, and a third slays by poison.  Some hunt in company, from what
-would seem to be a very love of sport—as crows and smaller birds give
-chase to the owl, apparently rejoicing in his embarrassment, at break of
-day.
-
-We need but refer to those remotely removed stages of human life
-illustrated by drift beds, bone caves, and shell heaps—to those primitive
-weapons which distinguished the lowest level of the Stone Age, weapons
-which every year are being brought to light by thousands—to give the
-_genus homo_ a place among the hunters; indeed one of the strongest
-incentives which helped on Pre-historic Man from one level to the other
-through the long night of the darkest ages, appears to have been that
-which such a pursuit supplied.  To obtain the skins of animals wilder
-than himself he entered upon a scramble with the wolf, the bear, and the
-hyena.  Driven by instinct or necessity to supply wants the whole
-creation felt, his utmost ingenuity was put forth in the chase; and in
-process of time we find him having recourse to the inventive arts to
-enable him to carry out his designs.  On the borders of lakes or on river
-banks, in caverns deep-seated amid primeval forest solitudes, he
-fashioned harpoons and arrow-heads of shell, horn, or bone, with which to
-repulse the attack of prowlers around his retreat and to arrest the
-flight of the swiftest beast he required for food; and when he emerged
-from the dark night which Science has as yet but partially penetrated,
-when he had succeeded in pressing the horse and the dog into his service,
-and when the cultivation of the soil even had removed him above the
-claims of hunger, he appears equally to have indulged the
-passion—probably for the gratification it gave and the advantages it
-brought in promoting that tide of full health from which is derived the
-pleasing consciousness of existence.
-
-Tradition, no less than archæology and the physical history of the
-country itself, lead us to suppose that when those oscillations of level
-ceased which led to the present distribution of land and water, one-third
-of the face of the country was covered with wood and another with
-uncultivated moor, and that marsh lands were extensive.  Remains dug up
-in the valley of the Severn, and others along the wide stretch of country
-drained by its tributaries, together with those disinterred from the bog
-and the marsh, show that animals, like plants, once indigenous, have at
-comparatively recent periods become as extinct as Dodos in the Mauritius.
-Old British names in various parts of the country, particularly along the
-valley of the Severn, exist to show that the beaver once built its house
-by the stream, that the badger burrowed in its banks, and that the eagle
-and the falcon reared their young on the rocks above.  At the same time,
-evidence exists to show that the bear and the boar ranged the forests as
-late as the conquest of England by the Normans, whilst the red deer, the
-egret and the crane, the bittern and the bustard, remained to a period
-almost within living memory.
-
-River loams, river gravels, lake beds, and cave breccias, disclose hooks
-and spears, and sometimes fragments of nets, which show that hunting and
-fishing were practised by the primitive dwellers along river plains and
-valleys.
-
-The situations of abbeys, priories, and other monastic piles, the ruins
-of which here and there are seen along the banks of rivers, and the
-records the heads of these houses have left behind them, lead us to
-suppose that those who reared and those who occupied them were alive to
-the advantages the neighbourhood of good fisheries supplied.  Some of the
-_vivaries_ or fish-pools, and meres even, which once afforded abundant
-supplies, no longer exist, their sites being now green fields; but
-indications of their former presence are distinct, whilst the positions
-of weirs on the Severn, the rights of which their owners zealously
-guarded, may still be pointed out.  Sometimes they were subjects of
-litigation, as with the canons of Lilleshall, who claimed rights of
-fishing in the Severn at Bridgnorth, and who obtained a bull from Pope
-Honorius confirming them in their rights.  In 1160 the Abbot of Salop,
-with the consent of his chapter, is found granting to Philip Fitz-Stephen
-and his heirs the fishery of Sutton (piscarium de Sutana), and lands near
-the said fishery.  These monks also had fisheries at Binnal, a few miles
-from Willey; and it is well known that they introduced into our rivers
-several varieties of fish not previously common thereto, but which now
-afford sport to the angler.
-
-Fishing, it is true, may have been followed more as a remunerative
-exercise by some members of these religious houses, still it did not fail
-to commend itself as an attractive art and a harmless recreation
-congenial to a spirit of contemplation and reflection to many
-distinguished ecclesiastics.  That the Severn of that day abounded in
-fish much more than at present is shown by Bishop Lyttleton, who takes
-some pains to describe it at Arley, and who explains the construction of
-the coracle and its uses in fishing, the only difference between it both
-then and now, and that of early British times, being that the latter was
-covered with a horse’s hide.
-
-A jury, empannelled for the purpose of estimating the value of Arley
-manor upon the death of one of its proprietors, gave the yearly rental of
-its fishery at 6_s._ 8_d._,—a large sum in comparison with the value of
-sixty acres of land, stated to have been 10_s._, or with the rent of a
-ferry, which was put down at sixpence.  There must have been fine fishing
-then.  Trout were plentiful, so were salmon; there were no locks or
-artificial weirs to obstruct the attempts of fish—still true to the
-instinct of their ancestors—to beat the tide in an upward summer
-excursion in the direction of its source.  The document states that the
-part of the river so valued “abounded in fish.”
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-  NOTE.—The Bishop of Worcester, by his regulations for the Priory of
-  Little Malvern, in 1323, enjoins the prior not to fish in the stew set
-  apart from ancient times _for the recreation of the sick_, unless
-  manifest utility, to be approved by the Chapter, should sanction it; in
-  which case he was, at a fit opportunity, to replace the fish which he
-  caught.
-
-  We fancy it is not difficult to recognise a growing feeling against
-  that separation of religion, recreation, and health which unfortunately
-  now exists, and in favour of re-uniting the three; and we are persuaded
-  that the sooner this takes place the better for the nation.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I.
-THE MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS.
-
-
-Early Features of the Country—The Hawk an acquisition to Sportsmen—Hawk
-aeries—Hawks according to Degrees—Brook and other kinds of
-Hawking—Hawking and Hunting—A Shropshire Historian’s Charge against the
-Conqueror—Bishops and their Clergy as much given to the Sport as
-Laymen—The Rector of Madeley—The Merrie Days, &c.
-
-[Picture: Trained Falcon] DIVERSIFIED by wood and moor, by lake and sedgy
-pool, dense flocks of wild fowl of various kinds at one time afforded a
-profusion of winged game; and the keen eye and sharp talons of the hawk
-no doubt pointed it out as a desirable acquisition to the sportsman long
-ere he succeeded in pressing it into his service; indeed it must have
-been a marked advance in the art when he first availed himself of its
-instinct.  Old records supply materials for judging of the estimation in
-which this bird was held by our ancestors, it being not uncommon to find
-persons holding tenements or paying fines in lieu of service to the lord
-of the fee by rendering a _sore_ sparrow-hawk—a hawk in its first year’s
-plumage.  Stringent restrictions upon the liberty the old Roman masters
-of the country allowed with respect to wild fowl were imposed; the act of
-stealing a hawk, and that of taking her eggs, being punishable by
-imprisonment for a year and a day.  The highborn, with birds bedecked
-with hoods of silk, collars of gold, and bells of even weight, but of
-different sound, appeared according to their rank—a ger-falcon for a
-king, a falcon gentle for a prince, a falcon of the rock for a duke, a
-janet for a knight, a merlin for a lady, and a lamere for a squire.  From
-close-pent manor and high-walled castle, to outspread plain and expansive
-lake or river bank, the gentry of the day sought perditch and plover,
-heron and wild fowl, many of which the fowling-piece has since driven
-from their haunts, and some—as the bustard and the bittern, the egret and
-the crane—into extinction.
-
-Mention is often made of hawk aeries, as at Little Wenlock, and in
-connection with districts within the jurisdiction of Shropshire forests,
-which seem to have been jealously guarded.  The use of the birds, too,
-appears to have been very much restricted down to the time that the
-forest-charter, enabling all freemen to ply their hawks, was wrung from
-King John, when a sport which before had been the pride of the rich
-became the privilege of the poor.  It was at one time so far a national
-pastime that an old writer asserts that “every degree had its peculiar
-hawk, from the emperor down to the holy-water clerk.” {10}  The sport
-seems to have divided itself into field-hawking, pond-hawking,
-brook-and-river hawking; into hawking on horseback and hawking on foot.
-In foot hawking the sportsman carried a pole, with which to leap the
-brook, into which he sometimes fell, as Henry VIII. did upon his head in
-the mud, in which he would have been stifled, it is said, had not John
-Moody rescued him; whether this Moody was an ancestor of the famous
-Whipper-in or not we cannot say.
-
-Evidence is not altogether wanting to show that during the earlier
-history of the Marsh period, the gigantic elk (_Cervus giganteus_), with
-his wide-spreading antlers, visited, if he did not inhabit, the flatter
-portions of the Willey country; and it is probable that the wild ox
-equally afforded a mark for the arrow of the ancient inhabitants of the
-district in those remote times, which investigators have distinguished as
-the Pile-building, the Stone, and the Bronze periods, when society was in
-what has been fittingly called the hunter-state.  At any rate, we know
-that at later periods the red deer, the goat, and the boar, together with
-other “beasts,” were hunted, and that both banks of the Severn resounded
-with the deep notes of “veteran hounds.”  Of the two pursuits, Prior in
-his day remarks, “Hawking comes near to hunting, the one in the ayre as
-the other on the earth, a sport as much affected as the other, by some
-preferred.”  That the chase was the choice pastime of monarchs and nobles
-before the Conquest, and the favourite sport of “great and worthy
-personages” after, we learn from old authors, who, like William Tivici,
-huntsman to Edward I., have written elaborate descriptive works,
-supplying details of the modes pursued, and of the kinds of dog which
-were used.
-
-Our Saxon ancestors no doubt brought with them from the great forests of
-Germany not only their institutions but the love of sport of their
-forefathers, pure and simple.  With them the forests appear to have been
-open to the people; and, although the Danes imposed restrictions, King
-Canute, by his general code of laws, confirmed to his subjects full right
-to hunt on their own lands, providing they abstained from the forests,
-the pleasures of which he appears to have had no inclination generally to
-share with his subjects.  He established in each county four chief
-foresters, who were gentlemen or thanes, and these had under them four
-yeomen, who had care of the vert and venison; whilst under these again
-were two officers of still lower rank, who had charge of the vert and
-venison in the night, and who did the more servile work.  King William
-curtailed many of the old forest privileges, and limited the sports of
-the people by prohibiting the boar and the hare, which Canute had allowed
-to be taken; and so jealous was he of the privileges of the chase that he
-is said to have ordained the loss of the eyes as the penalty for killing
-a stag.  His Norman predilections were such that an old Shropshire
-historian, Ordericus Vitalis (born at Atcham), who was at one time
-chaplain to the Conqueror, charges him with depopulating whole parishes
-that he might satisfy his ardour for hunting.  Prince Rufus, who
-inherited a love of the chase from his father, is made by a modern author
-to reply to a warning given him by saying:—
-
-    “I love the chase, ’tis mimic war,
-       And the hollow bay of hound;
-    The heart of the poorest Norman
-       Beats quicker at the sound.”
-
-King John stretched the stringent forest laws of the period to the
-utmost, till the love of liberty and of sport together, still latent
-among the people, compelled him to submit to an express declaration of
-their respective rights.  By this declaration all lands afforested by
-Henry I. or by Richard were to be disafforested, excepting demesne woods
-of the crown; and a fine or imprisonment for a year and a day, in case of
-default, was to be substituted for loss of life and members.
-
-To prevent disputes with regard to the king’s forests, it was also agreed
-that their limits should be defined by perambulations; but as a check
-upon the boldness of offenders in forests and chaces, and warrens, and
-upon the disposition of juries to find against those who were appointed
-to keep such places, it was deemed necessary on the other hand to give
-protection to the keepers.
-
-Large sums were lavished by kings and nobles on the kennels and
-appliances necessary for their diversions.  Nor were these costly
-establishments confined to the laity.  Bishops, abbots, and high
-dignitaries of the Church, could match their hounds and hawks against
-those of the nobles, and they equally prided themselves upon their skill
-in woodcraft.
-
-That the clergy were as much in favour of these amusements as the laity,
-appears from an old Shropshire author, Piers Plowman (Langland), who
-satirically gave it as his opinion that they thought more of sport than
-of their flocks, excepting at shearing time; and likewise from Chaucer,
-who says, “in hunting and riding they are more skilled than in divinity.”
-That Richard de Castillon, an early rector of Madeley, was a sportsman
-appears from the fact that when Henry III. was in Shrewsbury in
-September, 1267, concluding a treaty with Llewellyn, and settling sundry
-little differences with the monks and burgesses there, he granted him
-license to hunt “in the royal forest of Madeley,” then a portion of that
-of the Wrekin.  In 1283 also, King Edward permitted the Prior of Wenlock
-to have a park at Madeley, to fence out a portion of the forest, and to
-form a haia there for his deer.  It has been said that Walter, Bishop of
-Rochester, was so fond of sport, that at the age of fourscore he made
-hunting his sole employment.  The Archdeacon of Richmond, at his
-initiation to the Priory of Bridlington, is reported to have been
-attended by ninety-seven horses, twenty-one dogs, and three hawks.
-Walter de Suffield, Bishop of Norwich, bequeathed by will his pack of
-hounds to the king; but the Abbot of Tavistock, who had also a pack, was
-commanded by his bishop about the same time to break it up.  A famous
-hunter was the Abbot of Leicester, whose skill in the sport of hare
-hunting was so great, that we are told the king himself, his son Edward,
-and certain noblemen, paid him an annual pension that they might hunt
-with him.  Bishop Latimer said: “In my time my poor father was as
-diligent to teach me to shoot as to learn me any other thing, and so I
-think other men did their children.  He taught me how to draw, how to lay
-my body in my bow, and not draw with strength of arms as other nations
-do;” and the good bishop exclaims with the enthusiasm of a patriot, “It
-is a gift of God that He hath given us to excel all other nations withal;
-it hath been God’s instrument whereby He hath given us many victories
-over our enemies.”
-
-Such were the “merrie days,” when the kennels of the country gentry
-contained all sorts of dogs, and their halls all sorts of skins, when the
-otter and the badger were not uncommon along the banks of Shropshire
-streams, and ere the fox had taken first rank on the sportsman’s list.
-An old “Treatise on the Craft of Hunting” first gives the hare, the
-herte, the wulf, and the wild boar.  The author then goes on to say—
-
-    “But there ben other beastes five of the chase;
-       The buck the first, the second is the doe,
-    The fox the third, which hath ever hard grace,
-       The fourth the martyn, and the last the roe.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II.
-MORFE FOREST.
-
-
-Morfe one of the Five Royal Forests of Shropshire—Its History and
-Associations—Early British, Roman, Danish, and Norman Mementoes—Legends
-and Historical Incidents—Forest Wastes—Old Names—Hermitage Hill—Stanmore
-Grove—Essex Fall—Foresters—Old Forest Lodge, &c.
-
-THE hunting ground of the Willey country embraced the sites of five royal
-forests, the growth of earlier ages than those planted by the Normans,
-alluded to by Ordericus Vitalis.  In some instances they were the growth
-of wide areas offering favourable conditions of soil for the production
-of timber, as in the case of that of Morfe.  In others they were the
-result probably of the existence of hilly districts so sterile as to
-offer few inducements to cultivate them, as in the case of Shirlot, the
-Stiperstones, the Wrekin, and of the Clee Hills.  Some of these have
-histories running side by side with that of the nation, and associations
-closely linked with the names of heroic men and famous sportsmen.  Morfe
-Forest, which was separated from that of Shirlot by the Severn, along
-which it ran a considerable distance in the direction of its tributary
-the Worf, is rich in traditions of the rarest kind, the Briton, the
-Roman, Saxon, Dane, and Norman, having in succession left mementoes of
-their presence.  Here, as Mr. Eyton in his invaluable work on the
-“Antiquities of Shropshire” says,—“Patriotism, civilisation, military
-science, patient industry, adventurous barbarism, superstition, chivalry,
-and religion have each played a part.”
-
-                         [Picture: Morfe Forest]
-
-                             [Picture: Stag]
-
-The ancient British tumuli examined and described more than one hundred
-and thirty years ago by the Rev. Mr. Stackhouse have been levelled by the
-plough, but “the Walls” at Chesterton, and the evidence the name of
-Stratford supplies as to Roman occupation, to which Mr. Eyton refers, as
-well as the rude fortifications of Burf Castle, constructed by the Danes
-when they came to recruit after being out-manœuvred by Alfred on the
-Thames, remain.  At Quatford, a mile and a half west, on three sides of a
-rock overhanging the Severn, near to Danesford, are trenches cut out of
-the solid sandstone which, whether Danish or Norman, or in part both,
-shewed by the vast number of wild boar and red deer remains disclosed a
-few years ago the success with which the chase had here at one time been
-pursued.
-
-Within the forest were four manors, the continuous estate in Saxon times
-of Algar, Earl of Mercia, which after the Conquest were granted in their
-integrity to the first Norman Earl of Shrewsbury, and which in 1086 were
-held wholly in demesne by his son Hugh.  The predilections of the first
-Norman Earl of Shrewsbury for this vast forest, lying between those of
-Kinver, Wyre, and Shirlot,—the whole of which wide wooded district seems
-to have been comprehended under the old British name of _Coed_—are shown
-by the fact that he built his famous’ castle on the Severn close by, and
-founded there his collegiate church, the stones of which remain to attest
-its erection by a Norman founder.  The legend relating to the erection of
-the church seems so well to bear out the supposition that Morfe was the
-favourite hunting ground of the earl that, although frequently quoted, it
-may not be out of place to give it.  In substance it is this:—
-
-In 1082, Sir Roger married for his second wife a daughter of Sir Ebrard
-de Pusey, one of the chief nobles of France.  On coming over to England
-to join her husband a storm arose which threatened the destruction of the
-vessel when, wearied with much watching, a priest who accompanied her
-fell asleep and had a vision, in which it was said:—“If thy lady would
-wish to save herself and her attendants from the present danger of the
-sea, let her make a vow to God and faithfully promise to build a church
-in honour of the blessed Mary Magdalene, on the spot where she may first
-happen to meet her husband in England, especially where groweth a hollow
-oak, and where the wild swine have shelter.”  The legend adds that upon
-awaking the priest informed his lady, who took the prescribed vow; that
-the storm ceased, that the ship arrived safely in port, that the lady met
-the earl hunting the boar where an old hollow oak stood, and that at her
-request, and in fulfilment of her vow, Sir Roger built and endowed the
-church at Quatford, which a few years ago only was taken down and
-rebuilt.
-
-                   [Picture: Boar Hunt in Morfe Forest]
-
-On the high ground a little above the church there are still several
-trees whose gnarled and knotted trunks have borne the brunt of many
-centuries, two of which are supposed to have sprung from the remains of
-the one mentioned in the legend.
-
-Not only legends, but traditions, and some historical incidents, as those
-brought to light by the Forest Rolls, afford now and then an insight of
-the sporting kind of life led within the boundary and jurisdiction of the
-forest and upon its outskirts.  The bow being not only the chief weapon
-of sport but of war, those with a greater revenue from land than one
-hundred pence were at one time not only permitted but compelled to have
-in their possession bows and arrows, but, to prevent those living within
-the precincts of the forest killing the king’s deer, the arrows were to
-be rounded.  These were sometimes sharpened, and disputes arose between
-their owners, the dwellers in the villages, and the overseers of the
-forest, the more fruitful source of grievance being with the commoners,
-who, claiming pasturage for their cows and their horses, often became
-poachers.  On one occasion a kid being wounded by an arrow at Atterley,
-on the Willey side of the Severn, and the culprit not being forthcoming,
-a whole district is in _misericordiâ_, under the ban of the fierce Forest
-Laws of the period.  On another occasion a stag enters the postern gate
-of the Castle of Bridgnorth, and the vision of venison within reach
-proving too strong for the Castellan, he is entrapped, and litigation
-ensues.  Sometimes the stout foresters and sturdy guardians of the
-castle, and burgesses of the town, indulge in friendly trials of skill at
-quarter-staff or archery, or in a wrestling match for a cross-bow, a ram,
-or a “red gold ring.”  In Ritson’s “Robin Hood” we read:—
-
-    “By a bridge was a wrastling,
-    And there taryed was he:
-    And there was all the best yemen
-    Of all the west countrey.
-    A full fayre game there was set up,
-    A white bull up y-pight,
-    A great courser with saddle and brydle
-    With gold burnished full bryght;
-    A payre of gloves, a red golde ringe,
-    A pipe of wyne good fay:
-    What man bereth him best I wis,
-    The prize shall bear away.”
-
-In 1292, a wrestling match at a festive gathering on Bernard’s Hill takes
-place, when from ill blood arising from an old feud a dispute ensues, and
-a forester named Simon de Leyre quarrels with Robert de Turbevill, a
-canon of St. Mary’s, Bridgnorth, over a greyhound, which the latter,
-contrary to the regulations of the courts, had brought within the forest;
-and a jury of foresters, verderers, and regarders, in pursuance of the
-king’s writ, is empowered to try the case.  The evidence adduced shows
-that the foresters were to blame, the verdict come to being that the men
-of Brug, although at the wrestling match with bows and arrows, were in no
-way chargeable with the assault upon the forester.  “They had been
-indicted for trespass,” the jurors said, “not under any inquest taken on
-the matter, but by one Corbett’s suggestion to the Justice of the Forest;
-they had been attacked and imprisoned under the warrant of the said
-Justice, Corbett’s grudge being that two men of Brug had once promised
-him a cask of wine, a present in which the corporate body refused to
-join.”  Corbett was pronounced by the jurors “a malevolent and a procurer
-of evil.”
-
-To correct evils like these the “ordinatio” of Edward I. was introduced,
-containing many beneficial regulations, and stating that proceedings had
-been taken in the forest by one or two foresters or verderers to extort
-money, also providing that all trespassers in the forest of green hue and
-of hunting shall be presented by the foresters at the next Swainmote
-before foresters, verderers, and other officers.  In the same year the
-king confirmed the great charter of liberties of the forest.
-
-Various official reports of this Chace, drawn up from time to time, show
-how the great forest of Morfe gradually diminished, as the vills of
-Worfield and Claverley, and other settlements, extended within its
-limits, causing waste and destruction at various times of timber.  During
-the Barons’ War the bosc of Claverley was further damaged, it was said,
-“by many goats frequenting the cover;” it suffered also from waste by the
-Earl of Chester, who sold from it 1,700 oak trees.  Other wastes are
-recorded, as those caused by cutting down timber “for the Castle of
-Bridgnorth,” and “for enclosing the vill before it was fortified by a
-wall.”  The report further states that “there were few beasts,” because
-“they were destroyed in the time of war, and in the time when the liberty
-of the forest was conceded.”  By degrees, from one cause or another, and
-by one means or another, this, the “favourite chace of English kings and
-Norman earls,” which, so late as 1808, consisted of upwards of 3,820
-acres, disappeared, leaving about the names of places it once enclosed an
-air of quaint antiquity, the very mention of some of which may be
-interesting.  Among them are Bowman’s Hill, Bowman’s Pit, and Warrener’s
-Dead Fall—names carrying back the mind to times when bowmen were the
-reliance of English leaders in battles fought on the borders, and before
-strongholds like the Castle of Bridgnorth.  Gatacre, and Gatacre Hall,
-suggest a passing notice of a family which witnessed many such
-encounters, and which remained associated with a manor here from the
-reign of Edward the Confessor to the time when Earl Derby sought shelter
-as a fugitive after the Battle of Worcester.  As Camden describes it, the
-old hall must have been a fitting residence truly for a steward of the
-forest.  It had, in the middle of each side and centre, immense oak
-trees, hewn nearly square, set with their heads on large stones, and
-their roots uppermost, from which a few rafters formed a complete arched
-roof.
-
-The Hermitage, with its caves hewn out of the solid sand rock, by the
-road which led through the forest in the direction of Worfield, meets us
-with the tradition that here the brother of King Athelstan came seeking
-retirement from the world, and ended his days within sight of the queenly
-Severn.  Besides tradition, however, evidence exists to shew that this
-eremetical cave, of Saxon origin, under the patronage of the crown, was
-occupied by successive hermits, each being ushered to the cell with royal
-seal and patent, in the same way as a dean, constable, or sheriff was
-introduced to his office; as in the case of John Oxindon (Edward III.,
-1328), Andrew Corbrigg (Edward III., 1333), Edmund de la Marc (Edward
-III., 1335), and Roger Boughton (Edward III., 1346).  From the frequency
-of the presentations, it would appear either that these hermits must have
-been near the termination of their pilgrimage when they were inducted, or
-that confinement to a damp cell did not agree with them: indeed, no one
-looking at the place itself would consider it was a desirable one to live
-in.
-
-Other names not less significant of the former features of the country
-occur, as Stoneydale, Copy Foot, Sandy Burrow, Quatford Wyches, and Hill
-House Flat,—where the remains of an old forest oak may still be seen.  In
-addition to these we find Briery Hurst, Rushmoor Hill, Spring Valley,
-Stanmore Grove, and Essex Fall, the latter being at the head of a ravine,
-half concealed by wood, where tradition alleges the Earl of Essex,
-grandson of the Earl who founded St. James’s, a refuge, a little lower
-down, for sick and suffering pilgrims, which had unusual forest
-privileges allowed by royal owners, was killed whilst hunting.  Here too,
-higher up on the hill, may still be seen the remains of the old Forest
-Lodge, which, with its picturesque scenes, must have been associated with
-the visits of many a noble steward and forest-ranger.  Many a hunter of
-the stag and wild boar has on the walls of this old Lodge hung up his
-horn and spear, as he sought rest and refreshment for the night.
-
-The names of some of the stewards and other officers of the forest are
-preserved, together with their tenures and other privileges.  By an
-inquisition in the reign of Henry III., it was found that Robert, son of
-Nicholas, and others were seized of “Morffe Bosc.” {28}  In the 13 Hen.
-IV., “Worfield had common of pasture in Morffe.”  Besides many tenures
-(enumerated in Duke’s “Antiquities of Shropshire,” p. 52), dependent upon
-the forest, the kings (when these tenures were grown useless and
-obsolete) appointed stewards and rangers to take care of the woods and
-the deer; in the 19 Rich. II., Richard Chelmswick was forester for life:
-in the 1 Henry IV., John Bruyn was forester; and in the 26th Henry IV.,
-the stewardships of the forest of Morfe and Shirlot were granted to John
-Hampton, Esq., and his heirs.  Again, we find 9 Henry VII., rot. 28,
-George Earl of Shrewsbury, was steward and ranger for life, with a fee of
-4_d._ per day.  Orig. 6 Edward VI., William Gatacre de Gatacre, in com.
-Salop, had a lease of twenty-one years of the stewardship; and in the
-20th Elizabeth, George Bromley had a lease of twenty-one years of the
-stewardship, at a rent of 6_s._ 8_d._, et de incremento, 12_d._; and 36
-Elizabeth, George Powle, Gent., was steward, with a fee of 4_d._ per day.
-
-One of the descendants of George Earl of Shrewsbury sold at no very
-distant period the old Lodge and some land to the Stokes family of
-Roughton, and the property is still in their possession.  The remains of
-the old Lodge were then more extensive, but they were afterwards pulled
-down, with the exception of that portion which still goes by the name.
-As we have said, these places have about them interesting forest
-associations, reminding us that early sportsmen here met to enjoy the
-pleasures of the chase, with a success sometimes told by red-deer bones
-and wild-boar tusks, dug from some old ditch or trench.  Where the
-plough-share now cleaves the sandy soil, the wild-boar roamed at will;
-where fat kine feed in pastures green, stout oaks grew, and red-deer
-leaped; where the Albrighton red-coats with yelping hounds now meet, the
-ringing laugh of lords and ladies, of bishops and their clergy, hunting
-higher game, was heard.  Then, as good old Scott has said,—
-
-    “In the lofty arched hall
-    Was spread the gorgeous festival,
-    Then rose the riot and the din
-    Above, beneath, without, within,
-    For from its lofty balcony,
-    Rang trumpet, shawm and psaltery.
-    Their clanging bowls old warriors quaff’d,
-    Loudly they spoke and loudly laugh’d,
-    Whisper’d young knights in tones more mild,
-    To ladies fair, and ladies smiled.
-    The hooded hawks, high perch’d on beam,
-    The clamour join’d with whistling scream,
-    And flapped their wings and shook their bells,
-    In concert with the stag-hounds’ yells.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III.
-ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT.
-
-
-Afforestation of Shirlot—Extent—Places
-Disafforested—Hayes—Foresters—Hunting Lodges—Sporting Priors—Old
-Tenures—Encroachments upon Woods by Iron-making Operations—Animals that
-have Disappeared—Reaction due to a Love of Sport—What the Country would
-have lost—“The Merrie Greenwood”—Remarkable old Forest Trees, &c.
-
-    “Where with puffed cheek the belted hunter blows
-    His wreathed bugle horn.”
-
-MR. EYTON thinks the afforestation of Shirlot was probably suggested by
-its proximity to the Morville and Chetton manors, where Saxon kings and
-Mercian earls had their respective demesnes, and that Henry I. and his
-successors, in visiting the Castle of Bridgnorth, or as guests of the
-Prior of Wenlock, had obvious reasons for perpetuating there the
-exclusive rights of a Royal chace.  Although Shirlot Forest was separated
-from that of Morfe by the Severn, its jurisdiction extended across the
-river to Apley, and embraced places lying along the right bank of the
-river, in the direction of Cressage.  Bridgnorth with its surroundings
-was not taken out of its jurisdiction or thrown open by perambulation
-till 1301, when it was disafforested, together with Eardington, Much
-Wenlock, Broseley, and other places.  The extent and ancient jurisdiction
-of this forest may be estimated by the number of places taken from it at
-this date, as Benthall, Buildwas, Barrow, Belswardine, Shineton,
-Posenall, Walton, Willey, Atterley, the Dean, the Bold, Linley, Caughley,
-Little Caughley, Rowton, Sweyney, Appeleye (the only vill eastward of
-Severn), Colemore, Stanley, Rucroft, Medewegrene, Cantreyne, Simon de
-Severn’s messuage (now Severn Hall), Northleye, Astley Abbot’s Manor, La
-Dunfowe (Dunwall), La Rode (now Rhodes), Kinsedeleye (now Kinslow),
-Tasley, Crofte, Haleygton (Horton, near Morville), Aldenham, the Bosc of
-the Earl of Arundel within the bounds of the forest of Schyrlet, which is
-called Wiles Wode (_i.e._ Earl’s Wood), Aston Aer, Momerfield (Morville),
-Lee, Underdone, Walton (all three near Morville), Upton (now Upton
-Cresset), Meadowley, Stapeley, Criddon, Midteleton (Middleton Scriven),
-the Bosc of the Prior of Wenlock, called Lythewode, half the vill of
-Neuton (Newton near Bold), Faintree, Chetton, Walkes Batch (Wallsbatch,
-near Chetton), Hollycott, Hapesford (now Harpswood), Westwood (near
-Harpswood), Oldbury, a messuage at the More (the Moor Ridding), a
-messuage at La Cnolle (now Knowle Sands), and the Bosc which is called
-Ongeres.
-
-                          [Picture: Fallow deer]
-
-The ancient extent of the forest must have been about twelve miles by
-five.  The names of the places mentioned to which the limits of the chace
-are traced are so different in many instances from the present that it
-may be of interest to give a few of them.  From Yapenacres Merwey the
-boundary was to go up to the Raveneshok (Ravens’ Oak), thence straight to
-the Brenallegrene, near the Coleherth (Coal Hearth) going up by the
-Fendeshok (Friends’ Oak) to the Dernewhite-ford.  Thence upwards to the
-Nethercoumbesheved; and so straight through the Middlecoumbesheved, and
-then down to Caldewall.  Then down through the Lynde to the Mer Elyn.
-Thence down to Dubledaneslegh, and then up by a certain watercourse to
-the Pirle; and so up to Wichardesok; and so to the Pundefold; and so down
-by the Shepewey to the Holeweeuen, and then up by a certain fence to
-Adame’s Hale (Adam’s Hall), and thus by the assarts which John de
-Haldenham (Aldenham) holds at a rent of the king to the corner of
-Mokeleyes Rowe (Muckley Row); and thence down to Yapenacres Merwey, where
-the first land-mark of the Haye begins.  There was also, it was said, a
-certain bosc which the King still held in the same forest, called
-Benthlegh Haye (Bentley Haye).
-
-In addition to this Haye there was the Haye of Shirlot, opposite to which
-a portion of the forest in the fifth of Henry III.’s reign was ordered to
-be assarted, which consisted in grubbing up the roots so as to render the
-ground fit for tillage.
-
-In connection with these Hayes, generally a staff of foresters,
-verderers, rangers, stewards, and regarders was kept up; and forest
-courts were also held at stated times (in the forest of the Clee every
-six weeks), at which questions and privileges connected with the forest
-were considered.  Philip de Baggesour, Forester of the Fee in the king’s
-free Haye of Schyrlet in 1255, in the Inquisition of Hundreds, is said to
-have under him “two foresters, who give him 20_s._ per annum for holding
-their office, and to make a levy on oats in Lent, and on wheat in
-autumn.”  “The aforesaid Philip,” it is said, “hath now in the said Haye
-of Windfalls as much as seven trees, and likewise all trees which are
-wind-fallen, the jurors know not by what warrant except by ancient
-tenure.”  These privileged officers had good pickings, evidently by means
-of their various time-sanctioned customs, and jolly lives no doubt they
-led.
-
-In the forty-second of Henry III. Hammond le Strange was steward of this
-forest, and in the second of Edward I. the king’s forester is said to
-have given the sheriff of the county notice that he was to convey all the
-venison killed in the forests of Salop, and deliver it at Westminster to
-the king’s larder, for the use of the king’s palace.  According to the
-same record, the profits that were made of the oaks that were fallen were
-to be applied to the building of a vessel for the king.  In the
-nineteenth of Richard II., Richard Chelmswick was appointed forester for
-life; and in the twenty-sixth of Henry III. the stewardship both of the
-forests of Morfe and of Shirlot was granted to John Hampton and his
-heirs.
-
-Some of the chief foresters also held Willey, and probably resided there;
-at any rate it is not improbable that a building which bears marks of
-extreme antiquity, between Barrow and Broseley, called the Lodge Farm,
-was once the hunting lodge.  It has underneath strongly arched and
-extensive cellaring, which seems to be older than portions of the
-superstructure, and which may have held the essentials for feasts, for
-which sportsmen of all times have been famous.  Near the lodge, too, is
-the _Dear-Loape_, or Deer Leap, a little valley through which once
-evidently ran a considerable stream, and near which the soil is still
-black, wet, and boggy.  A deer leap, dear loape, or _saltory_, was a
-pitfall—a contrivance common during the forest periods, generally at the
-edge of the chace, for taking deer, and often granted by charter as a
-privilege—as that, for instance, on the edge of Cank, or Cannock Chace.
-Sometimes these pitfalls, dug for the purpose of taking game, were used
-by poachers, who drove the deer into them.  It is, therefore, easy to
-understand why the forest lodge should be near, as a protection.  It was
-usually one of the articles of inquiry at the Swainmote Court whether
-“any man have any great close within three miles of the forest that have
-any saltories, or great gaps called deer loapes, to receive deer into
-them when they be in chasing, and when they are in them they cannot get
-out again.”
-
-                           [Picture: Deer Leap]
-
-Among sportsmen of these forest periods we must not omit to notice the
-Priors of the ancient Abbey of Wenlock.  The heads of such wealthy
-establishments by no means confined themselves within the limits of the
-chapter-house.  They were no mere cloistered monks, devoted to book and
-candle, but jolly livers, gaily dressed, and waited upon by
-well-appointed servants; like the Abbot of Buildwas, who had for his
-vassal the Lord of Buildwas Parva, who held land under him on condition
-that he and his wife should place the first dish on the abbot’s table on
-Christmas Day, and ride with him any whither within the four seas at the
-abbot’s charge.  They had huntsmen and hounds, and one can imagine their
-sporting visitation rounds among their churches, the chanting of priests,
-the deep-mouthed baying of dogs, early matins, and the huntsman’s bugle
-horn harmoniously blending in the neighbourhood of the forest.  Hugh
-Montgomery in his day gave to the abbey a tithe of the venison which he
-took in its woods, and in 1190 we find the Prior of Wenlock giving twenty
-merks to the king that he may “have the Wood of Shirlott to himself,
-exempt from view of foresters, and taken out of the Regard.”  As we have
-already shown, the priors had a park at Madeley, they had one at
-Oxenbold, and they also had privileges over woods adjoining the forest of
-the Clees, where the Cliffords exercised rights ordinarily belonging to
-royal proprietors, and where their foresters carried things with such a
-high hand, and so frequently got into trouble with those of the priors,
-that the latter were glad to accept an arrangement, come to after much
-litigation in 1232, by which they were to have a tenth beast only of
-those taken in their own woods at Stoke and Ditton, and of those started
-in their demesne boscs, and taken elsewhere.  These boscs appear to have
-been woodland patches connecting the long line of forest stretching along
-the flanks of the Clee Hills with that on the high ground of Shirlot and,
-as in the case of others even much further removed, their ownership was
-exceedingly limited.  One of the complaints against Clifford’s foresters
-was, that they would not suffer the priors’ men to keep at Ditton Priors
-and Stoke St. Milburgh any dogs not _expedited_, or mutilated in their
-feet, nor pasture for their goats.
-
-                [Picture: Chapter House of Wenlock Priory]
-
-Imbert, one of these priors, was chosen as one of the Commissioners for
-concluding a truce with David ap Llewellyn in July, 1244.  He was
-subsequently heavily fined for trespasses for assarting, or grubbing up
-the roots of trees, in forest lands at Willey, Broseley, Coalbrookdale,
-Madeley, and other places, the charge for trespass amounting to the large
-sum of £126 13_s._ 4_d._
-
-A survey of the Haye of Shirlot, made by four knights of the county,
-pursuant to a royal writ in October 21, 1235, sets forth “its custody
-good as regards oak trees and underwood, except that great deliveries
-have been made by order of the king to the Abbeys of Salop and Bildewas,
-to the Priory of Wenlock, and to the Castle of Brug, for the repairs of
-buildings, &c.”
-
-Some curious tenures existed within the jurisdiction of this forest, one
-of which it may be worth while deviating from our present purpose to
-notice, as it affords an insight into the early iron manufacturing
-operations which, at a later period, led to the destruction of forest
-trees, but, at the same time, to the development of the mineral wealth of
-the district within and bordering upon the forest.  Of its origin nothing
-is known; but it is supposed to have arisen out of some kingly peril or
-other forest incident connected with the chase.  It consisted in this,
-that the tenant of the king at the More held his land upon the condition
-that he appeared yearly in the Exchequer with a hazel rod of a year’s
-growth and a cubit’s length, and two knives.  The treasurer and barons
-being present, the tenant was to attempt to sever the rod with one of the
-knives, so that it bent or broke.  The other knife was to do the same
-work at one stroke, and to be given up to the king’s chamberlain for
-royal use. {41}
-
-That iron was manufactured at a very early period in the heart of the
-forests of Shirlot and the Clees, is shown by Leland, who informs us that
-in his day there were blow-shops upon the Brown Clee Hills in Shropshire,
-where iron ores were exposed upon the hill sides, and where, from the
-fact that wood was required for smelting, it is only reasonable to look
-for them.  Historical records and monastic writings, as well as old
-tenures, traditions, and heaps of slag, tell us that iron had been
-manufactured in the midst of these woods from very remote periods.  As
-far back as 1250, a notice occurs of a right of road granted by Philip de
-Benthall, Lord of Benthall, to the monks of Buildwas, over all his
-estate, for the carriage of stone, coal, and timber; and in an old work
-in the Deer Leap, very primitive wooden shovels, and wheels flanged and
-cut out of the solid block, and apparently designed to bear heavy
-weights, were found a short time since, which are now in possession of
-Mr. Thursfield, of Barrow, together with an iron axletree and some brass
-sockets, two of which have on them “P. B.,” being the initials of Philip
-Benthall, or Philip Burnel, it is supposed, the latter having succeeded
-the former.  At Linley, and the Smithies, traces of old forges occur; so
-that there is good reason for supposing that knives and other articles of
-iron may have been manufactured in the district from a very early period.
-Among the assets, for instance, of the Priory of Wenlock, in the year
-1541–2, is a mine of ironstone, at Shirlot, fermed for £2 6_s._ 1_d._ per
-annum; and a forge, described as an Ierne Smythee, or a smith’s place, in
-Shirlot, rented at £12 8_s._  Another forge produced £2 13_s._ 4_d._ per
-annum; and the produce of some other mineral, probably coal, was £5 3_s._
-10_d._  These large rents for those days show the advance made in turning
-to account the mineral wealth of the district, and the superior value of
-mines compared with trees, or mere surface produce.
-
-Wherever powerful streams came down precipitous channels, little forges
-with clanging hammers were heard reverberating through the woods as early
-as the reigns of the Tudors.  Their sites now are—
-
-    “Downy banks damask’d with flowers:”
-
-but they reveal the havoc made of the timber by cutting and burning it
-for charcoal down to the reign of Elizabeth, when an act was passed to
-restrict the use for such purposes.
-
-These iron-making and mining operations caused the forest to be
-intersected by roads and tramways, as old maps and reports of the forest
-shew us; so that few beasts, except those passing between their more
-secluded haunts, were to be found there; and, as the stragglers preferred
-the tender vegetation the garden of the cottager afforded, even these
-were sometimes noosed, or shot with bows and arrows, which made no noise.
-
-                           [Picture: Waterfall]
-
-To such an extent had destruction of timber in this and other forests in
-the country been carried, that it was feared that in the event of a
-foreign war sufficient timber could not be found for the use of the navy.
-A reaction, however, set in: wealthy landowners set themselves to work to
-remedy the evil by planting and preserving trees, especially the oak; and
-many of the woods and plantations which gladden the eye of the traveller
-in passing through the country, and which afford good sport to the
-Wheatland and Albrighton packs, were the result.
-
-To this indigenous and deep-rooted love of sport we are therefore
-indebted, to a very great extent, for those beautiful woods which adorn
-the Willey country and many other portions of the kingdom.  But for our
-woods and the “creeping things” they shelter, we should have imperfect
-conceptions of those earlier phases of the island:—
-
-    “When stalked the bison from his shaggy lair,
-    Thousands of years before the silent air
-    Was pierced by whizzing shafts of hunters keen.”
-
-The country would have been wanting in subjects such as Creswick, with
-faithful expressions of foliage and knowledge of the play of light and
-shade, has depicted.  It would have lost the text-work of those
-characteristics Constable revelled in, and those Harding gave us in his
-oaks.  We should have lost subjects for the poet as well as for the
-painter; for the ballad literature of the country is redolent of sights
-and sounds associated therewith.  To come down from the earliest times.
-How the old Druids reverenced them! how the compilers of that surprising
-survey of the country we find in Domesday noted all details concerning
-them! what joyous allusions Chaucer, Spenser, and later writers make to
-them! what peculiar charms the “merry green-wood” and the deep forest
-glades had for the imagination of the people!  Hence the popular sympathy
-expressed by means of tales and traditions in connection with Sherwood’s
-sylvan shade, and the many editions of the song of the bold outlaw, and
-of the adventures contained therein.  Even the utilitarian philosopher
-and the ultra radical, fleeing from the stifling atmosphere of the town,
-and diving for an hour or so into some paternal wood, is inclined, we
-fancy, to sponge from his memory the bitter things he has said of the
-owners and of that aristocratic class who usually value and guard them as
-they do their picture galleries.  Thanks to such as these, there is now
-scarcely a run in the Willey country but brings the sportsman face to
-face with vestiges of some sylvan memorial Nature or man has planted
-along the hill and valley sides, memorials renewed again and again, as
-winter after winter rends the red leaves from the trees: and the man who
-has not made a pilgrimage, for sport or otherwise, through these
-far-reaching sylvan slopes along the valley of the Severn, stretching
-almost uninterruptedly for seven or eight miles, or through some similar
-wooded tract, witnessing the sheltered inequalities of the surface,
-varied by rocky glens and rushy pools—the winter haunt of snipe and
-woodcock—has missed much that might afford him the highest interest.
-Here and there, on indurated soils along the valley sides, opportunities
-occur of studying the manner in which trees of several centuries’ growth
-send their gnarled and massive roots in between the rocks in search of
-nourishment, for firmness, or to resist storms that shake branches little
-inferior to the parent stem.  Few places probably have finer old hollies
-and yew-trees indigenous to the soil, relieving the monotony of the
-general grey by their sombre green—trees rooted where they grew six or
-eight centuries since, and carrying back the mind to the time of Harold
-and the bowmen days of Robin Hood.
-
-                        [Picture: Forest scenery]
-
-Spoonhill, a very well-known covert of the Wheatland Hunt, was a slip of
-woodland as early as a perambulation in 1356, when it was recorded to lie
-outside the forest, its boundary on the Shirlot side being marked by a
-famous oak called Kinsok, “which stood on the king’s highway between
-Weston and Wenlock.”
-
-The Larden and Lutwyche woods for many years have been famous for foxes.
-The late M. Benson, Esq., told us that a fox had for several seasons made
-his home securely in a tree near his house, he having taken care to keep
-his secret.  The woods, too, on the opposite side of the ridge, rarely
-fail to furnish a fox; and it is difficult to imagine a finer spot than
-Smallman’s Leap, {49a} or Ipikin’s Rock, on the “Hill Top,” presents for
-viewing a run over Hughley and Kenley, or between there and Hope Bowdler.
-Near Lutwyche is a thick entangled wood, called Mog Forest; and in the
-old door of the Church of Easthope, {49b} near, is a large iron ring,
-which is conjectured to have been placed there for outlaws of the forest
-who sought sanctuary or freedom from arrest to take hold of.  Now and
-then, in wandering over the sites of these former forests, we come upon
-traditions of great trees, sometimes upon an aged tree itself, “bald with
-antiquity,” telling of parent forest tracts, like the Lady Oak at
-Cressage, which formerly stood in the public highway, and suffered much
-from gipsies and other vagabonds lighting fires in its hollow trunk, but
-which is now propped, cramped, and cared for, with as much concern as the
-Druids were wont to show to similar trees.  A young tree, too, sprung
-from an acorn from the old one, has grown up within its hollow trunk, and
-now mingles its foliage with that of the parent.
-
-                           [Picture: Lady Oak]
-
-There are a few fine old trees near Willey, supposed to be fragmentary
-forest remains.  One is a patriarchal-looking ash in the public road at
-Barrow; another is an oak near the Dean; it is one of which the present
-noble owner of Willey shows the greatest pride and care.  There are also
-two noble trees at Shipton and Larden; the one at the latter place being
-a fine beech, the branches of which, when tipped with foliage, have a
-circumference of 35 yards.  A magnificent oak, recently cut down in Corve
-Dale, contained 300 cubic feet of timber, and was 18 feet in
-circumference.  This, however, was a sapling compared with that king of
-forest trees which Loudon describes as having been cut down in Willey
-Park.  It spread 114 feet, and had a trunk 9 feet in diameter, exclusive
-of the bark.  It contained 24 cords of yard wood, 11½ cords of four-feet
-wood, 252 park palings, six feet long, 1 load of cooper’s wood, 16½ tons
-of timber in all the boughs; 28 tons of timber in the body, and this
-besides fagots and boughs that had dropped off:—
-
-    “What tales, if there be tongues in trees,
-    Those giant oaks could tell,
-    Of beings born and buried here;
-    Tales of the peasant and the peer,
-    Tales of the bridal and the bier
-    The welcome and farewell.”
-
-The old oak forests and chestnut groves which supplied the sturdy
-framework for the half-timbered houses of our ancestors, the rafters for
-their churches, and the beams for their cathedrals, are gone; and the
-mischief is, not only that we have lost former forests, but that our
-present woods every year are growing less, that much of that shrubby
-foliage which within our own recollection divided the fields, forming
-little copses in which a Morland would have revelled, have had to give
-way to agricultural improvements, and the objects of sport they sheltered
-have disappeared.  The badger lingered to the beginning of the present
-century along the rocks of Benthall and Apley; and the otter, which still
-haunts portions of the Severn and its more secluded tributaries, and
-occasionally affords sport in some parts of the country higher up, was
-far from being rare.  On the left bank of the Severn are the
-“Brock-holes,” or badger-holes, whilst near to it are the “Fox-holes,”
-where tradition alleges foxes a generation or two ago to have been
-numerous enough to have been a nuisance; and the same remark may apply to
-the “Fox-holes” at Benthall.  As the district became more cultivated and
-the country more populated, the range of these animals became more and
-more circumscribed, and the cherished sports of our forefathers came to
-form the staple topics of neighbours’ oft-told tales.
-
-Within our own recollection the badger was to be found at Benthall Edge;
-but he had two enemies—the fox, who sometimes took possession of his den
-and drove him from the place, and the miners of Broseley and Benthall,
-who were usually great dog-fanciers, and who were accustomed to steal
-forth as the moon rose above the horizon, and intercept him as he left
-his long winding excavation among the rocks, in order to make sport for
-them at their annual wakes.
-
-                          [Picture: The Badger]
-
-                         [Picture: Group of deer]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV.
-THE WREKIN FOREST AND THE FORESTERS.
-
-
-The Wrekin Forest—Hermit of Mount St. Gilbert—Poachers upon the King’s
-Preserves—Extent of the Forest—Haye of Wellington—Robert
-Forester—Perquisites—Hunting Matches—Singular Grant to John Forester—Sir
-Walter Scott’s Tony Foster a Member of the Shropshire Forester
-Family—Anthony Foster Lord of the Manor of Little Wenlock—The Foresters
-of Sutton and Bridgnorth—Anthony Foster altogether a different Character
-from what Sir Walter Scott represents him.
-
-    “I am clad in youthful green, I other colours scorn,
-    My silken bauldrick bears my bugle or my horn,
-    Which, setting to my lips, I wind so loud and shrill,
-    As makes the echoes shout from every neighbouring hill;
-    My dog-hook at my belt, to which my thong is tied,
-    My sheaf of arrows by, my wood-knife by my side,
-    My cross-bow in my hand, my gaffle on my rack,
-    To bend it when I please, or if I list to slack;
-    My hound then in my thong, I, by the woodman’s art,
-    Forecast where I may lodge the goodly hie-palm’d hart,
-    To view the grazing herds, so sundry times I use,
-    Where by the loftiest head I knew my deer to choose;
-    And to unherd him, then I gallop o’er the ground,
-    Upon my well-breathed nag, to cheer my learning hound.
-    Some time I pitch my toils the deer alive to take,
-    Some time I like the cry the deep-mouthed kennel make;
-    Then underneath my horse I stalk my game to strike,
-    And with a single dog to hunt or hurt him as I like.”
-
-                                                                  DRAYTON.
-
-IT is important, to the completion of our sketch of the earlier features
-of the country, that we cross the Severn and say a word or two respecting
-the forest of the Wrekin, of which the early ancestors of the present
-Willey family had charge.  This famous hill must then have formed a
-feature quite as conspicuous in the landscape as it does at present.  As
-it stood out above the wide-spreading forest that surrounded it, it must
-have looked like a barren island amid a waving sea of green.  From its
-position and outline too, it appears to have been selected during the
-struggles which took place along the borders as a military fortress,
-judging from the entrenchments near its summit, and the tumuli both here
-and in the valley at its foot, where numbers of broken weapons have been
-found.  At a later period it is spoken of as Mount St. Gilbert, in
-honour, it is said, of a recluse to whom the Gilbertine monks ascribe
-their origin.  Whether the saint fixed his abode in the cleft called the
-Needle’s Eye (which tradition alleges to have been made at the
-Crucifixion), or on some other part of the hill, there is no evidence to
-show; but that there was a hermitage there at one time, and that whilst
-the woods around were stocked with game, is clear.  It is charitable to
-suppose, however, that the good man who pitched his tent so high above
-his fellows abstained from such tempting luxuries, that on his wooden
-trencher no king’s venison smoked, and that fare more becoming gown and
-girdle contented him; so at least it must have been reported to Henry
-III., who, to give the hermit, Nicholas de Denton by name, “greater
-leisure for holy exercises, and to support him during his life, so long
-as he should be a hermit on the aforesaid mountain,” granted six quarters
-of corn, to be paid by the Sheriff of Shropshire, out of the issues of
-Pendleston Mill, near Bridgnorth.
-
-                         [Picture: Needle’s Eye]
-
-That there were, however, poachers upon the king’s preserves appears from
-a criminal prosecution recorded on the Forest Roll of 1209, to the effect
-that four of the county sergeants found venison in the house of Hugh le
-Scot, who took asylum in a church, and, refusing to quit, “there lived a
-month,” but afterwards “escaped in woman’s clothes.”
-
-Certain sales of forest land made by Henry II. near the Wrekin, and
-entered on the Forest Roll of 1180, together with the assessments and
-perambulations of later periods, afford some idea of the extent of this
-forest, which, from the Severn and the limits of Shrewsbury, swept round
-by Tibberton and Chetwynd to the east, and included Lilleshall, St.
-George’s, Dawley, Shifnal, Kemberton, and Madeley on the south.  From the
-“Survey of Shropshire Forests” in 1235, it appears that the following
-woods were subject to its jurisdiction: Leegomery, Wrockwardine Wood,
-Eyton-on-the-Weald Moors, Lilleshall, Sheriffhales, the Lizard,
-Stirchley, and Great Dawley.  A later perambulation fixed the bounds of
-the royal preserve, or Haye of Wellington, in which two burnings of lime
-for the use of the crown are recorded, as well as the fact that three
-hundred oak-trees were consumed in the operation.
-
-Hugh Forester, and Robert the Forester, are spoken of as tenants of the
-crown in connection with this Haye; and it is an interesting coincidence
-that the land originally granted by one of the Norman earls, or by King
-Henry I., for the custody of this Haye, which included what is now called
-Hay Gate, is still in possession of the present noble owner of Willey.
-It seems singular, however, that in the “Arundel Rolls” of 1255, it
-should be described as a _pourpresture_, for which eighteen pence per
-acre was paid to the king, as being held by the said Robert Forester
-towards the custody of the Wellington Haia.
-
-                        [Picture: Deer and young]
-
-Among the perquisites which the said Robert Forester was allowed, as
-Keeper of the Haye, all dead wood and windfalls are mentioned, unless
-more than five oak-trees were blown down at a time, in which case they
-went to the king.  The Haye is spoken of here as an “imparkment,” which
-agrees with the descriptions of Chaucer and other old writers, who speak
-of a Haia as a place paled in, or enclosed, into which deer or other game
-were driven, as they now drive deer in North America, or elephants in
-India, and of grants of land made to those whose especial duty it was to
-drive the deer with their troop of followers from all parts of a wide
-circle into such enclosure for slaughter.  The following description of
-deer-hunting in the seventeenth century by Taylor, the Water Poet, as he
-is called, will enable us to understand the plan pursued by the Norman
-sportsmen:—
-
-    “Five or six hundred men do rise early in the morning, and they do
-    disperse themselves divers ways; and seven, eight, or ten miles’
-    compass, they do bring or chase in the deer in many herds (two,
-    three, or four hundred in a herd) to such a place as the noblemen
-    shall appoint them; then, when the day is come, the lords and
-    gentlemen of their companies do ride or go to the said places,
-    sometimes wandering up to the middle through bourns, and rivers; and
-    then, they being come to the place, do lie down on the ground till
-    those foresaid scouts, which are called the Tinkheldt, do bring down
-    the deer.  Then, after we had stayed three hours or there abouts, we
-    might perceive the deer appear on the hills round about us (their
-    heads making a show like a wood), which being followed close by the
-    Tinkheldt, are chased down into the valley where we lay; then all the
-    valley on each side being waylaid with a hundred couple of strong
-    Irish greyhounds, they are let loose as occasion serves upon the herd
-    of deer, that with dogs, guns, arrows, dirks, and daggers, in the
-    space of two hours fourscore fat deer were slain.”
-
-Hunting matches were sometimes made in these forests, and one, embittered
-by some family feud respecting a fishery, terminated in the death of a
-bold and ancient knight, an event recorded upon a stone covering his
-remains in the quaint and truly ancient church at Atcham.
-
-    “The bugle sounds, ’tis Berwick’s lord
-       O’er Wrekin drives the deer;
-    That hunting match—that fatal feud—
-       Drew many a widow’s tear.
-
-    “With deep-mouthed talbe to rouse the game
-       His generous bosom warms,
-    Till furious foemen check the chase
-       And dare the din of arms.
-
-    “Then fell the high-born Malveysin,
-       His limbs besmeared with gore;
-    No more his trusty bow shall twang,
-       His bugle blow no more.
-
-    “Whilst Ridware mourns her last brave son
-       In arms untimely slain,
-    With kindred grief she here records
-       The last of Berwick’s train.”
-
-                         [Picture: Atcham Church]
-
-Robert Forester appears to have had charge not only of the Haye of the
-Wrekin, but also of that of Morfe, for both of which he is represented as
-answering at the Assizes in February, 1262, for the eight years then
-past.  A Robert Forester is also described as one chosen with the
-sheriff, the chief forester, and verderers of Shropshire in 1242, to try
-the question touching the _expeditation_ of dogs on the estates of the
-Lilleshall Abbey, and his seal still remains attached to the juror’s
-return now in possession of the Sutherland family at Trentham.
-
-A Roger de Wellington, whom Mr. Eyton calls Roger le Forester the second,
-is also described as one of six royal foresters-of-the-fee, who, on June
-6th, 1300, met to assist at the great perambulation of Shropshire
-forests.  He was admitted a burgess of Shrewsbury in 1319.  John
-Forester, his son and heir, it is supposed, was baptised at Wellington,
-and attained his majority in 1335; {63} and a John Forester—a lineal
-descendant of his—obtained the singular grant, now at Willey, from Henry
-VIII., privileging him to wear his hat in the royal presence.  After the
-usual formalities the grant proceeds:—“Know all men, our officers,
-ministers, &c.  Forasmuch as we be credibly informed that our trusty and
-well-beloved John Foster, of Wellington, in the county of Salop,
-Gentilman, for certain diseases and infirmities which he has on his hede,
-cannot consequently, without great danger and jeopardy, be discovered of
-the same.  Whereupon we, in consideration thereof, by these presents,
-licenced hym from henceforth to use and were his bonet on his said hede,”
-&c.
-
-It will be observed that in this grant the name occurs in its abridged
-form as Foster, and in the Sheriffs of Shropshire and many old documents
-it is variously spelt as Forester, Forster, and Foster, a circumstance
-which during the progress of the present work suggested an inquiry, the
-result of which—mainly through the researches of a painstaking friend—may
-add weight and interest to the archæological lore previously collected in
-connection with the family.  It appears, for instance, that the Anthony
-Foster of Sir Walter Scott’s “Kenilworth” was descended from the
-Foresters of Wellington; that he held the manor of Little Wenlock and
-other property in Shropshire in 1545; that the Richard Forester or
-Forster who built the interesting half-timbered mansion, {64} still
-standing in the Cartway, Bridgnorth, where Bishop Percy, the author of
-“Percy’s Reliques,” was born, was also a member; and that Anne, the
-daughter of this Richard Forester or Forster, was married in 1575 at
-Sutton Maddock to William Baxter, the antiquary, mentioned by the Rev.
-George Bellet at page 183 of the “Antiquities of Bridgnorth.”  Mr.
-Bellet, speaking of another mansion of the Foresters at Bridgnorth, says,
-“One could wish, as a mere matter of curiosity, that a remarkable
-building, called ‘Forester’s Folly,’ had been amongst those which escaped
-the fire; for it was built by Richard Forester, the private secretary of
-no less famous a person than Bishop Bonner, and bore the above
-appellation most likely on account of the cost of its erection.”  William
-Baxter, who, it will be seen, was a descendant of the Foresters, has an
-interesting passage in his life referring to the circumstance. {66}
-
-                [Picture: Richard Forester’s Old Mansion]
-
-We believe that the Forester pedigree in the MS. collection of Shropshire
-pedigrees, now in possession of Sidney Stedman Smith, Esq., compiled by
-that careful and painstaking genealogist the late Mr. Hardwick, fully
-confirms this, and shows that the Foresters of Watling Street, the
-Foresters or Forsters of Sutton Maddock, and the Forsters or Fosters of
-Evelith Manor were the same family.  The arms, like the names, differ;
-but all have the hunter’s horn stringed; and if any doubt existed as to
-the identity of the families, it is still further removed by a little
-work entitled “An Inquiry concerning the death of Amy Robsart,” by S. J.
-Pettigrew, F.R.S., F.S.A.  Mr. Pettigrew says: “Anthony Forster was the
-fourth son of Richard Forster, of Evelith, in Shropshire, by Mary,
-daughter of Sir Thomas Gresley, of an ancient family.  The Anthony
-Forster of Sir Walter Scott’s novel is supposed to have been born about
-1510; and a relative, Thomas, was the prior of an ecclesiastical
-establishment at Wombridge, the warden of Tong, and the vicar of Idsall,
-as appears by his altar-tomb in Shifnal Church.  He is conjectured to
-have attended to the early education of Anthony, whose after-connection
-with Berks is accounted for by the fact that he married somewhere between
-1530 and 1540 a Berkshire lady, Ann, daughter of Reginald Williams,
-eldest son of Sir John Williams.  He purchased Cumnor Place, in Berks, of
-William Owen, son of Dr. G. Owen, physician to Henry VIII.  He was not,
-therefore, as Sir Walter Scott alleges, a tenant of the Earl of
-Leicester, to whom, however, he left Cumnor Place by will at his death in
-1572.”  It is gratifying to find that Mr. Pettigrew, in his “Inquiry,”
-shows how groundless was the charge built up by Sir Walter Scott against
-the Earl of Leicester; and, what is still more to our purpose, that he
-completely clears the character of Anthony Forster, who was supposed to
-have been the agent in the foul deed, of the imputation, and shows him to
-have been quite a different character to that represented by this
-distinguished writer.  This, indeed, may be inferred from the fact that
-Anthony Forster not only enjoyed the confidence of his neighbours, but so
-grew in favour with the people of Abingdon that he acceded in 1570 to the
-representation of that borough, and continued to represent it till he
-died; also, from the inscription on his tomb, which is as follows:—
-
-    “Anthonius Forster, generis generosa propago,
-    Cumneræ Dominus Barcheriensis erat;
-    Armiger, Armigero prognatus patre Ricardo,
-    Qui quondam Iphlethæ Salopiensis erat.
-    Quatuor ex isto fluxerunt stemmate nati,
-    Ex isto Antonius stemmate quartus erat.
-    Mente sagax, animo præcellens, corpore promptus;
-    Eloquii dulcis, ore disertus erat.
-    In factis probitas fuit, in sermonte venustas,
-    In vultu gravitas, religione fides;
-    In patriam pietas, in egenos grata voluntas,
-    Accedunt reliquis annumeranda bonis:
-    Sic quod cuncta rapit, rapuit non omnia Lethum,
-    Sed quæ Mors rapuit, vivida fama dedit.”
-
-Then follow these laudatory verses:—
-
-    “Argute resonas Citharæ prætendere chordas,
-    Novit et Aonia concrepuisse lyra.
-    Gaudebat terræ teneras defigere plantas,
-    Et mira pulchras construere arte domos.
-    Composita varias lingua formare loquelas,
-    Doctus et edocta scribere multa manu.”
-
-Cleared of the slanders which had been so unjustly heaped upon his
-memory, one can welcome Anthony Forster, the Squire of Cumnor, as a
-member of the same distinguished family from which the Willey Squire and
-the present ennobled house of Willey are descended. {69}  But before
-introducing the Squire, it is fitting to say something of Willey itself.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V.
-WILLEY.
-
-
-Willey, close Neighbour to the Royal Chace of Shirlot—Etymology of the
-Name—Domesday—The Willileys—The Lacons—The Welds and the Foresters—Willey
-Old Hall—Cumnor Hall as described by Sir Walter Scott—Everything Old and
-Quaint—How Willey came into possession of the Foresters.
-
-    “’Bove the foliage of the wood
-       An antique mansion might you then espy,
-    Such as in the days of our forefathers stood,
-       Carved with device of quaintest imagery.”
-
-                        [Picture: Willey Old Hall]
-
-TO commence with its earlier phase, it was clear that Willey would be
-close neighbour to the Royal Chace of Shirlot, and that it must have been
-about the centre of the wooded country previously described.  The name is
-said to be of Saxon origin; and in wattle and dab and wicker-work times,
-when an osier-bed was probably equal in value to a vineyard, the place
-might have been as the word seems to suggest, one where willows grew,
-seeing that various osiers, esteemed by basket makers, coopers, and
-turners, still flourish along the stream winding past it to the Severn.
-The name is therefore redolent of the olden time, and is one of those old
-word-pictures which so often occur to indicate the earlier features of
-the country.  Under its agricultural Saxon holders, however, Willey so
-grew in value and importance that when the Conquest was complete, and
-King William’s generals were settling down to enjoy the good things the
-Saxons had provided, and as Byron has it—
-
-                                                                “Manors
-    Were their reward for following Billy’s banners,”
-
-Willey fell to the lot of a Norman, named Turold, who, as he held twelve
-other manors, considerately permitted the Saxon owner to continue in
-possession under him.  Domesday says: “The same Turold holds Willey, and
-Hunnit (holds it) of him.”  “Here is half a hide geldable.  Here is
-arable land sufficient for ii ox teams.  Here those ox teams are,
-together with ii villains, and ii boors.  Its value is v shillings.”  At
-the death of Hunnit the manor passed to a family which took its name from
-the place; and considerable additions resulted from the marriage of one,
-Warner de Williley, with the heiress of Roger Fitz Odo, of Kenley.
-Warner de Williley appears to have been a person of some consequence,
-from the fact that he was appointed to make inquiry concerning certain
-encroachments upon the royal forests of Shropshire; but an act of
-oppression and treachery, in which his wife had taken a part, against one
-of his own vassals, whose land he coveted, caused him to be committed to
-prison.  Several successive owners of Willey were overseers of Shirlot
-Forest; and Nicholas, son and heir of Warner, was sued for inattention to
-his duties; an under tenant also, profiting probably by the laxity of his
-lord, at a later period was charged and found guilty of taking a stag
-from the king’s preserves, on Sunday, June 6th, 1253.  Andrew de Williley
-joined Mountford against King Edward, and fell August 4th, 1265, in the
-battle of Evesham; in consequence of which act of disloyalty the property
-was forfeited to the crown, and the priors of Wenlock, who already had
-the seigniory usual to feudal lords, availing themselves of the
-opportunity, managed so to increase their power that a subsequent tenant,
-as shown by the Register at Willey, came to Wenlock (1388), and “before
-many witnesses did homage and fealty,” and acknowledged himself to hold
-the place of the lord prior by carrying his frock to parliament.  They
-succeeded too, after several suits, in establishing their rights to the
-advowson of the Church, founded and endowed by the lords of the place.
-
-By the middle of the 16th century Willey had passed to the hands of the
-old Catholic family of the Lacons, one of whom, Sir Roland, held it in
-1561, together with Kinlet; and from them it passed to Sir John Weld, who
-is mentioned as of Willey in 1666.  He married the daughter of Sir George
-Whitmore, and his son, George Weld, sat for the county with William
-Forester, who married the daughter of the Earl of Salisbury, and voted
-with him in favour of the succession of the House of Hanover.
-
-Who among the former feudal owners of Willey built the old hall, is a
-question which neither history nor tradition serves to solve.  Portions
-of the basement of the old buildings seem to indicate former structures
-still more ancient, like spurs of some primitive rock cropping up into a
-subsequent formation.  Contrasted with the handsome modern freestone
-mansion occupied by the Right Hon. Lord Forester close by, the remains
-shown in our engraving look like a stranded wreck, past which centuries
-of English life have gone sweeping by.  Some of the walls are three feet
-in thickness, and the buttressed chimneys, and small-paned windows—“set
-deep in the grey old tower”—make it a fair type of country mansions and a
-realisation of ideas such as the mind associates with the homes of the
-early owners of Willey.
-
-Although occupying a slight eminence, it really nestles in the hollow,
-and in its buff-coloured livery it stands pleasingly relieved by the high
-ground of Shirlot and its woods beyond.  In looking upon its quaint
-gables, shafts, and chimneys, one feels that when it was complete it must
-have had something of the poetry of ancient art about it.  Its
-irregularities of outline must have fitted in, as it were, with the
-undulating landscape, with which its walls are now tinted into harmony,
-by brown and yellow lichens.  There was nothing assuming or pretentious
-about it; it was content to stand close neighbour to the public old coach
-road, which came winding by from Bridgnorth to Wenlock, and passed
-beneath the arch which now connects the high-walled gardens with the
-shaded walk leading to its modern neighbour, the present mansion of the
-Foresters.
-
-Sir Walter Scott, in his description of Cumnor Place, speaks of woods
-closely adjacent, full of large trees, and in particular of ancient and
-mighty oaks, which stretched their giant arms over the high wall
-surrounding the demesne, thus giving it a secluded and monastic
-appearance.  He describes its formal walks and avenues as in part choked
-up with grass, and interrupted by billets, and piles of brushwood, and he
-tells us of the old-fashioned gateway in the outer wall, and of the door
-formed of two huge oaken leaves, thickly studded with nails—like the gate
-of an old town.  This picture of the approaches to the old mansion where
-Anthony Foster lived was no doubt a more faithful representation than the
-one he gave of the character of the man himself.  At any rate, it is one
-which would in many respects apply to old Willey Hall and its
-surroundings at the time to which the great novelist refers.  Everything
-was old and old-fashioned, even as its owners prided themselves it should
-be, and as grey as time and an uninterrupted growth of lichens in a
-congenial atmosphere could make it.  Hollies, yews, and junipers were to
-be seen in the grounds, and outside were oaks and other aged trees,
-scathed by lightning’s bolt and winter’s blast.  Here and there stood a
-few monarchs of the old forest in groups, each group a brotherhood
-sublime, carrying the thoughts back to the days when “from glade to
-glade, through wild copse and tangled dell, the wild deer bounded.”
-Trees, buildings, loose stones that had fallen, and still lay where they
-fell, were mossed with a hoar antiquity.  Everything in fact seemed to
-say that the place had a history of its own, and that it could tell a
-tale of the olden time.
-
-From the lawn and grounds adjoining a path led to the flower-gardens,
-intersected by gravel walks and grassy terraces, where a sun-dial stood,
-and where fountains, fed by copious supplies from unfailing springs on
-the high grounds of Shirlot, threw silvery showers above the shadows of
-the trees into the sunlight.
-
-Willey, augmented by tracts of Shirlot, which was finally disafforested
-and apportioned two centuries since, came into possession of the
-Foresters by the marriage of Brook Forester, of Dothill Park, with
-Elizabeth, only surviving child and heiress of George Weld, of Willey;
-and George Forester, “the Squire of Willey,” was the fruit of that
-marriage.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI.
-THE WILLEY SQUIRE.
-
-
-Squire Forester—His Instincts and Tendencies—Atmosphere of the Times
-favourable for their Development—Thackeray’s Opinion—Style of
-Hunting—Dawn of the Golden Age of Fox-hunting, &c.
-
-IT will be seen that around Willey and Willey Hall, associations crowd
-which serve to make the place a household word and Squire Forester a man
-of mark with modern sportsmen and future Nimrods, at any rate if we
-consent to regard the Squire’s characteristics as outcrops of the
-instincts of an ancient stock.  Descended from an ancestry so associated
-with forest sports and pursuits, he was like a moving plant which
-receives its nourishment from the air, and he lived chiefly through his
-senses.  He was waylaid, as it were, on life’s path by hereditary
-tendencies, and his career was chequered by indulgences which, read in
-the light of the present day, look different from what they then did,
-when at court and in the country there were many to keep him in
-countenance.  At any rate, Squire Forester lived in what may be called
-the dawn of the golden age of fox-hunting.  We say dawn, because although
-Lord Arundel kept a pack of hounds some time between 1690 and 1700, and
-Sir John Tyrwhitt and Charles Pelham, Esq., did so in 1713, yet as Lord
-Wilton, in his “Sports and Pursuits of the English” states, the first
-real pack of foxhounds was established in the West of England about 1730.
-It was a period when, for various reasons, a reaction in favour of the
-manly sports of England’s earlier days had set in, one being the
-discovery that those distinguished for such sports were they who assisted
-most in winning on the battle-fields of the Continent the victories which
-made the British arms so renowned.  Then, as now, it was found that they
-led to the development of the physical frame—sometimes to the removal of
-absolute maladies, and supplied the raw material of manliness out of
-which heroes are made—a view which the Duke of Wellington in some measure
-confirmed by the remark that the best officers he had under him during
-the Peninsular War were those whom he discovered to be bold riders to
-hounds.  Lord Wilton, in his book just quoted, goes still further, by
-contending that “the greatness and glory of Great Britain are in no
-slight degree attributable to her national sports and pastimes.”
-
-That such sports contributed to the jollity and rollicking fun which
-distinguished the time in which Squire Forester lived, there can be
-little doubt.  In his “Four Georges,” Thackeray gives it as his opinion,
-that “the England of our ancestors was a merrier England than the island
-we inhabit,” and that the people, high and low, amused themselves very
-much more.  “One hundred and twenty years ago,” he says, “every town had
-its fair, and every village its wake.  The old poets have sung a hundred
-jolly ditties about great cudgel playings, famous grinnings through
-horse-collars, great Maypole meetings, and morris-dances.  The girls used
-to run races, clad in very light attire; and the kind gentry and good
-parsons thought no shame in looking on.”  He adds, “I have calculated the
-manner in which statesmen and persons of condition passed their time; and
-what with drinking and dining, and supping and cards, wonder how they
-managed to get through their business at all.”  That they did manage to
-work, and to get through a considerable amount of it, is quite clear; and
-probably they did so with all the more ease in consequence of the
-amusement which often came first, as in the case of “Naughty idle Bobby,”
-as Clive was called when a boy; and not less so in that of Pitt, who did
-so much to develop that spirit of patriotism of which we boast.  It was a
-remark of Addison, that “those who have searched most into human nature
-observe that nothing so much shows the nobleness of the soul as that its
-felicity consists in action;” and that “every man has such an active
-principle in him that he will find out something to employ himself upon
-in whatever place or state he is posted.”
-
-                        [Picture: The Old Squire]
-
-Those familiar with the _Spectator_ will remember that he represents
-himself to have become so enamoured of the chase, that in his letters
-from the country he says: “I intend to hunt twice a week during my stay
-with Sir Roger, and shall prescribe the moderate use of this exercise to
-all my country friends as the best kind of physic for mending a bad
-constitution and preserving a good one.”  He concludes with the following
-quotation from Dryden:—
-
-    “The first physicians by debauch were made;
-    Excess began, and sloth sustains the trade:
-    By chase our long-liv’d fathers earned their food;
-    Toil strung their arms and purified their blood.”
-
-But a country squire of Mr. Forester’s day even more pithily and quaintly
-expresses himself as to the advantages to be derived from out-door
-sports:—“Those useful hours that our fathers employed on horseback in the
-fields,” he says, “are lost to their posterity between a stinking pair of
-sheets.  Balls and operas, assemblies and masquerades, so exhaust the
-spirits of the puny creatures over-night, that yawning and chocolate are
-the main labours and entertainments of the morning.  The important
-affairs of barber, milliner, perfumer, and looking-glass, are their
-employ till the call to dinner, and the bottle or gaming table demand the
-tedious hours that intervene before the return of the evening
-assignations.  What wonder, then, if such busy, trifling, effeminate
-mortals are heard to swear they have no notion of venturing their bodies
-out-of-doors in the cold air in the morning?  I have laughed heartily to
-see such delicate smock-faced animals judiciously interrupting their
-pinches of snuff with dull jokes upon fox-hunters; and foppishly
-declaiming against an art they know no more of than they do of Greek.  It
-cannot be expected they should speak well of a toil they dare not
-undertake; or that the fine things should be fit to work without doors,
-which are of the taylor’s creation.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII.
-THE WILLEY KENNELS.
-
-
-The Willey Kennels—Colonel Apperley on Hunting a Hundred Years
-ago—Character of the Hounds—Portraits of Favourites—Original
-Letters—Style.
-
-    “Tantivy! the huntsman he starts for the chase,
-       In good humour as fresh as the morn,
-    While health and hilarity beam from his face,
-       At the sound of the mellow-toned horn.”
-
-THE style of hunting in vogue in Squire Forester’s day was, in the
-opinion of authorities on the subject, even more favourable to the
-development of bodily strength and endurance than now.  The late Mr.
-Thursfield, of Barrow, was wont to say that it was no unusual thing to
-see Moody taking the hounds to cover before daylight in a morning.  The
-Squire himself, like most other sportsmen of the period, was an early
-man.
-
-                  [Picture: Childers, Pilot, and Pigmy]
-
-Col. Apperley says: “With our forefathers, when the roost-cock sounded
-his clarion, they sounded their horn, throwing off the pack so soon as
-they could distinguish a stile from a gate, or, in other words, so soon
-as they could see to ride to the hounds.  Then it was that the hare was
-hunted to her form by the trail, and the fox to his kennel by the drag.
-Slow as this system would be deemed, it was a grand treat to the real
-sportsman.  What, in the language of the chase, is called the
-‘tender-nosed hound,’ had an opportunity of displaying itself to the
-inexpressible delight of his master; and to the field—that is, to the
-sportsmen who joined in the diversion—the pleasures of the day were
-enhanced by the moments of anticipation produced by the drag.  As the
-scent grew warmer, the certainty of finding was confirmed; the music of
-the pack increased; and the game being up, away went the hounds in a
-crash.  Both trail and drag are at present but little thought of.  Hounds
-merely draw over ground most likely to hold the game they are in quest
-of, and thus, in a great measure, rely upon chance for coming across it;
-for if a challenge be heard, it can only be inferred that a fox has been
-on foot in the night—the scent being seldom sufficient to carry the
-hounds up to his kennel.  Advantages, however, as far as sport is
-concerned, attend the present hour of meeting in the field, independently
-of the misery of riding many miles in the dark, which sportsmen in the
-early part of the last century were obliged to do.  The game, when it is
-now aroused, is in a better state to encounter the great speed of modern
-hounds; having had time to digest the food it has partaken of in the
-night previous to its being stirred.  But it is only since the great
-increase of hares and foxes that the aid of the trail and drag could be
-dispensed with without the frequent recurrence of blank days, which now
-seldom happen.  Compared with the luxurious ease with which the modern
-sportsman is conveyed to the field—either lolling in his chaise and four,
-or galloping along at the rate of twenty miles an hour on a
-hundred-guinea hack—the situation of his predecessor was all but
-distressing.  In proportion to the distance he had to ride by starlight
-were his hours of rest broken in upon, and exclusive of the time that
-operation might consume another serious one was to be provided for—this
-was the filling his hair with powder and pomatum until it could hold no
-more, and forming it into a well-formed knot, or club, as it was called,
-by his valet, which cost commonly a good hour’s work.  The protecting mud
-boots, the cantering hack, the second horse in the field, were luxuries
-unknown to him.  His well-soiled buckskins, and brown-topped boots, would
-have cut an indifferent figure in the presence of a modern connoisseur by
-a Leicestershire cover side.”  “Notwithstanding all this, however,” he
-adds, “we are inclined strongly to suspect that, out of a given number of
-gentlemen taking the field with hounds, the proportion of really
-scientific sportsmen may have been in favour of the olden times.”
-
-The Willey Kennels were within easy reach of the Hall, between Willey and
-Shirlot, where the pleasant stream before alluded to goes murmuring on
-its way through the Smithies to the Severn.  But in order to save his
-dogs unnecessary exertion there were others on the opposite, or Wrekin,
-side of the river—
-
-    “Hounds stout and healthy,
-    Earths well stopped, and foxes plenty,”
-
-being mottoes of the period.  The dogs were of the “heavy painstaking
-breed” that “stooped to their work.”  How, it was said,
-
-    “Can the fox-hound ever tell,
-    Unless by pains he takes to smell,
-    Where Reynard’s gone?”
-
-Experience taught the Squire the importance of a principle now more
-generally acted upon, that of selecting the qualities required in the
-hounds he bred from; and by this means he obtained developments of
-swiftness and scent that made his pack one good horses only of that day
-could keep up with.  He prided himself much upon the blood of his best
-hounds, knew every one he had by name, and was familiar with its
-pedigree.  Portraits of four of his favourites were painted on canvas and
-hung in the hall, with lines beneath expressive of their qualities, and
-the dates at which the paintings were made.  The Right Hon. Lord Forester
-takes great care of these, as showing in what way the best dogs of that
-day differed from those of the present; and through his kindness we have
-been enabled to get drawings made, of which his lordship was pleased to
-approve, and we fancy there is no better judge living.
-
-Three of these are shown in our engraving at the head of this chapter.
-
-Pigmy, the bitch in the group nearest to the fox, is said to have been
-the smallest hound then known.  Underneath the portrait are the following
-lines:—
-
-    “Behold in miniature the foxhound keen,
-    Thro’ rough and smooth a better ne’er was seen;
-    As champion here the beauteous Pigmy stands,
-    She challenges the globe, both home and foreign lands.”
-
-                                    1773.
-
-The one the farthest from the fox, is a white dog, Pilot; and underneath
-the painting is the following:—
-
-    “Pilot rewards his master Rowley’s care,
-    And swift as lightning skims the transient air;
-    Famed for the chase, from cover always first,
-    His tongue and sterne proclaimed an arrant burst.”
-
-                                    1774.
-
-The dog in front, with his head thrown up, is Childers; and underneath
-the picture are these lines:—
-
-    “Sportsmen look up, old Childers’ picture view,
-    His virtues many were, his failings few;
-    Reynard with dread oft heard his awful name,
-    And grateful Musters thus rewards his fame.”
-
-                                    1772.
-
-The following letters from Mr. Forester to Walter Stubbs, Esq., of
-Beckbury, afterwards of Stratford-on-Avon, where he became distinguished
-in connection with the Warwickshire Hunt, show how particular he was in
-his selection.  It would seem that whilst admiring the Duke of Grafton’s
-hounds, which under the celebrated Tom Rose (“Honest old Tom,” as he was
-called), who used to say, “a man must breed his pack to suit his
-country,” gained some celebrity, he not unnaturally preferred his own.
-We give exact copies of two of his letters, they are so characteristic of
-the man.  In all the letters we have seen he began with a considerable
-margin at the side of the paper, but always filled up the space with a
-postscript:—
-
-                                             “WILLEY HALL, March 15, 1795.
-
-    “DEAR SIR,
-
-    “I beg leave to return you my hearty thanks for your civility in
-    sending your servant to Apley with three couple of my hounds that run
-    into your’s ye other day.  Could I have returned compliment in
-    sending ye three couple, that were missing from you, I should have
-    been happy in ye discharge of that duty, so incumbent on every good
-    sportsman.  I hear you are fond of the Duke of Grafton’s hounds.
-    It’s a sort I have ever admired, and have received favours from his
-    Grace in that line, having been acquainted together from our infancy
-    up; and on course, most likely to procure no very bad sort from his
-    Grace’s own hands.  I have sent you (as a present) a little bitch of
-    ye Grafton kind, which I call Whymsy, lately taken up from quarters,
-    and coming towards a year old.  She’s rather under size for me, or
-    otherwise I see not her fault.  She’s, in my opinion, _a true
-    Non-Pareil_.  Your acceptance of her from me _now_, and any other
-    hound of ye Grafton sort, that may come in near her size, will afford
-    me singular satisfaction; as I make it a rule that no man who shows
-    me civility shall find me wanting in making a proper return.
-
-                               “I am, dear sir,
-
-                                    “Your obliged and very humble servant,
-
-                                                             “G. FORESTER.
-
-    “P.S.—Next year Whymsy will be completely fit for entrance, but
-    rather too young for _this_.  The Duke’s hounds rather run small
-    enough for this country.  I see no other defect in them.  They are
-    invincibly stout, and perfectly just in every point that constitutes
-    your real true fox hound.”
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                                  “WILLEY, April 19, 1795.
-
-    “DEAR SIR,
-
-    “Per bearer I send you yr couple of bitches I promised you.  The
-    largest is near a year old, the lesser about half a one, and if she
-    be permitted to walk about your house this summer, will make you a
-    clever bitch; further, she’s of Grace Grafton’s kind, as her father
-    was got by his Grace’s Voucher, and bred by Mr. Pelham.  Blood
-    undeniable, _at a certainty_.  As to yr dam of her, she’s of my old
-    sort, and a bitch of blood and merit.  The other bitch I bred also,
-    _to ye test_ of my judgment, from a dog of Pelham’s.  I call her
-    handsome in my eye, and not far off _being a beauty_.  Her dam was
-    got by Noel’s famous Maltster, out of a daughter of Mr. Corbet, of
-    Sundorn, named Trojan.  I wish you luck and success with your hounds,
-    and when I can serve you _to effect_, at any time, you may rely on my
-    faithful remembrance of you.
-
-    “I remain, dear sir,
-
-                          “Your very humble servant,
-
-                                                             “G. FORESTER.
-
-    “P.S.—The largest bitch is named Musick, the lesser is named Gaudy.
-
-    “P.S.—We have had good sport lately; and _one particular_ run we had,
-    upon Monday last, of two hours and one quarter (from scent to view),
-    without one single interruption of any kind whatever.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII.
-THE WILLEY LONG RUNS.
-
-
-The Willey Long Runs—Dibdin’s Fifty Miles no Figure of Speech—From the
-Clee Hills to the Wrekin—The Squire’s Breakfast—Phœbe Higgs—Doggrel
-Ditties—Old Tinker—Moody’s Horse falls Dead—Run by Moonlight.
-
-    “Ye that remember well old Savory’s call,
-    With pleasure view’d her, as she pleased you all;
-    In distant countries still her fame resounds,
-    The huntsmen’s glory and the pride of hounds.”
-
-                                    1773.
-
-                            [Picture: Savory]
-
-THE portrait at the head of this chapter is from a carefully drawn copy
-of a painting at Willey of a favourite hound of the Squire’s, just a
-hundred years ago.
-
-Dibdin, in his song of Tom Moody, speaks of “a country well known to him
-fifty miles round;” and this was no mere figure of speech, as the hunting
-ground of the Willey Squire extended over the greater part of the forest
-lands we have described.  There were fewer packs of hounds in Shropshire
-then, and the Squire had a clear field extending from the Clee Hills to
-the Needle’s Eye on the Wrekin, through which, on one remarkable
-occasion, the hounds are reported to have followed their fox.  The Squire
-sometimes went beyond these notable landmarks, the day never appearing to
-be too long for him.
-
-Four o’clock on a hunting morning usually found him preparing the inner
-man with a breakfast of underdone beef, with eggs beaten up in brandy to
-fill the interstices; and thus fortified he was ready for a fifty miles
-run.  He was what Nimrod would have called, “a good rough rider” over the
-stiff Shropshire clays, and he generally managed to keep up with the best
-to the last;
-
-    “Nicking and craning he deemed a crime,
-    And nobody rode harder perhaps in his time.”
-
-He could scarcely “Top a flight of rails,” “Skim ridge and furrow,” or,
-charge a fence, however, with Phœbe Higgs, who sometimes accompanied him.
-
-Phœbe, who was a complete Diana, and would take hazardous leaps,
-beckoning Mr. Forester to follow her extraordinary feats, led the Squire
-to wager heavy sums that in leaping she would beat any woman in England.
-With Phœbe and Moody, and a few choice spirits of the same stamp on a
-scent, there was no telling to what point between the two extremities of
-the Severn it might carry them.  They might turn-up some few miles from
-its source or its estuary, and not be heard of at Willey for a week.  One
-long persevering run into Radnorshire, in which a few plucky riders
-continued the pace for some distance and then left the field to the
-Squire and Moody, with one or two others, who kept the heads of their
-favourites in the direction Reynard was leading, passed into a tradition;
-but the brush appears not to have been fairly won, a gamekeeper having
-sent a shot through the leg of the “varmint” as he saw him taking shelter
-in a churchyard—an event commemorated in some doggrel lines still
-current.
-
-Very romantic tales are told of long runs by a superannuated servant of
-the Foresters, old Simkiss, who had them from his father; but we forbear
-troubling the reader with more than an outline of one of these, that of
-Old Tinker.  Old Tinker was the name of a fox, with more than the usual
-cunning of his species, that had often proved more than a match for the
-hounds; and one morning the Squire, having made up his mind for a run,
-repaired to Tickwood, where this fox was put up.  On hearing the dogs in
-full cry the Squire vowed he would “Follow the devil this time to hell’s
-doors but he would catch him.”  Reynard, it appears, went off in the
-direction of the Clee Hills; but took a turn, and made for Thatcher’s
-Coppice; from there to the Titterstone Hill, and then back to Tickwood,
-where the hounds again ousted him, and over the same ground again.  On
-arriving at the Brown Clee Hills the huntsman’s horse was so blown that
-he took Moody’s, sending Tom with his own to the nearest inn to get
-spiced ale and a feed.  By this time the fox was on his way back, and the
-horse on which Tom was seated no sooner heard the horn sounding than he
-dashed away and joined in the chase.  Ten couples of fresh hounds were
-now set loose at the kennels in Willey Hollow, and these again turned the
-fox in the direction of Aldenham, but all besides Moody were now far
-behind, and his horse fell dead beneath him.  The dogs, too, had had
-enough; they refused to go further, and Old Tinker once more beat his
-pursuers, but only to die in a drain on the Aldenham estate, where he was
-found a week afterwards.
-
-    “A braver choice of dauntless spirits never
-    Dash’d after hound,”
-
-it is said, and to commemorate one of the good things of this kind, a
-long home-spun ditty was wont to be sung in public-houses by tenants on
-the estate, the first few lines of which were as follows:—
-
-    “Salopians every one,
-    Of high and low degree,
-    Who take delight in fox-hunting,
-    Come listen unto me.
-
-    “A story true I’ll tell to you
-    Concerning of a fox,
-    How they hunted him on Tickwood side
-    O’er Benthall Edge and rocks.
-
-    “Says Reynard, ‘I’ll take you o’er to Willey Park
-    Above there, for when we fairly get aground
-    I value neither huntsmen all
-    Nor Squire Forester’s best hound.
-
-    “‘I know your dogs are stout and good,
-    That they’ll run me like the wind!
-    But I’ll tread lightly on the land,
-    And leave no scent behind.’”
-
-Other verses describe the hunt, and Reynard, on being run to earth,
-asking for quarter on condition that
-
-    “He will both promise and fulfil,
-    Neither ducks nor geese to kill,
-    Nor lambs upon the hill;”
-
-and how bold Ranter, with little faith in his promise, “seized him by the
-neck and refused to let him go.”  It is one of many specimens of a like
-kind still current among old people.  An old man, speaking of Mr. Stubbs,
-for whom, he remarked, the day was never too long, and who at its close
-would sometimes urge his brother sportsmen to draw for a fresh fox, with
-the reminder that there was a moon to kill by, said,
-
-    “One of the rummiest things my father, who hunted with the Squire,
-    told me, was a run by moonlight.  I’m not sure, but I think Mr.
-    Dansey, Mr. Childe, and Mr. Stubbs, if not Mr. Meynell, were at the
-    Hall.  They came sometimes, and sometimes the Squire visited them.
-    Howsomeever, there were three or four couples of fresh hounds at the
-    kennels, and it was proposed to have an after-dinner run.  They dined
-    early, and, as nigh as I can tell, it was three o’clock when they
-    left the Hall, after the Beggarlybrook fox.  Mind that was a fox,
-    that was—he was.  He was a dark brown one, and a cunning beggar too,
-    that always got off at the edge of a wood, by running first along a
-    wall and then leaping part of the way down an old coal pit, which had
-    run in at the sides.  Well, they placed three couples of hounds near
-    to this place in readiness, and the hark-in having been given, the
-    gorse soon began to shake, and a hound or two were seen outside, and
-    amongst them old Pilot, who now and then took a turn outside, and
-    turned in, lashing his stern, and giving the right token.  ‘Have at
-    him!’ shouted one; ‘Get ready!’ said another; ‘Hold hard a bit, we
-    shall have him, for a hundred!’ shouted the Squire.  Then comes a
-    tally-ho, said my father, and off they go; every hound out of cover,
-    sterns up, carrying a beautiful head, and horses all in a straight
-    line along the open, with the scent breast high.  Reynard making
-    straight for the tongue of the coppice, finds himself circumvented,
-    and fresh hounds being let loose, he makes for Wenlock Walton as
-    though he was going to give ’em an airing on the hill-top.
-
-    “‘But, headed and foiled, his first point he forsook,
-    And merrily led them a dance o’er the brook.’
-
-    “Some lime burners coming from work turned him, and, leaving Wenlock
-    on the left, he made for Tickwood.  It was now getting dark, and the
-    ground being awkward, one or two were down.  The Squire swore he
-    would have the varmint out of Tickwood; and the hounds working well,
-    and old Trumpeter’s tongue being heard on the lower side, one
-    challenged the other, and they soon got into line in the hollow, the
-    fox leading.  Stragglers got to the scent, and off they went by the
-    burnt houses, where the Squire’s horse rolled over into a sand-pit.
-    The fox made for the Severn, but turned in the direction of Buildwas,
-    and was run into in the moonlight, among the ivied ruins of the
-    Abbey.”
-
-                        [Picture: Buildwas Abbey]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX.
-BACHELOR’S HALL.
-
-
-Its quaint Interior—An Old Friend’s Memory—Crabbe’s Peter at Ilford
-Hall—Singular Time-pieces—A Meet at Hangster’s Gate—Jolly Doings—Dibdin
-at Dinner—Broseley Pipes—Parson Stephens in his Shirt—The Parson’s Song.
-
-WE have already described the exterior of the Hall and its approaches.
-In the interior of the building the same air of antiquity reigned.  Its
-capacious chimney-pieces, and rooms wainscoted with oak to the ceiling,
-are familiar from the descriptions of an old friend, whose memory was
-still fresh and green as regards events and scenes of the time when the
-Hall stood entire, and who when a boy was not an unfrequent visitor.
-Like Crabbe’s Peter among the rooms and galleries of Ilford Hall,
-
-    “His vast delight was mixed with equal awe,
-    There was such magic in the things he saw;
-    Portraits he passed, admiring, but with pain
-    Turned from some objects, nor would look again.”
-
-Against the walls were grim old portraits of the Squire’s predecessors of
-the Weld and Forester lines, with stiff-starched frills, large vests, and
-small round hats of Henry VII.’s time; others of the fashions of earlier
-periods by distinguished painters, together with later productions of the
-pencil by less famous artists, representing dogs, cattle, and favourite
-horses.  In the great hall were horns and antlers, and other trophies of
-the chase, ancient guns which had done good execution in their time, a
-bustard, and rare species of birds of a like kind.  Here and there were
-ancient time-pieces, singular in construction and quaint in contrivance,
-one of which, on striking the hours of noon and midnight, set in motion
-figures with trumpets and various other instruments, which gave forth
-their appropriate sounds.  A great lamp—hoisted to its place by a thick
-rope—lighted up that portion of the hall into which opened the doors of
-the dining and other rooms, and from which a staircase led to the
-gallery.
-
-A meet in the neighbourhood of Willey was usually well attended: first,
-because of the certainty of good sport; secondly, because such sport was
-often preceded, or often followed by receptions at the Hall, so famous
-for its cheer.  Jolly were the doings on these occasions; songs were
-sung, racy tales were told, old October ale flowed freely, and the jovial
-merits and household virtues of Willey were fully up to the mark of the
-good old times.  The Squire usually dined about four o’clock, and his
-guests occasionally came booted and spurred, ready for the hunt the
-following day, and rarely left the festive board ’neath the hospitable
-roof of the Squire until they mounted their coursers in the court-yard.
-
-Dibdin, from materials gathered on the spot, has, in his own happy
-manner, drawn representations of these gatherings.  His portraits of
-horses and dogs, and his description of the social habits of the Squire
-and his friends are faithfully set forth in his song of “Bachelor’s
-Hall:”—
-
-    “To Bachelor’s Hall we good fellows invite
-    To partake of the chase which makes up our delight,
-    We’ve spirits like fire, and of health such a stock,
-    That our pulse strikes the seconds as true as a clock.
-    Did you see us you’d swear that we mount with a grace,
-    That Diana had dubb’d some new gods of the chase.
-          Hark away! hark away! all nature looks gay,
-          And Aurora with smiles ushers in the bright day.
-
-    “Dick Thickset came mounted upon a fine black,
-    A finer fleet gelding ne’er hunter did back;
-    Tom Trig rode a bay full of mettle and bone,
-    And gaily Bob Buckson rode on a roan;
-    But the horse of all horses that rivalled the day
-    Was the Squire’s Neck-or-Nothing, and that was a grey.
-          Hark away! &c.
-
-    “Then for hounds there was Nimble who well would climb rocks,
-    And Cocknose a good one at finding a fox;
-    Little Plunge, like a mole, who would ferret and search,
-    And beetle-brow’d Hawk’s Eye so dead at a lurch:
-    Young Sly-looks that scents the strong breeze from the south,
-    And Musical Echo with his deep mouth.
-          Hark away! &c.
-
-    “Our horses, thus all of the very best blood,
-    ’Tis not likely you’d easily find such a stud;
-    Then for foxhounds, our opinion for thousands we’ll back,
-    That all England throughout can’t produce such a pack.
-    Thus having described you our dogs, horses, and crew,
-    Away we set off, for our fox is in view.
-          Hark away! &c.
-
-    “Sly Reynard’s brought home, while the horn sounds the call,
-    And now you’re all welcome to Bachelor’s Hall;
-    The savoury sirloin gracefully smokes on the board,
-    And Bacchus pours wine from his sacred hoard.
-    Come on, then, do honour to this jovial place,
-    And enjoy the sweet pleasures that have sprung from the chase.
-          Hark away! hark away! while our spirits are gay,
-          Let us drink to the joys of next meeting day.”
-
-On the occasion of Dibdin’s visit there were at the Hall more than the
-usual local notables, and Parson Stephens was amongst them.  As a treat
-intended specially for Dibdin, the second course at dinner consisted of
-Severn fish, such as we no longer have in the river.  There were eels
-cooked in various ways, flounders, perch, trout, carp, grayling, pike,
-and at the head of the table that king of Severn fish, a salmon.
-
-_Dibdin_: “This is a treat, Squire, and I can readily understand now why
-the Severn should be called the ‘Queen of Rivers;’ it certainly deserves
-the distinction for its fish, if for nothing else.”
-
-_Mr. Forester_: “Do you know, Dibdin, that fellow Jessop, the engineer,
-set on by those Gloucester fellows, wants to put thirteen or fourteen
-bars or weirs in the river between here and Gloucester; why, it would
-shut out every fish worth eating.”
-
-“What could be his object?” asked Dibdin.
-
-“Oh, he believes, like Brindley, that rivers were made to feed canals
-with, and his backers—the Gloucester gentlemen, and the Stafford and
-Worcester Canal Company—say, to make the river navigable at all seasons
-up to Coalbrookdale; but my belief is that it is intended to crush what
-bit of trade there yet remains on the river here, and to give them a
-monopoly in the carrying trade, for our bargemen would be taxed, whilst
-their carriers would be free, or nearly so.”
-
-“We beat them, though,” said Mr. Pritchard.
-
-“So we did,” added the Squire, “but we had a hard job: begad, I thought
-our watermen had pretty well primed me when I went up to see Pitt on the
-subject; but I had not been with him five minutes before I found he knew
-far more about the river than I did:
-
-    “‘I am no orator, as Brutus is,
-    But, as you know me all, a plain and honest man.’”
-
-_Several voices_: “Bravo, Squire.”
-
-_To Stephens_: “Will you take a flounder?—‘flat as a flounder,’ they say.
-I know you have a sympathy with flats, if not a liking for them.”
-
-“The Broseley colliers made a flat of him when they dragged his own pond
-for the fish he was so grateful for,” said Hinton.
-
-The laugh went against the parson, who somehow missed his share of a
-venison pasty, which was a favourite of his.  He had been helped to a
-slice from a haunch which stood in the centre of the table, and had had a
-cut out of a saddle of mutton at one end, but he missed his favourite
-dish.
-
-“Is it true,” inquired Dibdin, looking round at roast, and boiled, and
-pasties, “what we hear in London, that there is very considerable
-_scarcity_ and _distress_ in the country?”—(general laughter).  This
-brought up questions of political economy, excess of population,
-stock-jobbing, usury, gentlemen taking their money out of the country and
-aping Frenchified, stick-frog fashions on their return.  The latter was a
-favourite subject with the Squire, who could not see, he said, what
-amusement a gentleman could find out of the country equal to foxhunting,
-and gave him an opportunity of introducing his favourite theory of taxing
-heavily those who did so.  The discussion had lasted over the fifth
-course, when more potent liquors were put upon the table, together with
-Broseley pipes.  The production of the latter was a temptation Stephens
-could not resist of telling the story of the Squire purchasing a box, for
-which he paid a high price, in London, and finding, on showing them to
-one of his tenants, as models, that they were made upon his own estate.
-The laugh went against the Squire, who gave indication, by a merry
-twinkle in his eye, that he would take an opportunity of being quits.
-Discussions ensued upon the virtues and evils of tobacco, and the refusal
-of Parliament to allow a census to be taken; one of the guests expressing
-a belief, founded upon a statement put forth by a Dr. Price, that the
-population of England and Wales was under five millions, or less, in
-fact, than it was in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.  “Which,” added the
-Squire, “is not correct, according to poor-law and other statistics
-produced before Parliament, which show that there are from three to four
-births to one death.”
-
-_Mr. Whitmore_: “I can readily believe that this is true in your parishes
-of Willey and Barrow, Forester, where a certain person’s amours, like
-Jupiter’s, are too numerous to mention.”  (Laughter, in which the Squire
-joined.)
-
-_Mr. Forester_: “A truce to statistics and politics, let us have Larry
-Palmer, our local Incledon, in to sing us some of Dibdin’s songs.”
-(General approbation.)
-
-And Larry, who was blind, and who was purposely kept in ignorance of
-Dibdin being present, then gave in succession several of what Incledon
-called his “sheet-anchors,” including “The Quaker,” “My Trim-built
-Wherry,” “Tom Bowling,” &c., with an effect and force which made the
-author exclaim that he never heard greater justice done to his
-compositions, and led to an exhibition of feeling which made the old hall
-ring again.
-
-Dibdin’s health was next given, with high eulogiums as to the effect of
-his animating effusions on the loyalty, valour, and patriotism which at
-that time blazed so intensely in the bosom of the British tar.
-
-Dibdin, in acknowledging the toast, related incidents he had himself
-several times witnessed at sea; and how deeply indebted he felt to men
-like Incledon and others, adding that the inspiration which moved him was
-strongly in his mind from his earliest remembrance.  It lay, he said, a
-quiet hidden spark which, for a time, found nothing hard enough to vivify
-it; but which, coming in contact with proper materials, expanded.
-
-“Tell Dibdin of Old Tinker,” cried Childe, of Kinlet.
-
-The tale of Old Tinker was given, the last bit of court scandal
-discussed, and some tales told of the King, with whom Mr. Forester was on
-terms of friendship, and the festivities of the evening had extended into
-the small hours of the morning, when, during a brief pause in the general
-mirth, a tremendous crash was heard, and the Squire rushing out to see
-what was the matter, met one of the servants, who said the sound came
-from the larder, whither Mr. Forester repaired.  Looking in, he saw
-Stephens _in his shirt_, and, with presence of mind, he turned the key,
-and went back to his company to consider how he should turn the incident
-to account.
-
-It appears that Stephens had been several hours in bed, when, waking up
-from his first sleep, he fancied he should like a dip into the venison
-pie, and forthwith had gone down into the larder, where, in searching for
-the pie, he knocked down the dish, with one or two more.  The Squire was
-not long in making up his mind how he should turn the matter to account;
-he declared that it was time to retire, but before doing so, he said,
-they must have a country dance, and insisted upon the whole household
-being roused to take part in it.  There was no resisting the wishes of
-the host; the whole of the house assembled, and formed sides for a dance
-in the hall, through which Stephens must necessarily pass in going to his
-room.  Whilst this was taking place Mr. Forester slipped the key into the
-door, and going behind Stephens, unkennelled his fox, making the parson
-run the gauntlet, in his shirt, amid an indescribable scene of merriment
-and confusion!
-
-The very Rev. Dr. Stephens had paid for his nocturnal escapade, one would
-have thought, sufficiently to satisfy the most exacting.  But the Squire
-and his guests, just ripe for fun, insisted that he should dress and come
-down into the dining-room to finish the night.  The further penalty, too,
-was inflicted of making him join in the chorus of the old song, sung with
-boundless approbation by one of the company, beginning—
-
-    “A parson once had a remarkable foible
-    Of loving good liquor far more than his Bible;
-    His neighbours all said he was much less perplext
-    In handling a tankard than in handling a text.
-             Derry down, down, down, derry down.”
-
-The gist of which lies in the parson’s reply to his wife, who, when the
-pigs set his ale running, and he stormed and swore, reminded him of his
-laudation of the patience of Job, whereupon he denies the application,
-with the remark—
-
-                   “Job never had such a cask in his life.”
-
-                        “The hunting in the Cheviot,”
-
-now called “Chevy Chase,” succeeded, and the night closed with Dibdin
-singing his last new song, to music of his own composing, with a jolly,
-rollicking chorus by the whole company.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X.
-THE WILLEY RECTOR, AND OTHER OF THE SQUIRE’S FRIENDS.
-
-
-The Squire’s Friends and the Willey Rector more fully
-drawn—Turner—Wilkinson—Harris—The Rev. Michael Pye Stephens—His
-Relationship to the Squire—In the Commission of the Peace—The Parson and
-the Poacher—A Fox-hunting Christening.
-
-BESIDES professional sportsmen who were wont to make the Willey
-roof-trees echo with their shouts, the Squire usually assembled round his
-table, on Sundays, the leading men of the neighbourhood, each of some
-special note or importance in his own district, who formed at Willey a
-sort of local parliament.  Among these were brother magistrates, tenants,
-and members of the clerical, legal, and medical professions.  Thomas
-Turner, a county magistrate, and the chairman of a court of equity, to
-establish which the Squire assisted him in obtaining an Act of
-Parliament, to whom was dedicated a sermon delivered before the justices
-of the peace by the Rev. L. Booker, LL.D., was one of these.  Mr. Turner
-carried on the now famous Caughley works, where he succeeded in
-producing, by means of English and French workmen, china of superior
-merit, which, like the old Wedgwood productions, is now highly prized by
-connoisseurs.  He was the first producer of the “willow pattern,” still
-so much in demand, and his general knowledge gave him great influence.
-The Squire paid occasional visits to his elegant chateau at Caughley, and
-gave him one of the two portraits of himself which he had painted, a
-picture now in possession of the widow of Mr. Turner’s son, George, of
-Scarborough, in which the Squire is represented—as in our engraving—in
-his scarlet hunting coat, with a fox’s brush in his hand—a facsimile of
-the one from which our woodcut is taken.  Another, but only an occasional
-visitor at the Hall, was John Wilkinson, “the Father of the Iron Trade,”
-as he is now called, who then lived at Broseley, and who was one of the
-most remarkable men of the past century.  He was for some years a tenant
-of the Squire, and carried on the Willey furnaces.  He was also a friend
-of Boulton and Watt, and was the first who succeeded in boring their
-cylinders even all through; he was the first, too, who taught the French
-the art of boring cannon from the solid.  He built and launched at Willey
-Wharf the first iron barge—the precursor of all iron vessels on the
-Thames and Tyne, and of the Great Eastern, as well as of our modern
-iron-clads.  Mr. Harries of Benthall, Mr. Hinton of Wenlock, Mr. Bryan of
-The Tuckies, and Mr. John Cox Morris, farmer of Willey, who took the
-first silver cup given by the Agricultural Society of Shropshire for the
-best cultivated farm, and who had still further distinguished himself in
-the estimation of sportsmen by a remarkable feat of horsemanship for a
-large amount, were among those who visited the Squire.
-
-But a more frequent guest at the Hall and at the covert-side was the
-Willey Rector, the Rev. Michael Pye Stephens, whose family was related to
-that of the Welds, through the Slaneys.  The Rector was therefore, as
-already shown, on familiar terms with the Squire, and the more so as he
-was able to tell a good tale and sing a good song.  The rural clergy a
-century ago were great acquisitions at the tables of country squires, and
-were not unfrequently among the most enthusiastic lovers of the chase.
-It was by no means an uncommon thing, forty years ago, to see the horse
-of the late Rector of Stockton, brother to the Squire of Apley, waiting
-for him at the church door at Bonnigale, which living he also held, that
-he might start immediately service was over for Melton Mowbray.  His
-clerk, too, old Littlehales, who to more secular professions added that
-of village tailor, has often told how his master, being sorely in need of
-a pair of hunting breeches for Melton, undertook to close the church one
-Sunday in order to give him the opportunity of making them, with the
-remark, “Oh, d—n the church, you stop at home and make the breeches.”
-But the Rector of Willey was by no means so enthusiastic as a sportsman.
-He was not the
-
-    “Clerical fop, half jockey and half clerk,
-    The tandem-driving Tommy of a town,
-    Disclaiming book, omniscient of a horse,
-    Impatient till September comes again,
-    Eloquent only of the pretty girl
-    With whom he danced last night!”
-
-Neither did he resemble those more bilious members of the profession of
-modern times—
-
-    “Who spit their puny spite on harmless recreation.”
-
-On the contrary, he held what it may be difficult to gainsay, that
-amusements calculated to strengthen the frame and to improve the health,
-if fitting for a gentleman, were not unfitting for a clergyman.  His
-presence, at any rate, was welcomed by neighbouring squires in the field,
-as “Hark in!  Hark in!  Hark!  Yoi over boys!” sounded merrily on the
-morning air; and as he sat mounted on the Squire’s thorough-bred it would
-have been difficult to have detected anything of the divine; the
-clerico-waistcoat and black single-breasted outer garment having given
-place to more fitting garb.  Fond of field sports himself, he willingly
-associated with his neighbours and joined in their pastimes and
-amusements.  A man who was a frequent guest at the Hall, who received
-letters from the Squire when in London, and who would take a long pipe
-now and then between his lips, and moisten his clay from a pewter tankard
-round a clean-scoured table in a road-side inn, was naturally of
-considerable importance in his own immediate district.
-
-The Rector of Willey had, we believe, been brought up to the legal
-profession, he had also a smattering knowledge of medicine, which enabled
-him to render at times service to his parishioners, who called him Dr.
-Stephens.  He was in the commission of the peace, too, for the borough;
-and so completely did the characters combine—so perfectly did law and
-divinity dove-tail into each other—that he might have been taken as a
-personification of either.
-
-    “Mild were his doctrines, and not one discourse
-    But gained in softness what it lost in force.”
-
-Without stinginess he partook of the good things heaven to man supplies;
-he was “full fed;” his face shone with good-humour, and he was as fond of
-a joke as of the Squire’s old port.  As a justice of the peace he was no
-regarder of persons, providing they equally brought grist to his mill; he
-had no objection to litigants smoothing the way to a decision by
-presents, such as a piece of pork, a pork pie, or a dish of fish; once or
-twice, however, he found the fish to have been caught the previous night
-out of his own pond.  Next to a weakness for fish was one for
-knee-breeches and top-boots, which in the course of much riding required
-frequent renewal; and, ’tis said, that seated in his judicial chair, he
-has had the satisfaction of seeing a pair of new chalked tops projecting
-alike from plaintiff’s and defendant’s pockets.  In which case, with
-spectacles raised and head thrown back, as though to look above the petty
-details of the plaint, after sundry hums and haws, with inquiries after
-the crops between, and each one telling some news about his neighbour, he
-would find the evidence on both sides equally balanced and suggest a
-compromise!  A good tale is told of the justice wanting a hare for a
-friend, and employing a notorious poacher to procure one.  The man
-brought it in a bag.  “You’ve brought a hare, then?”  “I have, Mr.
-Stephens, and a fine one too,” replied the other, as he turned it out,
-puss flying round the room, and over the table amongst the papers like a
-mad thing.  “Kill her! kill her!” shouted Stephens.  “No, by G—,” replied
-the poacher, who knew that by doing so he would bring himself within the
-law, “you kill her; I’ve had enough trouble to catch her.”  After two or
-three runs the justice succeeded in hitting her on the head with a ruler,
-and thus brought himself within the power of the poacher.
-
-The parson was sometimes out of temper, and then he swore, but this was
-not often; still his friends were wont to joke him on the following
-domestic little incident:—His services were suddenly in demand on one
-occasion when, a full clerical costume being required, he found his bands
-not ready, and he set to work to iron them himself.  He was going on
-swimmingly as he thought, and had only left the iron to go to the bottom
-of the stairs, with a “D—n you, madam,” to his wife, who had not yet come
-down; “d—n you, I can do without you,” when, on returning, he found his
-bands scorched and discoloured.
-
-A foxhunter’s christening in which the Willey Rector played a part on one
-occasion is too good to lose.  He was the guest of Squire B—t, a
-well-known foxhunter, who at one time hunted the Shifnal country with his
-own hounds.  A very jovial company from that side had assembled, and it
-was determined to celebrate a new arrival in the Squire’s family, and to
-take advantage of the presence of the parson to christen the little
-stranger.  The thing was soon settled, and Stephens proceeded in due form
-with the ceremony necessary to give to the fair-haired innocent a name by
-which it should be known to the world.  The conversation of the company
-had of course been upon their favourite sport, a good many bottles of
-fine sherry and crusty old port had been drunk, and under their
-influence, it was settled that one of the company should give the child a
-name in which it should be baptized, let it be what it would.  Stephens
-having taken the child in his hands, in due form asked the name; it was
-given immediately as Foxhunting Moll B—t!  With this name the little
-innocent grew up, and finally became the wife of Squire H—s; with this
-name she of course signed all legal documents—first, as Foxhunting Moll
-B—t, and, secondly, as Foxhunting Moll H—s.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER, XI.
-THE WILLEY WHIPPER-IN.
-
-
-The Willey Whipper-in—Tom’s Start in Life—His Pluck and Perseverance—Up
-Hill and down Dale—Adventures with the Buff-coloured Chaise—His own Wild
-Favourite—His Drinking-horn—Who-who-hoop—Good Temper—Never
-Married—Hangster’s Gate—Old Coaches—Tom Gone to Earth—Three View Halloos
-at the Grave—Old Boots.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-    “The huntsman’s self relented to a grin,
-    And rated him almost a whipper-in.”
-
-           [Picture: Moody’s Horn, Trencher, Cap, Saddle, &c.]
-
-TOM MOODY never rose above his post of whipper-in, but he had the honour
-of being at the top of his profession; and before proceeding further with
-our sketch of Squire Forester it may be well to dwell for a time upon
-this well-known character, whom Dibdin immortalised in his song, so
-familiar to all sportsmen.  He was in fact, in many respects, what Mr.
-Forester had made him: Nature supplied the material, and Squire Forester
-did the rest.  Tom had the advantage of entering the Squire’s service
-when a youth.  Like most boys of that period, he had been thrown a good
-deal upon his own resources, a state of things not unfavourable to a
-development of self-reliance, and a degree of humble heroism, such as
-made life wholesome.  Tom had no opportunities of obtaining a
-national-school education, nor of carrying away the prize now sometimes
-awarded to the best behaved lad in the village.  But in the unorganized
-school of common intercourse, common suffering, and interest, was
-developed a pluck and daring which led him to perform a feat on the bare
-back of a crop-eared cob that gave birth to the after events of his life.
-It appears that he was apprenticed to a Mr. Adams, a maltster, who had
-sent him to deliver malt at the Hall.  On his return he was seen by the
-Squire trying his horse at a gate, and repeating the attempt till he
-compelled him to leap it.  It is said that—
-
-    “He who excels in what we prize,
-    Appears a hero in our eyes.”
-
-                         [Picture: Gone to earth]
-
-And Squire Forester, struck by his pluck and perseverance, made up his
-mind to secure him.  He sent to his master to ask if he were willing to
-give him up, adding that he would like to see him at the Hall.  The
-message alarmed the mother, who was a widow, for, knowing her son’s
-froward nature, she at once imagined Tom had got into trouble.  On
-learning the true state of the case, however, and thinking she saw the
-way open to Tom’s promotion, she consented to the change in his
-condition.  His master, too, agreed to give him up, and Tom was
-transferred to the Willey stables, where, from his good nature and other
-agreeable qualities, he became a favourite, and from his daring courage
-quite a sort of little hero.  It was Tom’s duty to go on errands from the
-Hall, and once outside the park, feeling he had his liberty, he did not
-fail to make use of opportunities for displaying his skill.  In riding,
-it was generally up hill and down dale, at neck-or-nothing speed,
-stopping neither for gate nor hedge—his horse tearing away at a rate
-which would have given him three or four somersaults at a slip.  He
-seldom turned his horse’s head if he could help it, and if he went down
-he was soon up again.  Extraordinary tales are told of Tom’s adventures
-with the Squire’s buff-coloured chaise, in taking company from the Hall,
-and in fetching visitors from Shifnal, then the nearest place to reach a
-coach.  Having a spite at a pike-keeper, who offended him by not opening
-the gate quick enough, “Tom tanselled his hide,” and resolved the next
-time he went that way not to trouble him.  Driving up to the gate, he
-gave a spring, and touching his horse on the flanks, went straight over
-without starting a stitch or breaking a buckle.  On another occasion he
-tried the same trick, but failed; the horse went clean over, but the gig
-caught the top rail, and Tom was thrown on his back.  “That just sarves
-yo right,” said the pike-keeper.  “So it does, and now we are quits,”
-added Tom; and they were friends ever after.  This, however, did not
-prevent Tom trying it again; not that he wanted to defraud the pike-man,
-whom he generally paid another time, but for “the fun of the thing.”
-Indeed, with his old wild favourite, with or without the buff-coloured
-gig, there were no risks he was not prepared to run.  “Ay, ay, sir,” said
-one of our aged informants, “you should have seen him on his horse, a
-mad, wild animal no one but Tom could ride.  He could ride him though,
-with his eyes shut, savage as he was, and on a good road he would pass
-milestones as the clock measured minutes; but give him the green meadows,
-and Lord how I have seen him whip along the turf!”  “He was like a winged
-Mercury, making light both of stone walls and five-feet six-inch gates.
-He was a regular centaur, for he and his horse seemed one,” said another.
-“I cannot tell you the height of his horse,” said a third, “but he was a
-big un; whilst Tom himself was a little one, and he used to be on
-horse-back all day long.  If he got into the saddle in a morning he
-rarely left it till night.”
-
-In giving the qualifications necessary for one aspiring to the post of
-whipper-in, a well-known authority on sporting subjects has laid it down
-that he should be light (not too young), with a quick eye and still
-quicker ear, and that he should be—what in fact he generally is—fond of
-the sport, or he seldom succeeds in his profession.  Now Moody, or Muddy,
-as his name was pronounced, answered to these conditions.
-
-    “His conversation had no other course
-    Than that presented to his simple view
-    Of what concerned his saddle, groom, or horse;
-    Beyond this theme he little cared or knew:
-    Tell him of beauty and harmonious sounds,
-    He’d show his mare, and talk about his hounds.”
-
-He was what was called _Foxy_ all over—in his language, dress, and
-associations.  He wore a pin with a knob, something smaller than a
-tea-saucer, of Caughley china, with the head of a fox upon it; and
-everything nearest his person, so far as he could manage it, had
-something to put him in mind of his favourite sport.  His bed-room walls
-were hung with sporting prints, and on his mantelpiece were more
-substantial trophies of the hunt—as the brush of some remarkable victim
-of the pack, his boots and spurs, &c.  His famous drinking-horn, which we
-have engraved together with his trencher in the trophy at the head of
-this chapter, was equally embellished with a representation of a hunt,
-very elaborately carved with the point of a pen-knife.  At the top is a
-wind-mill, and below a number of horsemen and a lady, well mounted, in
-full chase, and with hounds in full cry after a fox, which is seen on the
-lower part of the horn.  A fox’s brush forms the finis.  The date upon
-the horn, which in size and shape resembles those in use in the mansions
-of the gentry in past centuries when hospitality was dispensed in their
-halls with such a free and generous hand, is 1663.  It is a relic still
-treasured by members of the Wheatland Hunt, who look back to the time
-when the shrill voice of Moody cheered the pack over the heavy
-Wheatlands; and together with his cap, of which we also give a
-representation, is often made to do duty at annual social gatherings.
-
-Tom was a small eight or nine stone man, with roundish face, marked with
-small pox, and a pair of eyes that twinkled with good humour.  He
-possessed great strength as well as courage and resolution, and displayed
-an equanimity of temper which made him many friends.  The huntsman was
-John Sewell, and under him he performed his duties in a way so
-satisfactory to his master and all who hunted with him, as to be deemed
-the best whipper-in in England.  None, it was said, could bring up the
-tail end of a pack, or sustain the burst of a long chase, and be in at
-the death with every hound well up, like Tom.  His plan was to allow his
-hounds their own cast without lifting, unless they showed wildness; and
-if young hounds dwelt on a stale drag behind the pack he whipped them on
-to those on the right line.  He never aspired to be more than “a
-serving-man;” he wished, however, to be considered “a good whipper-in,”
-and his fame as such spread through the country.  There was not a spark
-of envy in his composition, and he was one of the happiest fellows in the
-universe.  The lessons he seemed to have learnt, and which appeared to
-have sunk deepest into his unsophisticated nature, were those of being
-honest and of ordering himself “lowly and reverently towards his
-betters,” for whom he had a reverence which grew profound if they
-happened to have added to their qualifications of being good sportsmen
-that of being “_Parliament_ men.”
-
-Tom’s voice was something extraordinary, and on one occasion when he had
-fallen into an old pit shaft, which had given way on the sides, and could
-not get out, it saved him.  His halloo to the dogs brought him
-assistance, and he was extricated.  It was capable of wonderful
-modulations, and to hear him rehearse the sports of the day in the big
-roomy servants’ kitchen at the Hall, and give his tally-ho, or
-who-who-hoop, was considered a treat.  On one occasion, when Tom was in
-better trim than usual, the old housekeeper is said to have remarked,
-“La!  Tom, you have given the who-who-hoop, as you call it, so very loud
-and strong to-day that you have set the cups and saucers a dancing;” to
-which a gentleman, who had purposely placed himself within hearing,
-replied, “I am not at all surprised—his voice is music itself.  I am
-astonished and delighted, and hardly know how to praise it enough.  I
-never heard anything so attractive and inspiring before in the whole
-course of my life; its tones are as fine and mellow as a French horn.”
-
-When Squire Forester gave up hunting, the hounds went to Aldenham, as
-trencher hounds; the farmers of the district agreeing to keep them.  They
-were collected the night before the hunt, fed after a day’s sport, and
-dismissed at a crack of the whip, each dog going off to the farm at which
-he was kept.  But it was a great trial to Tom to see them depart; and he
-begged to be allowed to keep an old favourite, with which he might often
-have been seen sunning himself in the yard.  He continued with his master
-from first to last, with the exception of the short time he lived with
-Mr. Corbet, when the Sundorne roof-trees were wont to ring to the toast
-of “Old Trojan,” and when the elder Sebright was his fellow-whip.
-
-Like the old Squire, Tom never married, although, like his master, he had
-a leaning towards the softer sex, and spent much of his time in the
-company of his lady friends.  One he made his banker, and the presents
-made to him might have amounted to something considerable if he had taken
-care of them.  In lodging them in safe keeping he usually begged that
-they might be let out to him a shilling a time; but he made so many calls
-and pleaded so earnestly and availingly for more, and was so constant a
-visitor at Hangster’s Gate, that the stock never was very large.  Indeed
-he was on familiar terms with “Chalk Farm,” as the score behind the
-ale-house door was termed; still he never liked getting into debt, and it
-was always a relief to his mind to see the sponge applied to the score.
-
-Tom was a great gun at this little way-side inn, which was altogether a
-primitive institution of the kind even at that period, but which was
-afterwards swept away when the present Hall was built.  It then stood on
-the old road from Bridgnorth to Wenlock, which came winding past the
-Hall; and in the old coaching days was a well-known hostelry and a
-favourite tippling shop for local notables, among whom were old Scale,
-the Barrow schoolmaster and parish clerk; the Cartwrights and Crumps, of
-Broseley; and a few local farmers.  One attraction was the old coach,
-which called there and brought newspapers, and still later news in
-troubled times when battles, sieges, and the movements of armies were the
-chief topics of conversation.  Neither coachmen nor travellers ever
-appeared to hurry, but would wait to communicate the news, particularly
-in the pig killing season, when a pork pie and a jug of ale would be
-sufficient to keep the coach a good half hour if need be.  We speak of
-course of “The time when George III. was king,” before “His Majesty’s
-Mail” became an important institution, and when one old man in a scarlet
-coat, with a face that lost nothing by reflection therewith—excepting
-that a slight tinge of purple was visible—who had many more calling
-places than post offices on the road, carried pistols in his holsters,
-and brought all the letters and newspapers Willey, Wenlock, Broseley,
-Benthall, Ironbridge, Coalbrookdale, and some other places then required;
-and these, even, took the whole day to distribute.  Although the
-lumbering old vehicle was constantly tumbling over on going down slight
-declivities, it was a great institution of the period; it was—
-
-    “Hurrah for the old stage coach,
-    Be it never so worn and rusty!
-    Hurrah for the smooth high road,
-    Be it glaring, and scorching, and dusty!
-
-    “Hurrah for the snug little inn,
-    At the sign of the Plough and Harrow,
-    And the frothy juice of the dangling hop,
-    That tickles your spinal marrow.”
-
-It was a great treat to travellers, who would sometimes get off the coach
-and order a chaise to be sent for them from Bridgnorth or Wenlock, to
-stop and listen to Tom relating the incidents of a day’s sport, and a
-still greater treat to witness his acting, to hear his tally-ho, his
-who-who-hoop, or to hear him strike up—
-
-    “A southerly wind and a cloudy sky
-    Proclaim a hunting morning.”
-
-Another favourite country song just then was the following, which has
-been attributed to Bishop Still, called—
-
-                               THE JUG OF ALE.
-
-    “As I was sitting one afternoon
-    Of a pleasant day in the month of June,
-    I heard a thrush sing down the vale,
-    And the tune he sang was ‘the jug of ale,’
-    And the tune he sang was the jug of ale.
-
-    “The white sheet bleaches on the hedge,
-    And it sets my wisdom teeth on edge,
-    When dry with telling your pedlar’s tale,
-    Your only comfort’s a jug of ale,
-    Your only comfort’s a jug of ale.
-
-    “I jog along the footpath way,
-    For a merry heart goes all the day;
-    But at night, whoever may flout and rail,
-    I sit down with my friend, the jug of ale,
-    With my good old friend, the jug of ale.
-
-    “Whether the sweet or sour of the year,
-    I tramp and tramp though the gallows be near.
-    Oh, while I’ve a shilling I will not fail
-    To drown my cares in a jug of ale,
-    Drown my cares in a jug of ale!”
-
-To which old Amen, as the parish clerk was called, in order to be
-orthodox, would add from the same convivial prelate’s farce-comedy of
-“Gammer Gurton’s Needle:”—
-
-    “I cannot eat but little meat
-    My stomach is not good;
-    But sure I think that I can drink
-    With him that wears a hood.”
-
-A pleasant cheerful glass or two, Tom was wont to say, would hurt nobody,
-and he could toss off a horn or two of “October” without moving a muscle
-or winking an eye.  His constitution was as sound as a roach; and whilst
-he could get up early and sniff the fragrant gale, they did not appear to
-tell.  But he had a spark in his throat, as he said, and he indulged in
-such frequent libations to extinguish it, that, towards the end of the
-year 1796, he was well nigh worn out.  After a while, finding himself
-becoming weak, and feeling that his end was approaching, he expressed a
-desire to see his old master, who at once gratified the wish of the
-sufferer, and, without thinking that his end was so near, inquired what
-he wanted.  “I have,” said Tom, “one request to make, and it is the last
-favour I shall crave.”  “Well,” said the Squire, “what is it, Tom?”  “My
-time here won’t be long,” Tom added; “and when I am dead I wish to be
-buried at Barrow, under the yew tree, in the churchyard there, and to be
-carried to the grave by six earth-stoppers; my old horse, with my whip,
-boots, spurs, and cap, slung on each side of the saddle, and the brush of
-the last fox when I was up at the death, at the side of the forelock, and
-two couples of old hounds to follow me to the grave as mourners.  When I
-am laid in the grave let three halloos be given over me; and then, if I
-don’t lift up my head, you may fairly conclude that Tom Moody’s dead.”
-The old whipper-in expired shortly afterwards, and his request was
-carried out to the letter, as the following characteristic letter from
-the Squire to his friend Chambers, describing the circumstances, will
-show:—
-
-    “DEAR CHAMBERS,
-
-    “On Tuesday last died poor Tom Moody, as good for rough and smooth as
-    ever entered Wildmans Wood.  He died brave and honest, as he
-    lived—beloved by all, hated by none that ever knew him.  I took his
-    own orders as to his will, funeral, and every other thing that could
-    be thought of.  He died sensible and fully collected as ever man
-    died—in short, died game to the last; for when he could hardly
-    swallow, the poor old lad took the farewell glass for success to
-    fox-bunting, and his poor old master (as he termed it), for ever.  I
-    am sole executor, and the bulk of his fortune he left to
-    me—six-and-twenty shillings, real and _bonâ fide_ sterling cash, free
-    from all incumbrance, after every debt discharged to a farthing.
-    Noble deeds for Tom, you’d say.  The poor old ladies at the Ring of
-    Bells are to have a knot each in remembrance of the poor old lad.
-
-    “Salop paper will show the whole ceremony of his burial, but for fear
-    you should not see that paper, I send it to you, as under:—
-
-    “‘Sportsmen, attend.—On Tuesday, 29th inst., was buried at Barrow,
-    near Wenlock, Salop, Thomas Moody, the well-known whipper-in to G.
-    Forester, Esq.’s fox-hounds for twenty years.  He was carried to the
-    grave by a proper number of earth-stoppers, and attended by many
-    other sporting friends, who heartily mourned for him.’
-
-    “Directly after the corpse followed his old favourite horse (which he
-    always called his ‘Old Soul’), thus accoutred: carrying his last
-    fox’s brush in the front of his bridle, with his cap, whip, boots,
-    spurs, and girdle, across his saddle.  The ceremony being over, he
-    (by his own desire), had three clear rattling view haloos o’er his
-    grave; and thus ended the career of poor Tom, who lived and died an
-    honest fellow, but alas! a very wet one.
-
-    “I hope you and your family are well, and you’ll believe me, much
-    yours,
-
-                                                             “G. FORESTER.
-
-    “WILLEY, Dec. 5, 1796.”
-
-We need add nothing to the description the Squire gave of the way in
-which Tom’s last wishes were carried out, and shall merely remark that
-the old fellow kept on his livery to the last, and that he died in his
-boots, which were for some time kept as relics—a circumstance which leads
-us to appropriate the following lines, which appeared a few years ago in
-the _Sporting Magazine_:—
-
-    “You have ofttimes indulged in a sneer
-    At the old pair of boots I’ve kept year after year,
-    And I promised to tell you (when ‘funning’ last night)
-    The reasons I have thus to keep them in sight.
-
-    “Those boots were Tom Moody’s (a better ne’er strode
-    A hunter or hack, in the field—on the road—
-    None more true to his friend, or his bottle when full,
-    In short, you may call him a thorough John Bull).
-
-    “Now this world you must own’s a strange compound of fate,
-    (A kind of tee-to-turn resembling of late)
-    Where hope promised joy _there_ will sorrow be found,
-    And the vessel best trimm’d is oft soonest aground.
-
-    “I’ve come in for my share of ‘Take-up’ and ‘Put-down,’
-    And that rogue, Disappointment, oft makes me look brown,
-    And then (you may sneer and look wise if you will)
-    From those old pair of boots I can comfort distil.
-
-    “I but cast my eyes on them and old Willey Hall
-    Is before me again, with its ivy-crown’d wall,
-    Its brook of soft murmurs—its rook-laden trees,
-    The gilt vane on its dovecot swung round by the breeze.
-
-    “I see its old owner descend from the door,
-    I feel his warm grasp as I felt it of yore;
-    Whilst old servants crowd round—as they once us’d to do,
-    And their old smiles of welcome beam on me anew.
-
-    “I am in the old bedroom that looks on the lawn,
-    The old cock is crowing to herald the dawn;
-    There! old Jerry is rapping, and hark how he hoots,
-    ‘’Tis past five o’clock, Tom, and here are your boots.’
-
-    “I am in the old homestead, and here comes ‘old Jack,’
-    And old Stephens has help’d Master George to his back;
-    Whilst old _Childers_, old _Pilot_, and little _Blue-boar_
-    Lead the merry-tongued hounds through the old kennel door.
-
-    “I’m by the old wood, and I hear the old cry—
-    ‘Od’s rat ye dogs—wind him!  Hi!  Nimble, lad, hi!’
-    I see the old fox steal away through the gap,
-    Whilst old Jack cheers the hounds with his old velvet cap.
-
-    “I’m seated again by my old grandad’s chair,
-    Around me old friends and before me old fare;
-    Every guest is a sportsman, and scarlet his suit,
-    And each leg ’neath the table is cas’d in a boot.
-
-    “I hear the old toasts and the old songs again,
-    ‘_Old Maiden_’—‘_Tom Moody_’—‘_Poor Jack_’—‘_Honest Ben_;’
-    I drink the old wine, and I hear the old call—
-    ‘Clean glasses, fresh bottles, and _pipes_ for us all.’”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII.
-SUCCESS OF THE SONG.
-
-
-Dibdin’s Song—Dibdin and the Squire good fellows well met—Moody a
-Character after Dibdin’s own heart—The Squire’s Gift—Incledon—The
-Shropshire Fox-hunters on the Stage at Drury Lane.
-
-THE reader will have perceived that George Forester and Charles Dibdin
-were good fellows well met, and that no two men were ever better fitted
-to appreciate each other.  Like the popular monarch of the time, each
-prided himself upon being a Briton; each admired every new distinguishing
-trait of nationality, and gloried in any special development of national
-pluck and daring.  No one more than Mr. Forester was ready to endorse
-that charming bit of history Dibdin gave of his native land in his song
-of “The snug little Island,” or would join more heartily in the chorus:—
-
-    “Search the globe round, none can be found
-    So happy as this little island.”
-
-                   [Picture: A meet at Hangster’s gate]
-
-No one could have done its geography or have painted the features of its
-inhabitants in fewer words or stronger colours.  We use the word stronger
-rather than brighter, remembering that Dibdin drew his heroes redolent of
-tar, of rum, and tobacco.  He had the knack of seizing upon broad
-national characteristics, and, like a true artist, of bringing them
-prominently into the foreground by means of such simple accessories as
-seemed to give them force and effect.
-
-In the Willey whipper-in Dibdin found the same unsophisticated bit of
-primitive nature cropping up which he so successfully brought out in his
-portraits of salt-water heroes; he found the same spirit differently
-manifested; for had Moody served in the cock-pit, the gun-room, on deck,
-or at the windlass, he would have been a “Ben Backstay” or a “Poor
-Jack”—from that singleness of aim and daring which actuated him.  How
-clearly Dibdin set forth this sentiment in that stanza of the song of
-“Poor Jack,” in which the sailor, commenting upon the sermon of the
-chaplain, draws this conclusion:—
-
-    “D’ye mind me, a sailor should be, every inch,
-       All as one as a piece of a ship;
-    And, with her, brave the world without off’ring to flinch,
-       From the moment the anchor’s a-trip.
-    As to me, in all weathers, all times, tides, and ends,
-       Nought’s a trouble from duty that springs;
-    My heart is my Poll’s, and my rhino my friend’s,
-       And as for my life, ’tis my King’s.”
-
-The country was indebted to this faculty of rhyming for much of that
-daring and devotion to its interests which distinguished soldiers and
-sailors at that remarkable period.  Dibdin’s songs, as he, with pride,
-was wont to say, were “the solace of sailors on long voyages, in storms,
-and in battles.”  His “Tom Moody” illustrated the same pluck and daring
-which under the vicissitudes and peculiarities of the times—had it been
-Tom’s fortune to have served under Drake or Blake, Howe, Jervis, or
-Nelson—would equally have supplied materials for a stave.
-
-From the letter of the Squire the reader will see how truthfully the
-great English Beranger, as he has been called, adhered to the
-circumstances in his song:—
-
-    “You all knew Tom Moody, the whipper-in, well.
-    The bell that’s done tolling was honest Tom’s knell;
-    A more able sportsman ne’er followed a hound
-    Through a country well known to him fifty miles round.
-    No hound ever open’d with Tom near a wood,
-    But he’d challenge the tone, and could tell if it were good;
-    And all with attention would eagerly mark,
-    When he cheer’d up the pack, ‘Hark! to Rockwood, hark! hark!
-    Hie!—wind him! and cross him!  Now, Rattler, boy!  Hark!’
-
-    “Six crafty earth-stoppers, in hunter’s green drest,
-    Supported poor Tom to an earth made for rest.
-    His horse, which he styled his ‘Old Soul,’ next appear’d,
-    On whose forehead the brush of his last fox was rear’d:
-    Whip, cap, boots, and spurs, in a trophy were bound,
-    And here and there followed an old straggling hound.
-    Ah! no more at his voice yonder vales will they trace!
-    Nor the welkin resound his burst in the chase!
-    With high over!  Now press him!  Tally-ho!  Tally-ho!
-
-    “Thus Tom spoke his friends ere he gave up his breath:
-    ‘Since I see you’re resolved to be in at the death,
-    One favour bestow—’tis the last I shall crave,
-    Give a rattling view-halloo thrice over my grave;
-    And unless at that warning I lift up my head,
-    My boys, you may fairly conclude I am dead!’
-    Honest Tom was obeyed, and the shout rent the sky,
-    For every one joined in the tally-ho cry!
-    Tally-ho!  Hark forward!  Tally-ho!  Tally-ho!”
-
-On leaving Willey, Mr. Forester asked Dibdin what he could do to
-discharge the obligation he felt himself under for his services; the
-great ballad writer, whom Pitt pensioned, replied “Nothing;” he had been
-so well treated that he could not accept anything.  Finding artifice
-necessary, Mr. Forester asked him if he would deliver a letter for him
-personally at his banker’s on his arrival in London.  Of course Dibdin
-consented, and on doing so he found it was an order to pay him £100!
-
-When the song first came out Charles Incledon, by the “human voice
-divine,” was drawing vast audiences at Drury Lane Theatre.  On
-play-bills, in largest type, forming the most attractive morceaux of the
-bill of fare, this song, varied by others of Dibdin’s composing, would be
-seen; and when he was first announced to sing it, a few fox-hunting
-friends of the Squire went to London to hear it.  Taking up their
-positions in the pit, they were all attention as the inimitable singer
-rolled out, with that full volume of voice which at once delighted and
-astounded his audience, the verse commencing:—
-
-    “You all knew Tom Moody the whipper-in well.”
-
-But the great singer did not succeed to the satisfaction of the small
-knot of Shropshire fox-hunters in the “tally-ho chorus.”  Detecting the
-technical defect which practical experience in the field alone could
-supply, they jumped upon the stage, and gave the audience a specimen of
-what Shropshire lungs could do.
-
-The song soon became popular.  It seized at once upon the sporting mind,
-and upon the mind of the country generally.  The London publishers took
-it up, and gave it with the music, together with woodcuts and
-lithographic illustrations, and it soon found a ready sale.  But the
-illustrations were untruthful.  The church was altogether a fancy sketch,
-exceedingly unlike the quaint old simple structure still standing.  A
-print published by Wolstenholme, in 1832, contains a very faithful
-representation of the church on the northern side, with the grave, and a
-large gathering of sportsmen and spectators, at the moment the “view
-halloo” is supposed to have been given.  It is altogether spiritedly
-drawn and well coloured, and makes a pleasing subject; but the view is
-taken on the wrong side of the church, the artist having evidently chosen
-this, the northern side, because of the distance and middle distance, and
-in order to make a taking picture.  The view has this advantage, however,
-it shows the Clee Hills in the distance.  Tom’s grave is covered by a
-simple slab, containing the following inscription,
-
-                                  TOM MOODY,
-                           BURIED NOV. 19TH, 1796,
-
-and is on the opposite side, near the old porch, and chief entrance to
-the church.
-
-In the full-page engraving, representing a meet near “Hangster’s Gate,” a
-famous “fixture” in the old Squire’s time, the assembled sportsmen are
-supposed to be startled by the re-appearance of Tom upon the ground of
-his former exploits.  It is the belief of some that when a corpse is laid
-in the grave an angel gives notice of the coming of two examiners.  The
-dead person is then made to undergo the ordeal before two spirits of
-terrible appearance.  Whether this was the faith of Tom’s friends or not
-we cannot say, but Tom was supposed to have been anything but satisfied
-with his quarters or his company, and to have returned to visit the
-Willey Woods.  The picture presents a group of sportsmen and hounds
-beneath the trees, and attention is directed towards the spectre, an old
-decayed stump.  The following lines refer to the tradition:—
-
-    “See the shade of Tom Moody, you all have known well,
-    To our sports now returning, not liking to dwell
-    In a region where pleasure’s not found in the chase,
-    So Tom’s just returned to view his old place.
-    No sooner the hounds leave the kennel to try,
-    Than his spirit appears to join in the cry;
-    Now all with attention, his signal well mark,
-    For see his hand’s up for the cry of Hark! Hark!
-    Then cheer him, and mark him, Tally-ho! Boys! Tally-ho!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIII.
-THE WILLEY SQUIRE MEMBER FOR WENLOCK.
-
-
-The Willey Squire recognises the Duties of his Position, and becomes
-Member for Wenlock—Addison’s View of Whig Jockeys and Tory
-Fox-hunters—State of Parties—Pitt in Power—“Fiddle-Faddle”—Local
-Improvements—The Squire Mayor of Wenlock—The Mace now carried before the
-Chief Magistrate.
-
-THERE is an old English maxim that “too much of anything is good for
-nothing;” the obvious meaning being that a man should not addict himself
-over much to any one pursuit; and it is only justice to the Willey Squire
-that it should be fully understood that whilst passionately fond of the
-pleasures of the chase, he was not unmindful of the duties of his
-position.  Willey was the centre of the sporting country we have
-described; but it was also contiguous to a district remarkable for its
-manufacturing activity—for its iron works, its pot works, and its brick
-works, the proprietors of which, no less than the agricultural portion of
-the population, felt that they had an interest in questions of
-legislation.  Mr. Forester considered that whatever concerned his
-neighbourhood and his country concerned him, and his influence and
-popularity in the borough led to his taking upon himself the duty of
-representing it in Parliament.  There was about the temper of the times
-something more suited to the temperament of a country gentleman than at
-present, and a member of Parliament was less bound to his constituents.
-His duties as a representative sat much more lightly, whilst the
-pugnacious elements of the nation generally were such that when Mr.
-Forester entered upon public life there was nearly as much excitement in
-the House of Commons—and not unlike in kind—as was to be found in the
-cockpit or the hunting-field.
-
-As long as Mr. Forester could remember, parties had been as sharply
-defined as at present, and men were as industriously taught to believe
-that whatever ranged itself under one form of faith was praiseworthy,
-whilst everything on the other side was to be condemned.  Addison, in his
-usually happy style, had already described this state of things in the
-_Spectator_, where he says:—
-
-    “This humour fills the country with several periodical meetings of
-    Whig jockeys and Tory fox-hunters; not to mention the innumerable
-    curses, frowns, and whispers it produces at a quarter sessions. . . .
-    In all our journey from London to this house we did not so much as
-    bait at a Whig inn; or if by chance the coachman stopped at a wrong
-    place, one of Sir Roger’s servants would ride up to his master full
-    speed, and whisper to him that the master of the house was against
-    such an one in the last election.  This often betrayed us into hard
-    beds and bad cheer, for we were not so inquisitive about the inn as
-    the innkeeper; and, provided our landlord’s principles were sound,
-    did not take any notice of the staleness of the provisions.”
-
-So that Whig and Tory had even then long been names representing those
-principles by which the Constitution was balanced, names representing
-those popular and monarchical ingredients which it was supposed assured
-liberty and order, progress and stability.  But about the commencement of
-Mr. Forester’s parliamentary career parties had been in a great measure
-broken up into sections, if not into factions—into Pelhamites,
-Cobhamites, Foxites, Pittites, and Wilkites—the questions uppermost being
-place, power, and distinction, ministry and opposition—the Ins and the
-Outs.  The Ins, when Whigs, pretty much as now, adopted Tory principles,
-and Tories in opposition appealed to popular favour for support; indeed
-from the fall of Walpole to the American war, as now, there were few
-statesmen who were not by turns the colleagues and the adversaries, the
-friends and the foes of their contemporaries.  The general pulse, it is
-true, beat more feverishly, and men went to Parliament or into battle as
-readily as to the hunting-field—for the excitement of the thing.  To
-epitomise, mighty armies, such as Europe had not seen since the days of
-Marlborough, were moving in every direction.  Four hundred and fifty-two
-thousand men were gathering to crush the Prince of a German state, with
-one hundred and fifty thousand men in the field to encounter them.  The
-English and Hanoverian army, under the Duke of Cumberland, was relied
-upon to prevent the French attacking Prussia, with whom we had formed an
-alliance.  England felt an intense interest in the struggle, and bets
-were made as to the result.  Mr. Forester was returned to the new
-Parliament, which met in December, 1757, in time, we believe, to vote for
-the subsidy of £670,000 asked for by the king for his “good brother and
-ally,” the King of Prussia.  A minister like Pitt, who was then inspiring
-the people with his spirit, and raising the martial ardour of the nation
-to a pitch it had never known before, who drew such pictures of England’s
-power and pluck as to cause the French envoy to jump out of the window,
-was a man after the Squire’s own heart, and he gave him his hearty “aye,”
-to subsidy after subsidy.  As a contemporary satirist wrote:—
-
-    “No more they make a fiddle-faddle
-    About a Hessian horse or saddle.
-    No more of continental measures;
-    No more of wasting British treasures.
-    Ten millions, and a vote of credit.
-    ’Tis right.  He can’t be wrong who did it.”
-
-Mr. Forester gave way to Cecil Forester, a few months prior to the
-marriage of the King to the Princess Charlotte; but was returned again,
-in 1768, with Sir Henry Bridgeman, and sat till 1774, during what has
-been called the “Unreported Parliament.”  He was returned in October of
-the same year with the same gentleman.  He was also returned to the new
-Parliament in 1780, succeeding Mr. Whitmore, who, having been returned
-for Wenlock and Bridgnorth, elected to sit for the latter; and he sat
-till 1784.  Sir H. Bridgeman and John Simpson, Esq., were then returned,
-and sat till the following year; when Mr. Simpson accepted the Chiltern
-Hundreds, and Mr. Forester, being again solicited to represent the
-interests of the borough, was returned, and continued to sit until the
-sixteenth Parliament of Great Britain, having nearly completed its full
-term of seven years, was dissolved, soon after its prorogation in June,
-1790.
-
-                     [Picture: The First Iron Bridge]
-
-It is not our intention to comment upon the votes given by the Squire in
-his place in Parliament during the thirty years he sat in the House;
-suffice it to say, that we believe he gave an honest support to measures
-which came before the country, and that he was neither bought nor bribed,
-as many members of that period were.  He was active in getting the
-sanction of Parliament for local improvements, for the construction of a
-towing-path along the Severn, and for the present handsome iron
-bridge—the first of its kind—over it, to connect the districts of
-Broseley and Madeley.  On retiring from the office of chief magistrate of
-the borough, which he filled for some years, he presented to the
-corporation the handsome mace now in use, which bears the following
-inscription:—
-
-    “The gift of George Forester of Willey, Esq., to the Bailiff,
-    Burgesses, and Commonalty of the Borough of Wenlock, as a token of
-    his high esteem and regard for the attachment and respect they
-    manifested towards him during the many years he represented the
-    borough in Parliament, and served the office of Chief Magistrate and
-    Justice thereof.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIV.
-THE SQUIRE AND HIS VOLUNTEERS.
-
-
-The Squire and the Wenlock Volunteers—Community of Feeling—Threats of
-Invasion—“We’ll follow the Squire to Hell if necessary”—The Squire’s
-Speech—His Birthday—His Letter to the _Shrewsbury Chronicle_—Second
-Corps—Boney and Beacons—The Squire in a Rage—The Duke of York and Prince
-of Orange came down.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-    “Not once or twice, in our rough island story,
-    The path of duty was the way to glory.”
-
-                          [Picture: Bridgnorth]
-
-WE fancy there was a greater community of feeling in Squire Forester’s
-day than now, and that whether indulging in sport or in doing earnest
-work, men acted more together.  Differences of wealth caused less
-differences of caste, of speech, and of habit; men of different classes
-saw more of each other and were more together; consequently there was
-more cohesion of the particles of which society is composed, and, if the
-term be admissible, the several grades were more interpenetrated by
-agencies which served to make them one.  Gentlemen were content with the
-good old English sports and pastimes of the period, and these caused them
-to live on their own estates, surrounded by and in the presence of those
-whom modern refinements serve to separate; and their dependants therefore
-were more alive to those reciprocal, neighbourly, and social duties out
-of which patriotism springs.  They might not have been better or wiser,
-but they appear to have approached nearer to that state of society when
-every citizen considered himself to be so closely identified with the
-nation as to feel bound to bear arms against an invading enemy, and, as
-far as possible, to avert a danger.  Never was the rivalry of England and
-France more vehement.  Emboldened by successes, the French began to think
-themselves all but invincible, and burned to meet in mortal combat their
-ancient enemies, whilst our countrymen, equally defiant, and with
-recollections of former glory, sought no less an opportunity of measuring
-their strength with the veteran armies of their rivals.  The embers of
-former passions yet lay smouldering when the French Minister of Marine
-talked of making a descent on England, and of destroying the Government;
-a threat calculated to influence the feelings of old sportsmen like
-Squire Forester, who nourished a love of country, whose souls throbbed
-with the same national feeling, and who were equally ready to respond to
-a call to maintain the sacredness of their homes, or to risk their lives
-in their defence.  Oneyers and Moneyers—men “whose words upon ’change
-would go much further than their blows in battle,” as Falstaff says, came
-forward, if for nothing else, as examples to others.  On both banks of
-the Severn men looked upon the Squire as a sort of local centre, and as
-the head of a district, as a leader whom they would follow—as one old
-tradesman said—to hell, if necessary.  A general meeting was called at
-the Guildhall, Wenlock, and a still more enthusiastic gathering took
-place at Willey.  Mr. Forester never did things by halves, and what he
-did he did at once.  He was not much at speech-making, but he had that
-ready wit and happy knack of going to the point and hitting the nail on
-the head in good round Saxon, that told amazingly with his old foxhunting
-friends.
-
-“Gentlemen,” he said, “you know very well that I have retired from the
-representation of the borough.  I did so in the belief that I had
-discharged, as long as need be, those public duties I owe to my
-neighbours; and in the hope that I should be permitted henceforth to
-enjoy the pleasures of retirement.  I parted with my hounds, and gave up
-hunting; but here I am, continually on horseback, hunting up men all
-round the Wrekin!  The movement is general, and differences of feeling
-are subsiding into one for the defence of the nation.  Whigs and Tories
-stand together in the ranks; and as I told the Lord-Lieutenant the other
-day, we must have not less than four or five thousand men in uniform,
-equipped, every Jack-rag of ’em, without a farthing cost to the country.
-(Applause.)  There are some dastardly devils who run with the hare, but
-hang with the hounds, damn ’em (laughter); whose patriotism, by G—d,
-hangs by such a small strand that I believe the first success of the
-enemies of the country would sever it.  They are a lot of damnation
-Jacobins, all of ’em, whining black-hearted devils, with distorted
-intellects, who profess to perceive no danger.  And, by G—d, the more
-plain it is, the less they see it.  It is, as I say, put an owl into
-daylight, stick a candle on each side of him, and the more light the poor
-devil has the less he sees.”  (Cries of “Bravo, hurrah for the Squire.”)
-In conclusion he called upon the lawyer, the ironmaster, the pot maker,
-the artisan, and the labourer to drill, and prepare for defending their
-hearths and homes; they had property to defend, shops that might be
-plundered, houses that might be burned, or children to save from being
-brained, and wives or daughters to protect from treatment which sometimes
-prevailed in time of war.
-
-As a result of his exertions, a strong and efficient company was formed,
-called “The Wenlock Loyal Volunteers.”  The Squire was major, and he
-spared neither money nor trouble in rendering it efficient.  He always
-gave the members a dinner on the 4th of June, the birthday of George
-III., who had won his admiration and devotion by his boldness as a
-fox-hunter, no less than by his daring proposal, during the riots of
-1780, to ride at the head of his guards into the midst of the fires of
-the capital.  On New Year’s Day, that being the birthday of Major
-Forester, the officers and men invariably dined together in honour of
-their commander.  The corps were disbanded, we believe, in 1802, for we
-find in a cutting from a Shrewsbury paper of the 12th of January, 1803,
-that about that time a subscription was entered into for the purchase of
-a handsome punch-bowl.  The newspaper states that
-
-    “On New Year’s Day, 1803, the members of the late corps of Wenlock
-    Loyal Volunteers, commanded by Major Forester, dined at the Raven
-    Inn, Much Wenlock, in honour of their much-respected major’s
-    birthday, when the evening was spent with that cheerful hilarity and
-    orderly conduct which always characterised this respectable corps,
-    when embodied for the service of their king and country.  In the
-    morning of the day the officers, deputed by the whole corps, waited
-    on the Major, at Willey, and presented him, in an appropriate speech,
-    with a most elegant bowl, of one hundred guineas value, engraved with
-    his arms, and the following inscription, which the Major was pleased
-    to accept, and returned a suitable answer:—‘To George Forester, of
-    Willey, Esq., Major Commandant of the Wenlock Loyal Volunteers, for
-    his sedulous attention and unbounded liberality to his corps, raised
-    and disciplined under his command without any expense to Government,
-    and rendered essentially serviceable during times of unprecedented
-    difficulty and danger; this humble token of their gratitude and
-    esteem is most respectfully presented to him by his truly faithful
-    and very obedient servants,
-
-                                                 “‘THE WENLOCK VOLUNTEERS.
-
-    “‘Major Forester.’”
-
-The following reply appeared in the same paper the succeeding week:—
-
-    “Major Forester, seeing an account in the Shrewsbury papers relative
-    to the business which occurred at Willey upon New Year’s Day last,
-    between him and his late corps of Wenlock Volunteers, presumes to
-    trouble the public eye with his answer thereto, thinking it an
-    unbounded duty of gratitude and respect owing to his late corps, to
-    return them (as their late commander) his most explicit public
-    thanks, as well as his most grateful and most sincere
-    acknowledgments, for the high honour lately conferred upon him, by
-    their kind present of a silver bowl, value one hundred guineas.
-    Major Forester’s unwearied attention, as well as his liberality to
-    his late corps, were ever looked upon by him as a part of his duty,
-    in order to make some compensation to a body of distinguished
-    respectable yeomanry, who had so much the interest and welfare of him
-    and their country at heart, that he plainly perceived himself, and so
-    must every other intelligent spectator on the ground at the time of
-    exercise, that they only waited impatiently for the word to put the
-    order into execution directly; but with such regularity as their
-    commander required and ever had cheerfully granted to him.  A return
-    of mutual regard between the major and his late corps was all he
-    wished for, and he is now more fully convinced, by this public mark
-    of favour, of their real esteem and steady friendship.  He therefore
-    hopes they will (to a man) give him credit when he not only assures
-    them of his future constant sincerity and unabated affection, but
-    further take his word when he likewise promises them that his
-    gratitude and faithful remembrance of the Wenlock Loyal Volunteers
-    shall never cease but with the last period of his worldly existence.
-
-    “WILLEY, 12th Jan., 1803.”
-
-Soon after the first corps of volunteers was disbanded, the Squire was
-entertaining his guests with the toast—
-
-    “God save the king, and bless the land
-    In plenty, song, and peace;
-    And grant henceforth that foul debates
-    ’Twixt noblemen may cease—”
-
-when he received a letter from London, stating that at an audience given
-to Cornwallis, the First Consul was very gracious; that he inquired after
-the health of the king, and “spoke of the British nation in terms of
-great respect, intimating that as long as they remained friends there
-would be no interruption to the peace of Europe.”
-
-One of the guests added—
-
-         “And that I think’s a reason fair to drink and fill again.”
-
-It was clear to all, however, who looked beneath the surface, that the
-peace was a hollow truce, and that good grounds existed for timidity, if
-not for fear, respecting a descent upon our shores:
-
-                 “Sometimes the vulgar see and judge aright.”
-
-Month by month, week by week, clouds were gathering upon a sky which the
-Peace of Amiens failed to clear.
-
-The First Consul declared against English commerce, and preparations on a
-gigantic scale were being made by the construction of vessels on the
-opposite shores of the Channel for invasion.
-
-The public spirit in France was invoked; the spirit of this country was
-also aroused, and vigorous efforts were made by Parliament and the people
-to maintain the inviolability of our shores.  Newspaper denunciations
-excited the ire of the First Consul, who demanded of the English
-Government that it should restrict their power.  A recriminatory war of
-words, of loud and fierce defiances, influenced the temper of the people
-on each side of the Channel, and it again became evident that differences
-existed which could only be settled by the sword.  In a conversation with
-Lord Whitworth, Napoleon was reported to have said:—“A descent upon your
-coasts is the only means of offence I possess; and that I am determined
-to attempt, and to put myself at its head.  But can you suppose that,
-after having gained the height on which I stand, I would risk my life and
-reputation in so hazardous an undertaking, unless compelled to it by
-absolute necessity.  I know that the probability is that I myself, and
-the greatest part of the expedition, will go to the bottom.  There are a
-hundred chances to one against me; but I am determined to make the
-attempt; and such is the disposition of the troops that army after army
-will be found ready to engage in the enterprise.”  This conversation took
-place on the 21st of February, 1803; and such were the energetic measures
-taken by the English Government and people, that on the 25th of March,
-independent of the militia, 80,000 strong, which were called out at that
-date, and the regular army of 130,000 already voted, the House of
-Commons, on June 28th, agreed to the very unusual step of raising 50,000
-men additional, by drafting, in the proportion of 34,000 for England,
-10,000 for Ireland, and 6,000 for Scotland, which it was calculated would
-raise the regular troops in Great Britain to 112,000 men, besides a large
-surplus force for offensive operations.  In addition to this a bill was
-brought in shortly afterwards to enable the king to call out the levy _en
-masse_ to repel the invasion of the enemy, and empowering the
-lord-lieutenants of the several counties to enrol all the men in the
-kingdom, between seventeen and fifty-five years of age, to be divided
-into regiments according to their several ages and professions: those
-persons to be exempt who were members of any volunteer corps approved of
-by his Majesty.  Such was the state of public feeling generally that the
-king was enabled to review, in Hyde Park, sixty battalions of volunteers,
-127,000 men, besides cavalry, all equipped at their own expense.  The
-population of the country at the time was but a little over ten millions,
-about a third of what it is at present; yet such was the zeal and
-enthusiasm that in a few weeks 300,000 men were enrolled, armed, and
-disciplined, in the different parts of the kingdom.
-
-The movement embraced all classes and professions.  It was successful in
-providing a powerful reserve of trained men to strengthen the ranks and
-to supply the vacancies of the regular army, thus contributing in a
-remarkable manner to produce a patriotic ardour and feeling among the
-people, and laying the foundation of that spirit which enabled Great
-Britain at length to appear as principal in the contest, and to beat down
-the power of France, even where hitherto she had obtained unexampled
-success.
-
-Thus, after the first Wenlock Loyal Volunteers were disbanded, Squire
-Forester found but little respite; he and the Willey fox-hunters again
-felt it their duty to come forward and enroll themselves in the Second
-Wenlock Royal Volunteers.
-
-                   “Design whate’er we will,
-    There is a fate which overrules us still.”
-
-No man was better fitted to undertake the task; no one knew better how
-
-    “By winning words to conquer willing hearts,
-    And make persuasion do the work of fear.”
-
-And, mainly through his exertions, an able corps was formed, consisting
-of a company and a half at Much Wenlock, a company and a half at
-Broseley, and half a company at Little Wenlock; altogether forming a
-battalion of 280 men.  For the county altogether there were raised 940
-cavalry, 5,022 infantry; rank and file, 5,852.  Mr. Harries, of Benthall;
-Mr. Turner, of Caughley; Mr. Pritchard and Mr. Onions, of Broseley;
-Messrs. W. and R. Anstice, of Madeley Wood and Coalport; Mr. Collins, Mr.
-Jeffries, and Mr. Hinton, of Wenlock; and others, were among the officers
-and leading members.  The uniform was handsome, the coat being scarlet,
-turned up with yellow, the trousers and waistcoat white, and the hat a
-cube, with white and red feathers for the grenadiers, and green ones for
-the light company.  The old hall once more resounded with martial music,
-the clang of arms, and patriotic songs; drums and fifes, clarionets and
-bugles, were piled up with guns and accoutrements in the form of
-trophies, above the massive chimney-piece, putting the deer-horns, the
-foxes’ heads, and the old cabinets of oak—black as ebony—out of
-countenance by their gaudy colouring.  People became as familiar with the
-music of military bands as with the sound of church bells; both were
-heard together on Sundays, the days generally selected for drill, for
-heavy taxes were laid on, and people had to work hard to pay them, which
-they did willingly.  The Squire had the women on his side, and he worked
-upon the men through the women.  There was open house at Willey, and no
-baron of olden time dealt out hospitality more willingly or more
-liberally.  The Squire was here, there, and everywhere, visiting
-neighbouring squires, giving or receiving information, stirring up the
-gentry, and frightening country people out of their wits.  _Boney_ became
-more terrible than _bogy_, both to children and grown-up persons; and the
-more vague the notion of invasion to Shropshire inlanders, the more
-horrible the evils to be dreaded.  The clergy preached about Bonaparte
-out of the Revelations; conjurers and “wise-men,” greater authorities
-even then than the clergy, saw a connection between Bonaparte and the
-strange lights which every one had seen in the heavens!  The popular
-notion was that “Boney” was an undefined, horrible monster, who had a
-sheep dressed every morning for breakfast, who required an ox for his
-dinner, and had six little English children cooked—when he could get
-them—for supper!  At the name of “Boney” naughty children were
-frightened, and a false alarm of his coming and landing often made
-grown-up men turn pale.
-
-                “This way and that the anxious mind is torn.”
-
-The impulse was in proportion to the alarm; the determination raised was
-spirited and praiseworthy.  Stout hearts constituted an _impromptu_
-force, daily advancing in organization, with arms and accoutrements,
-ready to march with knapsacks to any point where numbers might be
-required.  Once or twice, when a company received orders to march, as to
-Bridgnorth, for instance, an alarm was created among wives, daughters,
-and sweethearts, that they were about to join the battalion for active
-service, and stories are told of leave-takings and weepings on such
-occasions.  Beacons were erected, and bonfires prepared on the highest
-points of the country round, as being the quickest means of transmitting
-news of the approach of an enemy.  Of these watch-fire signals, Macaulay
-says:—
-
-    “On and on, without a horse untired, they hounded still
-    All night from tower to tower, they sprang from hill to hill,
-    Till the proud peak unfurled the flag o’er Derwent’s rocky dales,—
-    Till like volcanoes flared to heaven the stormy hills of Wales,—
-    Till twelve fair counties saw the blaze on Malvern’s lonely height,—
-    Till streamed in crimson on the wind the Wrekin’s crest of light—
-    Till broad and fierce the star came forth on Elsig’s stately fane,
-    And tower and hamlet rose in arms o’er all the boundless plain.”
-
-Within a mile of Willey Hall a tenant of Squire Forester, and, as we have
-seen, an occasional guest—John Wilkinson, “the great ironmaster”—was
-urging his men day and night to push the manufacture of shot, shell,
-howitzers, and guns, which Mr. Forester believed were for the government
-of the country, but many of which were designed for its enemies.  Night
-and day heavy hammers were thundering, day and night the “great blast”
-was blowing.  He was well known to the French government and French
-engineers, having erected the first steam engine there in 1785, for which
-he was highly complimented by the Duke d’Angouleme, M. Bertrand, and
-others, and treated to a grand banquet, given to him on the 14th of
-January, 1786, at the Hôtel de Ville.  Arthur Young, in his travels in
-France, tells us that until this well-known English manufacturer arrived
-the French knew nothing of the art of casting cannon from the solid, and
-then boring them.  When Wilkinson returned to England, he continued to
-send guns after war had been declared.  This clandestine proceeding came
-to the knowledge of Squire Forester, who swore, and roared like a caged
-lion.  Here was the Squire, who boasted of his loyalty to good King
-George, having the minerals of his estate worked up into guns for those
-wretched French, whom he detested.  He declared he would hunt Wilkinson
-out of the country; but the latter took care to keep out of his way.
-
-The exposure ended in a seizure being made.  But Wilkinson, a
-money-getting, unprincipled fellow, finding he could not send guns
-openly, sent best gun-iron in rude blocks, with a pretence that they were
-for ballast for shipping, but which, like some of his water-pipes, were
-used for making guns.  His warehouse was at Willey Wharf, on the Severn,
-by which they were sent, when there was sufficient water, in barges,
-which took them out into the British Channel, and round the coast to
-French cruisers; and it was at this wharf he built his first famous iron
-barge.  The proprietors of the Calcutts furnaces, at which young
-Cochrane, afterwards Earl Dundonald—one of the last of our old “Sea
-Lions”—spent some time, when a boy, with his father, Lord Dundonald,
-{171} were also casting and boring guns; but, in consequence of refusing
-to fee Government servants at Woolwich, the manufacturers had a number of
-them thrown upon their hands, which they sold to a firm at Rotherham, and
-which found their way to India, where they were recognised by old workmen
-in the army, who captured them during the Sikh war.  At the same time
-cannon which burst, and did almost as much damage to the English as to
-their enemies, were palmed off upon the nation.
-
-Mr. Forester wrote to the Duke of York, who came down, accompanied by the
-Prince of Orange, to examine the guns for himself; and a number of 18 and
-32-pounders were fired in honour of the event.  Others were subjected to
-various tests, to the entire satisfaction of the visitors.
-
-At this period the Willey country presented a spectacle altogether
-unparalleled in Mr. Forester’s experience; his entire sympathy and that
-of his fox-hunting friends was enlisted in the warlike movements
-everywhere going forward, for the standards of the Wenlock and Morfe
-Volunteers now drew around them men of all classes.  Farmers allowed
-their ploughs to stand still in the furrows, that the peasant might hurry
-with the artisan, musket on shoulder, to his rallying point in the fields
-near Wenlock, Broseley, or Bridgnorth.  Whigs and Tories stood beside
-each other in the Volunteer ranks, heart-burnings and divisions as to
-principles and policy were for the time forgotten, and the Squire,
-although now unable to take the same active part he formerly did,
-contributed materially by his presence and advice to the zeal and
-alacrity which distinguished his neighbours.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XV.
-THE WILLEY SQUIRE AMONG HIS NEIGHBOURS.
-
-
-The Squire among his Neighbours—Roger de Coverley—Anecdotes—Gentlemen
-nearest the Fire in the Lower Regions—Food Riots—The Squire quells the
-Mob—His Virtues and his Failings—Influences of the Times—His Career draws
-to a Close—His wish for Old Friends and Servants to follow him to the
-Grave—That he may be buried in the Dusk of Evening—His Favourite Horse to
-be shot—His Estates to go to his Cousin, Cecil Weld, the First Lord
-Forester.
-
-LIKE Addison’s Sir Roger de Coverley, the Willey Squire lived a father
-among his tenants, a friend among his neighbours, and a good master
-amongst his servants, who seldom changed.  He feasted the rich, and did
-not forget the poor, but allowed them considerable privileges on the
-estate; and there are a few old people—it is true there are but few—who
-remember interviews they had with the Squire when going to gather
-bilberries in the park, or when sent on some errand to the Hall.  An old
-man, who brightened up at the mention of the Squire’s name, said,
-“Remember him, I think I do; he intended that I should do so.  I was sent
-by my mother to the Hall for barm, when, seeing an old man in the yard,
-and little thinking it was the Squire, I said, ‘Sirrah, is there going to
-be any stir here to-day?’  ‘Aye, lad,’ says he, ‘come in, and see;’ and
-danged if he didn’t get the horse-whip and stir me round the kitchen,
-where he pretended to flog me, laughing the while ready to split his
-sides.  He gave me a rare blow out though, and my mother found
-half-a-crown at the bottom of the jug when she poured out the barm.”
-“Did you ever hear of his being worsted by the sweep?” said another.  “He
-was generally a match for most, but the sweep was too much for him.  The
-Squire had been out, and, being caught in a storm, he called at a
-public-house to shelter.  Seeing that it was Mr. Forester, the customers
-made way for him to sit next the fire, and whilst he was drying himself a
-sweep came to the door, and looked in; but, seeing the Squire, he was
-making off again.  ‘Hollo,’ said Mr. Forester, ‘what news from the lower
-region?’  ‘Oh,’ replied the sweep, ‘things are going on there, Squire,
-much as they are here—the _gentlemen are nearest the fire_!’”  A third of
-our informants remarked: “He was one of the old sort, but a right ’un.
-Why, when there was a bad harvest, and no work for men, after one of them
-war times, and the colliers were rioting and going to break open the
-shops, to tear down the flour mill, and do other damage, the old Squire
-was the only man that could stop them—he had such influence with the
-people.  The poor never wanted a friend whilst old George Forester lived.
-There were plenty of broken victuals to be had for the fetching, a
-tankard of right good ale, with bread and cheese, or cold mutton, for all
-comers.”
-
-                         [Picture: Willey Church]
-
-The years 1774–1782 were periods of local gloom and distress, when
-haggard hunger and ignorant force banded together to trample down the
-safeguards of civil rights, and armed ruffians took the initiative in
-violent scrambles for food.  The cavalry were called out, and fierce
-battles were fought in the iron districts, where the rioters sometimes
-took refuge on cinder heaps, which supplied them with sharp cutting
-missiles.  In 1795 the colliers and iron-workers being in a state of
-commotion, were only prevented from rising by assurances that gentlemen
-of property were disposed to contribute liberally to their relief, and
-thousands of bushels of Indian corn were obtained by the Squire and
-others from Liverpool to add to the grain procurable in the neighbourhood
-to meet immediate necessities.  A meeting of gentlemen, farmers, millers,
-and tradesmen was held at the Tontine Hotel, on the 9th of July in that
-year, to consider the state of things arising out of the scarcity of corn
-and the dearness of all other provisions, at which a committee was formed
-for the immediate collection of contributions and the purchase of grain
-at a reduction of one-fourth, or 9_s._ for 12_s._  Mr. Forester at once
-gave notice to all his tenants to deliver wheat to the committee at
-12_s._, whilst he himself gave £105, and agreed to advance £700 more, to
-be repaid from the produce of the corn sold at a reduced price.  Such
-were the wants of the district, the murmurs of the inhabitants, and the
-distinctions made between those who were considered benefactors, and
-others who were not, that fear was entertained of a general uprising; and
-application was made to Mr. Forester, both as a friend and a magistrate.
-He assumed more the character of the former, and his presence acted like
-magic upon the rough miners, who by his kindness and tact were at once
-put into good humour.  Having brought waggons of coal, drawn with ropes,
-for sale, the first thing the Squire did was to purchase the coal: he
-then bought up all the butter in the market, and purchased all the bread
-in the town, he emptied the butchers’ shops in the same way, and advised
-the men to go home with the provisions he gave them.
-
-We are quite aware that it might be said that Squire Forester was not a
-model for imitation; and it might be replied that no man ever was,
-altogether, even for men of his own time, much less for those of one or
-two generations removed, always excepting Him whose name should never be
-uttered lightly, and in whom the human and divine were combined.  He had
-sufficient inherent good qualities, however, to make half a dozen
-ordinary modern country gentlemen popular; still his one failing, shared
-among the same number, might no less damn them in the eyes of society.
-
-Some would, no doubt, have liked Dibdin’s heroes better if he had been
-less truthful, by making the language more agreeable to the ear, by
-substituting, as one writer has said, “dear me” for “damme,” and lemonade
-for grog; but such critics are what Dibdin himself called “lubbers” and
-“swabs.”  In the same way, some would be for toning down the characters
-of Squire Forester and Parson Stephens; but this would be a mistake: an
-artist might as well smooth over with vegetation every out-cropping rock
-he finds in his foreground.  We might say a great deal more about the old
-Squire, and the Willey Rector too, but there is no reason why we should
-say less.  If we err, we err with the best and gravest writers of
-history, who, without fear or favour, wrote of things as they found them;
-and those who are familiar with the writings of men of the past—such as
-the Sixth Satire of Juvenal, will admit that men like Squire Forester
-were examples of modesty.  Men of all grades, every day, are brought in
-contact with much that might more strongly be objected to in the public
-Press; and there is no reason why the veil should not be raised in order
-that we may view the past as it really was.
-
-The fact is, the Squire found the atmosphere of the times congenial to
-his temperament.  A very popular Shropshire rake and play writer,
-Wycherley, had done much to lower the tone of morality by representing
-peccadilloes, not as something which the violence of passion may excuse,
-but as accomplishments worthy of gentlemen,—his “Country Wife” and “Plain
-Dealer” being examples.  Congreve followed in his wake, with his “Old
-Bachelor,” which may be judged by its apothegm:—
-
-    “What rugged ways attend the noon of life;
-    Our sun declines, and with what anxious strife,
-    What pain, we tug that galling load—a wife!”
-
-A fair estimate of the looseness of the time may be formed from another
-representation:—
-
-    “The miracle to-day is, that we find
-    A lover true, not that a woman’s kind;”
-
-and from the fact that even Pope, in his “Epistle to a Lady,” out of his
-mature experience could write—
-
-    “Men some to business, some to pleasure take,
-    But every woman is at heart a rake.”
-
-The Squire had been jilted, and breathing such an atmosphere, no wonder
-he cast lingering looks to the time
-
-    “Ere one to one was cursedly confined,”
-
-or that he never married.  It is fortunate he did not, for Venus herself,
-we fancy, could not have kept him by her side.  His amours were
-notorious, and some of his mistresses were rare specimens of rustic
-beauty.  Two daring spirits who followed the hounds were regular Dianas
-in their way, and he spent much of his time in the rural little cottages
-of these and others which were dotted over the estate at no great
-distance from the Hall.  As rare Ben Jonson has it:—
-
-    “When some one peculiar quality
-    Doth so possess a man that it doth draw
-    All his effects, his spirits, and his powers,
-    In their confluction all to run one way,
-    This may be truly said to be a humour.”
-
-Such a humour the old Squire had.  Towards the last he found that some of
-his mistresses gave him a good deal of trouble; for in carrying out his
-desire to leave them comfortably provided for, his best intentions
-created jealousy, and he found it difficult to adjust their claims as
-regarded matters of income, Phœbe Higgs, who survived the Squire many
-years, and lived in a cottage with land attached, on the Willey side of
-the Shirlot, being the most clamorous.  She set out one night with the
-intention of shooting the Squire, but was unnerved by her favourite
-monkey, who had stealthily gone on before, and jumped unobserved on her
-shoulder as she opened a gate.  On another occasion she succeeded in
-surprising the Squire by forcing her way into his room and pointing a
-loaded pistol at him across the table, vowing she would shoot him unless
-he promised to make the sum left for her maintenance equal to that of
-Miss Cal—t.  He had his children educated; they frequently visited at the
-Hall, and some married well.  He speaks of them as his children and
-grandchildren in his letters, and manifested the greatest anxiety that
-everything should be done that could be done, by provisions in his will
-for those he was about to leave behind him.  Indeed the same
-characteristics which gave a colouring to his life distinguished him to
-the last; and if the old fires burnt less brightly, the same inner sense
-and outward manifestations were evident in all he did.
-
-One thing which troubled him was the chancel of Barrow Church, as will be
-seen by the following characteristic letter to his agent, Mr. Pritchard,
-asking him to procure a legal opinion about certain encroachments upon
-what he conceived to be his rights, and those of the parishioners:—
-
-    “DEAR SIR,—
-
-    “You must remember Parson Jones has oft been talking to me about the
-    pews put up, unfairly, I think, in the chancel of Barrow church.  The
-    whole of the chancel is mine as patron, and I am always obliged to do
-    all the repairs to it, whenever wanted.  There is a little small pew
-    in it of very ancient date, besides these other two; in this, I
-    suppose, it is intended to thrust poor me, the patron, into; humble
-    and meek, and deprived of every comfort on my own spot, the chancel.
-    The parson, you know, has been saucy on the occasion, as you know all
-    black Toms are, and therefore I’ll now know my power from Mr. Mytton,
-    and set the matter straight somehow or other.  I can safely swear at
-    this minute a dozen people of this parish (crowd as they will) can’t
-    receive the Sacrament together, and therefore, instead of there being
-    pews of any kind therein, there ought to be none at all, but a free
-    unencumbered chancel at this hour.  Rather than be as it is, I’ll be
-    at the expense of pulling the present chancel down, rebuilding and
-    enlarging it, so as to make all convenient and clever, before I’ll
-    suffer these encroachments attended with every insult upon earth.
-    Surely upon a representation to the bishop that the present chancel
-    is much too small, and that the patron, at his own expense, wishes to
-    enlarge it, I cannot think but it will be comply’d with.  If this is
-    not Mr. Mytton’s opinion as the best way, what is? and how am I to
-    manage these encroaches?
-
-                                                              “Yours ever,
-                                                                         —
-
-    “P.S.—If the old chancel is taken down, I’ll take care that no pew
-    shall stand in the new one.  Mr. Mytton will properly turn this in
-    his mind, and I’ll then face the old kit of them boldly.  The old pew
-    I spoke of, besides the other two in the chancel (mean and dirty as
-    it is to a degree), yet the parson wants to let, if he does not do so
-    now, to any person that comes to church, no matter who, so long as he
-    gets the cash.  It’s so small no one can sit with bended knees in it;
-    and, in short, the whole chancel is not more than one-half as big as
-    the little room I am now seated in; which must apparently show you,
-    and, on your representation, Mr. Mytton likewise, how much too small
-    it must be for so large a parish as Barrow, and with the addition of
-    three pews—one very large indeed, the next to hold two or three
-    people abreast, and the latter about three sideways, always standing,
-    and totally unable to kneel in the least comfort.”
-
-Years were beginning to tell upon the old sportsman, reminding him that
-his career was drawing to a close, and he appeared to apprehend the truth
-Sir Thomas Brown embodied in the remark, that every hour adds to the
-current arithmetic, which scarce stands one moment; and since “the
-longest sun sets at right declensions,” he looked forward to that setting
-and made arrangements accordingly, which were in perfect keeping with the
-character of the man.  He felt that his day was done, that night was
-coming on; and it was his wish that those who knew him best should be
-those chosen to attend his funeral, that his domestics and servants who
-had experienced his kindness should carry him to the tomb.  And let it be
-when the sun goes down, when the work of the day is done; let each have a
-guinea, that he may meet his neighbour afterwards and talk over, if he
-likes, the merits and demerits of his old master, as none—next to his
-Maker—know them better.  The provisions in the will of the old Squire, in
-which he left his estates to his cousin Cecil, afterwards Lord Forester,
-father of the present Right Hon. Lord Forester, made about five years
-before his death, were evidently made in this spirit.
-
-He became ill at one of his cottages on Shirlot, was taken home, attended
-by Dr. Thursfield (grandfather of the present Greville Thursfield, M.D.),
-and died whilst the doctor was still with him, on the 13th of July, 1811,
-in the seventy-third year of his age.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-    EXTRACTS _from the last Will and Testament_ (_dated the_ 3_rd_ _day
-    of November_, 1805) _of George Forester_, _late of Willey_, _in the
-    County of Salop_, _Esquire_.
-
-    “I desire that all my just debts and funeral expenses, and the
-    charges of proving this my Will, may be paid and discharged by my
-    Executors hereinafter named, with all convenient speed after my
-    decease, and that my body may be interred in a grave near the
-    Communion table in the Parish Church of Willey aforesaid, or as near
-    thereto as may be, in a plain and decent manner.  And it is my Will
-    that eight of my Servants or Workmen be employed as Bearers of my
-    body to the grave, to each of whom I bequeath the sum of One Guinea,
-    and I desire my Cousin Cecil Forester, of Ross Hall, in the County of
-    Salop, Esquire, Member of Parliament for the Town and Liberties of
-    Wenlock, in the same County, the eldest son of my late uncle, Colonel
-    Cecil Forester, deceased, to fix upon and appoint six of those of my
-    friends and companions in the neighbourhood of Willey aforesaid, whom
-    he knew to have been intimate with, and respected by, me, to be
-    Bearers of the Pall at my funeral, and I request that my body may be
-    carried to its burial-place in the dusk of the evening.
-
-    “And I do hereby direct that my chestnut horse, commonly called the
-    Aldenham horse, shall be shot as soon as conveniently may be after my
-    decease by two persons, one of whom to fire first, and the other to
-    wait in reserve and fire immediately afterwards, so that he may be
-    put to death as expeditiously as possible, and I direct that he shall
-    afterwards be buried with his hide on, and that a flat stone without
-    inscription shall be placed over him.  And I do hereby request my
-    Cousin Cecil Forester and the said John Pritchard, as soon as
-    conveniently may be after my decease, to look over and inspect the
-    letters, papers, and writings belonging to me at the time of my
-    decease, and such of them as they shall deem to be useless I desire
-    them to destroy.”
-
-His wishes, we need scarcely say, were carried out to the letter.  He was
-buried by torchlight in the family vault in Willey Church, beneath the
-family pew, to which the steps shown in our engraving lead.  Founded and
-endowed by the lords of Willey at some remote period, this venerable
-edifice has remained, with the exception of its chancel, the same as we
-see it, for many generations past.  It stands within the shadow of the
-Old Hall, and might from its appearance have formed the text of Gray’s
-ivy-mantled tower, where
-
-    “The moping owl does to the moon complain;”
-
-being covered with a luxuriant growth of this clinging evergreen to the
-very top.  Standing beneath, and peering through the Norman-looking
-windows, which admit but a sober light, glimpses are obtained of costly
-monuments with the names and titles of patrons whose escutcheons are
-visible against the wall.  The Squire’s tomb remains uninscribed; but in
-1821 Cecil Weld, the first Lord Forester, erected a marble tablet near,
-with the simple record—“To the memory of my late cousin and benefactor,
-George Forester, Esq., Willey Park, May 10, 1821.”
-
-
-
-
-THE SQUIRE’S CHESTNUT MARE.
-
-
-                           A NEW HUNTING SONG.
-
-          _Written for the present Work by_ J. P. DOUGLAS, ESQ.
-
-    AWAY we go! my mare and I,
-       Over fallow and lea:
-    She’s carried me twenty years or nigh—
-       The best of friends are we.
-    With steady stride she sweeps along,
-       The old Squire on her back:
-    While echoes far, earth’s sweetest sound,
-       The music of the pack.
-    Ah! how they stare, both high and low,
-    To see the “Willey chestnut” go.
-
-    Full many a time, from dewy morn
-       Until the day was done,
-    We’ve follow’d the huntsman’s ringing horn,
-       Proud of a gallant run.
-    Well in the front, my mare and I—
-       A good ’un to lead is she;
-    For’ard, hark for’ard! still the cry—
-       In at the death are we.
-    My brave old mare—when I’m laid low
-    Shall never another master know.
-
-    The sailor fondly loves his ship,
-       The gallant loves his lass;
-    The toper drains with fever’d lip,
-       His deep, full-bottom’d glass.
-    Away! such hollow joys I scorn,
-       But give to me, I pray,
-    The cry of the hounds, the sounding horn,
-       For’ard! hark, hark away!
-    And this our burial chant shall be,
-    For the chestnut mare shall die with me!
-
-
-
-
-APPENDIX.
-
-
-A.—_Page_ 10.
-
-
-STRUTT, quoting from the book of St. Alban’s the sort of birds assigned
-to the different ranks of persons, places them in the following order:—
-
-The eagle, the vulture, and the melona for an emperor.
-The ger-falcon and the tercel of the ger-falcon for a king.
-The falcon gentle and the tercel gentle for a prince.
-The falcon of the rock for a duke.
-The falcon peregrine for an earl.
-The bastard for a baron.
-The sacre and the sacret for a knight.
-The lanere and the laneret for an esquire.
-The marlyon for a lady.
-The hobby for a young man.
-The gos-hawk for a yeoman.
-The tercel for a poor man.
-The sparrow-hawk for a priest.
-The musket for a holy-water clerk.
-The kesterel for a knave or a servant.
-
-Of some of the later and milder measures taken to protect the hawk, it
-may be remarked that the 5th of Elizabeth, c. 21, enacts that if any
-person shall unlawfully take any hawks, or their eggs, out of the woods
-or ground of any person, and be thereof convicted at the assizes or
-sessions on indictment, bill or information at the suit of the king, or
-of the party, he shall be imprisoned three months, and pay treble
-damages, and after the expiration of three months shall find sureties for
-his good abearing for seven years, or remain in prison till he doth, § 3.
-
-The last statute concerning _falconry_ (except a clause in 7 Jac. c. 11,
-which limits the time of hawking at pheasants and partridges) is that of
-the 23rd Eliz. c. 10, which enacts that if any manner of person shall
-hawk in another man’s corn after it is eared, and before it is shocked,
-and be therefore convicted at the assizes, sessions, or leet, he shall
-pay 40_s._ to the owner, and if not paid within ten days he shall be
-imprisoned for a month.
-
-
-
-B.—_Page_ 41.
-
-
-Mr. Eyton, to whose learned and valuable work on the “Antiquities of
-Shropshire” the author again acknowledges his obligations, as all who
-follow that painstaking writer must do, with regard to the holding at the
-More, says, “The earliest notice of this tenure which occurs in the Roll
-of Shropshire Sergeantries, is dated 13th of John, 1211, and merely says
-that Richard de Medler holds one virgate of land, and renders for the
-same annually, at the Feast of St. Michael, two knives (knifeulos).  A
-second contemporary roll supplies the place of payment, viz., the
-Exchequer; a third writes the name, Richard le Mener.  In 1245 Nicholas
-de More is said to pay at the Exchequer two knives (cultellos)—one good,
-the other very bad—for certain land which he holds of the King in capite
-in More.  In 1255 the Stottesden Jurors report that Nicholas de Medler
-holds one virgate in More, in capite of the Lord King, rendering at the
-Exchequer two knives, one of which ought to cut a hazel rod, and he does
-no other service for the said land.  In that of 1274 Jurors of the same
-Hundred say at length that Nicholas de la More holds one virgate in that
-vill of the Lord King, in capite, by sergeantry, of taking two knives to
-the King’s Exchequer, at the feast of St. Michael in each year, so that
-he ought to cut a hazel rod with one knife, so that the knife should bend
-(plicare) with the stroke; and again, to cut a rod with the other knife.
-The record of 1284 describes Nicholas de la More as holding three parts
-of a virgate and two moors, by sergeantry, &c.  The Jurors of Oct. 1292
-say that William de la More, of Erdington, holds one virgate in the More,
-by sergeantry of taking two knives to the King’s Exchequer on the morrow
-of St. Michael, and to cut with the same knives two hazel rods.”
-
-
-
-C—_Page_ 49.
-
-
-This bold projecting rock is called, from Major Thomas, “Smallman’s
-Leap,” from a tradition that the major, a staunch Royalist, being
-surprised by a party of Cromwell’s horse, was singly and hotly pursued
-over Westwood, where, finding all hope of escape at an end, he turned
-from the road, hurried his horse into a full gallop to the edge of the
-precipice, and went over.  The horse was killed by falling on the trees
-beneath, but the major escaped, and secreted himself in the woods.
-Certain historical facts, showing that the family long resided here,
-appear to give a colouring to this tradition.  Thus, in the reign of
-Henry III. (57th year) William Smallman had a lease from John Lord of
-Brockton par Shipton, Corvedale, of 17½ acres of land, with a sytche,
-called Woolsytche, and two parcels of meadow in the fields of Brockton.
-John Smallman possessed by lease and grant, from Thomas de la Lake, 30
-acres of land in the fields of Larden par Shipton, for twenty years from
-the feast of St. Michael, living 4th Edward II. (1310) 41st Edward III.
-(1367), Richard Smallman, of Shipton, granted to Roger Powke, of
-Brockton, all his lands and tenements in the township and fields of
-Shipton, as fully as was contained in an original deed.  Witnesses—John
-de Galford, Sir Roger Mon (Chaplain), Henry de Stanwy, John Tyklewardyne
-(Ticklarton), of Stanton, John de Gurre of the same, with others.  1st
-Henry VI. (1422), John Smallman was intrusted with the collection of the
-subsidies of taxes payable to the Crown within the franchise of Wenlock.
-Thomas Smallman, of Elton, co. Harford, and Inner Temple,
-barrister-at-law, afterwards a Welsh judge, purchased the manor of
-Wilderhope, Stanway, and the teg and estates, and had a numerous grant of
-arms, 5th October, 1589.  Major Thomas Smallman, a staunch royalist, born
-1624, compounded for his estate £140.
-
-Underneath this bold projecting headland, sometimes called “Ipikin’s
-Rock,” is Ipikin’s Cave, an excavation very difficult of approach, where
-tradition alleges a bold outlaw long concealed himself and his horse, and
-from which he issued to make some predatory excursion.
-
-The term _hope_, both as a prefix and termination, is of such frequent
-occurrence here that it is only natural to suppose that it has some
-special signification; and looking at the positions of Prest_hope_,
-East_hope_, Millic_hope_, Middle_hope_, Wilder_hope_, _Hope_say, and
-_Hope_ Bowdler, that signification appears to be a recess, or place
-remote between the hills.  Easthope is a rural little village about two
-miles beyond Ipikin’s Rock, pleasantly situated in one of these long
-natural troughs which follow the direction of Wenlock Edge.
-
-It appears to have been within the Long Forest, and is mentioned in
-Domesday as being held in Saxon times by Eruni and Uluric; it was
-afterwards held by Edric de Esthop, and others of the same name.  There
-was a church here as early as 1240, and in the graveyard, between two
-ancient yews, are two tombs, without either date or inscription, in which
-two monks connected with the Abbey of Wenlock are supposed to have been
-interred.
-
-Near Easthope, and about midway between Larden Hall and Lutwyche Hall, is
-an enclosure comprising about eight acres, or an encampment, forming
-nearly an entire circle, surrounded by inner and outer fosses.  The
-internal slope of the inner wall is 12 feet, and externally 25, while the
-crest of the parapet is 6 feet broad.  The relief of the second vallum
-rises 10 feet from the fosse, and is about 12 feet across its parapet.
-There is also a second ditch, but it is almost obliterated.  It is
-supposed to have been a military post, forming an important link in the
-chain of British entrenchments which stretched throughout this portion of
-the county.  Near it a mound resembling a tumulus was opened some years
-since by the Rev. R. More and T. Mytton, Esq., and in or near which a
-British urn of baked clay was discovered, on another occasion, while
-making a drain.
-
-
-
-D.—_Page_ 66.
-
-
-    “Proavus meus Richardus de isto matrimonio susceptus uxorem habuit
-    Annam Richardi dicti Forestarii filiam qui quidem Richardus filius
-    erat natu minor prænobilis familiæ Forestariorum (olim Regiorum
-    Vigorniensis saltûs custodum) et famoso Episcopo Bonnero a-Secritis
-    Hic Suttanum Madoci incolebat, et egregias ædes posuit in urbicula
-    dicta Brugge, sive ad Pontem vel hodie dictas Forestarii Dementiam,”
-
-
-
-E.—PEDIGREE OF THE FORESTER FAMILY, _Page_ 69.
-
-
-In his “Sheriffs of Shropshire,” Mr. Blakeway in speaking of the Forester
-family, says: “They were originally Foresters, an office much coveted by
-our ancestors, which latter seems probable, from the fact, that on the
-Pipe Rolls of 1214, Hugh Forester accounts for a hundred merks that he
-may hold the bailiwick of the forest of Salopscire, as his father held it
-before him.”  King John, however, remits thirty merks of the payment in
-consequence of Hugh having taken to wife the niece of John l’Estrange, at
-_His Majesty’s request_.  It does not seem clear, however, that Hugh, the
-son of Robert, can be traced to have been in the direct line of the
-Willey family, he having been ancestor to Roger, son of John, the first
-of the king’s six foresters.  The other, Robert de Wellington, the late
-Mr. George Morris, in his “Genealogies of the Principal Landed
-Proprietors,” now in the possession of T. C. Eyton, Esq., to whose
-kindness we are indebted for this extract, says was the earliest person
-that can certainly be called ancestor of the present family of Forester.
-His sergeantry is described as the custody of the King’s Hay of Eyton, of
-which, and several adjoining manors, Peter de Eyton, lineal ancestor of
-the present Thomas Campbell Eyton, of Eyton, and grandson of Robert de
-Eyton, who gave the whole of the Buttery estate to Shrewsbury Abbey, was
-the lord.
-
-Thomas, a son of Robert Forester of Wellington, in the Hundred Rolls, in
-1254, is said by the king’s justices itinerant to hold half a virgate of
-the king to keep the Hay of Wellington.  Roger le Forester of Wellington,
-who succeeded Robert, appears to have died 1277–8, and to have left two
-sons, Robert and Roger.  Robert had property in Wellington and the
-Bailiwick of the forest of the Wrekin, and is supposed to have succeeded
-his father, whom he did not long survive, having died the year following,
-1278–9.  Roger his brother succeeded to his possession, and held also the
-Hay of Wellington, of which he died seized in 1284–5.  Robert, the
-Forester of Wellington, Mr. Blakeway says, occurs in the Hundred Roll of
-Bradford in 1287, and is shown to have held the Hay of Wellington till
-1292–3, when Roger, son of Roger, proving himself of age, paid the king
-one merk as a relief for his lands in Wellington, held by sergeantry, to
-keep Wellington Hay, in the forest of the Wrekin, &c.  This is the Roger
-de Wellington before-mentioned, as one of King Edward’s foresters by fee,
-recorded in his Great Charter of the forests of Salopssier, in the
-perambulation of 1300.  He died 1331.
-
-John le Forester, as John, son and heir of Roger le Forester de Welynton,
-succeeded to the property, and proved himself of age in the reign of
-Edward III., 1335.  With John de Eyton he attested a grant in Wellington,
-and died 24th of Edward III., 1350.
-
-William le Forester succeeded his father, John, in 1377, and died 19th of
-Richard II., 1395.
-
-In 1397 Roger Forester de Wellington is described as holding Wellington
-Hay and Chace.  He died in 1402.
-
-Roger, his son and heir, was in 1416 appointed keeper of the same haia by
-the Duchess of Norfolk and the Lady Bergavenny, sisters and co-heiresses
-of the great Thomas Fitz-Alan, Earl of Arundel.
-
-His son and successor, John, died 5th of Edward IV. 1465, seized of the
-lands, &c., in Wellington, and the custody of the forest of the Wrekin.
-He had two sons, William and John, also a son Richard; and William, son
-of the above, appears to have been the father of another John, the former
-John having died without issue.  John, in 1506, witnesses a deed of
-Thomas Cresset, as John Forester the younger; he married Joice Upton, the
-heiress of Philip Upton, of Upton under Haymond, and obtained the estate
-of that place, which is still inherited by his descendants.
-
-This John Forester first resided in Watling Street, where his ancestors
-for several generations had lived, in the old timbered mansion, now
-occupied by Dr. Cranage, but he afterwards removed to Easthope, whilst
-his son William resided at Upton; and Richard Forester, alias Forster of
-Sutton Maddock, secretary to Bishop Bonner, who built the old mansion in
-Bridgnorth, called “Forester’s Folly,” which was burnt down during the
-siege of the castle, when the high town became a heap of ruins, appears
-to have been a son of John Forester, of Easthope; and Anthony Forester or
-Foster of Sir Walter Scott’s novel, who was born about 1510, was a son of
-his.
-
-In the 34th of Henry VIII., 1542–3, Thomas Foster and Elizabeth his wife,
-account in the Exchequer for several temporalities in connection with the
-monastery of St. Peter’s, Shrewsbury.  Sir William Forester, KB., married
-Lady Mary Cecil, daughter of James, third Earl of Salisbury.  He was a
-staunch Protestant, and represented the county with George Weld, as
-previously stated, with whom he voted in favour of the succession of the
-House of Hanover, and the family came into possession of the Willey
-estates by the marriage of Brook Forester of Dothill Park, with one of
-the Welds, the famous George Forester, the Willey Squire, being the fruit
-of that marriage.  George Forester left the whole of his estates to his
-cousin, Cecil Forester, of Ross Hall, who was allowed by George the
-Fourth, whose personal friendship he had been permitted to enjoy for many
-years, to add the name of Weld in 1821.  Cecil Weld Forester, Esq., was
-ennobled the same year by George the Fourth, who, when Prince of Wales,
-honoured him with a visit at Ross Hall.  He married Catherine, daughter
-of His Grace the fourth Duke of Rutland, and was not less renowned than
-his cousin, as a sportsman.  His eagerness for the chase was happily
-characterised by the late Mr. Meynell, who used to say, “First out of
-cover came Cecil Forester, next the fox, and then my hounds.”  A famous
-leap of his, thirty feet across a stream, on his famous horse Bernardo,
-has been recorded in some lines now at Willey which accompany the
-portrait of the horse.  He is supposed to have been one of the first who
-instituted the present system of hard riding to hounds, and a horse known
-to have been ridden by him, it is said, would at any time fetch £20 more
-than the ordinary price.  Speaking of the classic proportions of a horse,
-and the perfection of the art of riding in connection with his lordship
-as a sportsman, Colonel Apperley, remarked some years ago, “Unless a man
-sits gracefully on his horse, and handles him well, that fine effect is
-lost.  As the poet says, he would be incorporated with the brave beast,
-and such does Lord Forester appear to be.  His eye to a country is also
-remarkably quick, and his knowledge of Leicestershire has given him no
-small advantage.  On one occasion he disregarded the good old English
-custom of ‘looking before you leap,’ and landed in the middle of a deep
-pool.  ‘Hold on,’ a countryman who saw him, shouted to others coming in
-the same direction.  ‘Hold your tongue—say nothing, we shall have it full
-in a minute,’ said Lord Forester.”  The Colonel added, “In consequence of
-residing in Shropshire, a country which has been so long famous for its
-breed of horses, he has a good opportunity of mounting himself well.  He
-always insisted on the necessity of lengthy shoulders, good fetlocks,
-well formed hind legs and open feet; and knowing better than to confound
-strength and size, his horses seldom exceeded fifteen hands.  On anything
-relating to a hunter his authority has long been considered classic, and
-if Forester said so it was enough.  Lord Forester will always stand
-pre-eminent in the field, whilst in private life he is a very friendly
-man, and has ever adhered to those principles of honour and integrity
-which characterise the gentleman.”  He died on the 23rd of May, 1828, in
-his 61st year.  He had, as we have said, ten children, the gallant Frank
-Forester, as Colonel Apperley styles him, being one.  The oldest was the
-present Right Hon. J. G. W. Forester, whose popularity in connection with
-the Belvoir Hunt is so well known.
-
-His lordship, whose portrait we give at the commencement of this work,
-and who is now in the 73rd year of his age, has added very much to the
-Willey estates, both by purchase and by improvements, and is very much
-esteemed by his tenantry.
-
-The Right Hon. General Forester, who succeeded his brother in the
-representation of Wenlock, has sat for the borough for forty-five years,
-and is now the Father of the House of Commons.  Whether out-door
-exercises, associated with the pleasures of the chase, to which the
-ancestors of the Foresters have devoted themselves for so many centuries,
-have anything to do with it or not we cannot say; but the Foresters are
-remarkable for masculine and feminine beauty, and the General has
-frequently been spoken of by the press as the best looking man in the
-House of Commons.  Neither he nor his elder brother, the present Rt. Hon.
-Lord Forester, are likely to leave behind them direct issue.  The younger
-brother, the Hon. and Rev. O. W. W. Forester, has one son, Cecil, who has
-several sons to perpetuate the name of Forester, which we hope will long
-be associated with Willey.
-
-
-
-
-INDEX.
-
-
-Abbot of Leicester, 15
-   ,, Salop, 6
-   „ Tavistock, 15
-Addison, 80
-Albrighton red-coats, 30
-Aldenham, 32
-Alfred, 19
-Algar, 19
-Apley, 32
-Apperley, Col., 84
-Arrows, 22
-Atterley, 22, 32
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Bachelors’ Hall, 104
-Badger, 52
-Barons’ War, 25
-Barrow, 32
-Battle of Worcester, 26
-Baxter, 65
-Beacons, 168
-Beaver, 4
-Bellet’s, Rev. George, Antiquities of Bridgnorth, 66
-Belswardine, 32
-Benson, M., Esq., 48
-Benthall, 32
-Benthall Edge, 53
-Bernard’s Hill, 23
-Bishop Bonner, 66
-   ,, Percy, 65
-Bittern, 5
-Black Toms, 182
-Bold, 32
-Boney, 167
-Bowman’s Hill, 26
-Bow, the weapon of sport and of war, 22
-Brock-holes, 52
-Broseley, 32, 40
-Brown Clee, 96
-Brug, 40
-Buck, 16
-Buildwas, 100
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Cantreyne, 32
-Castellan, 23
-Castillon, 14
-Cask of wine, 24
-Castle, 22
-Caughley, 32
-Chace of Shirlot, 31
-Chaucer, 46
-Chesterton, 18
-Chester, Earl of, 25
-Chetton, 31
-Childers, 88
-Christmas Day, 38
-Claverley, 25
-Clee Hills, 39
-Cliffords, 40
-Coalbrookdale, 40
-Coed, 19
-Colemore, 32
-Collars of gold, 9
-Constable, 45
-Coracle, 6
-Corbett, 24
-Corve Dale, 51
-Cox Morris, 115
-Craft of Hunting, 16
-Cressage, 49
-Creswick, 45
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-D—n the Church, 116
-Danesford, 19
-Dastardly devils, 157
-Dawley, 58
-Dean, 32
-Deer, 31, 36, 37, 39
-Deer Leap, 36
-Dibdin, 141
-Ditton, 39
-Dodos, 4
-Domesday, 71
-Dothill, 65
-Druids, 46, 50
-Drury Lane, 144
-Duke’s Antiquities, 28
-Duke of York, 171
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Early features of the country, 8
-Earl of Derby, 26
-Earl Dundonald, 171
-Easthope, 49
-Egret, 5
-Elk, Gigantic, 11
-England, The, of our ancestor, 79
-Evelith, 66
-Eyton, 58
-Eyton, Sir H, 63
-Eyton, T. C, 63
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Falcon, 9
-First iron barge, 170
-Fishing a recreation for the sick, 7
-Fishing an attractive art, &c., 6
-   „ practised by primitive dwellers, 5
-Forest Lodge, 28
-Forest Roll, 58
-Forester, Brook, 76
-   „ George, 76
-   ,, Hugh, 58
-   „ John, 63
-   „ Robert, 58, 60, 63
-   „ Roger, 63
-   „ Squire, 76
-   „ William, 73
-Forester’s Folly, 66
-Forster, Richard, 64
-Foster, Anthony, Lord of the Manor of Little Wenlock, 64
-Foster, Anthony, a different character to what Sir Walter Scott
-represents him, 67, 68
-Fox-holes, 52
-Fox-hunters’ Christening, 120
-Fox-hunting Moll, 121
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Gammer Gurton’s Needle, 26, 29
-Gatacre, 26
-Gentlemen nearest the fire, 175
-George Earl of Shrewsbury, 29
-Goats, 25
-Grant, singular, to John Forester, 63
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Hangster’s Gate, 145
-Harold, 48
-Harpswood, 33
-Hay Gate, 59
-Haye, 60
-Haye of Shirlot, 40
-   ,, Wellington, 58
-Hawking, 10
-Hermitage, 26, 27
-Heron, 10
-Hill Top, 49
-Hinton, 115
-Honest old Tom, 89
-Hope Bowdler, 49
-Hughley, 49
-Hugh Montgomery, 39
-Hunting as old as the hills, 1
-Hunting-matches, 61
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Imbert, 40
-Incledon, 143
-Ipikin’s Rock, 49
-Iron, 41
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Kennels, 86
-King Canute, 12
-   „ Edward I., 24
-   ,, „ VI., 29
-   „ Henry I., 13
-   „ „ III. in Shrewsbury, 14
-   ,, ,, III., 28
-   ,, ,, VII., 29
-   „ „ VIII., 10, 63
-   „ John, 10
-   ,, Richard I., 13
-   „ „ II., 28
-   „ William I., 12
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Lacon, 73
-Lady Oak, 49, 50
-Larden, 48
-Larry Palmer, 109
-Latimer, 15
-Legend, 20
-Leland, 41
-Lilleshall, 5
-Linley, 42
-Little Wenlock, 10
-Lodge Farm, 36
-Long runs, 96
-Lutwyche, 48
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Major Forester and his Volunteers, 159
-Marsh and forest periods, 8
-Maypoles, 86
-Merrie days, 16
-Mog Forest, 49
-Moody, 11
-Moody’s Horn, 127
-Morfe Forest, 17
-   „ Volunteers, 172
-Morville, 31
-Mount St. Gilbert, 57
-Muckley Row, 34
-Needle’s Eye, 56
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Oaks, 51
-Offenders in forests, 14
-Old boots, 138
-Old Hall, 73
-   „ Lodge, 29
-   „ names, 27
-   „ records, 96
-   „ style of hunting, 84
-   ,, Simkiss, 96
-   „ tenures, 41
-   ,, Tinker, 96
-   „ trees, 50, 55
-   „ Trojan, 130
-Ordericus Vitalis, 13, 18
-Original letters, 90, 91
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Parson Stephens in his shirt, 111
-Parson Stephens and the poacher, 119
-Pendlestone Mill, 57
-Phœbe Higgs, 95
-Pigmy, 88
-Pilot, 88
-Piers Plowman, 14
-Prince Rufus, 13
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Quatford, 21
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Red deer, 30
-Robin Hood, 23
-Roger de Montgomery, 21
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Savory, 92
-Seabright, 130
-Second Wenlock Loyal Volunteers, 165
-Shade of Tom Moody, 146
-Sherwood, 47
-Shirlot, 34
-Shipton, 51
-Smallman’s Leap, 49
-Smith, Sidney Stedman, Esq., 66
-Smithies, 42
-Sore sparrow-hawk, 9
-Spoonhill, 48
-Sporting priors, 37
-Sporting visitations, 38
-Sportsmen attend, 136
-Squire Forester’s gift to Dibdin, 143
-Squire Forester among his neighbours, 173
-Squire Forester and the rioters, 177
-Squire Forester in Parliament, 151
-Squire Forester not a model for imitation, 177
-Squire Forester notorious for his amours, 180
-Squire Forester, Death of, 185
-   ,, „ Extracts from the will of, 185
-Stoke St. Milburgh, 40
-Stubbs, 89
-Sutton Maddock, 65
-Swainmote, 24, 37
-Swine, 20
-Sylvan slopes, 47
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Tasley, 32
-Taylor, the water-poet, 60
-Tevici, huntsman to Edward I., 12
-Thursfield, Thomas, 44
-   „ William, 84
-Tickwood, 100
-Tom Moody, 122
-Tom Moody’s last request, 135
-Trencher hounds, 130
-Tumuli, 18
-Turner, 114
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Venison, 35
-Vivaries, 5
-Volunteers, 158, 166
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-“Walls,” The, 18
-Wastes, 25
-Weirs, 5
-Welds, The, 73
-Wenlock (Loyal Volunteers), 159
-Wenlock, 38, 152
-Wheatland, 45
-Who-who-hoop, 129
-Wild boar, 29
-Wilkinson, 114
-Willey, 70
-   ,, Church, 173, 186
-   „ rector, 118
-   ,, Wharf, 170
-Williley, 72
-Wilton, 79
-Windfalls, 35
-Woodcraft, 14
-Worf, 18
-Wrekin, 55
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-              PRINTED BY VIRTUE AND CO., CITY ROAD, LONDON.
-
-
-
-
-ADVERTISEMENTS.
-
-
-                          _Price One Shilling_.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                 HANDBOOK
-
-                                  TO THE
-
-                          SEVERN VALLEY RAILWAY,
-
-                     With Twenty-five Illustrations.
-
-                          BY J. RANDALL, F.G.S.
-
-   Author of “The Severn Valley,” “Old Sports and Sportsmen,” “Villages
-                        and Village Churches,” &c.
-
-        [Picture: Illustration of from Severn Valley Railway book]
-
-                   VIRTUE & CO., 26, IVY LANE, LONDON;
-                     J. RANDALL, MADELEY, SHROPSHIRE.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                TENT LIFE
-
-                                   WITH
-
-                        ENGLISH GIPSIES IN NORWAY.
-
-                             BY HUBERT SMITH,
-
-   Member of the English Alpine Club; Norse Turist Forening; and Fellow
-               of the Historical Society of Great Britain.
-
-          _With Five full-page Engravings_, _Thirty-one smaller_
-       _Illustrations_, _and Map of the Country_, _showing Routes_.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-The following is a recent Review of the Book:—
-
-    “We do not know any similar kind of work, and we believe that it will
-    stand alone in the speciality of its interest.
-
-    “In addition to much adventure resulting from a nomadic life in a
-    foreign country, it contains descriptions of scenery, besides
-    information which may instruct the philologist.  A carefully prepared
-    map shows the routes and camp grounds of the Author’s nomadic
-    expedition.
-
-    “The work, in consequence of the death of his late Majesty, Carl XV.,
-    on the 18th Sept., 1872, is dedicated by permission of his present
-    Majesty, Oscar II., ‘_In Memoriam_.’
-
-    “The work has clearly been undertaken at considerable cost, and the
-    scenes of travel described extend over nearly 2,000 miles of sea and
-    land traversed by the Author with tents, gipsies, animal
-    commissariat, and baggage, independent of any other shelter or
-    accommodation than what he took with him.  In the course of the
-    expedition one of the highest waterfalls of Norway was visited,
-    ‘Morte fos,’ and the highest mountain in Norway, the ‘Galdhossiggen’
-    was ascended.  The book is cheap at a guinea, being illustrated with
-    five full-page engravings, all of which are taken from the Author’s
-    original sketches, or photographs specially obtained for the purpose;
-    they are beautiful works of Art, and are admirably executed by the
-    celebrated Mr. Edward Whymper, Author of ‘Scrambles amongst the
-    Alps.’”
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                   LONDON: S. KING & CO., 63, CORNHILL;
-                         AND 72, PATERNOSTER ROW.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
- [Picture: Decorative graphic with letters C S N on it, underneath which
-                           is written Coalport]
-
-                             JOHN ROSE & CO.,
-
-                        _PORCELAIN MANUFACTURERS_,
-
-                          COALPORT, SHROPSHIRE.
-
-   _Five minutes’ walk from Coalport Station on the Severn Valley and_
-                       _Shropshire Union Railways_.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                   MEDAL OF THE SOCIETY OF ARTS, 1820.
-                   FIRST CLASS MEDAL, EXHIBITION, 1851.
-                First Class Medal, Paris Exhibition, 1855.
-                   FIRST CLASS MEDAL, EXHIBITION, 1862.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-The _Court Journal_, speaking of the productions exhibited by William
-Pugh, Esq., May, 1871, says—
-
-    “We do not think that any porcelain productions would equal those of
-    the Coalport works.  The show-case that the owners exhibit
-    independently, and their manufactures, displayed by various firms,
-    have, in all instances, the highest merit.  We are well aware we
-    shall be informed that our praise is but a stale echo, as this firm
-    is renowned of old for producing the finest china, having some
-    process of blending or applying chemical agencies known only to
-    themselves, and being celebrated over Europe for the beautiful colour
-    of the gold—a matter of course of very considerable consequence, as
-    it is used so bounteously in the ornamentation of china.”
-
-In an article on the “world’s great show,” as the Viennese were pleased
-to call it, the same Journal remarked—
-
-    “We have latterly challenged the continental world to compete with us
-    and to contend for equality in many branches of manufacture into
-    which art excellence and refinement of taste enter, and we have
-    carried off the palm.  Neither Sèvres nor Dresden has of late years
-    compared with the best English productions.  There is no doubt of
-    this; and most especially we might instance as successful rivalry the
-    progress that the Coalport Works have made.  The marked patronage of
-    Royal circles on the Continent and at home for their productions is,
-    perhaps, the best proof of the truth of our statement. . . .  They
-    have been especially practical in their catering for the Vienna
-    Exhibition, and met the foreigner at his weak point rather than
-    courted rivalry at his strongest.  No nation on the Continent can
-    compete with the French as regards the painting, though Coalport
-    could and will challenge with every hope of success for the first
-    place when it comes to the question of rivalry in design, exquisite
-    form, graceful ornamentation, brilliancy of colour, bright burnish of
-    gold, and tenderness of glaze in merely decorative porcelain works.
-    The specimens of this character which are sent will, we are sure,
-    worthily maintain the reputation of Coalport.”
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-The _Standard_ also, May 23, 1873, in an article on the “Ceramic Art,”
-had the following:—
-
-    “Messrs. Daniell have so many good things from Coalport Works that it
-    would be difficult to present even a brief mention of them all.
-    There is one beautiful pair of vases in imitation Cashmere ware which
-    Sir R. Wallace has already purchased, and the same gentleman has also
-    secured a number of plates delightfully painted by Faugeron with
-    exotic leaves.  Two portrait vases of the Emperor and Empress of
-    Austria are of old Sèvres shape, the bodies being of turquoise and
-    gold, and the paintings by Palmere, almost miniatures in their fine
-    detail.  Two gros bleu vases, with raised and chased gold
-    ornamentation and panels, choicely painted with birds by Randall, are
-    as elegant as a pair of jardinières, with a cobalt ground and gold
-    ferns and grasses in relief, butterflies touched up in bright enamel,
-    toning the otherwise too great richness of the dark gold and blue.
-    These are only a few of the attractions of one of the finest, though
-    not largest, cases in the section.  Messrs. Pellatt exhibit some
-    Coalport ware, which is in every respect worthy of the high repute of
-    that renowned manufactory.”
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-              MARBLE AND STONE WORKS, SWAN HILL, SHREWSBURY.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                R. DODSON
-
-    Respectfully begs to intimate that the Show Rooms contain a large
-                              collection of
-
-             MARBLE, STONE, & ENAMELLED SLATE CHIMNEY PIECES,
-
-                    MARBLE AND STONE MURAL MONUMENTS,
-
-                    CEMETERY AND CHURCHYARD MEMORIALS,
-
-                 FONTS, FOUNTAINS, VASES, SLATE CISTERNS,
-                               &c. &c. &c.
-
- _Designs forwarded for inspection_; _and communications by letter will_
-                      _receive immediate attention_.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                          THE COALBROOKDALE CO.
-
-                      MANUFACTURERS OF ALL KINDS OF
-
-                            BRICKS AND TILES,
-
-                            RIDGING, FLOORING,
-
-                      FIRE BRICKS, SQUARES, CHIMNEY
-                                TOPS, &c.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                        _PRESSED & MOULDED BRICKS_
-
-                        FOR FACING STRING COURSES,
-
-            And other Architectural Purposes, in Blue, White,
-                                 and Red.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                       _ALSO PLAIN AND ORNAMENTAL_
-
-                          RADIATING ARCH BRICKS,
-
-                     FOR WINDOWS AND OTHER OPENINGS,
-                          IN THE ABOVE COLOURS.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                      FLOWER POTS, BOXES, PENDANTS,
-                                   &c.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-         ALL MATERIALS OF THE BEST AND MOST DURABLE DESCRIPTION.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                          CRAVEN, DUNNILL, & CO.
-                                (LIMITED),
-
-                      Encaustic & Geometrical Tiles,
-
-                             JACKFIELD WORKS,
-
-                       NEAR IRONBRIDGE, SHROPSHIRE.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                   PATTERN SHEETS, SPECIAL DESIGNS, AND
-                                ESTIMATES,
-
-                       ON APPLICATION TO THE WORKS.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-Elementary Geological Collections, at 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, to 100 guineas
-each, and every requisite to assist those commencing the study of this
-interesting branch of Science, a knowledge of which affords so much
-pleasure to the traveller in all parts of the world.
-
-A collection for Five Guineas, to illustrate the recent works on Geology,
-by Ansted, Buckland, Lyell, Mantell, Murchison, Page, Phillips, and
-others, contains 200 specimens, in a plain Mahogany Cabinet, with five
-trays, comprising the following specimens, viz.:—
-
-MINERALS which are either the components of Rocks, or occasionally
-imbedded in them—Quartz, Agate, Chalcedony, Jasper, Garnet, Zeolite,
-Hornblende, Augite, Asbestos, Felspar, Mica, Talc, Tourmaline, Spinel,
-Zircon, Corundum, Lapis Lazuli, Calcite, Fluor, Selenite, Baryta,
-Strontia, Salt, Sulphur, Plumbago, Bitumen, &c.
-
-NATIVE METALS, or METALLIFEROUS MINERALS; these are found in masses or
-beds, in veins, and occasionally in the beds of rivers.  Specimens of the
-following Metallic Ores are put in the Cabinet:—Iron, Manganese, Lead,
-Tin, Zinc, Copper, Antimony, Silver, Gold, Platina, Mercury, Titanium,
-&c.
-
-ROCKS: Granite, Gneiss, Mica-slate, Clay-slate, Porphyry, Serpentine,
-Sandstones, Limestones, Basalt, Lavas, &c.
-
-PALÆOZOIC FOSSILS from the Cambrian, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous,
-and Permian Rocks.
-
-SECONDARY FOSSILS from the Rhætic, Lias, Oolite, Wealden, and Cretaceous
-Groups.
-
-TERTIARY FOSSILS from the Plastic Clay, London Clay, Crag, &c.
-
-In the more expensive collections some of the specimens are rare, and all
-more select.
-
-               JAMES TENNANT, Mineralogist (by Appointment)
-                to Her Majesty, 149, Strand, London, W.C.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                   THE
-                             OLD HALL SCHOOL,
-                            WELLINGTON, SALOP.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                            RESIDENT MASTERS:
-
-                                Principal.
-
-J. EDWARD CRANAGE, M.A., Ph.D. of the University of Jena; Author of
-“Mental Education;” Lecturer to the Society of Arts, &c., &c.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                               Head Master.
-
-                  DAVID JOHNSTON, Esq., M.A., Aberdeen.
-
-                              Second Master.
-
-                       THOMAS WILLIAMS, Esq., B.A.,
-       (In Mathematical Honours) Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge.
-
-                         Modern Languages Master.
-
-              MONSIEUR VIDAL, of the University of Louvain.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                       TERMS FOR BOARD AND LODGING.
-
-       (EXCLUSIVE OF SCHOOL FEES, FOR WHICH SEE SEPARATE CIRCULAR.)
-
-PER QUARTER.                                                 £    _s._    _d._
-Private pupils above 18 years of age, with separate         42       0       0
-bedroom, horse riding, and other privileges
-Ditto, without horse exercise, under 18                     26       5       0
-Boarders                                                    12      12       0
-Ditto, under 10 years of age                                10      10       0
-Separate bedroom for one boy                                 5       5       0
-Ditto, for two boys (each)                                   4       4       0
-Ditto, for three boys (each)                                 3       3       0
-Washing, according to clothes used, generally                0      15       0
-
-DR. CRANAGE’S undeviating aim is to train the boys committed to his care,
-not only in mental acquisitions, but in their whole moral and physical
-being; believing, that as much pains and unremitting attention are
-required for the latter as the former.  Attention is given not only to
-the studies which the boys pursue, but to their recreation, games, and
-amusements—upon the principle that almost every incident affords
-materials for improvement, and opportunities for the formation of good
-habits.
-
-His main object in the intellectual culture is to teach the boy to think;
-without omitting the positive work and hard study to brace “the nerves of
-the mind” for the making of a scholar.
-
-The system of rewards and punishments is peculiar, with the general
-absence of corporal punishment; but the experience of more than
-twenty-four years has fully proved its efficiency.
-
-Above all, his desire is to bring them to Christ as their Saviour, and
-then to help them to walk like Christ, as their example.
-
-Dr. Cranage finds the most wonderful difference in the progress and
-conduct of the boys committed to his care according to the measure of
-moral support he receives from the parents and guardians of the boys.  He
-earnestly solicits their hearty and constant co-operation in his anxious
-labours.
-
-The skeleton Report will give a succinct view of the subjects of study.
-The aim is to give a thoroughly liberal education, without too exclusive
-attention to Latin and Greek.  In the study of languages the system of
-Arnold is considered admirable, but not perfect; the grammar is therefore
-supplied, and iteration and reiteration of declensions, conjugations, and
-rules to impress indelibly, by rote even, all the fundamentals are
-resorted to.  Latin, as the basis of most of the modern European
-languages, is considered—even to boys not going to college—very
-important; it is deemed also very desirable for _all_ boys to be able to
-read the Greek Testament before leaving school.
-
-Some objects are taught by familiar Lectures only, illustrated by
-extensive apparatus; while many other subjects are occasionally thus
-exemplified.
-
-A report of each boy’s improvement and conduct is sent to his parents or
-guardians eight times in each year.
-
-At the end of each year the School is examined by the authority and
-direction of the Syndicate appointed by the University of Cambridge, and
-a copy of the Report is sent to the parents or guardians of each boy.
-There is also an examination at midsummer by the masters of the school on
-the work of the previous half-year; a report of which is sent to the
-parents.
-
-The boy’s Reading Room is furnished with good Periodicals and a
-well-selected Library.
-
-There is a well-furnished Laboratory for the study of Chemistry,
-Photography, &c.; Dr. Cranage himself instructing in science in the
-school.
-
-A Museum is established for collecting specimens to illustrate natural
-history, arts, and sciences, together with articles of virtû and
-antiquity—the boys themselves being the principal collectors and
-contributors.
-
-There are three orders of distinction in the school conferred for
-proficiency, combined with good conduct:—1st, Holder of a Certificate;
-2nd, Palmer, or Holder of the Palm; 3rd, or highest, Grecian.
-
-The School-house is delightfully situated within a mile of the
-railway-station of Wellington; it is well adapted for its purpose, and
-fitted up with the necessary appliances.  The school-room, reading-room,
-dining-room, lavatory, bath-room, and dormitories are spacious, airy, and
-convenient; the playgrounds very extensive, and well fitted for healthy
-recreation.
-
-There is a swimming-bath on the grounds.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                             BUNNY AND EVANS
-
-                          (LATE J. D. SANDFORD),
-
-                       25, HIGH STREET, SHREWSBURY,
-
-                      GENERAL PRINTERS, BOOKSELLERS,
-                         BOOKBINDERS, STATIONERS,
-
-Beg to inform the Nobility, Gentry, Clergy, and the General Public that
-they have every facility for the execution of all orders with which they
-may be entrusted with the utmost promptitude and on the most reasonable
-terms.
-
-                                PRINTING.
-
-This branch includes the production of Maps and Plans of Estates, &c., in
-Lithography; and the Letter-press Printing that of Pamphlets, Sermons,
-Reports of Societies, Particulars of Sales, Posters and Handbills,
-Billheads, Memorandum Forms, &c.
-
-                                STAMPING,
-
-in colours or plain, in the best London fashion.
-
-                               BOOKBINDING,
-
-plain and ornamental.
-
-                               STATIONERY.
-
-Note Papers from 2s. to 10s. per ream, Envelopes from 4_s._ per 100
-upwards.  Ledgers, Journals, and Cash Books in stock, or made to any
-pattern.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
- _Bibles_, _Church Services_, _Prayers_, _and devotional books in great_
-                                _variety_.
-
-                    MAGAZINES AND NEWSPAPERS SUPPLIED.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                URICONIUM.
-
-         Mr. W. Wright’s valuable and comprehensive work on this
-              ancient Roman city is still on sale at 25_s._
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                           _ESTABLISHED_ 1772.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                   THE
-                          SHREWSBURY CHRONICLE,
-                AND SHROPSHIRE AND MONTGOMERYSHIRE TIMES.
-
-                          THE COUNTY NEWSPAPER,
-
-And LEADING JOURNAL for Shropshire and North Wales, has the GREATEST
-CIRCULATION through a most extensive district and possesses a wide-spread
-influence amongst the most important classes of the community.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                       Best Medium for Advertisers.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-      Published every Friday morning by the Proprietor, JOHN WATTON,
-               at the Offices, St. John’s Hill, Shrewsbury.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                                EDDOWES’S
-                           SHREWSBURY JOURNAL,
-                          AND SALOPIAN JOURNAL,
-
-                           (Established 1794.)
-
-         Advertiser for Shropshire and the Principality of Wales.
-
-            Published every Wednesday morning at the Offices,
-
-                              MARKET SQUARE.
-
-                                PRICE 2d.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-EDDOWES’S JOURNAL is the only Conservative Paper published in the County
-of Salop and is the recognised organ of the CHURCH OF ENGLAND, and the
-Constitutional Party in the district.
-
-It has a guaranteed circulation throughout the county of Salop and the
-whole principality of Wales, and also an Advertising patronage amongst
-Capitalists, Solicitors, Auctioneers, Merchants, Land Agents, and
-Traders, SUPERIOR TO THAT OF ANY OTHER NEWSPAPER published in the
-district.  It also circulates extensively in the neighbouring Counties,
-and will be found at the principal hotels and commercial offices in
-London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, and other important towns.  It
-is thus UNQUESTIONABLY THE BEST MEDIUM FOR ADVERTISING, and affords a
-safe and widely-spread means of publicity amongst all those classes most
-likely to be useful to advertisers.
-
-  _Annual Subscriptions_, _free by post_, 13_s._; _if paid in advance_,
-                                  11_s._
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                    _VALUABLE MEDIUM FOR ADVERTISING_.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                      THE IRONBRIDGE WEEKLY JOURNAL
-
-                                   AND
-
-                      Borough of Wenlock Advertiser,
-               Published every Saturday.  Price One Penny.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                    SCALE OF CHARGES FOR ADVERTISING.
-
-  Not exceeding 24 Words      1s.      0d.
-          Ditto 40 Words      1s.      6d.
-
-The Charges above apply to the class of Advertisements enumerated below
-and are strictly confined to those that are _paid for in advance_.
-
-Situations Wanted.        Apartments Wanted.        Articles Lost.
-Situations Vacant.        Apartments to Let.        Articles Found, &c.
-
-                               PUBLISHED AT
-                  JOSEPH SLATER’S STEAM PRINTING OFFICE,
-                            THE MARKET SQUARE,
-                            IRONBRIDGE, SALOP.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                               BRIDGNORTH.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                          CROWN AND ROYAL HOTEL.
-                  FAMILY, COMMERCIAL, AND POSTING HOUSE.
-
-    _Every attention paid to the Comfort and Convenience of Visitors_.
-
-                              BILLIARD-ROOM.
-
-           Post Horses and Carriages.  Omnibus to and from each
-                 Train, and Refreshment Rooms at Station.
-
-                                                 T. WHITEFOOT, Proprietor.
-
-                       N.B.—RAILWAY PARCELS OFFICE.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                      WREKIN HOTEL COMPANY, LIMITED.
-                            WELLINGTON, SALOP.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-                       FAMILY AND COMMERCIAL HOTEL.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-             EXTENSIVE LOCK-UP BAIT AND LIVERY STABLES, COACH
-                         HOUSES, LOOSE BOXES, &c.
-
-        Posting in all its Branches—Billiards—Hot and Cold Baths.
-
-                                * * * * *
-
-
-
-
-FOOTNOTES.
-
-
-{10}  Appendix A.
-
-{28}  Inquis. Henry III., incerti temporis, Nu. 6, 156.
-
-{41}  For additional particulars respecting this interesting tenure we
-refer the reader to the Appendix B.
-
-{49a}  There is a legend that Major Smallman, a staunch royalist,
-surprised by some of Cromwell’s troopers, hotly pursued over Presthope,
-turned from the road, spurred his horse at full gallop to the edge of the
-precipice, and went over.  The horse is said to have been killed on the
-trees, whilst the Major escaped, and secreted himself in the woods.
-Facts and local circumstances concur in giving a colouring to the
-tradition, and deeds extant show that the family resided here from the
-reign of Henry III. to the time mentioned.  See Appendix C.
-
-{49b}  See Appendix.
-
-{63}  In 1390, Sir Humphrey de Eyton, an ancestor of T. C. Eyton, Esq.,
-of Eyton, was ranger of this forest.
-
-{64}  The Old Hall, which we suppose to have been the old hunting lodge,
-the residence of Dr. Cranage, Watling Street, is another interesting
-specimen of the residences of the Forester family, and of the style of
-building and profusion of wood used therein during the great forest
-periods.  Dothill, now the residence of R. Groom, Esq., is another of the
-old family residences of the Foresters.
-
-{66}  Appendix D.
-
-{69}  For a more complete account of the Forester family, we refer the
-reader to the Pedigree given in the Appendix E.
-
-{171}  Lord Dundonald, who lived in the old mansion, still standing, at
-the Tuckies, was an excellent chemist, and constructed some ingeniously
-contrived ovens, by which he extracted from coal a tar for the use of the
-navy, and which also became an article of general commerce.
-
-
-
-
-***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD SPORTS AND SPORTSMEN***
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-
-The Project Gutenberg eBook, Old Sports and Sportsmen, by John Randall
-
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions 
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at 
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-
-Title: Old Sports and Sportsmen
-       or, the Willey Country
-
-
-Author: John Randall
-
-
-
-Release Date: November 18, 2020  [eBook #63805]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
-
-
-***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD SPORTS AND SPORTSMEN***
-</pre>
-<p>Transcribed from the 1873 Bunny and Evans edition by David
-Price.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/fpb.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Portrait of Lord Forester"
-title=
-"Portrait of Lord Forester"
- src="images/fps.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<h1>OLD SPORTS AND<br />
-SPORTSMEN</h1>
-<p style="text-align: center">Or, the Willey Country</p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center">WITH SKETCHES OF SQUIRE
-FORESTER</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">AND HIS
-WHIPPER-IN</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">TOM MOODY</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">(&ldquo;You
-all knew Tom Moody the Whipper-in well&rdquo;).</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">By</span> JOHN
-RANDALL, F.G.S.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">AUTHOR OF &ldquo;THE SEVERN VALLEY,&rdquo;
-ETC.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall">LONDON:</span><br />
-VIRTUE &amp; CO., 26, IVY LANE</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">SALOP: BUNNY
-and EVANS; and RANDALL,</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall"><span
-class="smcap">Bookseller</span></span><span class="GutSmall">,
-MADELEY</span><br />
-1873</p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="pageiv"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. iv</span><span
-class="GutSmall">LONDON</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">PRINTED BY VIRTUE AND CO.,</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">CITY ROAD.</span></p>
-<h2><a name="pagev"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-v</span>PREFACE.</h2>
-<p><span class="smcap">It</span> is too much to expect that these
-pages will altogether escape criticism; my object will have been
-gained, however, if I have succeeded in collecting and placing
-intelligibly before the reader such noticeable facts as are
-interesting matters of local history.&nbsp; Should it appear that
-there has been imported into the work too many details touching
-the earlier features of the country, the little that is generally
-known on the subject, the close connection of cause and effect,
-and the influences the old forests may have had in perpetuating a
-love of sport among some members of a family whose name appears
-to have been derived from pursuits connected therewith, must be
-my excuse.&nbsp; Dr. Arnold once remarked upon the close
-connection existing between nature and mankind, and how each in
-turn is affected by the other, whilst a living writer, and a
-deeper <a name="pagevi"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-vi</span>thinker, has gone still further, in saying that
-&ldquo;He is great who is what he is from nature.&rdquo;&nbsp; Of
-course it is not intended to claim greatness for Squire Forester
-in the sense in which the word is ordinarily used, or qualities,
-even, differing very much from those bearing the impress of the
-common mould of humanity; but simply that he was what he was from
-nature, from pre-disposition, and from living at the time he
-did.&nbsp; Also, that he was in many respects a fair
-representative of the squirearchy of the period, of a class of
-squires in whom we recognise features discoverable in those in
-the enjoyment of the same natural vigour in our own day, but who
-may have chosen different fields for its development.</p>
-<p>It did not appear to come within the scope of the work to
-enter to the same extent upon the doings of other sportsmen of
-Squire Forester&rsquo;s time, or to dilate upon those of
-gentlemen who subsequently distinguished themselves.&nbsp; It
-would have required many additional pages, for instance, to have
-done justice to the exploits of the first Lord Forester; or to
-those of the present right honourable proprietor of Willey, who
-upon retiring from the mastership of the Belvoir hounds was
-presented with a massive piece of plate, representing an incident
-which happened <a name="pagevii"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-vii</span>in connection with the Hunt.&nbsp; Of both Nimrod has
-written in the highest terms.&nbsp; The names of several whose
-deeds the same felicitous writer has described in connection with
-Shropshire will occur to the reader, as Mr. Stubbs, of Beckbury;
-Mr. Childe, of Kinlet; Mr. Boycott, of Rudge&mdash;who succeeded
-Sir Bellingham Graham on his giving up the Shifnal country; Lord
-Wenlock; Squire Corbett, and the Squire of Halston; names which,
-as Colonel Apperley has very justly said, will never be forgotten
-by the sporting world.&nbsp; As the reader will perceive, I have
-simply acted upon the principle laid down in the &ldquo;Natural
-History of Selborne&rdquo; by the Rev. Gilbert White, who says,
-&ldquo;If the stationary men would pay some attention to the
-district in which they reside, and would publish their thoughts
-respecting the objects that surround them, from such materials
-might be drawn the most complete county history.&rdquo;&nbsp;
-This advice influenced me in undertaking the &ldquo;Severn
-Valley,&rdquo; and I have endeavoured to keep the same in view
-now, by utilising the materials, and by using the best means at
-command for bringing together facts such as may serve to
-illustrate them, and which may not be unlooked for in a work of
-the kind.</p>
-<p><a name="pageviii"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-viii</span>Since the old Forest Periods, and since old Squire
-Forester&rsquo;s day even, the manners and the customs of the
-nation have changed; but the old love of sport discoverable in
-our ancestors, and inherited more or less by them from theirs,
-remains as a link connecting past generations with the
-present.</p>
-<p>It matters not, it appears to me, whether either the writer or
-the reader indulges himself in such sports or not, he may be
-equally willing to recall the &ldquo;Olden Time,&rdquo; with its
-instances of rough and ready pluck and daring, and to listen to
-an old song, made by an aged pate,</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Of a fine old English gentleman who had a
-great estate.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Shropshire and the surrounding counties during the past
-century had, as we all know, many old English gentlemen with
-large estates, who kept up their brave old houses at pretty
-liberal rates; but few probably exercised the virtue of
-hospitality more, or came nearer to the true type of the country
-gentleman of the period than the hearty old Willey Squire.&nbsp;
-Differ as we may in our views of the chase, we must admit that
-such amusements served to relieve the monotony of country life,
-and to make time pass pleasantly, which but for horses and
-hounds, and the <a name="pageix"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-ix</span>opportunities they afforded of intercourse with
-neighbours, must have hung heavily on a country gentleman&rsquo;s
-hands a hundred years ago.</p>
-<p>It is, moreover, it appears to me, to this love of sport, in
-one form or another, that we of this generation are indebted for
-those grand old woods which now delight the eye, and which it
-would have been a calamity to have lost.&nbsp; The green
-fertility of fields answering with laughing plenty to human
-industry is truly pleasing; but now that blue-bells, and violets,
-foxgloves and primroses are being driven from the hedgerows, and
-these themselves are fast disappearing before the advances of
-agricultural science, it is gratifying to think that there are
-wastes and wilds where weeds may still resort&mdash;where the
-perfumes of flowers, the songs of birds, and the music of the
-breeze may be enjoyed.&nbsp; That the love of nature which the
-out-door exercises of our ancestors did so much to foster and
-perpetuate still survives is evident.&nbsp; How often, for
-instance, among dwellers in towns does the weary spirit pant for
-the fields, that it may wing its flight with the lark through the
-gushing sunshine, and join in the melody that goes pealing
-through the fretted cathedral of the woods, whilst caged by the
-demands of the hour, or kept <a name="pagex"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. x</span>prisoner by the shop, the counter, or
-the machine?&nbsp; Spring, with its regenerating influences, may
-wake the clods of the valley into life, may wreathe the black
-twigs with their garb of green and white, and give to the trees
-their livery; but men who should read the lessons they teach know
-nothing of the rejoicings that gladden the glades and make merry
-the woods.&nbsp; Nevertheless, proof positive that the love of
-nature&mdash;scourged, crushed, and overlaid, it may be, with
-anxious cares for existence&mdash;never dies out may be found in
-customs still lingering among us.&nbsp; In the blackest iron
-districts, where the surface is one great ink-blotch, where
-clouds of dust and columns of smoke obscure the day, where scoria
-heaps, smouldering fires, and never-ceasing flames give a
-scorched aspect to the scene, the quickening influences that
-renew creation are felt, teaching men&mdash;ignorant as
-Wordsworth&rsquo;s &ldquo;Peter Bell&rdquo;&mdash;to take part in
-the festival of the year.&nbsp; When the sap has risen in the
-tree when the south wind stirs the young leaves, and the
-mechanism of the woods is in motion, when the blackbird has taken
-his place in the bush, and the thrush has perched itself upon the
-spray, in the month of pelting showers and laughing sunshine,
-when the first note of the cuckoo is heard <a
-name="pagexi"></a><span class="pagenum">p. xi</span>from the ash
-in the hedge-row or the wild cherry in the woods, an old custom
-still proclaims a holiday in honour of his arrival.&nbsp; When
-the last lingering feature of winter has vanished; when brooks,
-no longer hoarse, sink their voices to a tinkling sweetness,
-flooding mead and dingle with their music; when the merry, merry
-month, although no longer celebrated for its floral shows and
-games as formerly, arrives, the May-bush may be seen over the
-door of the village smithy and on the heads of horses on the
-road.</p>
-<p>It would have been of little use passing acts of Parliament,
-like the one which has just become law, for the preservation of
-members of the feathered tribes, if their native woods had not
-been preserved to us by sportsmen.&nbsp; To have lost our woods
-would have been to have lost the spring and summer residences of
-migratory birds: to have lost the laugh of the woodpecker, the
-songs of the blackbird and the thrush, the woodlark&rsquo;s
-thrilling melody, and the nightingale&rsquo;s inimitable notes,
-to say nothing of those faint soothing shadowings which steal
-upon one from these leafy labyrinths of nature.&nbsp; As some one
-taking deeper views has said:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a
-name="pagexii"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-xii</span>&ldquo;There lie around<br />
-Thy daily walk great store of beauteous things,<br />
-Each in its separate place most fair, and all<br />
-Of many parts disposed most skilfully,<br />
-Making in combination wonderful<br />
-An individual of a higher kind;<br />
-And that again in order ranging well<br />
-With its own fellows, till thou rise at length<br />
-Up to the majesty of this grand world;&mdash;<br />
-Hard task, and seldom reached by mortal souls,<br />
-For frequent intermission and neglect<br />
-Of close communion with the humblest things;<br />
-But in rare moments, whether memory<br />
-Hold compact with invention, or the door<br />
-Of heaven hath been a little pushed aside,<br />
-Methinks I can remember, after hours<br />
-Of unpremeditated thought in woods.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="pagexiii"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-xiii</span>CONTENTS.</h2>
-<table>
-<tr>
-<td></td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
-class="GutSmall">PAGE</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER I.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Hawk an Acquisition to Sportsmen&mdash;Hawk
-aeries&mdash;Hawks according to Degrees&mdash;Brook and other
-kinds of Hawking&mdash;Hawking and Hunting&mdash;A Shropshire
-Historian&rsquo;s charge against the Conqueror&mdash;Bishops and
-their Clergy as much given to the Sport as Laymen&mdash;The
-Rector of Madeley&mdash;The Merrie Days, &amp;c.</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page8">8</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER II.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">MORFE FOREST.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Morfe Forest one of the Five Royal Forests of
-Shropshire&mdash;Its History and Associations&mdash;Early
-British, Roman, Danish, and Norman Mementoes&mdash;Legends and
-Historical Incidents&mdash;Forest Wastes&mdash;Old
-Names&mdash;Hermitage Hill&mdash;Stanmore Grove&mdash;Essex
-Fall&mdash;Foresters&mdash;Old Forest Lodge, &amp;c.</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page17">17</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER III.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Royal Chase of Shirlot&mdash;Extent&mdash;Places
-disafforested&mdash;Hayes&mdash;Foresters&mdash;Hunting
-Lodge&mdash;Priors of Wenlock&mdash;Curious
-Tenures&mdash;Encroachments upon Woods by Iron-making
-Operations&mdash;Animals that have disappeared&mdash;Reaction due
-to a love of Sport&mdash;What the Country would have
-lost&mdash;&ldquo;The Merrie Greenwood&rdquo;&mdash;Old Forest
-Trees, &amp;c.</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page31">31</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center"><a
-name="pagexiv"></a><span class="pagenum">p. xiv</span>CHAPTER
-IV.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WREKIN FOREST AND THE
-FORESTERS.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Wrekin Forest and the Foresters&mdash;Hermit of Mount
-St. Gilbert&mdash;Poachers upon the King&rsquo;s
-Preserves&mdash;Extent of the Forest&mdash;Haye of
-Wellington&mdash;Robert Forester&mdash;Perquisites&mdash;Hunting
-Matches&mdash;Singular Grant to John Forester&mdash;Sir Walter
-Scott&rsquo;s Anthony Forster a Member of the Shropshire Forester
-Family&mdash;Anthony Forster Lord of the Manor of Little Wenlock,
-and related to the Foresters of Sutton and
-Bridgnorth&mdash;Anthony Foster altogether a different Character
-to what Sir Walter Scott represents him</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page54">54</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER V.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">WILLEY.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Willey, Close Neighbour to the Royal Chase of
-Shirlot&mdash;Etymology of the Name&mdash;Domesday&mdash;The
-Willileys&mdash;The Lacons&mdash;The Welds and the
-Foresters&mdash;The Old Hall&mdash;Cumnor Hall as described by
-Sir Walter Scott&mdash;Everything Old and Quaint&mdash;How Willey
-came into possession of the Foresters</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page70">70</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER VI.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY SQUIRE.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Willey Squire&mdash;Instincts and
-Tendencies&mdash;Atmosphere of the times favourable for their
-development&mdash;Thackeray&rsquo;s Opinion&mdash;Style of
-Hunting&mdash;Dawn of the Golden Age of the Sport, &amp;c.</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page77">77</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER VII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY KENNELS.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Willey Kennels&mdash;Colonel Apperley on Hunting a
-hundred years ago&mdash;Character of the Hounds&mdash;Portraits
-of Favourites&mdash;Original Letters</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page83">83</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center"><a
-name="pagexv"></a><span class="pagenum">p. xv</span>CHAPTER
-VIII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY LONG RUNS.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Willey Long Runs&mdash;Dibdin&rsquo;s fifty miles no
-figure of speech&mdash;From the Wrekin to the Clee&mdash;The
-Squire&rsquo;s Breakfast&mdash;Ph&oelig;be Higgs&mdash;Doggrel
-Ditties&mdash;Old Tinker&mdash;Moody&rsquo;s Horse falls
-dead&mdash;Run by Moonlight</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page93">93</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER IX.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">BACHELOR&rsquo;S HALL.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Its Quaint Interior&mdash;An Old Friend&rsquo;s
-Memory&mdash;Crabbe&rsquo;s Peter at Ilford Hall&mdash;Singular
-Time-pieces&mdash;A Meet at Hangster&rsquo;s Gate&mdash;Jolly
-Doings&mdash;Dibdin at Dinner&mdash;Broseley Pipes&mdash;Parson
-Stephens in his Shirt&mdash;The Parson&rsquo;s Song</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page102">102</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER X.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY RECTOR AND OTHER OF THE
-SQUIRE&rsquo;S FRIENDS.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Squire&rsquo;s Friends and the Rector more fully
-drawn&mdash;Turner&mdash;Wilkinson&mdash;Harris&mdash;The Rev.
-Michael Pye Stephens&mdash;His Relationship to the
-Squire&mdash;In the Commission of the Peace&mdash;The Parson and
-the Poacher&mdash;A Fox-hunting Christening</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page113">113</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER XI.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY WHIPPER-IN.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Willey Whipper-in&mdash;Tom&rsquo;s Start in
-Life&mdash;His Pluck and Perseverance&mdash;Up hill and down
-dale&mdash;Adventures with the Buff-coloured Chaise&mdash;His own
-Wild Favourite&mdash;His Drinking
-Horn&mdash;Who-who-hoop&mdash;Good Temper&mdash;Never
-Married&mdash;Hangster&rsquo;s Gate&mdash;Old Coaches&mdash;Tom
-gone to Earth&mdash;Three View Halloos at the Grave&mdash;Old
-Boots</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page124">124</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center"><a
-name="pagexvi"></a><span class="pagenum">p. xvi</span>CHAPTER
-XII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">SUCCESS OF THE SONG.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Dibdin&rsquo;s Song&mdash;Dibdin and the Squire good
-fellows well met&mdash;Moody a character after Dibdin&rsquo;s own
-heart&mdash;The Squire&rsquo;s Gift&mdash;Incledon&mdash;The
-Shropshire Fox-hunters on the Stage at Drury Lane</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page140">140</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER XIII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY SQUIRE MEMBER FOR
-WENLOCK.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Willey Squire recognises the duty of his position, and
-becomes Member for Wenlock&mdash;Addison&rsquo;s View of Whig
-Jockeys and Tory Fox-hunters&mdash;State of Parties&mdash;Pitt in
-Power&mdash;&ldquo;Fiddle-Faddle&rdquo;&mdash;Local
-Improvements&mdash;The Squire Mayor of Wenlock&mdash;The Mace now
-carried before the Chief Magistrate</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page147">147</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER XV.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE SQUIRE AND HIS VOLUNTEERS.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Squire and his Volunteers&mdash;Community of
-Feeling&mdash;Threats of Invasion&mdash;&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll follow
-the Squire to Hell, if necessary&rdquo;&mdash;The Squire&rsquo;s
-Speech&mdash;His Birthday&mdash;His Letter to the <i>Shrewsbury
-Chronicle</i>&mdash;Second Corps&mdash;Boney and
-Beacons&mdash;The Squire in a Rage&mdash;The Duke of York and
-Prince of Orange come down</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page154">154</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td colspan='2'><p style="text-align: center">CHAPTER XV.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY SQUIRE AMONG HIS
-NEIGHBOURS.</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>The Squire among his Neighbours&mdash;Sir Roger de
-Coverley&mdash;Anecdotes&mdash;Gentlemen nearest the fire in the
-Lower Regions&mdash;Food Riots&mdash;The Squire quells the
-Mob&mdash;His Virtues and his Failings&mdash;Influences of the
-Times&mdash;His career draws to a close&mdash;His wish for Old
-Friends and Servants to follow him to the Grave&mdash;To be
-buried in the dusk of the evening&mdash;His Favourite Horse to be
-shot&mdash;His estates left to his cousin, Cecil Weld, the First
-Lord Forester&mdash;New Hunting Song</p>
-</td>
-<td style='vertical-align: bottom'><p style="text-align:
-right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page173">173</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Appendix</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page189">189</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Index</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page201">201</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-</table>
-<h2><a name="pagexvii"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-xvii</span>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
-<table>
-<tr>
-<td></td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span
-class="GutSmall">PAGE</span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Lord Forester</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><i>Frontispiece</i></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">The Valley of the Severn</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page1">1</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Trained Falcon</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page8">8</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Hooded Falcon</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page9">9</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Morfe Forest</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page17">17</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Stag</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page17">17</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Boar Hunt in Morfe Forest</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page21">21</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Fallow Deer</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page31">31</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Deer Leap</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page36">36</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Chapter House of Wenlock
-Priory</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page38">38</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Waterfall</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page44">44</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Forest Scenery</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page46">46</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Lady Oak at Cressage</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page50">50</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">The Badger</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page53">53</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Group of Deer</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page54">54</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Needle&rsquo;s Eye</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page56">56</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Deer and Young</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page59">59</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Atcham Church</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page62">62</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Richard Forester&rsquo;s Old
-Mansion</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page65">65</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><a name="pagexviii"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-xviii</span><span class="smcap">Willey Old Hall</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page70">70</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">The Old Squire</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page77">77</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Favourite Dogs</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page83">83</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Portrait of a Fox-hound</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page93">93</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Buildwas Abbey</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page100">100</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Moody&rsquo;s Horn, Trencher, Cap,
-Saddle</span>, &amp;c.</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page122">122</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Gone to Earth</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page122">122</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">A Meet at Hangster&rsquo;s
-Gate</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page140">140</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">The First Iron Bridge</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page147">147</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">View of Bridgnorth</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page154">154</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><span class="smcap">Willey Church</span></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page173">173</a></span></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-</table>
-<h2><a name="page1"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-1</span>INTRODUCTION.</h2>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p1b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Valley of the Severn, near Willey"
-title=
-"Valley of the Severn, near Willey"
- src="images/p1s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>A <span class="smcap">simple</span> reading of the history of
-the earth is sufficient to show that hunting is as old as the
-hills&mdash;not figuratively, but literally; and that the hunter
-and the hunted, one furnished with weapons of attack, and the
-other with means of defence, have existed from the earliest
-periods of creation to the present.&nbsp; That is, the strong
-have mastered the weak, and in some instances have fallen side by
-side, as we see by their remains.&nbsp; In the economy of <a
-name="page2"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 2</span>Nature, the
-process of decay appears to have been the exception, rather than
-the rule; with beak or tooth, or deadly claw, the strong having
-struck down the less defended in a never-ending arena.&nbsp; What
-a hunting field, in one sense, the Old World must have been, when
-creatures of strange and undefined natures infested the uncertain
-limits of the elements, and what encounters must have taken place
-in the ooze and mud periods, when monsters, enormous in stature
-and stretch of wing, were the implacable hunters of the air, the
-water, and the slime!&nbsp; Nor can the inhabitants of the earth,
-the water, and the air, taking the term in its broad rather than
-in its technical sense, be said to be less hunters now, or less
-equipped with deadly weapons.&nbsp; Some have supernumerary teeth
-to supply the loss of such as might get broken in the fray.&nbsp;
-One strikes down its prey at a blow, another impales its victims
-on thorns, and a third slays by poison.&nbsp; Some hunt in
-company, from what would seem to be a very love of sport&mdash;as
-crows and smaller birds give chase to the owl, apparently
-rejoicing in his embarrassment, at break of day.</p>
-<p>We need but refer to those remotely removed stages of human
-life illustrated by drift beds, bone <a name="page3"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 3</span>caves, and shell heaps&mdash;to those
-primitive weapons which distinguished the lowest level of the
-Stone Age, weapons which every year are being brought to light by
-thousands&mdash;to give the <i>genus homo</i> a place among the
-hunters; indeed one of the strongest incentives which helped on
-Pre-historic Man from one level to the other through the long
-night of the darkest ages, appears to have been that which such a
-pursuit supplied.&nbsp; To obtain the skins of animals wilder
-than himself he entered upon a scramble with the wolf, the bear,
-and the hyena.&nbsp; Driven by instinct or necessity to supply
-wants the whole creation felt, his utmost ingenuity was put forth
-in the chase; and in process of time we find him having recourse
-to the inventive arts to enable him to carry out his
-designs.&nbsp; On the borders of lakes or on river banks, in
-caverns deep-seated amid primeval forest solitudes, he fashioned
-harpoons and arrow-heads of shell, horn, or bone, with which to
-repulse the attack of prowlers around his retreat and to arrest
-the flight of the swiftest beast he required for food; and when
-he emerged from the dark night which Science has as yet but
-partially penetrated, when he had succeeded in pressing the horse
-and the dog into his service, and when the <a
-name="page4"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 4</span>cultivation of
-the soil even had removed him above the claims of hunger, he
-appears equally to have indulged the passion&mdash;probably for
-the gratification it gave and the advantages it brought in
-promoting that tide of full health from which is derived the
-pleasing consciousness of existence.</p>
-<p>Tradition, no less than arch&aelig;ology and the physical
-history of the country itself, lead us to suppose that when those
-oscillations of level ceased which led to the present
-distribution of land and water, one-third of the face of the
-country was covered with wood and another with uncultivated moor,
-and that marsh lands were extensive.&nbsp; Remains dug up in the
-valley of the Severn, and others along the wide stretch of
-country drained by its tributaries, together with those
-disinterred from the bog and the marsh, show that animals, like
-plants, once indigenous, have at comparatively recent periods
-become as extinct as Dodos in the Mauritius.&nbsp; Old British
-names in various parts of the country, particularly along the
-valley of the Severn, exist to show that the beaver once built
-its house by the stream, that the badger burrowed in its banks,
-and that the eagle and the falcon reared their young on the rocks
-above.&nbsp; At the same time, evidence exists <a
-name="page5"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 5</span>to show that
-the bear and the boar ranged the forests as late as the conquest
-of England by the Normans, whilst the red deer, the egret and the
-crane, the bittern and the bustard, remained to a period almost
-within living memory.</p>
-<p>River loams, river gravels, lake beds, and cave breccias,
-disclose hooks and spears, and sometimes fragments of nets, which
-show that hunting and fishing were practised by the primitive
-dwellers along river plains and valleys.</p>
-<p>The situations of abbeys, priories, and other monastic piles,
-the ruins of which here and there are seen along the banks of
-rivers, and the records the heads of these houses have left
-behind them, lead us to suppose that those who reared and those
-who occupied them were alive to the advantages the neighbourhood
-of good fisheries supplied.&nbsp; Some of the <i>vivaries</i> or
-fish-pools, and meres even, which once afforded abundant
-supplies, no longer exist, their sites being now green fields;
-but indications of their former presence are distinct, whilst the
-positions of weirs on the Severn, the rights of which their
-owners zealously guarded, may still be pointed out.&nbsp;
-Sometimes they were subjects of litigation, as with the canons of
-Lilleshall, who claimed <a name="page6"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 6</span>rights of fishing in the Severn at
-Bridgnorth, and who obtained a bull from Pope Honorius confirming
-them in their rights.&nbsp; In 1160 the Abbot of Salop, with the
-consent of his chapter, is found granting to Philip Fitz-Stephen
-and his heirs the fishery of Sutton (piscarium de Sutana), and
-lands near the said fishery.&nbsp; These monks also had fisheries
-at Binnal, a few miles from Willey; and it is well known that
-they introduced into our rivers several varieties of fish not
-previously common thereto, but which now afford sport to the
-angler.</p>
-<p>Fishing, it is true, may have been followed more as a
-remunerative exercise by some members of these religious houses,
-still it did not fail to commend itself as an attractive art and
-a harmless recreation congenial to a spirit of contemplation and
-reflection to many distinguished ecclesiastics.&nbsp; That the
-Severn of that day abounded in fish much more than at present is
-shown by Bishop Lyttleton, who takes some pains to describe it at
-Arley, and who explains the construction of the coracle and its
-uses in fishing, the only difference between it both then and
-now, and that of early British times, being that the latter was
-covered with a horse&rsquo;s hide.</p>
-<p><a name="page7"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 7</span>A jury,
-empannelled for the purpose of estimating the value of Arley
-manor upon the death of one of its proprietors, gave the yearly
-rental of its fishery at 6<i>s.</i> 8<i>d.</i>,&mdash;a large sum
-in comparison with the value of sixty acres of land, stated to
-have been 10<i>s.</i>, or with the rent of a ferry, which was put
-down at sixpence.&nbsp; There must have been fine fishing
-then.&nbsp; Trout were plentiful, so were salmon; there were no
-locks or artificial weirs to obstruct the attempts of
-fish&mdash;still true to the instinct of their ancestors&mdash;to
-beat the tide in an upward summer excursion in the direction of
-its source.&nbsp; The document states that the part of the river
-so valued &ldquo;abounded in fish.&rdquo;</p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutindent"><span class="smcap">Note</span>.&mdash;The
-Bishop of Worcester, by his regulations for the Priory of Little
-Malvern, in 1323, enjoins the prior not to fish in the stew set
-apart from ancient times <i>for the recreation of the sick</i>,
-unless manifest utility, to be approved by the Chapter, should
-sanction it; in which case he was, at a fit opportunity, to
-replace the fish which he caught.</p>
-<p class="gutindent">We fancy it is not difficult to recognise a
-growing feeling against that separation of religion, recreation,
-and health which unfortunately now exists, and in favour of
-re-uniting the three; and we are persuaded that the sooner this
-takes place the better for the nation.</p>
-<h2><a name="page8"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 8</span>CHAPTER
-I.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">Early Features of the Country&mdash;The Hawk
-an acquisition to Sportsmen&mdash;Hawk aeries&mdash;Hawks
-according to Degrees&mdash;Brook and other kinds of
-Hawking&mdash;Hawking and Hunting&mdash;A Shropshire
-Historian&rsquo;s Charge against the Conqueror&mdash;Bishops and
-their Clergy as much given to the Sport as Laymen&mdash;The
-Rector of Madeley&mdash;The Merrie Days, &amp;c.</p>
-<p>
-<a href="images/p8b.jpg">
-<img class='floatright' alt=
-"Trained Falcon"
-title=
-"Trained Falcon"
- src="images/p8s.jpg" />
-</a><span class="smcap">Diversified</span> by wood and moor, by
-lake and sedgy pool, dense flocks of wild fowl of various kinds
-at one time afforded a profusion of winged game; and the keen eye
-and sharp talons of the hawk no doubt pointed it out as a
-desirable acquisition to the sportsman long ere he succeeded in
-pressing it into his service; indeed it must have been a marked
-advance in the art when he first availed himself of its
-instinct.&nbsp; Old records supply materials for judging <a
-name="page9"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 9</span>of the
-estimation in which this bird was held by our ancestors, it being
-not uncommon to find persons holding tenements or paying fines in
-lieu of service to the lord of the fee by rendering a <i>sore</i>
-sparrow-hawk&mdash;a hawk in its first year&rsquo;s
-plumage.&nbsp; Stringent restrictions upon the liberty the old
-Roman masters of the country allowed with respect to wild fowl
-were imposed; the act of stealing a hawk, and that of taking her
-eggs, being punishable by imprisonment for a year and a
-day.&nbsp; The highborn, with birds bedecked with hoods of silk,
-collars of gold, and bells of even weight, but of different
-sound, appeared according to their rank&mdash;a ger-falcon for a
-king, a falcon gentle for a prince, a falcon of the rock for a
-duke, a janet for a knight, a merlin for a lady, and a lamere for
-a squire.&nbsp; From close-pent manor and high-walled castle, to
-outspread plain and expansive lake or river <a
-name="page10"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 10</span>bank, the
-gentry of the day sought perditch and plover, heron and wild
-fowl, many of which the fowling-piece has since driven from their
-haunts, and some&mdash;as the bustard and the bittern, the egret
-and the crane&mdash;into extinction.</p>
-<p>Mention is often made of hawk aeries, as at Little Wenlock,
-and in connection with districts within the jurisdiction of
-Shropshire forests, which seem to have been jealously
-guarded.&nbsp; The use of the birds, too, appears to have been
-very much restricted down to the time that the forest-charter,
-enabling all freemen to ply their hawks, was wrung from King
-John, when a sport which before had been the pride of the rich
-became the privilege of the poor.&nbsp; It was at one time so far
-a national pastime that an old writer asserts that &ldquo;every
-degree had its peculiar hawk, from the emperor down to the
-holy-water clerk.&rdquo; <a name="citation10"></a><a
-href="#footnote10" class="citation">[10]</a>&nbsp; The sport
-seems to have divided itself into field-hawking, pond-hawking,
-brook-and-river hawking; into hawking on horseback and hawking on
-foot.&nbsp; In foot hawking the sportsman carried a pole, with
-which to leap the brook, into which he sometimes fell, as Henry
-VIII. did upon his head in the mud, in which he would have been
-<a name="page11"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 11</span>stifled,
-it is said, had not John Moody rescued him; whether this Moody
-was an ancestor of the famous Whipper-in or not we cannot
-say.</p>
-<p>Evidence is not altogether wanting to show that during the
-earlier history of the Marsh period, the gigantic elk (<i>Cervus
-giganteus</i>), with his wide-spreading antlers, visited, if he
-did not inhabit, the flatter portions of the Willey country; and
-it is probable that the wild ox equally afforded a mark for the
-arrow of the ancient inhabitants of the district in those remote
-times, which investigators have distinguished as the
-Pile-building, the Stone, and the Bronze periods, when society
-was in what has been fittingly called the hunter-state.&nbsp; At
-any rate, we know that at later periods the red deer, the goat,
-and the boar, together with other &ldquo;beasts,&rdquo; were
-hunted, and that both banks of the Severn resounded with the deep
-notes of &ldquo;veteran hounds.&rdquo;&nbsp; Of the two pursuits,
-Prior in his day remarks, &ldquo;Hawking comes near to hunting,
-the one in the ayre as the other on the earth, a sport as much
-affected as the other, by some preferred.&rdquo;&nbsp; That the
-chase was the choice pastime of monarchs and nobles before the
-Conquest, and the favourite sport of &ldquo;great and worthy
-personages&rdquo; after, we learn <a name="page12"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 12</span>from old authors, who, like William
-Tivici, huntsman to Edward I., have written elaborate descriptive
-works, supplying details of the modes pursued, and of the kinds
-of dog which were used.</p>
-<p>Our Saxon ancestors no doubt brought with them from the great
-forests of Germany not only their institutions but the love of
-sport of their forefathers, pure and simple.&nbsp; With them the
-forests appear to have been open to the people; and, although the
-Danes imposed restrictions, King Canute, by his general code of
-laws, confirmed to his subjects full right to hunt on their own
-lands, providing they abstained from the forests, the pleasures
-of which he appears to have had no inclination generally to share
-with his subjects.&nbsp; He established in each county four chief
-foresters, who were gentlemen or thanes, and these had under them
-four yeomen, who had care of the vert and venison; whilst under
-these again were two officers of still lower rank, who had charge
-of the vert and venison in the night, and who did the more
-servile work.&nbsp; King William curtailed many of the old forest
-privileges, and limited the sports of the people by prohibiting
-the boar and the hare, which Canute had allowed to be taken; and
-so jealous was he of the privileges of <a name="page13"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 13</span>the chase that he is said to have
-ordained the loss of the eyes as the penalty for killing a
-stag.&nbsp; His Norman predilections were such that an old
-Shropshire historian, Ordericus Vitalis (born at Atcham), who was
-at one time chaplain to the Conqueror, charges him with
-depopulating whole parishes that he might satisfy his ardour for
-hunting.&nbsp; Prince Rufus, who inherited a love of the chase
-from his father, is made by a modern author to reply to a warning
-given him by saying:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;I love the chase, &rsquo;tis mimic war,<br
-/>
-&nbsp;&nbsp; And the hollow bay of hound;<br />
-The heart of the poorest Norman<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; Beats quicker at the sound.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>King John stretched the stringent forest laws of the period to
-the utmost, till the love of liberty and of sport together, still
-latent among the people, compelled him to submit to an express
-declaration of their respective rights.&nbsp; By this declaration
-all lands afforested by Henry I. or by Richard were to be
-disafforested, excepting demesne woods of the crown; and a fine
-or imprisonment for a year and a day, in case of default, was to
-be substituted for loss of life and members.</p>
-<p>To prevent disputes with regard to the king&rsquo;s <a
-name="page14"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 14</span>forests, it
-was also agreed that their limits should be defined by
-perambulations; but as a check upon the boldness of offenders in
-forests and chaces, and warrens, and upon the disposition of
-juries to find against those who were appointed to keep such
-places, it was deemed necessary on the other hand to give
-protection to the keepers.</p>
-<p>Large sums were lavished by kings and nobles on the kennels
-and appliances necessary for their diversions.&nbsp; Nor were
-these costly establishments confined to the laity.&nbsp; Bishops,
-abbots, and high dignitaries of the Church, could match their
-hounds and hawks against those of the nobles, and they equally
-prided themselves upon their skill in woodcraft.</p>
-<p>That the clergy were as much in favour of these amusements as
-the laity, appears from an old Shropshire author, Piers Plowman
-(Langland), who satirically gave it as his opinion that they
-thought more of sport than of their flocks, excepting at shearing
-time; and likewise from Chaucer, who says, &ldquo;in hunting and
-riding they are more skilled than in divinity.&rdquo;&nbsp; That
-Richard de Castillon, an early rector of Madeley, was a sportsman
-appears from the fact that when Henry III. was in Shrewsbury in
-September, 1267, concluding a treaty with Llewellyn, and settling
-<a name="page15"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 15</span>sundry
-little differences with the monks and burgesses there, he granted
-him license to hunt &ldquo;in the royal forest of Madeley,&rdquo;
-then a portion of that of the Wrekin.&nbsp; In 1283 also, King
-Edward permitted the Prior of Wenlock to have a park at Madeley,
-to fence out a portion of the forest, and to form a haia there
-for his deer.&nbsp; It has been said that Walter, Bishop of
-Rochester, was so fond of sport, that at the age of fourscore he
-made hunting his sole employment.&nbsp; The Archdeacon of
-Richmond, at his initiation to the Priory of Bridlington, is
-reported to have been attended by ninety-seven horses, twenty-one
-dogs, and three hawks.&nbsp; Walter de Suffield, Bishop of
-Norwich, bequeathed by will his pack of hounds to the king; but
-the Abbot of Tavistock, who had also a pack, was commanded by his
-bishop about the same time to break it up.&nbsp; A famous hunter
-was the Abbot of Leicester, whose skill in the sport of hare
-hunting was so great, that we are told the king himself, his son
-Edward, and certain noblemen, paid him an annual pension that
-they might hunt with him.&nbsp; Bishop Latimer said: &ldquo;In my
-time my poor father was as diligent to teach me to shoot as to
-learn me any other thing, and so I think other men did their
-children.&nbsp; He taught <a name="page16"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 16</span>me how to draw, how to lay my body in
-my bow, and not draw with strength of arms as other nations
-do;&rdquo; and the good bishop exclaims with the enthusiasm of a
-patriot, &ldquo;It is a gift of God that He hath given us to
-excel all other nations withal; it hath been God&rsquo;s
-instrument whereby He hath given us many victories over our
-enemies.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>Such were the &ldquo;merrie days,&rdquo; when the kennels of
-the country gentry contained all sorts of dogs, and their halls
-all sorts of skins, when the otter and the badger were not
-uncommon along the banks of Shropshire streams, and ere the fox
-had taken first rank on the sportsman&rsquo;s list.&nbsp; An old
-&ldquo;Treatise on the Craft of Hunting&rdquo; first gives the
-hare, the herte, the wulf, and the wild boar.&nbsp; The author
-then goes on to say&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;But there ben other beastes five of the
-chase;<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; The buck the first, the second is the doe,<br />
-The fox the third, which hath ever hard grace,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; The fourth the martyn, and the last the
-roe.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="page17"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-17</span>CHAPTER II.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">MORFE FOREST.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">Morfe one of the Five Royal Forests of
-Shropshire&mdash;Its History and Associations&mdash;Early
-British, Roman, Danish, and Norman Mementoes&mdash;Legends and
-Historical Incidents&mdash;Forest Wastes&mdash;Old
-Names&mdash;Hermitage Hill&mdash;Stanmore Grove&mdash;Essex
-Fall&mdash;Foresters&mdash;Old Forest Lodge, &amp;c.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> hunting ground of the Willey
-country embraced the sites of five royal forests, the growth of
-earlier ages than those planted by the Normans, alluded to by <a
-name="page18"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 18</span>Ordericus
-Vitalis.&nbsp; In some instances they were the growth of wide
-areas offering favourable conditions of soil for the production
-of timber, as in the case of that of Morfe.&nbsp; In others they
-were the result probably of the existence of hilly districts so
-sterile as to offer few inducements to cultivate them, as in the
-case of Shirlot, the Stiperstones, the Wrekin, and of the Clee
-Hills.&nbsp; Some of these have histories running side by side
-with that of the nation, and associations closely linked with the
-names of heroic men and famous sportsmen.&nbsp; Morfe Forest,
-which was separated from that of Shirlot by the Severn, along
-which it ran a considerable distance in the direction of its
-tributary the Worf, is rich in traditions of the rarest kind, the
-Briton, the Roman, Saxon, Dane, and Norman, having in succession
-left mementoes of their presence.&nbsp; Here, as Mr. Eyton in his
-invaluable work on the &ldquo;Antiquities of Shropshire&rdquo;
-says,&mdash;&ldquo;Patriotism, civilisation, military science,
-patient industry, adventurous barbarism, superstition, chivalry,
-and religion have each played a part.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p16.1b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Morfe Forest"
-title=
-"Morfe Forest"
- src="images/p16.1s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p16.2b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Stag"
-title=
-"Stag"
- src="images/p16.2s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>The ancient British tumuli examined and described more than
-one hundred and thirty years ago by the Rev. Mr. Stackhouse have
-been levelled by the plough, but &ldquo;the Walls&rdquo; at
-Chesterton, and the <a name="page19"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-19</span>evidence the name of Stratford supplies as to Roman
-occupation, to which Mr. Eyton refers, as well as the rude
-fortifications of Burf Castle, constructed by the Danes when they
-came to recruit after being out-man&oelig;uvred by Alfred on the
-Thames, remain.&nbsp; At Quatford, a mile and a half west, on
-three sides of a rock overhanging the Severn, near to Danesford,
-are trenches cut out of the solid sandstone which, whether Danish
-or Norman, or in part both, shewed by the vast number of wild
-boar and red deer remains disclosed a few years ago the success
-with which the chase had here at one time been pursued.</p>
-<p>Within the forest were four manors, the continuous estate in
-Saxon times of Algar, Earl of Mercia, which after the Conquest
-were granted in their integrity to the first Norman Earl of
-Shrewsbury, and which in 1086 were held wholly in demesne by his
-son Hugh.&nbsp; The predilections of the first Norman Earl of
-Shrewsbury for this vast forest, lying between those of Kinver,
-Wyre, and Shirlot,&mdash;the whole of which wide wooded district
-seems to have been comprehended under the old British name of
-<i>Coed</i>&mdash;are shown by the fact that he built his
-famous&rsquo; castle on the Severn close by, and founded <a
-name="page20"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 20</span>there his
-collegiate church, the stones of which remain to attest its
-erection by a Norman founder.&nbsp; The legend relating to the
-erection of the church seems so well to bear out the supposition
-that Morfe was the favourite hunting ground of the earl that,
-although frequently quoted, it may not be out of place to give
-it.&nbsp; In substance it is this:&mdash;</p>
-<p>In 1082, Sir Roger married for his second wife a daughter of
-Sir Ebrard de Pusey, one of the chief nobles of France.&nbsp; On
-coming over to England to join her husband a storm arose which
-threatened the destruction of the vessel when, wearied with much
-watching, a priest who accompanied her fell asleep and had a
-vision, in which it was said:&mdash;&ldquo;If thy lady would wish
-to save herself and her attendants from the present danger of the
-sea, let her make a vow to God and faithfully promise to build a
-church in honour of the blessed Mary Magdalene, on the spot where
-she may first happen to meet her husband in England, especially
-where groweth a hollow oak, and where the wild swine have
-shelter.&rdquo;&nbsp; The legend adds that upon awaking the
-priest informed his lady, who took the prescribed vow; that the
-storm ceased, that the ship arrived safely in port, that the lady
-met the earl hunting the boar where <a name="page21"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 21</span>an old hollow oak stood, and that at
-her request, and in fulfilment of her vow, Sir Roger built and
-endowed the church at Quatford, which a few years ago only was
-taken down and rebuilt.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p21b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Boar Hunt in Morfe Forest"
-title=
-"Boar Hunt in Morfe Forest"
- src="images/p21s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>On the high ground a little above the church there are still
-several trees whose gnarled and knotted trunks have borne the
-brunt of many centuries, two of which are supposed to have sprung
-<a name="page22"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 22</span>from the
-remains of the one mentioned in the legend.</p>
-<p>Not only legends, but traditions, and some historical
-incidents, as those brought to light by the Forest Rolls, afford
-now and then an insight of the sporting kind of life led within
-the boundary and jurisdiction of the forest and upon its
-outskirts.&nbsp; The bow being not only the chief weapon of sport
-but of war, those with a greater revenue from land than one
-hundred pence were at one time not only permitted but compelled
-to have in their possession bows and arrows, but, to prevent
-those living within the precincts of the forest killing the
-king&rsquo;s deer, the arrows were to be rounded.&nbsp; These
-were sometimes sharpened, and disputes arose between their
-owners, the dwellers in the villages, and the overseers of the
-forest, the more fruitful source of grievance being with the
-commoners, who, claiming pasturage for their cows and their
-horses, often became poachers.&nbsp; On one occasion a kid being
-wounded by an arrow at Atterley, on the Willey side of the
-Severn, and the culprit not being forthcoming, a whole district
-is in <i>misericordi&acirc;</i>, under the ban of the fierce
-Forest Laws of the period.&nbsp; On another occasion a stag
-enters the postern gate of the Castle of Bridgnorth, and the
-vision of venison <a name="page23"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-23</span>within reach proving too strong for the Castellan, he is
-entrapped, and litigation ensues.&nbsp; Sometimes the stout
-foresters and sturdy guardians of the castle, and burgesses of
-the town, indulge in friendly trials of skill at quarter-staff or
-archery, or in a wrestling match for a cross-bow, a ram, or a
-&ldquo;red gold ring.&rdquo;&nbsp; In Ritson&rsquo;s &ldquo;Robin
-Hood&rdquo; we read:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;By a bridge was a wrastling,<br />
-And there taryed was he:<br />
-And there was all the best yemen<br />
-Of all the west countrey.<br />
-A full fayre game there was set up,<br />
-A white bull up y-pight,<br />
-A great courser with saddle and brydle<br />
-With gold burnished full bryght;<br />
-A payre of gloves, a red golde ringe,<br />
-A pipe of wyne good fay:<br />
-What man bereth him best I wis,<br />
-The prize shall bear away.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>In 1292, a wrestling match at a festive gathering on
-Bernard&rsquo;s Hill takes place, when from ill blood arising
-from an old feud a dispute ensues, and a forester named Simon de
-Leyre quarrels with Robert de Turbevill, a canon of St.
-Mary&rsquo;s, Bridgnorth, over a greyhound, which the latter,
-contrary to the regulations of the courts, had brought within the
-forest; and a jury of foresters, verderers, and regarders, <a
-name="page24"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 24</span>in pursuance
-of the king&rsquo;s writ, is empowered to try the case.&nbsp; The
-evidence adduced shows that the foresters were to blame, the
-verdict come to being that the men of Brug, although at the
-wrestling match with bows and arrows, were in no way chargeable
-with the assault upon the forester.&nbsp; &ldquo;They had been
-indicted for trespass,&rdquo; the jurors said, &ldquo;not under
-any inquest taken on the matter, but by one Corbett&rsquo;s
-suggestion to the Justice of the Forest; they had been attacked
-and imprisoned under the warrant of the said Justice,
-Corbett&rsquo;s grudge being that two men of Brug had once
-promised him a cask of wine, a present in which the corporate
-body refused to join.&rdquo;&nbsp; Corbett was pronounced by the
-jurors &ldquo;a malevolent and a procurer of evil.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>To correct evils like these the &ldquo;ordinatio&rdquo; of
-Edward I. was introduced, containing many beneficial regulations,
-and stating that proceedings had been taken in the forest by one
-or two foresters or verderers to extort money, also providing
-that all trespassers in the forest of green hue and of hunting
-shall be presented by the foresters at the next Swainmote before
-foresters, verderers, and other officers.&nbsp; In the same year
-the king <a name="page25"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-25</span>confirmed the great charter of liberties of the
-forest.</p>
-<p>Various official reports of this Chace, drawn up from time to
-time, show how the great forest of Morfe gradually diminished, as
-the vills of Worfield and Claverley, and other settlements,
-extended within its limits, causing waste and destruction at
-various times of timber.&nbsp; During the Barons&rsquo; War the
-bosc of Claverley was further damaged, it was said, &ldquo;by
-many goats frequenting the cover;&rdquo; it suffered also from
-waste by the Earl of Chester, who sold from it 1,700 oak
-trees.&nbsp; Other wastes are recorded, as those caused by
-cutting down timber &ldquo;for the Castle of Bridgnorth,&rdquo;
-and &ldquo;for enclosing the vill before it was fortified by a
-wall.&rdquo;&nbsp; The report further states that &ldquo;there
-were few beasts,&rdquo; because &ldquo;they were destroyed in the
-time of war, and in the time when the liberty of the forest was
-conceded.&rdquo;&nbsp; By degrees, from one cause or another, and
-by one means or another, this, the &ldquo;favourite chace of
-English kings and Norman earls,&rdquo; which, so late as 1808,
-consisted of upwards of 3,820 acres, disappeared, leaving about
-the names of places it once enclosed an air of quaint antiquity,
-the very mention of some of which may be interesting.&nbsp; <a
-name="page26"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 26</span>Among them
-are Bowman&rsquo;s Hill, Bowman&rsquo;s Pit, and Warrener&rsquo;s
-Dead Fall&mdash;names carrying back the mind to times when bowmen
-were the reliance of English leaders in battles fought on the
-borders, and before strongholds like the Castle of
-Bridgnorth.&nbsp; Gatacre, and Gatacre Hall, suggest a passing
-notice of a family which witnessed many such encounters, and
-which remained associated with a manor here from the reign of
-Edward the Confessor to the time when Earl Derby sought shelter
-as a fugitive after the Battle of Worcester.&nbsp; As Camden
-describes it, the old hall must have been a fitting residence
-truly for a steward of the forest.&nbsp; It had, in the middle of
-each side and centre, immense oak trees, hewn nearly square, set
-with their heads on large stones, and their roots uppermost, from
-which a few rafters formed a complete arched roof.</p>
-<p>The Hermitage, with its caves hewn out of the solid sand rock,
-by the road which led through the forest in the direction of
-Worfield, meets us with the tradition that here the brother of
-King Athelstan came seeking retirement from the world, and ended
-his days within sight of the queenly Severn.&nbsp; Besides
-tradition, however, evidence exists to shew that this <a
-name="page27"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 27</span>eremetical
-cave, of Saxon origin, under the patronage of the crown, was
-occupied by successive hermits, each being ushered to the cell
-with royal seal and patent, in the same way as a dean, constable,
-or sheriff was introduced to his office; as in the case of John
-Oxindon (Edward III., 1328), Andrew Corbrigg (Edward III., 1333),
-Edmund de la Marc (Edward III., 1335), and Roger Boughton (Edward
-III., 1346).&nbsp; From the frequency of the presentations, it
-would appear either that these hermits must have been near the
-termination of their pilgrimage when they were inducted, or that
-confinement to a damp cell did not agree with them: indeed, no
-one looking at the place itself would consider it was a desirable
-one to live in.</p>
-<p>Other names not less significant of the former features of the
-country occur, as Stoneydale, Copy Foot, Sandy Burrow, Quatford
-Wyches, and Hill House Flat,&mdash;where the remains of an old
-forest oak may still be seen.&nbsp; In addition to these we find
-Briery Hurst, Rushmoor Hill, Spring Valley, Stanmore Grove, and
-Essex Fall, the latter being at the head of a ravine, half
-concealed by wood, where tradition alleges the Earl of Essex,
-grandson of the Earl who founded St. James&rsquo;s, a refuge, a
-little <a name="page28"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-28</span>lower down, for sick and suffering pilgrims, which had
-unusual forest privileges allowed by royal owners, was killed
-whilst hunting.&nbsp; Here too, higher up on the hill, may still
-be seen the remains of the old Forest Lodge, which, with its
-picturesque scenes, must have been associated with the visits of
-many a noble steward and forest-ranger.&nbsp; Many a hunter of
-the stag and wild boar has on the walls of this old Lodge hung up
-his horn and spear, as he sought rest and refreshment for the
-night.</p>
-<p>The names of some of the stewards and other officers of the
-forest are preserved, together with their tenures and other
-privileges.&nbsp; By an inquisition in the reign of Henry III.,
-it was found that Robert, son of Nicholas, and others were seized
-of &ldquo;Morffe Bosc.&rdquo; <a name="citation28"></a><a
-href="#footnote28" class="citation">[28]</a>&nbsp; In the 13 Hen.
-IV., &ldquo;Worfield had common of pasture in
-Morffe.&rdquo;&nbsp; Besides many tenures (enumerated in
-Duke&rsquo;s &ldquo;Antiquities of Shropshire,&rdquo; p. 52),
-dependent upon the forest, the kings (when these tenures were
-grown useless and obsolete) appointed stewards and rangers to
-take care of the woods and the deer; in the 19 Rich. II., Richard
-Chelmswick was forester for life: in the 1 Henry IV., John Bruyn
-was forester; and in <a name="page29"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 29</span>the 26th Henry IV., the stewardships
-of the forest of Morfe and Shirlot were granted to John Hampton,
-Esq., and his heirs.&nbsp; Again, we find 9 Henry VII., rot. 28,
-George Earl of Shrewsbury, was steward and ranger for life, with
-a fee of 4<i>d.</i> per day.&nbsp; Orig. 6 Edward VI., William
-Gatacre de Gatacre, in com. Salop, had a lease of twenty-one
-years of the stewardship; and in the 20th Elizabeth, George
-Bromley had a lease of twenty-one years of the stewardship, at a
-rent of 6<i>s.</i> 8<i>d.</i>, et de incremento, 12<i>d.</i>; and
-36 Elizabeth, George Powle, Gent., was steward, with a fee of
-4<i>d.</i> per day.</p>
-<p>One of the descendants of George Earl of Shrewsbury sold at no
-very distant period the old Lodge and some land to the Stokes
-family of Roughton, and the property is still in their
-possession.&nbsp; The remains of the old Lodge were then more
-extensive, but they were afterwards pulled down, with the
-exception of that portion which still goes by the name.&nbsp; As
-we have said, these places have about them interesting forest
-associations, reminding us that early sportsmen here met to enjoy
-the pleasures of the chase, with a success sometimes told by
-red-deer bones and wild-boar tusks, dug from some old ditch or
-trench.&nbsp; Where the plough-share now <a
-name="page30"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 30</span>cleaves the
-sandy soil, the wild-boar roamed at will; where fat kine feed in
-pastures green, stout oaks grew, and red-deer leaped; where the
-Albrighton red-coats with yelping hounds now meet, the ringing
-laugh of lords and ladies, of bishops and their clergy, hunting
-higher game, was heard.&nbsp; Then, as good old Scott has
-said,&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;In the lofty arched hall<br />
-Was spread the gorgeous festival,<br />
-Then rose the riot and the din<br />
-Above, beneath, without, within,<br />
-For from its lofty balcony,<br />
-Rang trumpet, shawm and psaltery.<br />
-Their clanging bowls old warriors quaff&rsquo;d,<br />
-Loudly they spoke and loudly laugh&rsquo;d,<br />
-Whisper&rsquo;d young knights in tones more mild,<br />
-To ladies fair, and ladies smiled.<br />
-The hooded hawks, high perch&rsquo;d on beam,<br />
-The clamour join&rsquo;d with whistling scream,<br />
-And flapped their wings and shook their bells,<br />
-In concert with the stag-hounds&rsquo; yells.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="page31"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-31</span>CHAPTER III.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">Afforestation of
-Shirlot&mdash;Extent&mdash;Places
-Disafforested&mdash;Hayes&mdash;Foresters&mdash;Hunting
-Lodges&mdash;Sporting Priors&mdash;Old
-Tenures&mdash;Encroachments upon Woods by Iron-making
-Operations&mdash;Animals that have Disappeared&mdash;Reaction due
-to a Love of Sport&mdash;What the Country would have
-lost&mdash;&ldquo;The Merrie Greenwood&rdquo;&mdash;Remarkable
-old Forest Trees, &amp;c.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Where with puffed cheek the belted hunter
-blows<br />
-His wreathed bugle horn.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><span class="smcap">Mr. Eyton</span> thinks the afforestation
-of Shirlot was probably suggested by its proximity to the
-Morville and Chetton manors, where Saxon kings and Mercian earls
-had their respective demesnes, and that Henry I. and his
-successors, in visiting the Castle of Bridgnorth, or as guests of
-the Prior of Wenlock, had <a name="page32"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 32</span>obvious reasons for perpetuating
-there the exclusive rights of a Royal chace.&nbsp; Although
-Shirlot Forest was separated from that of Morfe by the Severn,
-its jurisdiction extended across the river to Apley, and embraced
-places lying along the right bank of the river, in the direction
-of Cressage.&nbsp; Bridgnorth with its surroundings was not taken
-out of its jurisdiction or thrown open by perambulation till
-1301, when it was disafforested, together with Eardington, Much
-Wenlock, Broseley, and other places.&nbsp; The extent and ancient
-jurisdiction of this forest may be estimated by the number of
-places taken from it at this date, as Benthall, Buildwas, Barrow,
-Belswardine, Shineton, Posenall, Walton, Willey, Atterley, the
-Dean, the Bold, Linley, Caughley, Little Caughley, Rowton,
-Sweyney, Appeleye (the only vill eastward of Severn), Colemore,
-Stanley, Rucroft, Medewegrene, Cantreyne, Simon de Severn&rsquo;s
-messuage (now Severn Hall), Northleye, Astley Abbot&rsquo;s
-Manor, La Dunfowe (Dunwall), La Rode (now Rhodes), Kinsedeleye
-(now Kinslow), Tasley, Crofte, Haleygton (Horton, near Morville),
-Aldenham, the Bosc of the Earl of Arundel within the bounds of
-the forest of Schyrlet, which is called Wiles Wode (<i>i.e.</i>
-Earl&rsquo;s Wood), Aston Aer, Momerfield (Morville), <a
-name="page33"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 33</span>Lee,
-Underdone, Walton (all three near Morville), Upton (now Upton
-Cresset), Meadowley, Stapeley, Criddon, Midteleton (Middleton
-Scriven), the Bosc of the Prior of Wenlock, called Lythewode,
-half the vill of Neuton (Newton near Bold), Faintree, Chetton,
-Walkes Batch (Wallsbatch, near Chetton), Hollycott, Hapesford
-(now Harpswood), Westwood (near Harpswood), Oldbury, a messuage
-at the More (the Moor Ridding), a messuage at La Cnolle (now
-Knowle Sands), and the Bosc which is called Ongeres.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p31b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Fallow deer"
-title=
-"Fallow deer"
- src="images/p31s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>The ancient extent of the forest must have been about twelve
-miles by five.&nbsp; The names of the places mentioned to which
-the limits of the chace are traced are so different in many
-instances from the present that it may be of interest to give a
-few of them.&nbsp; From Yapenacres Merwey the boundary was to go
-up to the Raveneshok (Ravens&rsquo; Oak), thence straight to the
-Brenallegrene, near the Coleherth (Coal Hearth) going up by the
-Fendeshok (Friends&rsquo; Oak) to the Dernewhite-ford.&nbsp;
-Thence upwards to the Nethercoumbesheved; and so straight through
-the Middlecoumbesheved, and then down to Caldewall.&nbsp; Then
-down through the Lynde to the Mer Elyn.&nbsp; Thence down to
-Dubledaneslegh, <a name="page34"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-34</span>and then up by a certain watercourse to the Pirle; and
-so up to Wichardesok; and so to the Pundefold; and so down by the
-Shepewey to the Holeweeuen, and then up by a certain fence to
-Adame&rsquo;s Hale (Adam&rsquo;s Hall), and thus by the assarts
-which John de Haldenham (Aldenham) holds at a rent of the king to
-the corner of Mokeleyes Rowe (Muckley Row); and thence down to
-Yapenacres Merwey, where the first land-mark of the Haye
-begins.&nbsp; There was also, it was said, a certain bosc which
-the King still held in the same forest, called Benthlegh Haye
-(Bentley Haye).</p>
-<p>In addition to this Haye there was the Haye of Shirlot,
-opposite to which a portion of the forest in the fifth of Henry
-III.&rsquo;s reign was ordered to be assarted, which consisted in
-grubbing up the roots so as to render the ground fit for
-tillage.</p>
-<p>In connection with these Hayes, generally a staff of
-foresters, verderers, rangers, stewards, and regarders was kept
-up; and forest courts were also held at stated times (in the
-forest of the Clee every six weeks), at which questions and
-privileges connected with the forest were considered.&nbsp;
-Philip de Baggesour, Forester of the Fee in the king&rsquo;s free
-Haye of Schyrlet in 1255, in the Inquisition of <a
-name="page35"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 35</span>Hundreds, is
-said to have under him &ldquo;two foresters, who give him
-20<i>s.</i> per annum for holding their office, and to make a
-levy on oats in Lent, and on wheat in autumn.&rdquo;&nbsp;
-&ldquo;The aforesaid Philip,&rdquo; it is said, &ldquo;hath now
-in the said Haye of Windfalls as much as seven trees, and
-likewise all trees which are wind-fallen, the jurors know not by
-what warrant except by ancient tenure.&rdquo;&nbsp; These
-privileged officers had good pickings, evidently by means of
-their various time-sanctioned customs, and jolly lives no doubt
-they led.</p>
-<p>In the forty-second of Henry III. Hammond le Strange was
-steward of this forest, and in the second of Edward I. the
-king&rsquo;s forester is said to have given the sheriff of the
-county notice that he was to convey all the venison killed in the
-forests of Salop, and deliver it at Westminster to the
-king&rsquo;s larder, for the use of the king&rsquo;s
-palace.&nbsp; According to the same record, the profits that were
-made of the oaks that were fallen were to be applied to the
-building of a vessel for the king.&nbsp; In the nineteenth of
-Richard II., Richard Chelmswick was appointed forester for life;
-and in the twenty-sixth of Henry III. the stewardship both of the
-forests of Morfe and of Shirlot was granted to John Hampton and
-his heirs.</p>
-<p><a name="page36"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 36</span>Some of
-the chief foresters also held Willey, and probably resided there;
-at any rate it is not improbable that a building which bears
-marks of extreme antiquity, between Barrow and Broseley, called
-the Lodge Farm, was once the hunting lodge.&nbsp; It has
-underneath strongly arched and extensive cellaring, which seems
-to be older than portions of the superstructure, and which may
-have held the essentials for feasts, for which sportsmen of all
-times have been famous.&nbsp; Near the lodge, too, is the
-<i>Dear-Loape</i>, or Deer Leap, a little valley through which
-once evidently ran a considerable stream, <a
-name="page37"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 37</span>and near
-which the soil is still black, wet, and boggy.&nbsp; A deer leap,
-dear loape, or <i>saltory</i>, was a pitfall&mdash;a contrivance
-common during the forest periods, generally at the edge of the
-chace, for taking deer, and often granted by charter as a
-privilege&mdash;as that, for instance, on the edge of Cank, or
-Cannock Chace.&nbsp; Sometimes these pitfalls, dug for the
-purpose of taking game, were used by poachers, who drove the deer
-into them.&nbsp; It is, therefore, easy to understand why the
-forest lodge should be near, as a protection.&nbsp; It was
-usually one of the articles of inquiry at the Swainmote Court
-whether &ldquo;any man have any great close within three miles of
-the forest that have any saltories, or great gaps called deer
-loapes, to receive deer into them when they be in chasing, and
-when they are in them they cannot get out again.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p36b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Deer Leap"
-title=
-"Deer Leap"
- src="images/p36s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>Among sportsmen of these forest periods we must not omit to
-notice the Priors of the ancient Abbey of Wenlock.&nbsp; The
-heads of such wealthy establishments by no means confined
-themselves within the limits of the chapter-house.&nbsp; They
-were no mere cloistered monks, devoted to book and candle, but
-jolly livers, gaily dressed, and waited upon by well-appointed
-servants; like the Abbot of Buildwas, who <a
-name="page38"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 38</span>had for his
-vassal the Lord of Buildwas Parva, who held land under him on
-condition that he and his wife should place the first dish on the
-abbot&rsquo;s table on Christmas Day, and ride with him any
-whither within the four seas at the abbot&rsquo;s charge.&nbsp;
-They had huntsmen and hounds, and one can imagine their sporting
-visitation rounds among their churches, the chanting of priests,
-the deep-mouthed baying of <a name="page39"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 39</span>dogs, early matins, and the
-huntsman&rsquo;s bugle horn harmoniously blending in the
-neighbourhood of the forest.&nbsp; Hugh Montgomery in his day
-gave to the abbey a tithe of the venison which he took in its
-woods, and in 1190 we find the Prior of Wenlock giving twenty
-merks to the king that he may &ldquo;have the Wood of Shirlott to
-himself, exempt from view of foresters, and taken out of the
-Regard.&rdquo;&nbsp; As we have already shown, the priors had a
-park at Madeley, they had one at Oxenbold, and they also had
-privileges over woods adjoining the forest of the Clees, where
-the Cliffords exercised rights ordinarily belonging to royal
-proprietors, and where their foresters carried things with such a
-high hand, and so frequently got into trouble with those of the
-priors, that the latter were glad to accept an arrangement, come
-to after much litigation in 1232, by which they were to have a
-tenth beast only of those taken in their own woods at Stoke and
-Ditton, and of those started in their demesne boscs, and taken
-elsewhere.&nbsp; These boscs appear to have been woodland patches
-connecting the long line of forest stretching along the flanks of
-the Clee Hills with that on the high ground of Shirlot and, as in
-the case of others even much further removed, their <a
-name="page40"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 40</span>ownership was
-exceedingly limited.&nbsp; One of the complaints against
-Clifford&rsquo;s foresters was, that they would not suffer the
-priors&rsquo; men to keep at Ditton Priors and Stoke St. Milburgh
-any dogs not <i>expedited</i>, or mutilated in their feet, nor
-pasture for their goats.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p38b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Chapter House of Wenlock Priory"
-title=
-"Chapter House of Wenlock Priory"
- src="images/p38s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>Imbert, one of these priors, was chosen as one of the
-Commissioners for concluding a truce with David ap Llewellyn in
-July, 1244.&nbsp; He was subsequently heavily fined for
-trespasses for assarting, or grubbing up the roots of trees, in
-forest lands at Willey, Broseley, Coalbrookdale, Madeley, and
-other places, the charge for trespass amounting to the large sum
-of &pound;126 13<i>s.</i> 4<i>d.</i></p>
-<p>A survey of the Haye of Shirlot, made by four knights of the
-county, pursuant to a royal writ in October 21, 1235, sets forth
-&ldquo;its custody good as regards oak trees and underwood,
-except that great deliveries have been made by order of the king
-to the Abbeys of Salop and Bildewas, to the Priory of Wenlock,
-and to the Castle of Brug, for the repairs of buildings,
-&amp;c.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>Some curious tenures existed within the jurisdiction of this
-forest, one of which it may be worth while deviating from our
-present purpose to notice, <a name="page41"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 41</span>as it affords an insight into the
-early iron manufacturing operations which, at a later period, led
-to the destruction of forest trees, but, at the same time, to the
-development of the mineral wealth of the district within and
-bordering upon the forest.&nbsp; Of its origin nothing is known;
-but it is supposed to have arisen out of some kingly peril or
-other forest incident connected with the chase.&nbsp; It
-consisted in this, that the tenant of the king at the More held
-his land upon the condition that he appeared yearly in the
-Exchequer with a hazel rod of a year&rsquo;s growth and a
-cubit&rsquo;s length, and two knives.&nbsp; The treasurer and
-barons being present, the tenant was to attempt to sever the rod
-with one of the knives, so that it bent or broke.&nbsp; The other
-knife was to do the same work at one stroke, and to be given up
-to the king&rsquo;s chamberlain for royal use. <a
-name="citation41"></a><a href="#footnote41"
-class="citation">[41]</a></p>
-<p>That iron was manufactured at a very early period in the heart
-of the forests of Shirlot and the Clees, is shown by Leland, who
-informs us that in his day there were blow-shops upon the Brown
-Clee Hills in Shropshire, where iron ores were exposed upon the
-hill sides, and where, from the fact that <a
-name="page42"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 42</span>wood was
-required for smelting, it is only reasonable to look for
-them.&nbsp; Historical records and monastic writings, as well as
-old tenures, traditions, and heaps of slag, tell us that iron had
-been manufactured in the midst of these woods from very remote
-periods.&nbsp; As far back as 1250, a notice occurs of a right of
-road granted by Philip de Benthall, Lord of Benthall, to the
-monks of Buildwas, over all his estate, for the carriage of
-stone, coal, and timber; and in an old work in the Deer Leap,
-very primitive wooden shovels, and wheels flanged and cut out of
-the solid block, and apparently designed to bear heavy weights,
-were found a short time since, which are now in possession of Mr.
-Thursfield, of Barrow, together with an iron axletree and some
-brass sockets, two of which have on them &ldquo;P. B.,&rdquo;
-being the initials of Philip Benthall, or Philip Burnel, it is
-supposed, the latter having succeeded the former.&nbsp; At
-Linley, and the Smithies, traces of old forges occur; so that
-there is good reason for supposing that knives and other articles
-of iron may have been manufactured in the district from a very
-early period.&nbsp; Among the assets, for instance, of the Priory
-of Wenlock, in the year 1541&ndash;2, is a mine of ironstone, at
-Shirlot, fermed for <a name="page43"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-43</span>&pound;2 6<i>s.</i> 1<i>d.</i> per annum; and a forge,
-described as an Ierne Smythee, or a smith&rsquo;s place, in
-Shirlot, rented at &pound;12 8<i>s.</i>&nbsp; Another forge
-produced &pound;2 13<i>s.</i> 4<i>d.</i> per annum; and the
-produce of some other mineral, probably coal, was &pound;5
-3<i>s.</i> 10<i>d.</i>&nbsp; These large rents for those days
-show the advance made in turning to account the mineral wealth of
-the district, and the superior value of mines compared with
-trees, or mere surface produce.</p>
-<p>Wherever powerful streams came down precipitous channels,
-little forges with clanging hammers were heard reverberating
-through the woods as early as the reigns of the Tudors.&nbsp;
-Their sites now are&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Downy banks damask&rsquo;d with
-flowers:&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>but they reveal the havoc made of the timber by cutting and
-burning it for charcoal down to the reign of Elizabeth, when an
-act was passed to restrict the use for such purposes.</p>
-<p>These iron-making and mining operations caused the forest to
-be intersected by roads and tramways, as old maps and reports of
-the forest shew us; so that few beasts, except those passing
-between their more secluded haunts, were to be found there; and,
-<a name="page44"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 44</span>as the
-stragglers preferred the tender vegetation the garden of the
-cottager afforded, even these were sometimes noosed, or shot with
-bows and arrows, which made no noise.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p44b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Waterfall"
-title=
-"Waterfall"
- src="images/p44s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>To such an extent had destruction of timber in this and other
-forests in the country been carried, that it was feared that in
-the event of a foreign war sufficient timber could not be found
-for the use of the navy.&nbsp; A reaction, however, set in:
-wealthy <a name="page45"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-45</span>landowners set themselves to work to remedy the evil by
-planting and preserving trees, especially the oak; and many of
-the woods and plantations which gladden the eye of the traveller
-in passing through the country, and which afford good sport to
-the Wheatland and Albrighton packs, were the result.</p>
-<p>To this indigenous and deep-rooted love of sport we are
-therefore indebted, to a very great extent, for those beautiful
-woods which adorn the Willey country and many other portions of
-the kingdom.&nbsp; But for our woods and the &ldquo;creeping
-things&rdquo; they shelter, we should have imperfect conceptions
-of those earlier phases of the island:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;When stalked the bison from his shaggy
-lair,<br />
-Thousands of years before the silent air<br />
-Was pierced by whizzing shafts of hunters keen.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>The country would have been wanting in subjects such as
-Creswick, with faithful expressions of foliage and knowledge of
-the play of light and shade, has depicted.&nbsp; It would have
-lost the text-work of those characteristics Constable revelled
-in, and those Harding gave us in his oaks.&nbsp; We should have
-lost subjects for the poet as well as for the painter; for the
-ballad literature of the country is redolent of sights and sounds
-associated therewith.&nbsp; <a name="page46"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 46</span>To come down from the earliest
-times.&nbsp; How the old Druids reverenced them! how the
-compilers of that surprising survey of the country we find in
-Domesday noted all details concerning them! what joyous allusions
-Chaucer, Spenser, and later writers make to them! what peculiar
-charms the &ldquo;merry green-wood&rdquo; and the deep forest
-glades had for the imagination of the people!&nbsp; Hence the
-popular sympathy expressed by means of tales and traditions <a
-name="page47"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 47</span>in connection
-with Sherwood&rsquo;s sylvan shade, and the many editions of the
-song of the bold outlaw, and of the adventures contained
-therein.&nbsp; Even the utilitarian philosopher and the ultra
-radical, fleeing from the stifling atmosphere of the town, and
-diving for an hour or so into some paternal wood, is inclined, we
-fancy, to sponge from his memory the bitter things he has said of
-the owners and of that aristocratic class who usually value and
-guard them as they do their picture galleries.&nbsp; Thanks to
-such as these, there is now scarcely a run in the Willey country
-but brings the sportsman face to face with vestiges of some
-sylvan memorial Nature or man has planted along the hill and
-valley sides, memorials renewed again and again, as winter after
-winter rends the red leaves from the trees: and the man who has
-not made a pilgrimage, for sport or otherwise, through these
-far-reaching sylvan slopes along the valley of the Severn,
-stretching almost uninterruptedly for seven or eight miles, or
-through some similar wooded tract, witnessing the sheltered
-inequalities of the surface, varied by rocky glens and rushy
-pools&mdash;the winter haunt of snipe and woodcock&mdash;has
-missed much that might afford him the highest interest.&nbsp; <a
-name="page48"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 48</span>Here and
-there, on indurated soils along the valley sides, opportunities
-occur of studying the manner in which trees of several
-centuries&rsquo; growth send their gnarled and massive roots in
-between the rocks in search of nourishment, for firmness, or to
-resist storms that shake branches little inferior to the parent
-stem.&nbsp; Few places probably have finer old hollies and
-yew-trees indigenous to the soil, relieving the monotony of the
-general grey by their sombre green&mdash;trees rooted where they
-grew six or eight centuries since, and carrying back the mind to
-the time of Harold and the bowmen days of Robin Hood.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p46b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Forest scenery"
-title=
-"Forest scenery"
- src="images/p46s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>Spoonhill, a very well-known covert of the Wheatland Hunt, was
-a slip of woodland as early as a perambulation in 1356, when it
-was recorded to lie outside the forest, its boundary on the
-Shirlot side being marked by a famous oak called Kinsok,
-&ldquo;which stood on the king&rsquo;s highway between Weston and
-Wenlock.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>The Larden and Lutwyche woods for many years have been famous
-for foxes.&nbsp; The late M. Benson, Esq., told us that a fox had
-for several seasons made his home securely in a tree near his
-house, he having taken care to keep his secret.&nbsp; The woods,
-too, <a name="page49"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 49</span>on
-the opposite side of the ridge, rarely fail to furnish a fox; and
-it is difficult to imagine a finer spot than Smallman&rsquo;s
-Leap, <a name="citation49a"></a><a href="#footnote49a"
-class="citation">[49a]</a> or Ipikin&rsquo;s Rock, on the
-&ldquo;Hill Top,&rdquo; presents for viewing a run over Hughley
-and Kenley, or between there and Hope Bowdler.&nbsp; Near
-Lutwyche is a thick entangled wood, called Mog Forest; and in the
-old door of the Church of Easthope, <a name="citation49b"></a><a
-href="#footnote49b" class="citation">[49b]</a> near, is a large
-iron ring, which is conjectured to have been placed there for
-outlaws of the forest who sought sanctuary or freedom from arrest
-to take hold of.&nbsp; Now and then, in wandering over the sites
-of these former forests, we come upon traditions of great trees,
-sometimes upon an aged tree itself, &ldquo;bald with
-antiquity,&rdquo; telling of parent forest tracts, like the Lady
-Oak at Cressage, which formerly stood in the public highway, and
-suffered much from gipsies and other vagabonds lighting <a
-name="page50"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 50</span>fires in its
-hollow trunk, but which is now propped, cramped, and cared for,
-with as much concern as the Druids were wont to show to similar
-trees.&nbsp; A young tree, too, sprung from an acorn from the old
-one, has grown up within its hollow trunk, and now mingles its
-foliage with that of the parent.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p50b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Lady Oak"
-title=
-"Lady Oak"
- src="images/p50s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>There are a few fine old trees near Willey, supposed to be
-fragmentary forest remains.&nbsp; One is <a
-name="page51"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 51</span>a
-patriarchal-looking ash in the public road at Barrow; another is
-an oak near the Dean; it is one of which the present noble owner
-of Willey shows the greatest pride and care.&nbsp; There are also
-two noble trees at Shipton and Larden; the one at the latter
-place being a fine beech, the branches of which, when tipped with
-foliage, have a circumference of 35 yards.&nbsp; A magnificent
-oak, recently cut down in Corve Dale, contained 300 cubic feet of
-timber, and was 18 feet in circumference.&nbsp; This, however,
-was a sapling compared with that king of forest trees which
-Loudon describes as having been cut down in Willey Park.&nbsp; It
-spread 114 feet, and had a trunk 9 feet in diameter, exclusive of
-the bark.&nbsp; It contained 24 cords of yard wood, 11&frac12;
-cords of four-feet wood, 252 park palings, six feet long, 1 load
-of cooper&rsquo;s wood, 16&frac12; tons of timber in all the
-boughs; 28 tons of timber in the body, and this besides fagots
-and boughs that had dropped off:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;What tales, if there be tongues in
-trees,<br />
-Those giant oaks could tell,<br />
-Of beings born and buried here;<br />
-Tales of the peasant and the peer,<br />
-Tales of the bridal and the bier<br />
-The welcome and farewell.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>The old oak forests and chestnut groves which supplied <a
-name="page52"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 52</span>the sturdy
-framework for the half-timbered houses of our ancestors, the
-rafters for their churches, and the beams for their cathedrals,
-are gone; and the mischief is, not only that we have lost former
-forests, but that our present woods every year are growing less,
-that much of that shrubby foliage which within our own
-recollection divided the fields, forming little copses in which a
-Morland would have revelled, have had to give way to agricultural
-improvements, and the objects of sport they sheltered have
-disappeared.&nbsp; The badger lingered to the beginning of the
-present century along the rocks of Benthall and Apley; and the
-otter, which still haunts portions of the Severn and its more
-secluded tributaries, and occasionally affords sport in some
-parts of the country higher up, was far from being rare.&nbsp; On
-the left bank of the Severn are the &ldquo;Brock-holes,&rdquo; or
-badger-holes, whilst near to it are the &ldquo;Fox-holes,&rdquo;
-where tradition alleges foxes a generation or two ago to have
-been numerous enough to have been a nuisance; and the same remark
-may apply to the &ldquo;Fox-holes&rdquo; at Benthall.&nbsp; As
-the district became more cultivated and the country more
-populated, the range of these animals became more and more
-circumscribed, and the cherished sports of our forefathers came
-to form the staple topics of neighbours&rsquo; oft-told
-tales.</p>
-<p><a name="page53"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 53</span>Within
-our own recollection the badger was to be found at Benthall Edge;
-but he had two enemies&mdash;the fox, who sometimes took
-possession of his den and drove him from the place, and the
-miners of Broseley and Benthall, who were usually great
-dog-fanciers, and who were accustomed to steal forth as the moon
-rose above the horizon, and intercept him as he left his long
-winding excavation among the rocks, in order to make sport for
-them at their annual wakes.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p53.1b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"The Badger"
-title=
-"The Badger"
- src="images/p53.1s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p53.2b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Group of deer"
-title=
-"Group of deer"
- src="images/p53.2s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<h2><a name="page54"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-54</span>CHAPTER IV.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WREKIN FOREST AND THE
-FORESTERS.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Wrekin Forest&mdash;Hermit of Mount St.
-Gilbert&mdash;Poachers upon the King&rsquo;s
-Preserves&mdash;Extent of the Forest&mdash;Haye of
-Wellington&mdash;Robert Forester&mdash;Perquisites&mdash;Hunting
-Matches&mdash;Singular Grant to John Forester&mdash;Sir Walter
-Scott&rsquo;s Tony Foster a Member of the Shropshire Forester
-Family&mdash;Anthony Foster Lord of the Manor of Little
-Wenlock&mdash;<a name="page55"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-55</span>The Foresters of Sutton and Bridgnorth&mdash;Anthony
-Foster altogether a different Character from what Sir Walter
-Scott represents him.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;I am clad in youthful green, I other
-colours scorn,<br />
-My silken bauldrick bears my bugle or my horn,<br />
-Which, setting to my lips, I wind so loud and shrill,<br />
-As makes the echoes shout from every neighbouring hill;<br />
-My dog-hook at my belt, to which my thong is tied,<br />
-My sheaf of arrows by, my wood-knife by my side,<br />
-My cross-bow in my hand, my gaffle on my rack,<br />
-To bend it when I please, or if I list to slack;<br />
-My hound then in my thong, I, by the woodman&rsquo;s art,<br />
-Forecast where I may lodge the goodly hie-palm&rsquo;d hart,<br
-/>
-To view the grazing herds, so sundry times I use,<br />
-Where by the loftiest head I knew my deer to choose;<br />
-And to unherd him, then I gallop o&rsquo;er the ground,<br />
-Upon my well-breathed nag, to cheer my learning hound.<br />
-Some time I pitch my toils the deer alive to take,<br />
-Some time I like the cry the deep-mouthed kennel make;<br />
-Then underneath my horse I stalk my game to strike,<br />
-And with a single dog to hunt or hurt him as I like.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: right"><span
-class="smcap">Drayton</span>.</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><span class="smcap">It</span> is important, to the completion
-of our sketch of the earlier features of the country, that we
-cross the Severn and say a word or two respecting the forest of
-the Wrekin, of which the early ancestors of the present Willey
-family had charge.&nbsp; This famous hill must then have formed a
-feature quite as conspicuous in the landscape as it does at
-present.&nbsp; As it stood out above the wide-spreading forest
-that <a name="page56"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-56</span>surrounded it, it must have looked like a barren island
-amid a waving sea of green.&nbsp; From its position and outline
-too, it appears to have been selected during the struggles which
-took place along the borders as a military fortress, judging from
-the entrenchments near its summit, and the tumuli both here and
-in the valley at its foot, where numbers of broken weapons have
-been found.&nbsp; At a later period <a name="page57"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 57</span>it is spoken of as Mount St. Gilbert,
-in honour, it is said, of a recluse to whom the Gilbertine monks
-ascribe their origin.&nbsp; Whether the saint fixed his abode in
-the cleft called the Needle&rsquo;s Eye (which tradition alleges
-to have been made at the Crucifixion), or on some other part of
-the hill, there is no evidence to show; but that there was a
-hermitage there at one time, and that whilst the woods around
-were stocked with game, is clear.&nbsp; It is charitable to
-suppose, however, that the good man who pitched his tent so high
-above his fellows abstained from such tempting luxuries, that on
-his wooden trencher no king&rsquo;s venison smoked, and that fare
-more becoming gown and girdle contented him; so at least it must
-have been reported to Henry III., who, to give the hermit,
-Nicholas de Denton by name, &ldquo;greater leisure for holy
-exercises, and to support him during his life, so long as he
-should be a hermit on the aforesaid mountain,&rdquo; granted six
-quarters of corn, to be paid by the Sheriff of Shropshire, out of
-the issues of Pendleston Mill, near Bridgnorth.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p56b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Needle&rsquo;s Eye"
-title=
-"Needle&rsquo;s Eye"
- src="images/p56s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>That there were, however, poachers upon the king&rsquo;s
-preserves appears from a criminal prosecution recorded on the
-Forest Roll of 1209, to the effect that four of the county
-sergeants found venison in <a name="page58"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 58</span>the house of Hugh le Scot, who took
-asylum in a church, and, refusing to quit, &ldquo;there lived a
-month,&rdquo; but afterwards &ldquo;escaped in woman&rsquo;s
-clothes.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>Certain sales of forest land made by Henry II. near the
-Wrekin, and entered on the Forest Roll of 1180, together with the
-assessments and perambulations of later periods, afford some idea
-of the extent of this forest, which, from the Severn and the
-limits of Shrewsbury, swept round by Tibberton and Chetwynd to
-the east, and included Lilleshall, St. George&rsquo;s, Dawley,
-Shifnal, Kemberton, and Madeley on the south.&nbsp; From the
-&ldquo;Survey of Shropshire Forests&rdquo; in 1235, it appears
-that the following woods were subject to its jurisdiction:
-Leegomery, Wrockwardine Wood, Eyton-on-the-Weald Moors,
-Lilleshall, Sheriffhales, the Lizard, Stirchley, and Great
-Dawley.&nbsp; A later perambulation fixed the bounds of the royal
-preserve, or Haye of Wellington, in which two burnings of lime
-for the use of the crown are recorded, as well as the fact that
-three hundred oak-trees were consumed in the operation.</p>
-<p>Hugh Forester, and Robert the Forester, are spoken of as
-tenants of the crown in connection with this Haye; and it is an
-interesting coincidence that the land originally granted by one
-of the Norman <a name="page59"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-59</span>earls, or by King Henry I., for the custody of this
-Haye, which included what is now called Hay Gate, is still in
-possession of the present noble owner of Willey.&nbsp; It seems
-singular, however, that in the &ldquo;Arundel Rolls&rdquo; of
-1255, it should be described as a <i>pourpresture</i>, for which
-eighteen pence per acre was paid to the king, as being held by
-the said Robert Forester towards the custody of the Wellington
-Haia.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p59b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Deer and young"
-title=
-"Deer and young"
- src="images/p59s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p><a name="page60"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 60</span>Among
-the perquisites which the said Robert Forester was allowed, as
-Keeper of the Haye, all dead wood and windfalls are mentioned,
-unless more than five oak-trees were blown down at a time, in
-which case they went to the king.&nbsp; The Haye is spoken of
-here as an &ldquo;imparkment,&rdquo; which agrees with the
-descriptions of Chaucer and other old writers, who speak of a
-Haia as a place paled in, or enclosed, into which deer or other
-game were driven, as they now drive deer in North America, or
-elephants in India, and of grants of land made to those whose
-especial duty it was to drive the deer with their troop of
-followers from all parts of a wide circle into such enclosure for
-slaughter.&nbsp; The following description of deer-hunting in the
-seventeenth century by Taylor, the Water Poet, as he is called,
-will enable us to understand the plan pursued by the Norman
-sportsmen:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Five or six hundred men do rise early in
-the morning, and they do disperse themselves divers ways; and
-seven, eight, or ten miles&rsquo; compass, they do bring or chase
-in the deer in many herds (two, three, or four hundred in a herd)
-to such a place as the noblemen shall appoint them; then, when
-the day is come, the lords and gentlemen of their companies <a
-name="page61"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 61</span>do ride or go
-to the said places, sometimes wandering up to the middle through
-bourns, and rivers; and then, they being come to the place, do
-lie down on the ground till those foresaid scouts, which are
-called the Tinkheldt, do bring down the deer.&nbsp; Then, after
-we had stayed three hours or there abouts, we might perceive the
-deer appear on the hills round about us (their heads making a
-show like a wood), which being followed close by the Tinkheldt,
-are chased down into the valley where we lay; then all the valley
-on each side being waylaid with a hundred couple of strong Irish
-greyhounds, they are let loose as occasion serves upon the herd
-of deer, that with dogs, guns, arrows, dirks, and daggers, in the
-space of two hours fourscore fat deer were slain.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Hunting matches were sometimes made in these forests, and one,
-embittered by some family feud respecting a fishery, terminated
-in the death of a bold and ancient knight, an event recorded upon
-a stone covering his remains in the quaint and truly ancient
-church at Atcham.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The bugle sounds, &rsquo;tis
-Berwick&rsquo;s lord<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; O&rsquo;er Wrekin drives the deer;<br />
-That hunting match&mdash;that fatal feud&mdash;<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; Drew many a widow&rsquo;s tear.</p>
-<p><a name="page62"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-62</span>&ldquo;With deep-mouthed talbe to rouse the game<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; His generous bosom warms,<br />
-Till furious foemen check the chase<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; And dare the din of arms.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Then fell the high-born Malveysin,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; His limbs besmeared with gore;<br />
-No more his trusty bow shall twang,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; His bugle blow no more.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Whilst Ridware mourns her last brave son<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; In arms untimely slain,<br />
-With kindred grief she here records<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; The last of Berwick&rsquo;s train.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p62b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Atcham Church"
-title=
-"Atcham Church"
- src="images/p62s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>Robert Forester appears to have had charge not only of the
-Haye of the Wrekin, but also of that of <a
-name="page63"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 63</span>Morfe, for
-both of which he is represented as answering at the Assizes in
-February, 1262, for the eight years then past.&nbsp; A Robert
-Forester is also described as one chosen with the sheriff, the
-chief forester, and verderers of Shropshire in 1242, to try the
-question touching the <i>expeditation</i> of dogs on the estates
-of the Lilleshall Abbey, and his seal still remains attached to
-the juror&rsquo;s return now in possession of the Sutherland
-family at Trentham.</p>
-<p>A Roger de Wellington, whom Mr. Eyton calls Roger le Forester
-the second, is also described as one of six royal
-foresters-of-the-fee, who, on June 6th, 1300, met to assist at
-the great perambulation of Shropshire forests.&nbsp; He was
-admitted a burgess of Shrewsbury in 1319.&nbsp; John Forester,
-his son and heir, it is supposed, was baptised at Wellington, and
-attained his majority in 1335; <a name="citation63"></a><a
-href="#footnote63" class="citation">[63]</a> and a John
-Forester&mdash;a lineal descendant of his&mdash;obtained the
-singular grant, now at Willey, from Henry VIII., privileging him
-to wear his hat in the royal presence.&nbsp; After the usual
-formalities the grant proceeds:&mdash;&ldquo;Know all men, our
-officers, ministers, &amp;c.&nbsp; Forasmuch as we be credibly
-informed that our trusty and well-beloved <a
-name="page64"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 64</span>John Foster,
-of Wellington, in the county of Salop, Gentilman, for certain
-diseases and infirmities which he has on his hede, cannot
-consequently, without great danger and jeopardy, be discovered of
-the same.&nbsp; Whereupon we, in consideration thereof, by these
-presents, licenced hym from henceforth to use and were his bonet
-on his said hede,&rdquo; &amp;c.</p>
-<p>It will be observed that in this grant the name occurs in its
-abridged form as Foster, and in the Sheriffs of Shropshire and
-many old documents it is variously spelt as Forester, Forster,
-and Foster, a circumstance which during the progress of the
-present work suggested an inquiry, the result of
-which&mdash;mainly through the researches of a painstaking
-friend&mdash;may add weight and interest to the
-arch&aelig;ological lore previously collected in connection with
-the family.&nbsp; It appears, for instance, that the Anthony
-Foster of Sir Walter Scott&rsquo;s &ldquo;Kenilworth&rdquo; was
-descended from the Foresters of Wellington; that he held the
-manor of Little Wenlock and other property in Shropshire in 1545;
-that the Richard Forester or Forster who built the interesting
-half-timbered mansion, <a name="citation64"></a><a
-href="#footnote64" class="citation">[64]</a> still standing in <a
-name="page65"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 65</span>the Cartway,
-Bridgnorth, where Bishop Percy, the author of
-&ldquo;Percy&rsquo;s Reliques,&rdquo; was born, was also a
-member; and that Anne, the daughter of this Richard Forester or
-Forster, was married in 1575 at Sutton Maddock to William Baxter,
-the antiquary, <a name="page66"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-66</span>mentioned by the Rev. George Bellet at page 183 of the
-&ldquo;Antiquities of Bridgnorth.&rdquo;&nbsp; Mr. Bellet,
-speaking of another mansion of the Foresters at Bridgnorth, says,
-&ldquo;One could wish, as a mere matter of curiosity, that a
-remarkable building, called &lsquo;Forester&rsquo;s Folly,&rsquo;
-had been amongst those which escaped the fire; for it was built
-by Richard Forester, the private secretary of no less famous a
-person than Bishop Bonner, and bore the above appellation most
-likely on account of the cost of its erection.&rdquo;&nbsp;
-William Baxter, who, it will be seen, was a descendant of the
-Foresters, has an interesting passage in his life referring to
-the circumstance. <a name="citation66"></a><a href="#footnote66"
-class="citation">[66]</a></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p65b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Richard Forester&rsquo;s Old Mansion"
-title=
-"Richard Forester&rsquo;s Old Mansion"
- src="images/p65s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>We believe that the Forester pedigree in the MS. collection of
-Shropshire pedigrees, now in possession of Sidney Stedman Smith,
-Esq., compiled by that careful and painstaking genealogist the
-late Mr. Hardwick, fully confirms this, and shows that the
-Foresters of Watling Street, the Foresters or Forsters of Sutton
-Maddock, and the Forsters or Fosters of Evelith Manor were the
-same family.&nbsp; The arms, like the names, differ; but all have
-the hunter&rsquo;s horn stringed; and if any doubt existed as to
-the identity of the families, it is still <a
-name="page67"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 67</span>further
-removed by a little work entitled &ldquo;An Inquiry concerning
-the death of Amy Robsart,&rdquo; by S. J. Pettigrew, F.R.S.,
-F.S.A.&nbsp; Mr. Pettigrew says: &ldquo;Anthony Forster was the
-fourth son of Richard Forster, of Evelith, in Shropshire, by
-Mary, daughter of Sir Thomas Gresley, of an ancient family.&nbsp;
-The Anthony Forster of Sir Walter Scott&rsquo;s novel is supposed
-to have been born about 1510; and a relative, Thomas, was the
-prior of an ecclesiastical establishment at Wombridge, the warden
-of Tong, and the vicar of Idsall, as appears by his altar-tomb in
-Shifnal Church.&nbsp; He is conjectured to have attended to the
-early education of Anthony, whose after-connection with Berks is
-accounted for by the fact that he married somewhere between 1530
-and 1540 a Berkshire lady, Ann, daughter of Reginald Williams,
-eldest son of Sir John Williams.&nbsp; He purchased Cumnor Place,
-in Berks, of William Owen, son of Dr. G. Owen, physician to Henry
-VIII.&nbsp; He was not, therefore, as Sir Walter Scott alleges, a
-tenant of the Earl of Leicester, to whom, however, he left Cumnor
-Place by will at his death in 1572.&rdquo;&nbsp; It is gratifying
-to find that Mr. Pettigrew, in his &ldquo;Inquiry,&rdquo; shows
-how groundless was the charge built up by Sir Walter Scott
-against the Earl of <a name="page68"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-68</span>Leicester; and, what is still more to our purpose, that
-he completely clears the character of Anthony Forster, who was
-supposed to have been the agent in the foul deed, of the
-imputation, and shows him to have been quite a different
-character to that represented by this distinguished writer.&nbsp;
-This, indeed, may be inferred from the fact that Anthony Forster
-not only enjoyed the confidence of his neighbours, but so grew in
-favour with the people of Abingdon that he acceded in 1570 to the
-representation of that borough, and continued to represent it
-till he died; also, from the inscription on his tomb, which is as
-follows:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Anthonius Forster, generis generosa
-propago,<br />
-Cumner&aelig; Dominus Barcheriensis erat;<br />
-Armiger, Armigero prognatus patre Ricardo,<br />
-Qui quondam Iphleth&aelig; Salopiensis erat.<br />
-Quatuor ex isto fluxerunt stemmate nati,<br />
-Ex isto Antonius stemmate quartus erat.<br />
-Mente sagax, animo pr&aelig;cellens, corpore promptus;<br />
-Eloquii dulcis, ore disertus erat.<br />
-In factis probitas fuit, in sermonte venustas,<br />
-In vultu gravitas, religione fides;<br />
-In patriam pietas, in egenos grata voluntas,<br />
-Accedunt reliquis annumeranda bonis:<br />
-Sic quod cuncta rapit, rapuit non omnia Lethum,<br />
-Sed qu&aelig; Mors rapuit, vivida fama dedit.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Then follow these laudatory verses:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p><a name="page69"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-69</span>&ldquo;Argute resonas Cithar&aelig; pr&aelig;tendere
-chordas,<br />
-Novit et Aonia concrepuisse lyra.<br />
-Gaudebat terr&aelig; teneras defigere plantas,<br />
-Et mira pulchras construere arte domos.<br />
-Composita varias lingua formare loquelas,<br />
-Doctus et edocta scribere multa manu.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Cleared of the slanders which had been so unjustly heaped upon
-his memory, one can welcome Anthony Forster, the Squire of
-Cumnor, as a member of the same distinguished family from which
-the Willey Squire and the present ennobled house of Willey are
-descended. <a name="citation69"></a><a href="#footnote69"
-class="citation">[69]</a>&nbsp; But before introducing the
-Squire, it is fitting to say something of Willey itself.</p>
-<h2><a name="page70"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-70</span>CHAPTER V.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">WILLEY.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">Willey, close Neighbour to the Royal Chace of
-Shirlot&mdash;Etymology of the Name&mdash;Domesday&mdash;The
-Willileys&mdash;The Lacons&mdash;The Welds and the
-Foresters&mdash;Willey Old Hall&mdash;Cumnor Hall as described by
-Sir Walter Scott&mdash;Everything Old and Quaint&mdash;How Willey
-came into possession of the Foresters.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;&rsquo;Bove the foliage of the wood<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; An antique mansion might you then espy,<br />
-Such as in the days of our forefathers stood,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; Carved with device of quaintest imagery.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p70b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Willey Old Hall"
-title=
-"Willey Old Hall"
- src="images/p70s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p><span class="smcap">To</span> commence with its earlier phase,
-it was clear that Willey would be close neighbour to the Royal
-Chace of Shirlot, and that it must have been about the centre of
-the wooded country previously described.&nbsp; The name is said
-to be of Saxon origin; and in wattle and dab and wicker-work
-times, when an osier-bed was probably equal in value to a
-vineyard, the place might have been as the word seems <a
-name="page71"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 71</span>to suggest,
-one where willows grew, seeing that various osiers, esteemed by
-basket makers, coopers, and turners, still flourish along the
-stream winding past it to the Severn.&nbsp; The name is therefore
-redolent of the olden time, and is one of those old word-pictures
-which so often occur to indicate the earlier features of the
-country.&nbsp; Under its agricultural Saxon holders, however,
-Willey so grew in value and importance that when the Conquest was
-complete, and King William&rsquo;s generals were settling down to
-enjoy the good things the Saxons had provided, and as Byron has
-it&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&ldquo;Manors<br
-/>
-Were their reward for following Billy&rsquo;s banners,&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Willey fell to the lot of a Norman, named Turold, who, as he
-held twelve other manors, considerately permitted the Saxon owner
-to continue in possession under him.&nbsp; Domesday says:
-&ldquo;The same Turold holds Willey, and Hunnit (holds it) of
-him.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Here is half a hide geldable.&nbsp; Here
-is arable land sufficient for ii ox teams.&nbsp; Here those ox
-teams are, together with ii villains, and ii boors.&nbsp; Its
-value is v shillings.&rdquo;&nbsp; At the death of Hunnit the
-manor passed to a family which took its name from the place; and
-considerable additions resulted from <a name="page72"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 72</span>the marriage of one, Warner de
-Williley, with the heiress of Roger Fitz Odo, of Kenley.&nbsp;
-Warner de Williley appears to have been a person of some
-consequence, from the fact that he was appointed to make inquiry
-concerning certain encroachments upon the royal forests of
-Shropshire; but an act of oppression and treachery, in which his
-wife had taken a part, against one of his own vassals, whose land
-he coveted, caused him to be committed to prison.&nbsp; Several
-successive owners of Willey were overseers of Shirlot Forest; and
-Nicholas, son and heir of Warner, was sued for inattention to his
-duties; an under tenant also, profiting probably by the laxity of
-his lord, at a later period was charged and found guilty of
-taking a stag from the king&rsquo;s preserves, on Sunday, June
-6th, 1253.&nbsp; Andrew de Williley joined Mountford against King
-Edward, and fell August 4th, 1265, in the battle of Evesham; in
-consequence of which act of disloyalty the property was forfeited
-to the crown, and the priors of Wenlock, who already had the
-seigniory usual to feudal lords, availing themselves of the
-opportunity, managed so to increase their power that a subsequent
-tenant, as shown by the Register at Willey, came to Wenlock
-(1388), and &ldquo;before <a name="page73"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 73</span>many witnesses did homage and
-fealty,&rdquo; and acknowledged himself to hold the place of the
-lord prior by carrying his frock to parliament.&nbsp; They
-succeeded too, after several suits, in establishing their rights
-to the advowson of the Church, founded and endowed by the lords
-of the place.</p>
-<p>By the middle of the 16th century Willey had passed to the
-hands of the old Catholic family of the Lacons, one of whom, Sir
-Roland, held it in 1561, together with Kinlet; and from them it
-passed to Sir John Weld, who is mentioned as of Willey in
-1666.&nbsp; He married the daughter of Sir George Whitmore, and
-his son, George Weld, sat for the county with William Forester,
-who married the daughter of the Earl of Salisbury, and voted with
-him in favour of the succession of the House of Hanover.</p>
-<p>Who among the former feudal owners of Willey built the old
-hall, is a question which neither history nor tradition serves to
-solve.&nbsp; Portions of the basement of the old buildings seem
-to indicate former structures still more ancient, like spurs of
-some primitive rock cropping up into a subsequent
-formation.&nbsp; Contrasted with the handsome modern freestone
-mansion occupied by the Right Hon. Lord <a
-name="page74"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 74</span>Forester
-close by, the remains shown in our engraving look like a stranded
-wreck, past which centuries of English life have gone sweeping
-by.&nbsp; Some of the walls are three feet in thickness, and the
-buttressed chimneys, and small-paned windows&mdash;&ldquo;set
-deep in the grey old tower&rdquo;&mdash;make it a fair type of
-country mansions and a realisation of ideas such as the mind
-associates with the homes of the early owners of Willey.</p>
-<p>Although occupying a slight eminence, it really nestles in the
-hollow, and in its buff-coloured livery it stands pleasingly
-relieved by the high ground of Shirlot and its woods
-beyond.&nbsp; In looking upon its quaint gables, shafts, and
-chimneys, one feels that when it was complete it must have had
-something of the poetry of ancient art about it.&nbsp; Its
-irregularities of outline must have fitted in, as it were, with
-the undulating landscape, with which its walls are now tinted
-into harmony, by brown and yellow lichens.&nbsp; There was
-nothing assuming or pretentious about it; it was content to stand
-close neighbour to the public old coach road, which came winding
-by from Bridgnorth to Wenlock, and passed beneath the arch which
-now connects the high-walled gardens with the shaded walk leading
-to its <a name="page75"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-75</span>modern neighbour, the present mansion of the
-Foresters.</p>
-<p>Sir Walter Scott, in his description of Cumnor Place, speaks
-of woods closely adjacent, full of large trees, and in particular
-of ancient and mighty oaks, which stretched their giant arms over
-the high wall surrounding the demesne, thus giving it a secluded
-and monastic appearance.&nbsp; He describes its formal walks and
-avenues as in part choked up with grass, and interrupted by
-billets, and piles of brushwood, and he tells us of the
-old-fashioned gateway in the outer wall, and of the door formed
-of two huge oaken leaves, thickly studded with nails&mdash;like
-the gate of an old town.&nbsp; This picture of the approaches to
-the old mansion where Anthony Foster lived was no doubt a more
-faithful representation than the one he gave of the character of
-the man himself.&nbsp; At any rate, it is one which would in many
-respects apply to old Willey Hall and its surroundings at the
-time to which the great novelist refers.&nbsp; Everything was old
-and old-fashioned, even as its owners prided themselves it should
-be, and as grey as time and an uninterrupted growth of lichens in
-a congenial atmosphere could make it.&nbsp; Hollies, yews, and
-junipers were to be seen in the grounds, and <a
-name="page76"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 76</span>outside were
-oaks and other aged trees, scathed by lightning&rsquo;s bolt and
-winter&rsquo;s blast.&nbsp; Here and there stood a few monarchs
-of the old forest in groups, each group a brotherhood sublime,
-carrying the thoughts back to the days when &ldquo;from glade to
-glade, through wild copse and tangled dell, the wild deer
-bounded.&rdquo;&nbsp; Trees, buildings, loose stones that had
-fallen, and still lay where they fell, were mossed with a hoar
-antiquity.&nbsp; Everything in fact seemed to say that the place
-had a history of its own, and that it could tell a tale of the
-olden time.</p>
-<p>From the lawn and grounds adjoining a path led to the
-flower-gardens, intersected by gravel walks and grassy terraces,
-where a sun-dial stood, and where fountains, fed by copious
-supplies from unfailing springs on the high grounds of Shirlot,
-threw silvery showers above the shadows of the trees into the
-sunlight.</p>
-<p>Willey, augmented by tracts of Shirlot, which was finally
-disafforested and apportioned two centuries since, came into
-possession of the Foresters by the marriage of Brook Forester, of
-Dothill Park, with Elizabeth, only surviving child and heiress of
-George Weld, of Willey; and George Forester, &ldquo;the Squire of
-Willey,&rdquo; was the fruit of that marriage.</p>
-<h2><a name="page77"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-77</span>CHAPTER VI.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY SQUIRE.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">Squire Forester&mdash;His Instincts and
-Tendencies&mdash;Atmosphere of the Times favourable for their
-Development&mdash;Thackeray&rsquo;s Opinion&mdash;Style of
-Hunting&mdash;Dawn of the Golden Age of Fox-hunting, &amp;c.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">It</span> will be seen that around Willey
-and Willey Hall, associations crowd which serve to make the place
-a household word and Squire Forester a man of <a
-name="page78"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 78</span>mark with
-modern sportsmen and future Nimrods, at any rate if we consent to
-regard the Squire&rsquo;s characteristics as outcrops of the
-instincts of an ancient stock.&nbsp; Descended from an ancestry
-so associated with forest sports and pursuits, he was like a
-moving plant which receives its nourishment from the air, and he
-lived chiefly through his senses.&nbsp; He was waylaid, as it
-were, on life&rsquo;s path by hereditary tendencies, and his
-career was chequered by indulgences which, read in the light of
-the present day, look different from what they then did, when at
-court and in the country there were many to keep him in
-countenance.&nbsp; At any rate, Squire Forester lived in what may
-be called the dawn of the golden age of fox-hunting.&nbsp; We say
-dawn, because although Lord Arundel kept a pack of hounds some
-time between 1690 and 1700, and Sir John Tyrwhitt and Charles
-Pelham, Esq., did so in 1713, yet as Lord Wilton, in his
-&ldquo;Sports and Pursuits of the English&rdquo; states, the
-first real pack of foxhounds was established in the West of
-England about 1730.&nbsp; It was a period when, for various
-reasons, a reaction in favour of the manly sports of
-England&rsquo;s earlier days had set in, one being the discovery
-that those distinguished for such sports were they who assisted
-most in winning on the <a name="page79"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 79</span>battle-fields of the Continent the
-victories which made the British arms so renowned.&nbsp; Then, as
-now, it was found that they led to the development of the
-physical frame&mdash;sometimes to the removal of absolute
-maladies, and supplied the raw material of manliness out of which
-heroes are made&mdash;a view which the Duke of Wellington in some
-measure confirmed by the remark that the best officers he had
-under him during the Peninsular War were those whom he discovered
-to be bold riders to hounds.&nbsp; Lord Wilton, in his book just
-quoted, goes still further, by contending that &ldquo;the
-greatness and glory of Great Britain are in no slight degree
-attributable to her national sports and pastimes.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>That such sports contributed to the jollity and rollicking fun
-which distinguished the time in which Squire Forester lived,
-there can be little doubt.&nbsp; In his &ldquo;Four
-Georges,&rdquo; Thackeray gives it as his opinion, that
-&ldquo;the England of our ancestors was a merrier England than
-the island we inhabit,&rdquo; and that the people, high and low,
-amused themselves very much more.&nbsp; &ldquo;One hundred and
-twenty years ago,&rdquo; he says, &ldquo;every town had its fair,
-and every village its wake.&nbsp; The old poets have sung a
-hundred jolly ditties about great cudgel playings, <a
-name="page80"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 80</span>famous
-grinnings through horse-collars, great Maypole meetings, and
-morris-dances.&nbsp; The girls used to run races, clad in very
-light attire; and the kind gentry and good parsons thought no
-shame in looking on.&rdquo;&nbsp; He adds, &ldquo;I have
-calculated the manner in which statesmen and persons of condition
-passed their time; and what with drinking and dining, and supping
-and cards, wonder how they managed to get through their business
-at all.&rdquo;&nbsp; That they did manage to work, and to get
-through a considerable amount of it, is quite clear; and probably
-they did so with all the more ease in consequence of the
-amusement which often came first, as in the case of
-&ldquo;Naughty idle Bobby,&rdquo; as Clive was called when a boy;
-and not less so in that of Pitt, who did so much to develop that
-spirit of patriotism of which we boast.&nbsp; It was a remark of
-Addison, that &ldquo;those who have searched most into human
-nature observe that nothing so much shows the nobleness of the
-soul as that its felicity consists in action;&rdquo; and that
-&ldquo;every man has such an active principle in him that he will
-find out something to employ himself upon in whatever place or
-state he is posted.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p77b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"The Old Squire"
-title=
-"The Old Squire"
- src="images/p77s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>Those familiar with the <i>Spectator</i> will remember <a
-name="page81"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 81</span>that he
-represents himself to have become so enamoured of the chase, that
-in his letters from the country he says: &ldquo;I intend to hunt
-twice a week during my stay with Sir Roger, and shall prescribe
-the moderate use of this exercise to all my country friends as
-the best kind of physic for mending a bad constitution and
-preserving a good one.&rdquo;&nbsp; He concludes with the
-following quotation from Dryden:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The first physicians by debauch were
-made;<br />
-Excess began, and sloth sustains the trade:<br />
-By chase our long-liv&rsquo;d fathers earned their food;<br />
-Toil strung their arms and purified their blood.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>But a country squire of Mr. Forester&rsquo;s day even more
-pithily and quaintly expresses himself as to the advantages to be
-derived from out-door sports:&mdash;&ldquo;Those useful hours
-that our fathers employed on horseback in the fields,&rdquo; he
-says, &ldquo;are lost to their posterity between a stinking pair
-of sheets.&nbsp; Balls and operas, assemblies and masquerades, so
-exhaust the spirits of the puny creatures over-night, that
-yawning and chocolate are the main labours and entertainments of
-the morning.&nbsp; The important affairs of barber, milliner,
-perfumer, and looking-glass, are their employ till the call to
-dinner, and the bottle or gaming table demand the tedious hours
-that intervene <a name="page82"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-82</span>before the return of the evening assignations.&nbsp;
-What wonder, then, if such busy, trifling, effeminate mortals are
-heard to swear they have no notion of venturing their bodies
-out-of-doors in the cold air in the morning?&nbsp; I have laughed
-heartily to see such delicate smock-faced animals judiciously
-interrupting their pinches of snuff with dull jokes upon
-fox-hunters; and foppishly declaiming against an art they know no
-more of than they do of Greek.&nbsp; It cannot be expected they
-should speak well of a toil they dare not undertake; or that the
-fine things should be fit to work without doors, which are of the
-taylor&rsquo;s creation.&rdquo;</p>
-<h2><a name="page83"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-83</span>CHAPTER VII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY KENNELS.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Willey Kennels&mdash;Colonel Apperley on
-Hunting a Hundred Years ago&mdash;Character of the
-Hounds&mdash;Portraits of Favourites&mdash;Original
-Letters&mdash;Style.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Tantivy! the huntsman he starts for the
-chase,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; In good humour as fresh as the morn,<br />
-While health and hilarity beam from his face,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; At the sound of the mellow-toned horn.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> style of hunting in vogue in
-Squire Forester&rsquo;s day was, in the opinion of authorities on
-the subject, even more favourable to the development of bodily <a
-name="page84"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 84</span>strength and
-endurance than now.&nbsp; The late Mr. Thursfield, of Barrow, was
-wont to say that it was no unusual thing to see Moody taking the
-hounds to cover before daylight in a morning.&nbsp; The Squire
-himself, like most other sportsmen of the period, was an early
-man.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p83b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Childers, Pilot, and Pigmy"
-title=
-"Childers, Pilot, and Pigmy"
- src="images/p83s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>Col. Apperley says: &ldquo;With our forefathers, when the
-roost-cock sounded his clarion, they sounded their horn, throwing
-off the pack so soon as they could distinguish a stile from a
-gate, or, in other words, so soon as they could see to ride to
-the hounds.&nbsp; Then it was that the hare was hunted to her
-form by the trail, and the fox to his kennel by the drag.&nbsp;
-Slow as this system would be deemed, it was a grand treat to the
-real sportsman.&nbsp; What, in the language of the chase, is
-called the &lsquo;tender-nosed hound,&rsquo; had an opportunity
-of displaying itself to the inexpressible delight of his master;
-and to the field&mdash;that is, to the sportsmen who joined in
-the diversion&mdash;the pleasures of the day were enhanced by the
-moments of anticipation produced by the drag.&nbsp; As the scent
-grew warmer, the certainty of finding was confirmed; the music of
-the pack increased; and the game being up, away went the hounds
-in a crash.&nbsp; Both trail and drag are at present <a
-name="page85"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 85</span>but little
-thought of.&nbsp; Hounds merely draw over ground most likely to
-hold the game they are in quest of, and thus, in a great measure,
-rely upon chance for coming across it; for if a challenge be
-heard, it can only be inferred that a fox has been on foot in the
-night&mdash;the scent being seldom sufficient to carry the hounds
-up to his kennel.&nbsp; Advantages, however, as far as sport is
-concerned, attend the present hour of meeting in the field,
-independently of the misery of riding many miles in the dark,
-which sportsmen in the early part of the last century were
-obliged to do.&nbsp; The game, when it is now aroused, is in a
-better state to encounter the great speed of modern hounds;
-having had time to digest the food it has partaken of in the
-night previous to its being stirred.&nbsp; But it is only since
-the great increase of hares and foxes that the aid of the trail
-and drag could be dispensed with without the frequent recurrence
-of blank days, which now seldom happen.&nbsp; Compared with the
-luxurious ease with which the modern sportsman is conveyed to the
-field&mdash;either lolling in his chaise and four, or galloping
-along at the rate of twenty miles an hour on a hundred-guinea
-hack&mdash;the situation of his predecessor was all but
-distressing.&nbsp; In proportion to the <a
-name="page86"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 86</span>distance he
-had to ride by starlight were his hours of rest broken in upon,
-and exclusive of the time that operation might consume another
-serious one was to be provided for&mdash;this was the filling his
-hair with powder and pomatum until it could hold no more, and
-forming it into a well-formed knot, or club, as it was called, by
-his valet, which cost commonly a good hour&rsquo;s work.&nbsp;
-The protecting mud boots, the cantering hack, the second horse in
-the field, were luxuries unknown to him.&nbsp; His well-soiled
-buckskins, and brown-topped boots, would have cut an indifferent
-figure in the presence of a modern connoisseur by a
-Leicestershire cover side.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Notwithstanding
-all this, however,&rdquo; he adds, &ldquo;we are inclined
-strongly to suspect that, out of a given number of gentlemen
-taking the field with hounds, the proportion of really scientific
-sportsmen may have been in favour of the olden times.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>The Willey Kennels were within easy reach of the Hall, between
-Willey and Shirlot, where the pleasant stream before alluded to
-goes murmuring on its way through the Smithies to the
-Severn.&nbsp; But in order to save his dogs unnecessary exertion
-there were others on the opposite, or Wrekin, side of the
-river&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p><a name="page87"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-87</span>&ldquo;Hounds stout and healthy,<br />
-Earths well stopped, and foxes plenty,&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>being mottoes of the period.&nbsp; The dogs were of the
-&ldquo;heavy painstaking breed&rdquo; that &ldquo;stooped to
-their work.&rdquo;&nbsp; How, it was said,</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Can the fox-hound ever tell,<br />
-Unless by pains he takes to smell,<br />
-Where Reynard&rsquo;s gone?&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Experience taught the Squire the importance of a principle now
-more generally acted upon, that of selecting the qualities
-required in the hounds he bred from; and by this means he
-obtained developments of swiftness and scent that made his pack
-one good horses only of that day could keep up with.&nbsp; He
-prided himself much upon the blood of his best hounds, knew every
-one he had by name, and was familiar with its pedigree.&nbsp;
-Portraits of four of his favourites were painted on canvas and
-hung in the hall, with lines beneath expressive of their
-qualities, and the dates at which the paintings were made.&nbsp;
-The Right Hon. Lord Forester takes great care of these, as
-showing in what way the best dogs of that day differed from those
-of the present; and through his kindness we have been enabled to
-get drawings made, of which his lordship <a
-name="page88"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 88</span>was pleased
-to approve, and we fancy there is no better judge living.</p>
-<p>Three of these are shown in our engraving at the head of this
-chapter.</p>
-<p>Pigmy, the bitch in the group nearest to the fox, is said to
-have been the smallest hound then known.&nbsp; Underneath the
-portrait are the following lines:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Behold in miniature the foxhound keen,<br
-/>
-Thro&rsquo; rough and smooth a better ne&rsquo;er was seen;<br />
-As champion here the beauteous Pigmy stands,<br />
-She challenges the globe, both home and foreign lands.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">1773.</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>The one the farthest from the fox, is a white dog, Pilot; and
-underneath the painting is the following:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Pilot rewards his master Rowley&rsquo;s
-care,<br />
-And swift as lightning skims the transient air;<br />
-Famed for the chase, from cover always first,<br />
-His tongue and sterne proclaimed an arrant burst.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">1774.</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>The dog in front, with his head thrown up, is Childers; and
-underneath the picture are these lines:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Sportsmen look up, old Childers&rsquo;
-picture view,<br />
-His virtues many were, his failings few;<br />
-Reynard with dread oft heard his awful name,<br />
-And grateful Musters thus rewards his fame.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">1772.</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><a name="page89"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 89</span>The
-following letters from Mr. Forester to Walter Stubbs, Esq., of
-Beckbury, afterwards of Stratford-on-Avon, where he became
-distinguished in connection with the Warwickshire Hunt, show how
-particular he was in his selection.&nbsp; It would seem that
-whilst admiring the Duke of Grafton&rsquo;s hounds, which under
-the celebrated Tom Rose (&ldquo;Honest old Tom,&rdquo; as he was
-called), who used to say, &ldquo;a man must breed his pack to
-suit his country,&rdquo; gained some celebrity, he not
-unnaturally preferred his own.&nbsp; We give exact copies of two
-of his letters, they are so characteristic of the man.&nbsp; In
-all the letters we have seen he began with a considerable margin
-at the side of the paper, but always filled up the space with a
-postscript:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;<span
-class="smcap">Willey Hall</span>, March 15, 1795.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;<span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I beg leave to return you my hearty thanks for your
-civility in sending your servant to Apley with three couple of my
-hounds that run into your&rsquo;s ye other day.&nbsp; Could I
-have returned compliment in sending ye three couple, that were
-missing from you, I should have been happy in ye discharge of
-that duty, so incumbent on every good sportsman.&nbsp; <a
-name="page90"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 90</span>I hear you
-are fond of the Duke of Grafton&rsquo;s hounds.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s
-a sort I have ever admired, and have received favours from his
-Grace in that line, having been acquainted together from our
-infancy up; and on course, most likely to procure no very bad
-sort from his Grace&rsquo;s own hands.&nbsp; I have sent you (as
-a present) a little bitch of ye Grafton kind, which I call
-Whymsy, lately taken up from quarters, and coming towards a year
-old.&nbsp; She&rsquo;s rather under size for me, or otherwise I
-see not her fault.&nbsp; She&rsquo;s, in my opinion, <i>a true
-Non-Pareil</i>.&nbsp; Your acceptance of her from me <i>now</i>,
-and any other hound of ye Grafton sort, that may come in near her
-size, will afford me singular satisfaction; as I make it a rule
-that no man who shows me civility shall find me wanting in making
-a proper return.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">&ldquo;I am, dear sir,</p>
-<p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;Your obliged and very humble
-servant,</p>
-<p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;G. <span
-class="smcap">Forester</span>.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;P.S.&mdash;Next year Whymsy will be completely fit for
-entrance, but rather too young for <i>this</i>.&nbsp; The
-Duke&rsquo;s hounds rather run small enough for this
-country.&nbsp; I see no other defect in them.&nbsp; They are <a
-name="page91"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 91</span>invincibly
-stout, and perfectly just in every point that constitutes your
-real true fox hound.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;<span
-class="smcap">Willey</span>, April 19, 1795.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;<span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Per bearer I send you yr couple of bitches I promised
-you.&nbsp; The largest is near a year old, the lesser about half
-a one, and if she be permitted to walk about your house this
-summer, will make you a clever bitch; further, she&rsquo;s of
-Grace Grafton&rsquo;s kind, as her father was got by his
-Grace&rsquo;s Voucher, and bred by Mr. Pelham.&nbsp; Blood
-undeniable, <i>at a certainty</i>.&nbsp; As to yr dam of her,
-she&rsquo;s of my old sort, and a bitch of blood and merit.&nbsp;
-The other bitch I bred also, <i>to ye test</i> of my judgment,
-from a dog of Pelham&rsquo;s.&nbsp; I call her handsome in my
-eye, and not far off <i>being a beauty</i>.&nbsp; Her dam was got
-by Noel&rsquo;s famous Maltster, out of a daughter of Mr. Corbet,
-of Sundorn, named Trojan.&nbsp; I wish you luck and success with
-your hounds, and when I can serve you <i>to effect</i>, at any
-time, you may rely on my faithful remembrance of you.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I remain, dear sir,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">&ldquo;Your very humble
-servant,</p>
-<p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;G. <span
-class="smcap">Forester</span>.</p>
-<p><a name="page92"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-92</span>&ldquo;P.S.&mdash;The largest bitch is named Musick, the
-lesser is named Gaudy.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;P.S.&mdash;We have had good sport lately; and <i>one
-particular</i> run we had, upon Monday last, of two hours and one
-quarter (from scent to view), without one single interruption of
-any kind whatever.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="page93"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-93</span>CHAPTER VIII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY LONG RUNS.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Willey Long Runs&mdash;Dibdin&rsquo;s
-Fifty Miles no Figure of Speech&mdash;From the Clee Hills to the
-Wrekin&mdash;The Squire&rsquo;s Breakfast&mdash;Ph&oelig;be
-Higgs&mdash;Doggrel Ditties&mdash;Old Tinker&mdash;Moody&rsquo;s
-Horse falls Dead&mdash;Run by Moonlight.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Ye that remember well old Savory&rsquo;s
-call,<br />
-With pleasure view&rsquo;d her, as she pleased you all;<br />
-In distant countries still her fame resounds,<br />
-The huntsmen&rsquo;s glory and the pride of hounds.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">1773.</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p93b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Savory"
-title=
-"Savory"
- src="images/p93s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> portrait at the head of this
-chapter is from a carefully drawn copy of a painting at Willey of
-a <a name="page94"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-94</span>favourite hound of the Squire&rsquo;s, just a hundred
-years ago.</p>
-<p>Dibdin, in his song of Tom Moody, speaks of &ldquo;a country
-well known to him fifty miles round;&rdquo; and this was no mere
-figure of speech, as the hunting ground of the Willey Squire
-extended over the greater part of the forest lands we have
-described.&nbsp; There were fewer packs of hounds in Shropshire
-then, and the Squire had a clear field extending from the Clee
-Hills to the Needle&rsquo;s Eye on the Wrekin, through which, on
-one remarkable occasion, the hounds are reported to have followed
-their fox.&nbsp; The Squire sometimes went beyond these notable
-landmarks, the day never appearing to be too long for him.</p>
-<p>Four o&rsquo;clock on a hunting morning usually found him
-preparing the inner man with a breakfast of underdone beef, with
-eggs beaten up in brandy to fill the interstices; and thus
-fortified he was ready for a fifty miles run.&nbsp; He was what
-Nimrod would have called, &ldquo;a good rough rider&rdquo; over
-the stiff Shropshire clays, and he generally managed to keep up
-with the best to the last;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Nicking and craning he deemed a crime,<br
-/>
-And nobody rode harder perhaps in his time.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><a name="page95"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 95</span>He
-could scarcely &ldquo;Top a flight of rails,&rdquo; &ldquo;Skim
-ridge and furrow,&rdquo; or, charge a fence, however, with
-Ph&oelig;be Higgs, who sometimes accompanied him.</p>
-<p>Ph&oelig;be, who was a complete Diana, and would take
-hazardous leaps, beckoning Mr. Forester to follow her
-extraordinary feats, led the Squire to wager heavy sums that in
-leaping she would beat any woman in England.&nbsp; With
-Ph&oelig;be and Moody, and a few choice spirits of the same stamp
-on a scent, there was no telling to what point between the two
-extremities of the Severn it might carry them.&nbsp; They might
-turn-up some few miles from its source or its estuary, and not be
-heard of at Willey for a week.&nbsp; One long persevering run
-into Radnorshire, in which a few plucky riders continued the pace
-for some distance and then left the field to the Squire and
-Moody, with one or two others, who kept the heads of their
-favourites in the direction Reynard was leading, passed into a
-tradition; but the brush appears not to have been fairly won, a
-gamekeeper having sent a shot through the leg of the
-&ldquo;varmint&rdquo; as he saw him taking shelter in a
-churchyard&mdash;an event commemorated in some doggrel lines
-still current.</p>
-<p>Very romantic tales are told of long runs by a <a
-name="page96"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 96</span>superannuated
-servant of the Foresters, old Simkiss, who had them from his
-father; but we forbear troubling the reader with more than an
-outline of one of these, that of Old Tinker.&nbsp; Old Tinker was
-the name of a fox, with more than the usual cunning of his
-species, that had often proved more than a match for the hounds;
-and one morning the Squire, having made up his mind for a run,
-repaired to Tickwood, where this fox was put up.&nbsp; On hearing
-the dogs in full cry the Squire vowed he would &ldquo;Follow the
-devil this time to hell&rsquo;s doors but he would catch
-him.&rdquo;&nbsp; Reynard, it appears, went off in the direction
-of the Clee Hills; but took a turn, and made for Thatcher&rsquo;s
-Coppice; from there to the Titterstone Hill, and then back to
-Tickwood, where the hounds again ousted him, and over the same
-ground again.&nbsp; On arriving at the Brown Clee Hills the
-huntsman&rsquo;s horse was so blown that he took Moody&rsquo;s,
-sending Tom with his own to the nearest inn to get spiced ale and
-a feed.&nbsp; By this time the fox was on his way back, and the
-horse on which Tom was seated no sooner heard the horn sounding
-than he dashed away and joined in the chase.&nbsp; Ten couples of
-fresh hounds were now set loose at the kennels in Willey Hollow,
-and these <a name="page97"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-97</span>again turned the fox in the direction of Aldenham, but
-all besides Moody were now far behind, and his horse fell dead
-beneath him.&nbsp; The dogs, too, had had enough; they refused to
-go further, and Old Tinker once more beat his pursuers, but only
-to die in a drain on the Aldenham estate, where he was found a
-week afterwards.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;A braver choice of dauntless spirits
-never<br />
-Dash&rsquo;d after hound,&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>it is said, and to commemorate one of the good things of this
-kind, a long home-spun ditty was wont to be sung in public-houses
-by tenants on the estate, the first few lines of which were as
-follows:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Salopians every one,<br />
-Of high and low degree,<br />
-Who take delight in fox-hunting,<br />
-Come listen unto me.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;A story true I&rsquo;ll tell to you<br />
-Concerning of a fox,<br />
-How they hunted him on Tickwood side<br />
-O&rsquo;er Benthall Edge and rocks.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Says Reynard, &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll take you o&rsquo;er to
-Willey Park<br />
-Above there, for when we fairly get aground<br />
-I value neither huntsmen all<br />
-Nor Squire Forester&rsquo;s best hound.</p>
-<p><a name="page98"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-98</span>&ldquo;&lsquo;I know your dogs are stout and good,<br />
-That they&rsquo;ll run me like the wind!<br />
-But I&rsquo;ll tread lightly on the land,<br />
-And leave no scent behind.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Other verses describe the hunt, and Reynard, on being run to
-earth, asking for quarter on condition that</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;He will both promise and fulfil,<br />
-Neither ducks nor geese to kill,<br />
-Nor lambs upon the hill;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>and how bold Ranter, with little faith in his promise,
-&ldquo;seized him by the neck and refused to let him
-go.&rdquo;&nbsp; It is one of many specimens of a like kind still
-current among old people.&nbsp; An old man, speaking of Mr.
-Stubbs, for whom, he remarked, the day was never too long, and
-who at its close would sometimes urge his brother sportsmen to
-draw for a fresh fox, with the reminder that there was a moon to
-kill by, said,</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;One of the rummiest things my father, who
-hunted with the Squire, told me, was a run by moonlight.&nbsp;
-I&rsquo;m not sure, but I think Mr. Dansey, Mr. Childe, and Mr.
-Stubbs, if not Mr. Meynell, were at the Hall.&nbsp; They came
-sometimes, and sometimes the Squire visited them.&nbsp;
-Howsomeever, there were three or four couples of fresh hounds at
-the kennels, and it was proposed to have <a
-name="page99"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 99</span>an
-after-dinner run.&nbsp; They dined early, and, as nigh as I can
-tell, it was three o&rsquo;clock when they left the Hall, after
-the Beggarlybrook fox.&nbsp; Mind that was a fox, that
-was&mdash;he was.&nbsp; He was a dark brown one, and a cunning
-beggar too, that always got off at the edge of a wood, by running
-first along a wall and then leaping part of the way down an old
-coal pit, which had run in at the sides.&nbsp; Well, they placed
-three couples of hounds near to this place in readiness, and the
-hark-in having been given, the gorse soon began to shake, and a
-hound or two were seen outside, and amongst them old Pilot, who
-now and then took a turn outside, and turned in, lashing his
-stern, and giving the right token.&nbsp; &lsquo;Have at
-him!&rsquo; shouted one; &lsquo;Get ready!&rsquo; said another;
-&lsquo;Hold hard a bit, we shall have him, for a hundred!&rsquo;
-shouted the Squire.&nbsp; Then comes a tally-ho, said my father,
-and off they go; every hound out of cover, sterns up, carrying a
-beautiful head, and horses all in a straight line along the open,
-with the scent breast high.&nbsp; Reynard making straight for the
-tongue of the coppice, finds himself circumvented, and fresh
-hounds being let loose, he makes for Wenlock Walton as though he
-was going to give &rsquo;em an airing on the hill-top.</p>
-<p><a name="page100"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-100</span>&ldquo;&lsquo;But, headed and foiled, his first point
-he forsook,<br />
-And merrily led them a dance o&rsquo;er the brook.&rsquo;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Some lime burners coming from work turned him, and,
-leaving Wenlock on the left, he made for Tickwood.&nbsp; It was
-now getting dark, and the ground being awkward, one or two were
-down.&nbsp; The Squire swore he would have the varmint out of
-Tickwood; and the hounds working well, and old Trumpeter&rsquo;s
-tongue being heard on the lower <a name="page101"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 101</span>side, one challenged the other, and
-they soon got into line in the hollow, the fox leading.&nbsp;
-Stragglers got to the scent, and off they went by the burnt
-houses, where the Squire&rsquo;s horse rolled over into a
-sand-pit.&nbsp; The fox made for the Severn, but turned in the
-direction of Buildwas, and was run into in the moonlight, among
-the ivied ruins of the Abbey.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p100b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Buildwas Abbey"
-title=
-"Buildwas Abbey"
- src="images/p100s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<h2><a name="page102"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-102</span>CHAPTER IX.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">BACHELOR&rsquo;S HALL.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">Its quaint Interior&mdash;An Old
-Friend&rsquo;s Memory&mdash;Crabbe&rsquo;s Peter at Ilford
-Hall&mdash;Singular Time-pieces&mdash;A Meet at Hangster&rsquo;s
-Gate&mdash;Jolly Doings&mdash;Dibdin at Dinner&mdash;Broseley
-Pipes&mdash;Parson Stephens in his Shirt&mdash;The Parson&rsquo;s
-Song.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">We</span> have already described the
-exterior of the Hall and its approaches.&nbsp; In the interior of
-the building the same air of antiquity reigned.&nbsp; Its
-capacious chimney-pieces, and rooms wainscoted with oak to the
-ceiling, are familiar from the descriptions of an old friend,
-whose memory was still fresh and green as regards events and
-scenes of the time when the Hall stood entire, and who when a boy
-was not an unfrequent visitor.&nbsp; Like Crabbe&rsquo;s Peter
-among the rooms and galleries of Ilford Hall,</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;His vast delight was mixed with equal
-awe,<br />
-There was such magic in the things he saw;<br />
-Portraits he passed, admiring, but with pain<br />
-Turned from some objects, nor would look again.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><a name="page103"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-103</span>Against the walls were grim old portraits of the
-Squire&rsquo;s predecessors of the Weld and Forester lines, with
-stiff-starched frills, large vests, and small round hats of Henry
-VII.&rsquo;s time; others of the fashions of earlier periods by
-distinguished painters, together with later productions of the
-pencil by less famous artists, representing dogs, cattle, and
-favourite horses.&nbsp; In the great hall were horns and antlers,
-and other trophies of the chase, ancient guns which had done good
-execution in their time, a bustard, and rare species of birds of
-a like kind.&nbsp; Here and there were ancient time-pieces,
-singular in construction and quaint in contrivance, one of which,
-on striking the hours of noon and midnight, set in motion figures
-with trumpets and various other instruments, which gave forth
-their appropriate sounds.&nbsp; A great lamp&mdash;hoisted to its
-place by a thick rope&mdash;lighted up that portion of the hall
-into which opened the doors of the dining and other rooms, and
-from which a staircase led to the gallery.</p>
-<p>A meet in the neighbourhood of Willey was usually well
-attended: first, because of the certainty of good sport;
-secondly, because such sport was often preceded, or often
-followed by receptions at the Hall, so famous for its
-cheer.&nbsp; Jolly <a name="page104"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-104</span>were the doings on these occasions; songs were sung,
-racy tales were told, old October ale flowed freely, and the
-jovial merits and household virtues of Willey were fully up to
-the mark of the good old times.&nbsp; The Squire usually dined
-about four o&rsquo;clock, and his guests occasionally came booted
-and spurred, ready for the hunt the following day, and rarely
-left the festive board &rsquo;neath the hospitable roof of the
-Squire until they mounted their coursers in the court-yard.</p>
-<p>Dibdin, from materials gathered on the spot, has, in his own
-happy manner, drawn representations of these gatherings.&nbsp;
-His portraits of horses and dogs, and his description of the
-social habits of the Squire and his friends are faithfully set
-forth in his song of &ldquo;Bachelor&rsquo;s
-Hall:&rdquo;&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;To Bachelor&rsquo;s Hall we good fellows
-invite<br />
-To partake of the chase which makes up our delight,<br />
-We&rsquo;ve spirits like fire, and of health such a stock,<br />
-That our pulse strikes the seconds as true as a clock.<br />
-Did you see us you&rsquo;d swear that we mount with a grace,<br
-/>
-That Diana had dubb&rsquo;d some new gods of the chase.<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Hark away! hark away! all nature
-looks gay,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; And Aurora with smiles ushers in
-the bright day.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Dick Thickset came mounted upon a fine black,<br />
-A finer fleet gelding ne&rsquo;er hunter did back;<br />
-<a name="page105"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 105</span>Tom Trig
-rode a bay full of mettle and bone,<br />
-And gaily Bob Buckson rode on a roan;<br />
-But the horse of all horses that rivalled the day<br />
-Was the Squire&rsquo;s Neck-or-Nothing, and that was a grey.<br
-/>
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Hark away! &amp;c.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Then for hounds there was Nimble who well would climb
-rocks,<br />
-And Cocknose a good one at finding a fox;<br />
-Little Plunge, like a mole, who would ferret and search,<br />
-And beetle-brow&rsquo;d Hawk&rsquo;s Eye so dead at a lurch:<br
-/>
-Young Sly-looks that scents the strong breeze from the south,<br
-/>
-And Musical Echo with his deep mouth.<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Hark away! &amp;c.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Our horses, thus all of the very best blood,<br />
-&rsquo;Tis not likely you&rsquo;d easily find such a stud;<br />
-Then for foxhounds, our opinion for thousands we&rsquo;ll
-back,<br />
-That all England throughout can&rsquo;t produce such a pack.<br
-/>
-Thus having described you our dogs, horses, and crew,<br />
-Away we set off, for our fox is in view.<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Hark away! &amp;c.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Sly Reynard&rsquo;s brought home, while the horn sounds
-the call,<br />
-And now you&rsquo;re all welcome to Bachelor&rsquo;s Hall;<br />
-The savoury sirloin gracefully smokes on the board,<br />
-And Bacchus pours wine from his sacred hoard.<br />
-Come on, then, do honour to this jovial place,<br />
-And enjoy the sweet pleasures that have sprung from the chase.<br
-/>
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Hark away! hark away! while our
-spirits are gay,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Let us drink to the joys of next
-meeting day.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>On the occasion of Dibdin&rsquo;s visit there were at the Hall
-more than the usual local notables, and Parson Stephens was
-amongst them.&nbsp; As a treat intended specially for Dibdin, the
-second course at <a name="page106"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-106</span>dinner consisted of Severn fish, such as we no longer
-have in the river.&nbsp; There were eels cooked in various ways,
-flounders, perch, trout, carp, grayling, pike, and at the head of
-the table that king of Severn fish, a salmon.</p>
-<p><i>Dibdin</i>: &ldquo;This is a treat, Squire, and I can
-readily understand now why the Severn should be called the
-&lsquo;Queen of Rivers;&rsquo; it certainly deserves the
-distinction for its fish, if for nothing else.&rdquo;</p>
-<p><i>Mr. Forester</i>: &ldquo;Do you know, Dibdin, that fellow
-Jessop, the engineer, set on by those Gloucester fellows, wants
-to put thirteen or fourteen bars or weirs in the river between
-here and Gloucester; why, it would shut out every fish worth
-eating.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;What could be his object?&rdquo; asked Dibdin.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Oh, he believes, like Brindley, that rivers were made
-to feed canals with, and his backers&mdash;the Gloucester
-gentlemen, and the Stafford and Worcester Canal
-Company&mdash;say, to make the river navigable at all seasons up
-to Coalbrookdale; but my belief is that it is intended to crush
-what bit of trade there yet remains on the river here, and to
-give them a monopoly in the carrying trade, for our bargemen
-would be taxed, whilst their carriers would be free, or nearly
-so.&rdquo;</p>
-<p><a name="page107"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-107</span>&ldquo;We beat them, though,&rdquo; said Mr.
-Pritchard.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;So we did,&rdquo; added the Squire, &ldquo;but we had a
-hard job: begad, I thought our watermen had pretty well primed me
-when I went up to see Pitt on the subject; but I had not been
-with him five minutes before I found he knew far more about the
-river than I did:</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;&lsquo;I am no orator, as Brutus is,<br />
-But, as you know me all, a plain and honest
-man.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><i>Several voices</i>: &ldquo;Bravo, Squire.&rdquo;</p>
-<p><i>To Stephens</i>: &ldquo;Will you take a
-flounder?&mdash;&lsquo;flat as a flounder,&rsquo; they say.&nbsp;
-I know you have a sympathy with flats, if not a liking for
-them.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;The Broseley colliers made a flat of him when they
-dragged his own pond for the fish he was so grateful for,&rdquo;
-said Hinton.</p>
-<p>The laugh went against the parson, who somehow missed his
-share of a venison pasty, which was a favourite of his.&nbsp; He
-had been helped to a slice from a haunch which stood in the
-centre of the table, and had had a cut out of a saddle of mutton
-at one end, but he missed his favourite dish.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Is it true,&rdquo; inquired Dibdin, looking round at
-roast, and boiled, and pasties, &ldquo;what we hear in <a
-name="page108"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 108</span>London,
-that there is very considerable <i>scarcity</i> and
-<i>distress</i> in the country?&rdquo;&mdash;(general
-laughter).&nbsp; This brought up questions of political economy,
-excess of population, stock-jobbing, usury, gentlemen taking
-their money out of the country and aping Frenchified, stick-frog
-fashions on their return.&nbsp; The latter was a favourite
-subject with the Squire, who could not see, he said, what
-amusement a gentleman could find out of the country equal to
-foxhunting, and gave him an opportunity of introducing his
-favourite theory of taxing heavily those who did so.&nbsp; The
-discussion had lasted over the fifth course, when more potent
-liquors were put upon the table, together with Broseley
-pipes.&nbsp; The production of the latter was a temptation
-Stephens could not resist of telling the story of the Squire
-purchasing a box, for which he paid a high price, in London, and
-finding, on showing them to one of his tenants, as models, that
-they were made upon his own estate.&nbsp; The laugh went against
-the Squire, who gave indication, by a merry twinkle in his eye,
-that he would take an opportunity of being quits.&nbsp;
-Discussions ensued upon the virtues and evils of tobacco, and the
-refusal of Parliament to allow a census to be taken; one of the
-guests expressing a belief, founded upon a statement <a
-name="page109"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 109</span>put forth
-by a Dr. Price, that the population of England and Wales was
-under five millions, or less, in fact, than it was in the reign
-of Queen Elizabeth.&nbsp; &ldquo;Which,&rdquo; added the Squire,
-&ldquo;is not correct, according to poor-law and other statistics
-produced before Parliament, which show that there are from three
-to four births to one death.&rdquo;</p>
-<p><i>Mr. Whitmore</i>: &ldquo;I can readily believe that this is
-true in your parishes of Willey and Barrow, Forester, where a
-certain person&rsquo;s amours, like Jupiter&rsquo;s, are too
-numerous to mention.&rdquo;&nbsp; (Laughter, in which the Squire
-joined.)</p>
-<p><i>Mr. Forester</i>: &ldquo;A truce to statistics and
-politics, let us have Larry Palmer, our local Incledon, in to
-sing us some of Dibdin&rsquo;s songs.&rdquo;&nbsp; (General
-approbation.)</p>
-<p>And Larry, who was blind, and who was purposely kept in
-ignorance of Dibdin being present, then gave in succession
-several of what Incledon called his &ldquo;sheet-anchors,&rdquo;
-including &ldquo;The Quaker,&rdquo; &ldquo;My Trim-built
-Wherry,&rdquo; &ldquo;Tom Bowling,&rdquo; &amp;c., with an effect
-and force which made the author exclaim that he never heard
-greater justice done to his compositions, and led to an
-exhibition of feeling which made the old hall ring again.</p>
-<p><a name="page110"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-110</span>Dibdin&rsquo;s health was next given, with high
-eulogiums as to the effect of his animating effusions on the
-loyalty, valour, and patriotism which at that time blazed so
-intensely in the bosom of the British tar.</p>
-<p>Dibdin, in acknowledging the toast, related incidents he had
-himself several times witnessed at sea; and how deeply indebted
-he felt to men like Incledon and others, adding that the
-inspiration which moved him was strongly in his mind from his
-earliest remembrance.&nbsp; It lay, he said, a quiet hidden spark
-which, for a time, found nothing hard enough to vivify it; but
-which, coming in contact with proper materials, expanded.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Tell Dibdin of Old Tinker,&rdquo; cried Childe, of
-Kinlet.</p>
-<p>The tale of Old Tinker was given, the last bit of court
-scandal discussed, and some tales told of the King, with whom Mr.
-Forester was on terms of friendship, and the festivities of the
-evening had extended into the small hours of the morning, when,
-during a brief pause in the general mirth, a tremendous crash was
-heard, and the Squire rushing out to see what was the matter, met
-one of the servants, who said the sound came from the larder,
-whither <a name="page111"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-111</span>Mr. Forester repaired.&nbsp; Looking in, he saw
-Stephens <i>in his shirt</i>, and, with presence of mind, he
-turned the key, and went back to his company to consider how he
-should turn the incident to account.</p>
-<p>It appears that Stephens had been several hours in bed, when,
-waking up from his first sleep, he fancied he should like a dip
-into the venison pie, and forthwith had gone down into the
-larder, where, in searching for the pie, he knocked down the
-dish, with one or two more.&nbsp; The Squire was not long in
-making up his mind how he should turn the matter to account; he
-declared that it was time to retire, but before doing so, he
-said, they must have a country dance, and insisted upon the whole
-household being roused to take part in it.&nbsp; There was no
-resisting the wishes of the host; the whole of the house
-assembled, and formed sides for a dance in the hall, through
-which Stephens must necessarily pass in going to his room.&nbsp;
-Whilst this was taking place Mr. Forester slipped the key into
-the door, and going behind Stephens, unkennelled his fox, making
-the parson run the gauntlet, in his shirt, amid an indescribable
-scene of merriment and confusion!</p>
-<p>The very Rev. Dr. Stephens had paid for his <a
-name="page112"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 112</span>nocturnal
-escapade, one would have thought, sufficiently to satisfy the
-most exacting.&nbsp; But the Squire and his guests, just ripe for
-fun, insisted that he should dress and come down into the
-dining-room to finish the night.&nbsp; The further penalty, too,
-was inflicted of making him join in the chorus of the old song,
-sung with boundless approbation by one of the company,
-beginning&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;A parson once had a remarkable foible<br />
-Of loving good liquor far more than his Bible;<br />
-His neighbours all said he was much less perplext<br />
-In handling a tankard than in handling a text.<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Derry down,
-down, down, derry down.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>The gist of which lies in the parson&rsquo;s reply to his
-wife, who, when the pigs set his ale running, and he stormed and
-swore, reminded him of his laudation of the patience of Job,
-whereupon he denies the application, with the remark&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">&ldquo;Job never had
-such a cask in his life.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">&ldquo;The hunting in the
-Cheviot,&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>now called &ldquo;Chevy Chase,&rdquo; succeeded, and the night
-closed with Dibdin singing his last new song, to music of his own
-composing, with a jolly, rollicking chorus by the whole
-company.</p>
-<h2><a name="page113"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-113</span>CHAPTER X.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY RECTOR, AND OTHER OF THE
-SQUIRE&rsquo;S FRIENDS.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Squire&rsquo;s Friends and the Willey
-Rector more fully
-drawn&mdash;Turner&mdash;Wilkinson&mdash;Harris&mdash;The Rev.
-Michael Pye Stephens&mdash;His Relationship to the
-Squire&mdash;In the Commission of the Peace&mdash;The Parson and
-the Poacher&mdash;A Fox-hunting Christening.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Besides</span> professional sportsmen who
-were wont to make the Willey roof-trees echo with their shouts,
-the Squire usually assembled round his table, on Sundays, the
-leading men of the neighbourhood, each of some special note or
-importance in his own district, who formed at Willey a sort of
-local parliament.&nbsp; Among these were brother magistrates,
-tenants, and members of the clerical, legal, and medical
-professions.&nbsp; Thomas Turner, a county magistrate, and the
-chairman of a court of equity, to establish which the Squire
-assisted him in obtaining an Act of Parliament, to whom was
-dedicated a <a name="page114"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-114</span>sermon delivered before the justices of the peace by
-the Rev. L. Booker, LL.D., was one of these.&nbsp; Mr. Turner
-carried on the now famous Caughley works, where he succeeded in
-producing, by means of English and French workmen, china of
-superior merit, which, like the old Wedgwood productions, is now
-highly prized by connoisseurs.&nbsp; He was the first producer of
-the &ldquo;willow pattern,&rdquo; still so much in demand, and
-his general knowledge gave him great influence.&nbsp; The Squire
-paid occasional visits to his elegant chateau at Caughley, and
-gave him one of the two portraits of himself which he had
-painted, a picture now in possession of the widow of Mr.
-Turner&rsquo;s son, George, of Scarborough, in which the Squire
-is represented&mdash;as in our engraving&mdash;in his scarlet
-hunting coat, with a fox&rsquo;s brush in his hand&mdash;a
-facsimile of the one from which our woodcut is taken.&nbsp;
-Another, but only an occasional visitor at the Hall, was John
-Wilkinson, &ldquo;the Father of the Iron Trade,&rdquo; as he is
-now called, who then lived at Broseley, and who was one of the
-most remarkable men of the past century.&nbsp; He was for some
-years a tenant of the Squire, and carried on the Willey
-furnaces.&nbsp; He was also a friend of Boulton and Watt, and was
-the first who succeeded <a name="page115"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 115</span>in boring their cylinders even all
-through; he was the first, too, who taught the French the art of
-boring cannon from the solid.&nbsp; He built and launched at
-Willey Wharf the first iron barge&mdash;the precursor of all iron
-vessels on the Thames and Tyne, and of the Great Eastern, as well
-as of our modern iron-clads.&nbsp; Mr. Harries of Benthall, Mr.
-Hinton of Wenlock, Mr. Bryan of The Tuckies, and Mr. John Cox
-Morris, farmer of Willey, who took the first silver cup given by
-the Agricultural Society of Shropshire for the best cultivated
-farm, and who had still further distinguished himself in the
-estimation of sportsmen by a remarkable feat of horsemanship for
-a large amount, were among those who visited the Squire.</p>
-<p>But a more frequent guest at the Hall and at the covert-side
-was the Willey Rector, the Rev. Michael Pye Stephens, whose
-family was related to that of the Welds, through the
-Slaneys.&nbsp; The Rector was therefore, as already shown, on
-familiar terms with the Squire, and the more so as he was able to
-tell a good tale and sing a good song.&nbsp; The rural clergy a
-century ago were great acquisitions at the tables of country
-squires, and were not unfrequently among the most enthusiastic
-lovers of the chase.&nbsp; It was by <a name="page116"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 116</span>no means an uncommon thing, forty
-years ago, to see the horse of the late Rector of Stockton,
-brother to the Squire of Apley, waiting for him at the church
-door at Bonnigale, which living he also held, that he might start
-immediately service was over for Melton Mowbray.&nbsp; His clerk,
-too, old Littlehales, who to more secular professions added that
-of village tailor, has often told how his master, being sorely in
-need of a pair of hunting breeches for Melton, undertook to close
-the church one Sunday in order to give him the opportunity of
-making them, with the remark, &ldquo;Oh, d&mdash;n the church,
-you stop at home and make the breeches.&rdquo;&nbsp; But the
-Rector of Willey was by no means so enthusiastic as a
-sportsman.&nbsp; He was not the</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Clerical fop, half jockey and half
-clerk,<br />
-The tandem-driving Tommy of a town,<br />
-Disclaiming book, omniscient of a horse,<br />
-Impatient till September comes again,<br />
-Eloquent only of the pretty girl<br />
-With whom he danced last night!&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Neither did he resemble those more bilious members of the
-profession of modern times&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Who spit their puny spite on harmless
-recreation.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>On the contrary, he held what it may be difficult <a
-name="page117"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 117</span>to gainsay,
-that amusements calculated to strengthen the frame and to improve
-the health, if fitting for a gentleman, were not unfitting for a
-clergyman.&nbsp; His presence, at any rate, was welcomed by
-neighbouring squires in the field, as &ldquo;Hark in!&nbsp; Hark
-in!&nbsp; Hark!&nbsp; Yoi over boys!&rdquo; sounded merrily on
-the morning air; and as he sat mounted on the Squire&rsquo;s
-thorough-bred it would have been difficult to have detected
-anything of the divine; the clerico-waistcoat and black
-single-breasted outer garment having given place to more fitting
-garb.&nbsp; Fond of field sports himself, he willingly associated
-with his neighbours and joined in their pastimes and
-amusements.&nbsp; A man who was a frequent guest at the Hall, who
-received letters from the Squire when in London, and who would
-take a long pipe now and then between his lips, and moisten his
-clay from a pewter tankard round a clean-scoured table in a
-road-side inn, was naturally of considerable importance in his
-own immediate district.</p>
-<p>The Rector of Willey had, we believe, been brought up to the
-legal profession, he had also a smattering knowledge of medicine,
-which enabled him to render at times service to his parishioners,
-who <a name="page118"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-118</span>called him Dr. Stephens.&nbsp; He was in the commission
-of the peace, too, for the borough; and so completely did the
-characters combine&mdash;so perfectly did law and divinity
-dove-tail into each other&mdash;that he might have been taken as
-a personification of either.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Mild were his doctrines, and not one
-discourse<br />
-But gained in softness what it lost in force.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Without stinginess he partook of the good things heaven to man
-supplies; he was &ldquo;full fed;&rdquo; his face shone with
-good-humour, and he was as fond of a joke as of the
-Squire&rsquo;s old port.&nbsp; As a justice of the peace he was
-no regarder of persons, providing they equally brought grist to
-his mill; he had no objection to litigants smoothing the way to a
-decision by presents, such as a piece of pork, a pork pie, or a
-dish of fish; once or twice, however, he found the fish to have
-been caught the previous night out of his own pond.&nbsp; Next to
-a weakness for fish was one for knee-breeches and top-boots,
-which in the course of much riding required frequent renewal;
-and, &rsquo;tis said, that seated in his judicial chair, he has
-had the satisfaction of seeing a pair of new chalked tops
-projecting alike from plaintiff&rsquo;s and defendant&rsquo;s
-pockets.&nbsp; In which <a name="page119"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 119</span>case, with spectacles raised and
-head thrown back, as though to look above the petty details of
-the plaint, after sundry hums and haws, with inquiries after the
-crops between, and each one telling some news about his
-neighbour, he would find the evidence on both sides equally
-balanced and suggest a compromise!&nbsp; A good tale is told of
-the justice wanting a hare for a friend, and employing a
-notorious poacher to procure one.&nbsp; The man brought it in a
-bag.&nbsp; &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve brought a hare, then?&rdquo;&nbsp;
-&ldquo;I have, Mr. Stephens, and a fine one too,&rdquo; replied
-the other, as he turned it out, puss flying round the room, and
-over the table amongst the papers like a mad thing.&nbsp;
-&ldquo;Kill her! kill her!&rdquo; shouted Stephens.&nbsp;
-&ldquo;No, by G&mdash;,&rdquo; replied the poacher, who knew that
-by doing so he would bring himself within the law, &ldquo;you
-kill her; I&rsquo;ve had enough trouble to catch
-her.&rdquo;&nbsp; After two or three runs the justice succeeded
-in hitting her on the head with a ruler, and thus brought himself
-within the power of the poacher.</p>
-<p>The parson was sometimes out of temper, and then he swore, but
-this was not often; still his friends were wont to joke him on
-the following domestic little incident:&mdash;His services were
-suddenly <a name="page120"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-120</span>in demand on one occasion when, a full clerical costume
-being required, he found his bands not ready, and he set to work
-to iron them himself.&nbsp; He was going on swimmingly as he
-thought, and had only left the iron to go to the bottom of the
-stairs, with a &ldquo;D&mdash;n you, madam,&rdquo; to his wife,
-who had not yet come down; &ldquo;d&mdash;n you, I can do without
-you,&rdquo; when, on returning, he found his bands scorched and
-discoloured.</p>
-<p>A foxhunter&rsquo;s christening in which the Willey Rector
-played a part on one occasion is too good to lose.&nbsp; He was
-the guest of Squire B&mdash;t, a well-known foxhunter, who at one
-time hunted the Shifnal country with his own hounds.&nbsp; A very
-jovial company from that side had assembled, and it was
-determined to celebrate a new arrival in the Squire&rsquo;s
-family, and to take advantage of the presence of the parson to
-christen the little stranger.&nbsp; The thing was soon settled,
-and Stephens proceeded in due form with the ceremony necessary to
-give to the fair-haired innocent a name by which it should be
-known to the world.&nbsp; The conversation of the company had of
-course been upon their favourite sport, a good many bottles of
-fine sherry and crusty old port had been drunk, and under their
-influence, <a name="page121"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-121</span>it was settled that one of the company should give the
-child a name in which it should be baptized, let it be what it
-would.&nbsp; Stephens having taken the child in his hands, in due
-form asked the name; it was given immediately as Foxhunting Moll
-B&mdash;t!&nbsp; With this name the little innocent grew up, and
-finally became the wife of Squire H&mdash;s; with this name she
-of course signed all legal documents&mdash;first, as Foxhunting
-Moll B&mdash;t, and, secondly, as Foxhunting Moll H&mdash;s.</p>
-<h2><a name="page122"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-122</span>CHAPTER, XI.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY WHIPPER-IN.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Willey Whipper-in&mdash;Tom&rsquo;s Start
-in Life&mdash;His Pluck and Perseverance&mdash;Up Hill and down
-Dale&mdash;Adventures with the Buff-coloured Chaise&mdash;His own
-Wild Favourite&mdash;His
-Drinking-horn&mdash;Who-who-hoop&mdash;Good Temper&mdash;Never
-Married&mdash;Hangster&rsquo;s Gate&mdash;Old Coaches&mdash;Tom
-Gone to Earth&mdash;Three View Halloos at the Grave&mdash;Old
-Boots.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The huntsman&rsquo;s self relented to a
-grin,<br />
-And rated him almost a whipper-in.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p122.1b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Moody&rsquo;s Horn, Trencher, Cap, Saddle, &amp;c."
-title=
-"Moody&rsquo;s Horn, Trencher, Cap, Saddle, &amp;c."
- src="images/p122.1s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Tom Moody</span> never rose above his post
-of whipper-in, but he had the honour of being at the top of his
-profession; and before proceeding further with our sketch of
-Squire Forester it may be well to dwell for a time upon this
-well-known character, whom Dibdin immortalised in his song, so
-familiar to all <a name="page123"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-123</span>sportsmen.&nbsp; He was in fact, in many respects, what
-Mr. Forester had made him: Nature supplied the material, and
-Squire Forester did the rest.&nbsp; Tom had the advantage of
-entering the Squire&rsquo;s service when a youth.&nbsp; Like most
-boys of that period, he had been thrown a good deal upon his own
-resources, a state of things not unfavourable to a development of
-self-reliance, and a degree of humble heroism, such as made life
-wholesome.&nbsp; Tom had no opportunities of obtaining a
-national-school education, nor of carrying away the prize now
-sometimes awarded to the best behaved lad in the village.&nbsp;
-But in the unorganized school of common intercourse, common
-suffering, and interest, was developed a pluck and daring which
-led him to perform a feat on the bare back of a crop-eared cob
-that gave birth to the after events of his life.&nbsp; It appears
-that he was apprenticed to a Mr. Adams, a maltster, who had sent
-him to deliver malt at the Hall.&nbsp; On his return he was seen
-by the Squire trying his horse at a gate, and repeating the
-attempt till he compelled him to leap it.&nbsp; It is said
-that&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;He who excels in what we prize,<br />
-Appears a hero in our eyes.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p122.2b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Gone to earth"
-title=
-"Gone to earth"
- src="images/p122.2s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p><a name="page124"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 124</span>And
-Squire Forester, struck by his pluck and perseverance, made up
-his mind to secure him.&nbsp; He sent to his master to ask if he
-were willing to give him up, adding that he would like to see him
-at the Hall.&nbsp; The message alarmed the mother, who was a
-widow, for, knowing her son&rsquo;s froward nature, she at once
-imagined Tom had got into trouble.&nbsp; On learning the true
-state of the case, however, and thinking she saw the way open to
-Tom&rsquo;s promotion, she consented to the change in his
-condition.&nbsp; His master, too, agreed to give him up, and Tom
-was transferred to the Willey stables, where, from his good
-nature and other agreeable qualities, he became a favourite, and
-from his daring courage quite a sort of little hero.&nbsp; It was
-Tom&rsquo;s duty to go on errands from the Hall, and once outside
-the park, feeling he had his liberty, he did not fail to make use
-of opportunities for displaying his skill.&nbsp; In riding, it
-was generally up hill and down dale, at neck-or-nothing speed,
-stopping neither for gate nor hedge&mdash;his horse tearing away
-at a rate which would have given him three or four somersaults at
-a slip.&nbsp; He seldom turned his horse&rsquo;s head if he could
-help it, and if he went down he was soon up again.&nbsp;
-Extraordinary tales are told <a name="page125"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 125</span>of Tom&rsquo;s adventures with the
-Squire&rsquo;s buff-coloured chaise, in taking company from the
-Hall, and in fetching visitors from Shifnal, then the nearest
-place to reach a coach.&nbsp; Having a spite at a pike-keeper,
-who offended him by not opening the gate quick enough, &ldquo;Tom
-tanselled his hide,&rdquo; and resolved the next time he went
-that way not to trouble him.&nbsp; Driving up to the gate, he
-gave a spring, and touching his horse on the flanks, went
-straight over without starting a stitch or breaking a
-buckle.&nbsp; On another occasion he tried the same trick, but
-failed; the horse went clean over, but the gig caught the top
-rail, and Tom was thrown on his back.&nbsp; &ldquo;That just
-sarves yo right,&rdquo; said the pike-keeper.&nbsp; &ldquo;So it
-does, and now we are quits,&rdquo; added Tom; and they were
-friends ever after.&nbsp; This, however, did not prevent Tom
-trying it again; not that he wanted to defraud the pike-man, whom
-he generally paid another time, but for &ldquo;the fun of the
-thing.&rdquo;&nbsp; Indeed, with his old wild favourite, with or
-without the buff-coloured gig, there were no risks he was not
-prepared to run.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ay, ay, sir,&rdquo; said one of our
-aged informants, &ldquo;you should have seen him on his horse, a
-mad, wild animal no one but Tom could ride.&nbsp; He could ride
-him though, with his eyes shut, <a name="page126"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 126</span>savage as he was, and on a good road
-he would pass milestones as the clock measured minutes; but give
-him the green meadows, and Lord how I have seen him whip along
-the turf!&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;He was like a winged Mercury,
-making light both of stone walls and five-feet six-inch
-gates.&nbsp; He was a regular centaur, for he and his horse
-seemed one,&rdquo; said another.&nbsp; &ldquo;I cannot tell you
-the height of his horse,&rdquo; said a third, &ldquo;but he was a
-big un; whilst Tom himself was a little one, and he used to be on
-horse-back all day long.&nbsp; If he got into the saddle in a
-morning he rarely left it till night.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>In giving the qualifications necessary for one aspiring to the
-post of whipper-in, a well-known authority on sporting subjects
-has laid it down that he should be light (not too young), with a
-quick eye and still quicker ear, and that he should be&mdash;what
-in fact he generally is&mdash;fond of the sport, or he seldom
-succeeds in his profession.&nbsp; Now Moody, or Muddy, as his
-name was pronounced, answered to these conditions.</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;His conversation had no other course<br />
-Than that presented to his simple view<br />
-Of what concerned his saddle, groom, or horse;<br />
-Beyond this theme he little cared or knew:<br />
-<a name="page127"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 127</span>Tell him
-of beauty and harmonious sounds,<br />
-He&rsquo;d show his mare, and talk about his hounds.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>He was what was called <i>Foxy</i> all over&mdash;in his
-language, dress, and associations.&nbsp; He wore a pin with a
-knob, something smaller than a tea-saucer, of Caughley china,
-with the head of a fox upon it; and everything nearest his
-person, so far as he could manage it, had something to put him in
-mind of his favourite sport.&nbsp; His bed-room walls were hung
-with sporting prints, and on his mantelpiece were more
-substantial trophies of the hunt&mdash;as the brush of some
-remarkable victim of the pack, his boots and spurs, &amp;c.&nbsp;
-His famous drinking-horn, which we have engraved together with
-his trencher in the trophy at the head of this chapter, was
-equally embellished with a representation of a hunt, very
-elaborately carved with the point of a pen-knife.&nbsp; At the
-top is a wind-mill, and below a number of horsemen and a lady,
-well mounted, in full chase, and with hounds in full cry after a
-fox, which is seen on the lower part of the horn.&nbsp; A
-fox&rsquo;s brush forms the finis.&nbsp; The date upon the horn,
-which in size and shape resembles those in use in the mansions of
-the gentry in past centuries when hospitality was dispensed in
-their halls with such a free and generous <a
-name="page128"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 128</span>hand, is
-1663.&nbsp; It is a relic still treasured by members of the
-Wheatland Hunt, who look back to the time when the shrill voice
-of Moody cheered the pack over the heavy Wheatlands; and together
-with his cap, of which we also give a representation, is often
-made to do duty at annual social gatherings.</p>
-<p>Tom was a small eight or nine stone man, with roundish face,
-marked with small pox, and a pair of eyes that twinkled with good
-humour.&nbsp; He possessed great strength as well as courage and
-resolution, and displayed an equanimity of temper which made him
-many friends.&nbsp; The huntsman was John Sewell, and under him
-he performed his duties in a way so satisfactory to his master
-and all who hunted with him, as to be deemed the best whipper-in
-in England.&nbsp; None, it was said, could bring up the tail end
-of a pack, or sustain the burst of a long chase, and be in at the
-death with every hound well up, like Tom.&nbsp; His plan was to
-allow his hounds their own cast without lifting, unless they
-showed wildness; and if young hounds dwelt on a stale drag behind
-the pack he whipped them on to those on the right line.&nbsp; He
-never aspired to be more than &ldquo;a serving-man;&rdquo; he
-wished, however, to be considered &ldquo;a good
-whipper-in,&rdquo; and his fame as such spread through the
-country.&nbsp; <a name="page129"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-129</span>There was not a spark of envy in his composition, and
-he was one of the happiest fellows in the universe.&nbsp; The
-lessons he seemed to have learnt, and which appeared to have sunk
-deepest into his unsophisticated nature, were those of being
-honest and of ordering himself &ldquo;lowly and reverently
-towards his betters,&rdquo; for whom he had a reverence which
-grew profound if they happened to have added to their
-qualifications of being good sportsmen that of being
-&ldquo;<i>Parliament</i> men.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>Tom&rsquo;s voice was something extraordinary, and on one
-occasion when he had fallen into an old pit shaft, which had
-given way on the sides, and could not get out, it saved
-him.&nbsp; His halloo to the dogs brought him assistance, and he
-was extricated.&nbsp; It was capable of wonderful modulations,
-and to hear him rehearse the sports of the day in the big roomy
-servants&rsquo; kitchen at the Hall, and give his tally-ho, or
-who-who-hoop, was considered a treat.&nbsp; On one occasion, when
-Tom was in better trim than usual, the old housekeeper is said to
-have remarked, &ldquo;La!&nbsp; Tom, you have given the
-who-who-hoop, as you call it, so very loud and strong to-day that
-you have set the cups and saucers a dancing;&rdquo; to which a
-gentleman, who had purposely placed himself <a
-name="page130"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 130</span>within
-hearing, replied, &ldquo;I am not at all surprised&mdash;his
-voice is music itself.&nbsp; I am astonished and delighted, and
-hardly know how to praise it enough.&nbsp; I never heard anything
-so attractive and inspiring before in the whole course of my
-life; its tones are as fine and mellow as a French
-horn.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>When Squire Forester gave up hunting, the hounds went to
-Aldenham, as trencher hounds; the farmers of the district
-agreeing to keep them.&nbsp; They were collected the night before
-the hunt, fed after a day&rsquo;s sport, and dismissed at a crack
-of the whip, each dog going off to the farm at which he was
-kept.&nbsp; But it was a great trial to Tom to see them depart;
-and he begged to be allowed to keep an old favourite, with which
-he might often have been seen sunning himself in the yard.&nbsp;
-He continued with his master from first to last, with the
-exception of the short time he lived with Mr. Corbet, when the
-Sundorne roof-trees were wont to ring to the toast of &ldquo;Old
-Trojan,&rdquo; and when the elder Sebright was his
-fellow-whip.</p>
-<p>Like the old Squire, Tom never married, although, like his
-master, he had a leaning towards the softer sex, and spent much
-of his time in the company of his lady friends.&nbsp; One he made
-his banker, and the <a name="page131"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 131</span>presents made to him might have
-amounted to something considerable if he had taken care of
-them.&nbsp; In lodging them in safe keeping he usually begged
-that they might be let out to him a shilling a time; but he made
-so many calls and pleaded so earnestly and availingly for more,
-and was so constant a visitor at Hangster&rsquo;s Gate, that the
-stock never was very large.&nbsp; Indeed he was on familiar terms
-with &ldquo;Chalk Farm,&rdquo; as the score behind the ale-house
-door was termed; still he never liked getting into debt, and it
-was always a relief to his mind to see the sponge applied to the
-score.</p>
-<p>Tom was a great gun at this little way-side inn, which was
-altogether a primitive institution of the kind even at that
-period, but which was afterwards swept away when the present Hall
-was built.&nbsp; It then stood on the old road from Bridgnorth to
-Wenlock, which came winding past the Hall; and in the old
-coaching days was a well-known hostelry and a favourite tippling
-shop for local notables, among whom were old Scale, the Barrow
-schoolmaster and parish clerk; the Cartwrights and Crumps, of
-Broseley; and a few local farmers.&nbsp; One attraction was the
-old coach, which called there and brought newspapers, and still
-later news in <a name="page132"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-132</span>troubled times when battles, sieges, and the movements
-of armies were the chief topics of conversation.&nbsp; Neither
-coachmen nor travellers ever appeared to hurry, but would wait to
-communicate the news, particularly in the pig killing season,
-when a pork pie and a jug of ale would be sufficient to keep the
-coach a good half hour if need be.&nbsp; We speak of course of
-&ldquo;The time when George III. was king,&rdquo; before
-&ldquo;His Majesty&rsquo;s Mail&rdquo; became an important
-institution, and when one old man in a scarlet coat, with a face
-that lost nothing by reflection therewith&mdash;excepting that a
-slight tinge of purple was visible&mdash;who had many more
-calling places than post offices on the road, carried pistols in
-his holsters, and brought all the letters and newspapers Willey,
-Wenlock, Broseley, Benthall, Ironbridge, Coalbrookdale, and some
-other places then required; and these, even, took the whole day
-to distribute.&nbsp; Although the lumbering old vehicle was
-constantly tumbling over on going down slight declivities, it was
-a great institution of the period; it was&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Hurrah for the old stage coach,<br />
-Be it never so worn and rusty!<br />
-Hurrah for the smooth high road,<br />
-Be it glaring, and scorching, and dusty!</p>
-<p><a name="page133"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-133</span>&ldquo;Hurrah for the snug little inn,<br />
-At the sign of the Plough and Harrow,<br />
-And the frothy juice of the dangling hop,<br />
-That tickles your spinal marrow.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>It was a great treat to travellers, who would sometimes get
-off the coach and order a chaise to be sent for them from
-Bridgnorth or Wenlock, to stop and listen to Tom relating the
-incidents of a day&rsquo;s sport, and a still greater treat to
-witness his acting, to hear his tally-ho, his who-who-hoop, or to
-hear him strike up&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;A southerly wind and a cloudy sky<br />
-Proclaim a hunting morning.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Another favourite country song just then was the following,
-which has been attributed to Bishop Still, called&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">THE JUG OF ALE.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;As I was sitting one afternoon<br />
-Of a pleasant day in the month of June,<br />
-I heard a thrush sing down the vale,<br />
-And the tune he sang was &lsquo;the jug of ale,&rsquo;<br />
-And the tune he sang was the jug of ale.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;The white sheet bleaches on the hedge,<br />
-And it sets my wisdom teeth on edge,<br />
-When dry with telling your pedlar&rsquo;s tale,<br />
-Your only comfort&rsquo;s a jug of ale,<br />
-Your only comfort&rsquo;s a jug of ale.</p>
-<p><a name="page134"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-134</span>&ldquo;I jog along the footpath way,<br />
-For a merry heart goes all the day;<br />
-But at night, whoever may flout and rail,<br />
-I sit down with my friend, the jug of ale,<br />
-With my good old friend, the jug of ale.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Whether the sweet or sour of the year,<br />
-I tramp and tramp though the gallows be near.<br />
-Oh, while I&rsquo;ve a shilling I will not fail<br />
-To drown my cares in a jug of ale,<br />
-Drown my cares in a jug of ale!&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>To which old Amen, as the parish clerk was called, in order to
-be orthodox, would add from the same convivial prelate&rsquo;s
-farce-comedy of &ldquo;Gammer Gurton&rsquo;s
-Needle:&rdquo;&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;I cannot eat but little meat<br />
-My stomach is not good;<br />
-But sure I think that I can drink<br />
-With him that wears a hood.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>A pleasant cheerful glass or two, Tom was wont to say, would
-hurt nobody, and he could toss off a horn or two of
-&ldquo;October&rdquo; without moving a muscle or winking an
-eye.&nbsp; His constitution was as sound as a roach; and whilst
-he could get up early and sniff the fragrant gale, they did not
-appear to tell.&nbsp; But he had a spark in his throat, as he
-said, and he indulged in such frequent libations to extinguish
-it, that, towards the end of the year 1796, he <a
-name="page135"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 135</span>was well
-nigh worn out.&nbsp; After a while, finding himself becoming
-weak, and feeling that his end was approaching, he expressed a
-desire to see his old master, who at once gratified the wish of
-the sufferer, and, without thinking that his end was so near,
-inquired what he wanted.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have,&rdquo; said Tom,
-&ldquo;one request to make, and it is the last favour I shall
-crave.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the Squire,
-&ldquo;what is it, Tom?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;My time here
-won&rsquo;t be long,&rdquo; Tom added; &ldquo;and when I am dead
-I wish to be buried at Barrow, under the yew tree, in the
-churchyard there, and to be carried to the grave by six
-earth-stoppers; my old horse, with my whip, boots, spurs, and
-cap, slung on each side of the saddle, and the brush of the last
-fox when I was up at the death, at the side of the forelock, and
-two couples of old hounds to follow me to the grave as
-mourners.&nbsp; When I am laid in the grave let three halloos be
-given over me; and then, if I don&rsquo;t lift up my head, you
-may fairly conclude that Tom Moody&rsquo;s dead.&rdquo;&nbsp; The
-old whipper-in expired shortly afterwards, and his request was
-carried out to the letter, as the following characteristic letter
-from the Squire to his friend Chambers, describing the
-circumstances, will show:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p><a name="page136"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-136</span>&ldquo;<span class="smcap">Dear Chambers</span>,</p>
-<p>&ldquo;On Tuesday last died poor Tom Moody, as good for rough
-and smooth as ever entered Wildmans Wood.&nbsp; He died brave and
-honest, as he lived&mdash;beloved by all, hated by none that ever
-knew him.&nbsp; I took his own orders as to his will, funeral,
-and every other thing that could be thought of.&nbsp; He died
-sensible and fully collected as ever man died&mdash;in short,
-died game to the last; for when he could hardly swallow, the poor
-old lad took the farewell glass for success to fox-bunting, and
-his poor old master (as he termed it), for ever.&nbsp; I am sole
-executor, and the bulk of his fortune he left to
-me&mdash;six-and-twenty shillings, real and <i>bon&acirc;
-fide</i> sterling cash, free from all incumbrance, after every
-debt discharged to a farthing.&nbsp; Noble deeds for Tom,
-you&rsquo;d say.&nbsp; The poor old ladies at the Ring of Bells
-are to have a knot each in remembrance of the poor old lad.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Salop paper will show the whole ceremony of his burial,
-but for fear you should not see that paper, I send it to you, as
-under:&mdash;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;&lsquo;Sportsmen, attend.&mdash;On Tuesday, 29th inst.,
-was buried at Barrow, near Wenlock, Salop, Thomas <a
-name="page137"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 137</span>Moody, the
-well-known whipper-in to G. Forester, Esq.&rsquo;s fox-hounds for
-twenty years.&nbsp; He was carried to the grave by a proper
-number of earth-stoppers, and attended by many other sporting
-friends, who heartily mourned for him.&rsquo;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Directly after the corpse followed his old favourite
-horse (which he always called his &lsquo;Old Soul&rsquo;), thus
-accoutred: carrying his last fox&rsquo;s brush in the front of
-his bridle, with his cap, whip, boots, spurs, and girdle, across
-his saddle.&nbsp; The ceremony being over, he (by his own
-desire), had three clear rattling view haloos o&rsquo;er his
-grave; and thus ended the career of poor Tom, who lived and died
-an honest fellow, but alas! a very wet one.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I hope you and your family are well, and you&rsquo;ll
-believe me, much yours,</p>
-<p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;G. <span
-class="smcap">Forester</span>.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;<span class="smcap">Willey</span>, Dec. 5,
-1796.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>We need add nothing to the description the Squire gave of the
-way in which Tom&rsquo;s last wishes were carried out, and shall
-merely remark that the old fellow kept on his livery to the last,
-and that he died in his boots, which were for some time kept as
-relics&mdash;a circumstance which leads us to <a
-name="page138"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 138</span>appropriate
-the following lines, which appeared a few years ago in the
-<i>Sporting Magazine</i>:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;You have ofttimes indulged in a sneer<br />
-At the old pair of boots I&rsquo;ve kept year after year,<br />
-And I promised to tell you (when &lsquo;funning&rsquo; last
-night)<br />
-The reasons I have thus to keep them in sight.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Those boots were Tom Moody&rsquo;s (a better
-ne&rsquo;er strode<br />
-A hunter or hack, in the field&mdash;on the road&mdash;<br />
-None more true to his friend, or his bottle when full,<br />
-In short, you may call him a thorough John Bull).</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Now this world you must own&rsquo;s a strange compound
-of fate,<br />
-(A kind of tee-to-turn resembling of late)<br />
-Where hope promised joy <i>there</i> will sorrow be found,<br />
-And the vessel best trimm&rsquo;d is oft soonest aground.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve come in for my share of
-&lsquo;Take-up&rsquo; and &lsquo;Put-down,&rsquo;<br />
-And that rogue, Disappointment, oft makes me look brown,<br />
-And then (you may sneer and look wise if you will)<br />
-From those old pair of boots I can comfort distil.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I but cast my eyes on them and old Willey Hall<br />
-Is before me again, with its ivy-crown&rsquo;d wall,<br />
-Its brook of soft murmurs&mdash;its rook-laden trees,<br />
-The gilt vane on its dovecot swung round by the breeze.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I see its old owner descend from the door,<br />
-I feel his warm grasp as I felt it of yore;<br />
-Whilst old servants crowd round&mdash;as they once us&rsquo;d to
-do,<br />
-And their old smiles of welcome beam on me anew.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I am in the old bedroom that looks on the lawn,<br />
-The old cock is crowing to herald the dawn;<br />
-<a name="page139"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 139</span>There!
-old Jerry is rapping, and hark how he hoots,<br />
-&lsquo;&rsquo;Tis past five o&rsquo;clock, Tom, and here are your
-boots.&rsquo;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I am in the old homestead, and here comes &lsquo;old
-Jack,&rsquo;<br />
-And old Stephens has help&rsquo;d Master George to his back;<br
-/>
-Whilst old <i>Childers</i>, old <i>Pilot</i>, and little
-<i>Blue-boar</i><br />
-Lead the merry-tongued hounds through the old kennel door.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m by the old wood, and I hear the old
-cry&mdash;<br />
-&lsquo;Od&rsquo;s rat ye dogs&mdash;wind him!&nbsp; Hi!&nbsp;
-Nimble, lad, hi!&rsquo;<br />
-I see the old fox steal away through the gap,<br />
-Whilst old Jack cheers the hounds with his old velvet cap.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m seated again by my old grandad&rsquo;s
-chair,<br />
-Around me old friends and before me old fare;<br />
-Every guest is a sportsman, and scarlet his suit,<br />
-And each leg &rsquo;neath the table is cas&rsquo;d in a boot.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I hear the old toasts and the old songs again,<br />
-&lsquo;<i>Old Maiden</i>&rsquo;&mdash;&lsquo;<i>Tom
-Moody</i>&rsquo;&mdash;&lsquo;<i>Poor
-Jack</i>&rsquo;&mdash;&lsquo;<i>Honest Ben</i>;&rsquo;<br />
-I drink the old wine, and I hear the old call&mdash;<br />
-&lsquo;Clean glasses, fresh bottles, and <i>pipes</i> for us
-all.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="page140"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-140</span>CHAPTER XII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">SUCCESS OF THE SONG.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">Dibdin&rsquo;s Song&mdash;Dibdin and the
-Squire good fellows well met&mdash;Moody a Character after
-Dibdin&rsquo;s own heart&mdash;The Squire&rsquo;s
-Gift&mdash;Incledon&mdash;The Shropshire Fox-hunters on the Stage
-at Drury Lane.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> reader will have perceived that
-George Forester and Charles Dibdin were good fellows well met,
-and that no two men were ever better fitted to appreciate each
-other.&nbsp; Like the popular monarch of the time, each prided
-himself upon being a Briton; each admired every new
-distinguishing trait of nationality, and gloried in any special
-development of national pluck and daring.&nbsp; No one more than
-Mr. Forester was ready to endorse that charming bit of history
-Dibdin gave of his native land in his song of &ldquo;The snug
-little Island,&rdquo; or would join more heartily in the
-chorus:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Search the globe round, none can be
-found<br />
-So happy as this little island.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p140b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"A meet at Hangster&rsquo;s gate"
-title=
-"A meet at Hangster&rsquo;s gate"
- src="images/p140s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p><a name="page141"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 141</span>No
-one could have done its geography or have painted the features of
-its inhabitants in fewer words or stronger colours.&nbsp; We use
-the word stronger rather than brighter, remembering that Dibdin
-drew his heroes redolent of tar, of rum, and tobacco.&nbsp; He
-had the knack of seizing upon broad national characteristics,
-and, like a true artist, of bringing them prominently into the
-foreground by means of such simple accessories as seemed to give
-them force and effect.</p>
-<p>In the Willey whipper-in Dibdin found the same unsophisticated
-bit of primitive nature cropping up which he so successfully
-brought out in his portraits of salt-water heroes; he found the
-same spirit differently manifested; for had Moody served in the
-cock-pit, the gun-room, on deck, or at the windlass, he would
-have been a &ldquo;Ben Backstay&rdquo; or a &ldquo;Poor
-Jack&rdquo;&mdash;from that singleness of aim and daring which
-actuated him.&nbsp; How clearly Dibdin set forth this sentiment
-in that stanza of the song of &ldquo;Poor Jack,&rdquo; in which
-the sailor, commenting upon the sermon of the chaplain, draws
-this conclusion:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;D&rsquo;ye mind me, a sailor should be,
-every inch,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; All as one as a piece of a ship;<br />
-And, with her, brave the world without off&rsquo;ring to
-flinch,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; From the moment the anchor&rsquo;s a-trip.<br />
-<a name="page142"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 142</span>As to
-me, in all weathers, all times, tides, and ends,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; Nought&rsquo;s a trouble from duty that springs;<br
-/>
-My heart is my Poll&rsquo;s, and my rhino my friend&rsquo;s,<br
-/>
-&nbsp;&nbsp; And as for my life, &rsquo;tis my
-King&rsquo;s.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>The country was indebted to this faculty of rhyming for much
-of that daring and devotion to its interests which distinguished
-soldiers and sailors at that remarkable period.&nbsp;
-Dibdin&rsquo;s songs, as he, with pride, was wont to say, were
-&ldquo;the solace of sailors on long voyages, in storms, and in
-battles.&rdquo;&nbsp; His &ldquo;Tom Moody&rdquo; illustrated the
-same pluck and daring which under the vicissitudes and
-peculiarities of the times&mdash;had it been Tom&rsquo;s fortune
-to have served under Drake or Blake, Howe, Jervis, or
-Nelson&mdash;would equally have supplied materials for a
-stave.</p>
-<p>From the letter of the Squire the reader will see how
-truthfully the great English Beranger, as he has been called,
-adhered to the circumstances in his song:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;You all knew Tom Moody, the whipper-in,
-well.<br />
-The bell that&rsquo;s done tolling was honest Tom&rsquo;s
-knell;<br />
-A more able sportsman ne&rsquo;er followed a hound<br />
-Through a country well known to him fifty miles round.<br />
-No hound ever open&rsquo;d with Tom near a wood,<br />
-But he&rsquo;d challenge the tone, and could tell if it were
-good;<br />
-And all with attention would eagerly mark,<br />
-When he cheer&rsquo;d up the pack, &lsquo;Hark! to Rockwood,
-hark! hark!<br />
-Hie!&mdash;wind him! and cross him!&nbsp; Now, Rattler,
-boy!&nbsp; Hark!&rsquo;</p>
-<p><a name="page143"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-143</span>&ldquo;Six crafty earth-stoppers, in hunter&rsquo;s
-green drest,<br />
-Supported poor Tom to an earth made for rest.<br />
-His horse, which he styled his &lsquo;Old Soul,&rsquo; next
-appear&rsquo;d,<br />
-On whose forehead the brush of his last fox was rear&rsquo;d:<br
-/>
-Whip, cap, boots, and spurs, in a trophy were bound,<br />
-And here and there followed an old straggling hound.<br />
-Ah! no more at his voice yonder vales will they trace!<br />
-Nor the welkin resound his burst in the chase!<br />
-With high over!&nbsp; Now press him!&nbsp; Tally-ho!&nbsp;
-Tally-ho!</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Thus Tom spoke his friends ere he gave up his
-breath:<br />
-&lsquo;Since I see you&rsquo;re resolved to be in at the
-death,<br />
-One favour bestow&mdash;&rsquo;tis the last I shall crave,<br />
-Give a rattling view-halloo thrice over my grave;<br />
-And unless at that warning I lift up my head,<br />
-My boys, you may fairly conclude I am dead!&rsquo;<br />
-Honest Tom was obeyed, and the shout rent the sky,<br />
-For every one joined in the tally-ho cry!<br />
-Tally-ho!&nbsp; Hark forward!&nbsp; Tally-ho!&nbsp;
-Tally-ho!&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>On leaving Willey, Mr. Forester asked Dibdin what he could do
-to discharge the obligation he felt himself under for his
-services; the great ballad writer, whom Pitt pensioned, replied
-&ldquo;Nothing;&rdquo; he had been so well treated that he could
-not accept anything.&nbsp; Finding artifice necessary, Mr.
-Forester asked him if he would deliver a letter for him
-personally at his banker&rsquo;s on his arrival in London.&nbsp;
-Of course Dibdin consented, and on doing so he found it was an
-order to pay him &pound;100!</p>
-<p>When the song first came out Charles Incledon, <a
-name="page144"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 144</span>by the
-&ldquo;human voice divine,&rdquo; was drawing vast audiences at
-Drury Lane Theatre.&nbsp; On play-bills, in largest type, forming
-the most attractive morceaux of the bill of fare, this song,
-varied by others of Dibdin&rsquo;s composing, would be seen; and
-when he was first announced to sing it, a few fox-hunting friends
-of the Squire went to London to hear it.&nbsp; Taking up their
-positions in the pit, they were all attention as the inimitable
-singer rolled out, with that full volume of voice which at once
-delighted and astounded his audience, the verse
-commencing:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;You all knew Tom Moody the whipper-in
-well.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>But the great singer did not succeed to the satisfaction of
-the small knot of Shropshire fox-hunters in the &ldquo;tally-ho
-chorus.&rdquo;&nbsp; Detecting the technical defect which
-practical experience in the field alone could supply, they jumped
-upon the stage, and gave the audience a specimen of what
-Shropshire lungs could do.</p>
-<p>The song soon became popular.&nbsp; It seized at once upon the
-sporting mind, and upon the mind of the country generally.&nbsp;
-The London publishers took it up, and gave it with the music,
-together with woodcuts and lithographic illustrations, and it
-soon found <a name="page145"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-145</span>a ready sale.&nbsp; But the illustrations were
-untruthful.&nbsp; The church was altogether a fancy sketch,
-exceedingly unlike the quaint old simple structure still
-standing.&nbsp; A print published by Wolstenholme, in 1832,
-contains a very faithful representation of the church on the
-northern side, with the grave, and a large gathering of sportsmen
-and spectators, at the moment the &ldquo;view halloo&rdquo; is
-supposed to have been given.&nbsp; It is altogether spiritedly
-drawn and well coloured, and makes a pleasing subject; but the
-view is taken on the wrong side of the church, the artist having
-evidently chosen this, the northern side, because of the distance
-and middle distance, and in order to make a taking picture.&nbsp;
-The view has this advantage, however, it shows the Clee Hills in
-the distance.&nbsp; Tom&rsquo;s grave is covered by a simple
-slab, containing the following inscription,</p>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">TOM MOODY,<br />
-<span class="smcap">Buried Nov</span>. 19<span
-class="smcap">th</span>, 1796,</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>and is on the opposite side, near the old porch, and chief
-entrance to the church.</p>
-<p>In the full-page engraving, representing a meet near
-&ldquo;Hangster&rsquo;s Gate,&rdquo; a famous
-&ldquo;fixture&rdquo; in the old Squire&rsquo;s time, the
-assembled sportsmen are <a name="page146"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 146</span>supposed to be startled by the
-re-appearance of Tom upon the ground of his former
-exploits.&nbsp; It is the belief of some that when a corpse is
-laid in the grave an angel gives notice of the coming of two
-examiners.&nbsp; The dead person is then made to undergo the
-ordeal before two spirits of terrible appearance.&nbsp; Whether
-this was the faith of Tom&rsquo;s friends or not we cannot say,
-but Tom was supposed to have been anything but satisfied with his
-quarters or his company, and to have returned to visit the Willey
-Woods.&nbsp; The picture presents a group of sportsmen and hounds
-beneath the trees, and attention is directed towards the spectre,
-an old decayed stump.&nbsp; The following lines refer to the
-tradition:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;See the shade of Tom Moody, you all have
-known well,<br />
-To our sports now returning, not liking to dwell<br />
-In a region where pleasure&rsquo;s not found in the chase,<br />
-So Tom&rsquo;s just returned to view his old place.<br />
-No sooner the hounds leave the kennel to try,<br />
-Than his spirit appears to join in the cry;<br />
-Now all with attention, his signal well mark,<br />
-For see his hand&rsquo;s up for the cry of Hark! Hark!<br />
-Then cheer him, and mark him, Tally-ho! Boys!
-Tally-ho!&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="page147"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-147</span>CHAPTER XIII.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY SQUIRE MEMBER FOR
-WENLOCK.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Willey Squire recognises the Duties of his
-Position, and becomes Member for Wenlock&mdash;Addison&rsquo;s
-View of Whig Jockeys and Tory Fox-hunters&mdash;State of
-Parties&mdash;Pitt in
-Power&mdash;&ldquo;Fiddle-Faddle&rdquo;&mdash;Local
-Improvements&mdash;The Squire Mayor of Wenlock&mdash;The Mace now
-carried before the Chief Magistrate.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">There</span> is an old English maxim that
-&ldquo;too much of anything is good for nothing;&rdquo; the
-obvious meaning being that a man should not addict himself over
-much to any one pursuit; and it is only justice to the Willey
-Squire that it should be fully understood <a
-name="page148"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 148</span>that whilst
-passionately fond of the pleasures of the chase, he was not
-unmindful of the duties of his position.&nbsp; Willey was the
-centre of the sporting country we have described; but it was also
-contiguous to a district remarkable for its manufacturing
-activity&mdash;for its iron works, its pot works, and its brick
-works, the proprietors of which, no less than the agricultural
-portion of the population, felt that they had an interest in
-questions of legislation.&nbsp; Mr. Forester considered that
-whatever concerned his neighbourhood and his country concerned
-him, and his influence and popularity in the borough led to his
-taking upon himself the duty of representing it in
-Parliament.&nbsp; There was about the temper of the times
-something more suited to the temperament of a country gentleman
-than at present, and a member of Parliament was less bound to his
-constituents.&nbsp; His duties as a representative sat much more
-lightly, whilst the pugnacious elements of the nation generally
-were such that when Mr. Forester entered upon public life there
-was nearly as much excitement in the House of Commons&mdash;and
-not unlike in kind&mdash;as was to be found in the cockpit or the
-hunting-field.</p>
-<p>As long as Mr. Forester could remember, parties <a
-name="page149"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 149</span>had been as
-sharply defined as at present, and men were as industriously
-taught to believe that whatever ranged itself under one form of
-faith was praiseworthy, whilst everything on the other side was
-to be condemned.&nbsp; Addison, in his usually happy style, had
-already described this state of things in the <i>Spectator</i>,
-where he says:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;This humour fills the country with several
-periodical meetings of Whig jockeys and Tory fox-hunters; not to
-mention the innumerable curses, frowns, and whispers it produces
-at a quarter sessions. . . .&nbsp; In all our journey from London
-to this house we did not so much as bait at a Whig inn; or if by
-chance the coachman stopped at a wrong place, one of Sir
-Roger&rsquo;s servants would ride up to his master full speed,
-and whisper to him that the master of the house was against such
-an one in the last election.&nbsp; This often betrayed us into
-hard beds and bad cheer, for we were not so inquisitive about the
-inn as the innkeeper; and, provided our landlord&rsquo;s
-principles were sound, did not take any notice of the staleness
-of the provisions.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>So that Whig and Tory had even then long been names
-representing those principles by which the Constitution was
-balanced, names representing those <a name="page150"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 150</span>popular and monarchical ingredients
-which it was supposed assured liberty and order, progress and
-stability.&nbsp; But about the commencement of Mr.
-Forester&rsquo;s parliamentary career parties had been in a great
-measure broken up into sections, if not into factions&mdash;into
-Pelhamites, Cobhamites, Foxites, Pittites, and Wilkites&mdash;the
-questions uppermost being place, power, and distinction, ministry
-and opposition&mdash;the Ins and the Outs.&nbsp; The Ins, when
-Whigs, pretty much as now, adopted Tory principles, and Tories in
-opposition appealed to popular favour for support; indeed from
-the fall of Walpole to the American war, as now, there were few
-statesmen who were not by turns the colleagues and the
-adversaries, the friends and the foes of their
-contemporaries.&nbsp; The general pulse, it is true, beat more
-feverishly, and men went to Parliament or into battle as readily
-as to the hunting-field&mdash;for the excitement of the
-thing.&nbsp; To epitomise, mighty armies, such as Europe had not
-seen since the days of Marlborough, were moving in every
-direction.&nbsp; Four hundred and fifty-two thousand men were
-gathering to crush the Prince of a German state, with one hundred
-and fifty thousand men in the field to encounter them.&nbsp; The
-English and Hanoverian <a name="page151"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 151</span>army, under the Duke of Cumberland,
-was relied upon to prevent the French attacking Prussia, with
-whom we had formed an alliance.&nbsp; England felt an intense
-interest in the struggle, and bets were made as to the
-result.&nbsp; Mr. Forester was returned to the new Parliament,
-which met in December, 1757, in time, we believe, to vote for the
-subsidy of &pound;670,000 asked for by the king for his
-&ldquo;good brother and ally,&rdquo; the King of Prussia.&nbsp; A
-minister like Pitt, who was then inspiring the people with his
-spirit, and raising the martial ardour of the nation to a pitch
-it had never known before, who drew such pictures of
-England&rsquo;s power and pluck as to cause the French envoy to
-jump out of the window, was a man after the Squire&rsquo;s own
-heart, and he gave him his hearty &ldquo;aye,&rdquo; to subsidy
-after subsidy.&nbsp; As a contemporary satirist wrote:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;No more they make a fiddle-faddle<br />
-About a Hessian horse or saddle.<br />
-No more of continental measures;<br />
-No more of wasting British treasures.<br />
-Ten millions, and a vote of credit.<br />
-&rsquo;Tis right.&nbsp; He can&rsquo;t be wrong who did
-it.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Mr. Forester gave way to Cecil Forester, a few <a
-name="page152"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 152</span>months
-prior to the marriage of the King to the Princess Charlotte; but
-was returned again, in 1768, with Sir Henry Bridgeman, and sat
-till 1774, during what has been called the &ldquo;Unreported
-Parliament.&rdquo;&nbsp; He was returned in October of the same
-year with the same gentleman.&nbsp; He was also returned to the
-new Parliament in 1780, succeeding Mr. Whitmore, who, having been
-returned for Wenlock and Bridgnorth, elected to sit for the
-latter; and he sat till 1784.&nbsp; Sir H. Bridgeman and John
-Simpson, Esq., were then returned, and sat till the following
-year; when Mr. Simpson accepted the Chiltern Hundreds, and Mr.
-Forester, being again solicited to represent the interests of the
-borough, was returned, and continued to sit until the sixteenth
-Parliament of Great Britain, having nearly completed its full
-term of seven years, was dissolved, soon after its prorogation in
-June, 1790.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p147b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"The First Iron Bridge"
-title=
-"The First Iron Bridge"
- src="images/p147s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>It is not our intention to comment upon the votes given by the
-Squire in his place in Parliament during the thirty years he sat
-in the House; suffice it to say, that we believe he gave an
-honest support to measures which came before the country, and
-that he was neither bought nor bribed, as many members of that
-period were.&nbsp; He was active in <a name="page153"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 153</span>getting the sanction of Parliament
-for local improvements, for the construction of a towing-path
-along the Severn, and for the present handsome iron
-bridge&mdash;the first of its kind&mdash;over it, to connect the
-districts of Broseley and Madeley.&nbsp; On retiring from the
-office of chief magistrate of the borough, which he filled for
-some years, he presented to the corporation the handsome mace now
-in use, which bears the following inscription:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The gift of George Forester of Willey,
-Esq., to the Bailiff, Burgesses, and Commonalty of the Borough of
-Wenlock, as a token of his high esteem and regard for the
-attachment and respect they manifested towards him during the
-many years he represented the borough in Parliament, and served
-the office of Chief Magistrate and Justice thereof.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="page154"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-154</span>CHAPTER XIV.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE SQUIRE AND HIS VOLUNTEERS.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Squire and the Wenlock
-Volunteers&mdash;Community of Feeling&mdash;Threats of
-Invasion&mdash;&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll follow the Squire to Hell if
-necessary&rdquo;&mdash;The Squire&rsquo;s Speech&mdash;His
-Birthday&mdash;His Letter to the <i>Shrewsbury
-Chronicle</i>&mdash;Second Corps&mdash;Boney and
-Beacons&mdash;The Squire in a Rage&mdash;The Duke of York and
-Prince of Orange came down.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Not once or twice, in our rough island
-story,<br />
-The path of duty was the way to glory.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p154b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Bridgnorth"
-title=
-"Bridgnorth"
- src="images/p154s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p><span class="smcap">We</span> fancy there was a greater
-community of feeling in Squire Forester&rsquo;s day than now, and
-that whether indulging in sport or in doing earnest work, men
-acted more together.&nbsp; Differences of wealth caused less
-differences of caste, of speech, and of habit; men of different
-classes saw more of each other and were more together;
-consequently there was more cohesion of the particles of which
-society is composed, and, if the term be admissible, the several
-grades were more interpenetrated by agencies which served to make
-them one.&nbsp; Gentlemen <a name="page155"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 155</span>were content with the good old
-English sports and pastimes of the period, and these caused them
-to live on their own estates, surrounded by and in the presence
-of those whom modern refinements serve to separate; and their
-dependants therefore were more alive to those reciprocal,
-neighbourly, and social duties out of which patriotism
-springs.&nbsp; They might not have been better or wiser, but they
-appear to have approached nearer to that state of society when
-every citizen considered himself to be so closely identified with
-the nation as to feel bound to bear arms against an invading
-enemy, and, as far as possible, to avert a danger.&nbsp; Never
-was the rivalry of England and France more vehement.&nbsp;
-Emboldened by successes, the French began to think themselves all
-but invincible, and burned to meet in mortal combat their ancient
-enemies, whilst our countrymen, equally defiant, and with
-recollections of former glory, sought no less an opportunity of
-measuring their strength with the veteran armies of their
-rivals.&nbsp; The embers of former passions yet lay smouldering
-when the French Minister of Marine talked of making a descent on
-England, and of destroying the Government; a threat calculated to
-influence the feelings of old sportsmen like Squire Forester, who
-nourished a love of country, whose <a name="page156"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 156</span>souls throbbed with the same
-national feeling, and who were equally ready to respond to a call
-to maintain the sacredness of their homes, or to risk their lives
-in their defence.&nbsp; Oneyers and Moneyers&mdash;men
-&ldquo;whose words upon &rsquo;change would go much further than
-their blows in battle,&rdquo; as Falstaff says, came forward, if
-for nothing else, as examples to others.&nbsp; On both banks of
-the Severn men looked upon the Squire as a sort of local centre,
-and as the head of a district, as a leader whom they would
-follow&mdash;as one old tradesman said&mdash;to hell, if
-necessary.&nbsp; A general meeting was called at the Guildhall,
-Wenlock, and a still more enthusiastic gathering took place at
-Willey.&nbsp; Mr. Forester never did things by halves, and what
-he did he did at once.&nbsp; He was not much at speech-making,
-but he had that ready wit and happy knack of going to the point
-and hitting the nail on the head in good round Saxon, that told
-amazingly with his old foxhunting friends.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;Gentlemen,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you know very well
-that I have retired from the representation of the borough.&nbsp;
-I did so in the belief that I had discharged, as long as need be,
-those public duties I owe to my neighbours; and in the hope that
-I <a name="page157"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 157</span>should
-be permitted henceforth to enjoy the pleasures of
-retirement.&nbsp; I parted with my hounds, and gave up hunting;
-but here I am, continually on horseback, hunting up men all round
-the Wrekin!&nbsp; The movement is general, and differences of
-feeling are subsiding into one for the defence of the
-nation.&nbsp; Whigs and Tories stand together in the ranks; and
-as I told the Lord-Lieutenant the other day, we must have not
-less than four or five thousand men in uniform, equipped, every
-Jack-rag of &rsquo;em, without a farthing cost to the
-country.&nbsp; (Applause.)&nbsp; There are some dastardly devils
-who run with the hare, but hang with the hounds, damn &rsquo;em
-(laughter); whose patriotism, by G&mdash;d, hangs by such a small
-strand that I believe the first success of the enemies of the
-country would sever it.&nbsp; They are a lot of damnation
-Jacobins, all of &rsquo;em, whining black-hearted devils, with
-distorted intellects, who profess to perceive no danger.&nbsp;
-And, by G&mdash;d, the more plain it is, the less they see
-it.&nbsp; It is, as I say, put an owl into daylight, stick a
-candle on each side of him, and the more light the poor devil has
-the less he sees.&rdquo;&nbsp; (Cries of &ldquo;Bravo, hurrah for
-the Squire.&rdquo;)&nbsp; In conclusion he called upon the
-lawyer, the ironmaster, the pot maker, the artisan, and the
-labourer <a name="page158"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-158</span>to drill, and prepare for defending their hearths and
-homes; they had property to defend, shops that might be
-plundered, houses that might be burned, or children to save from
-being brained, and wives or daughters to protect from treatment
-which sometimes prevailed in time of war.</p>
-<p>As a result of his exertions, a strong and efficient company
-was formed, called &ldquo;The Wenlock Loyal
-Volunteers.&rdquo;&nbsp; The Squire was major, and he spared
-neither money nor trouble in rendering it efficient.&nbsp; He
-always gave the members a dinner on the 4th of June, the birthday
-of George III., who had won his admiration and devotion by his
-boldness as a fox-hunter, no less than by his daring proposal,
-during the riots of 1780, to ride at the head of his guards into
-the midst of the fires of the capital.&nbsp; On New Year&rsquo;s
-Day, that being the birthday of Major Forester, the officers and
-men invariably dined together in honour of their commander.&nbsp;
-The corps were disbanded, we believe, in 1802, for we find in a
-cutting from a Shrewsbury paper of the 12th of January, 1803,
-that about that time a subscription was entered into for the
-purchase of a handsome punch-bowl.&nbsp; The newspaper states
-that</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;On New Year&rsquo;s Day, 1803, the members
-of the late corps of <a name="page159"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 159</span>Wenlock Loyal Volunteers, commanded
-by Major Forester, dined at the Raven Inn, Much Wenlock, in
-honour of their much-respected major&rsquo;s birthday, when the
-evening was spent with that cheerful hilarity and orderly conduct
-which always characterised this respectable corps, when embodied
-for the service of their king and country.&nbsp; In the morning
-of the day the officers, deputed by the whole corps, waited on
-the Major, at Willey, and presented him, in an appropriate
-speech, with a most elegant bowl, of one hundred guineas value,
-engraved with his arms, and the following inscription, which the
-Major was pleased to accept, and returned a suitable
-answer:&mdash;&lsquo;To George Forester, of Willey, Esq., Major
-Commandant of the Wenlock Loyal Volunteers, for his sedulous
-attention and unbounded liberality to his corps, raised and
-disciplined under his command without any expense to Government,
-and rendered essentially serviceable during times of
-unprecedented difficulty and danger; this humble token of their
-gratitude and esteem is most respectfully presented to him by his
-truly faithful and very obedient servants,</p>
-<p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;&lsquo;<span
-class="smcap">The Wenlock Volunteers</span>.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;&lsquo;Major Forester.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><a name="page160"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 160</span>The
-following reply appeared in the same paper the succeeding
-week:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Major Forester, seeing an account in the
-Shrewsbury papers relative to the business which occurred at
-Willey upon New Year&rsquo;s Day last, between him and his late
-corps of Wenlock Volunteers, presumes to trouble the public eye
-with his answer thereto, thinking it an unbounded duty of
-gratitude and respect owing to his late corps, to return them (as
-their late commander) his most explicit public thanks, as well as
-his most grateful and most sincere acknowledgments, for the high
-honour lately conferred upon him, by their kind present of a
-silver bowl, value one hundred guineas.&nbsp; Major
-Forester&rsquo;s unwearied attention, as well as his liberality
-to his late corps, were ever looked upon by him as a part of his
-duty, in order to make some compensation to a body of
-distinguished respectable yeomanry, who had so much the interest
-and welfare of him and their country at heart, that he plainly
-perceived himself, and so must every other intelligent spectator
-on the ground at the time of exercise, that they only waited
-impatiently for the word to put the order into execution
-directly; but with such <a name="page161"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 161</span>regularity as their commander
-required and ever had cheerfully granted to him.&nbsp; A return
-of mutual regard between the major and his late corps was all he
-wished for, and he is now more fully convinced, by this public
-mark of favour, of their real esteem and steady friendship.&nbsp;
-He therefore hopes they will (to a man) give him credit when he
-not only assures them of his future constant sincerity and
-unabated affection, but further take his word when he likewise
-promises them that his gratitude and faithful remembrance of the
-Wenlock Loyal Volunteers shall never cease but with the last
-period of his worldly existence.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;<span class="smcap">Willey</span>, 12th Jan.,
-1803.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Soon after the first corps of volunteers was disbanded, the
-Squire was entertaining his guests with the toast&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;God save the king, and bless the land<br />
-In plenty, song, and peace;<br />
-And grant henceforth that foul debates<br />
-&rsquo;Twixt noblemen may cease&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>when he received a letter from London, stating that at an
-audience given to Cornwallis, the First Consul was very gracious;
-that he inquired <a name="page162"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-162</span>after the health of the king, and &ldquo;spoke of the
-British nation in terms of great respect, intimating that as long
-as they remained friends there would be no interruption to the
-peace of Europe.&rdquo;</p>
-<p>One of the guests added&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">&ldquo;And that I
-think&rsquo;s a reason fair to drink and fill again.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>It was clear to all, however, who looked beneath the surface,
-that the peace was a hollow truce, and that good grounds existed
-for timidity, if not for fear, respecting a descent upon our
-shores:</p>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">&ldquo;Sometimes the
-vulgar see and judge aright.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Month by month, week by week, clouds were gathering upon a sky
-which the Peace of Amiens failed to clear.</p>
-<p>The First Consul declared against English commerce, and
-preparations on a gigantic scale were being made by the
-construction of vessels on the opposite shores of the Channel for
-invasion.</p>
-<p>The public spirit in France was invoked; the spirit of this
-country was also aroused, and vigorous efforts were made by
-Parliament and the people to maintain the inviolability of our
-shores.&nbsp; Newspaper denunciations excited the ire of the
-First <a name="page163"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-163</span>Consul, who demanded of the English Government that it
-should restrict their power.&nbsp; A recriminatory war of words,
-of loud and fierce defiances, influenced the temper of the people
-on each side of the Channel, and it again became evident that
-differences existed which could only be settled by the
-sword.&nbsp; In a conversation with Lord Whitworth, Napoleon was
-reported to have said:&mdash;&ldquo;A descent upon your coasts is
-the only means of offence I possess; and that I am determined to
-attempt, and to put myself at its head.&nbsp; But can you suppose
-that, after having gained the height on which I stand, I would
-risk my life and reputation in so hazardous an undertaking,
-unless compelled to it by absolute necessity.&nbsp; I know that
-the probability is that I myself, and the greatest part of the
-expedition, will go to the bottom.&nbsp; There are a hundred
-chances to one against me; but I am determined to make the
-attempt; and such is the disposition of the troops that army
-after army will be found ready to engage in the
-enterprise.&rdquo;&nbsp; This conversation took place on the 21st
-of February, 1803; and such were the energetic measures taken by
-the English Government and people, that on the 25th of March,
-independent of the militia, 80,000 strong, which were <a
-name="page164"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 164</span>called out
-at that date, and the regular army of 130,000 already voted, the
-House of Commons, on June 28th, agreed to the very unusual step
-of raising 50,000 men additional, by drafting, in the proportion
-of 34,000 for England, 10,000 for Ireland, and 6,000 for
-Scotland, which it was calculated would raise the regular troops
-in Great Britain to 112,000 men, besides a large surplus force
-for offensive operations.&nbsp; In addition to this a bill was
-brought in shortly afterwards to enable the king to call out the
-levy <i>en masse</i> to repel the invasion of the enemy, and
-empowering the lord-lieutenants of the several counties to enrol
-all the men in the kingdom, between seventeen and fifty-five
-years of age, to be divided into regiments according to their
-several ages and professions: those persons to be exempt who were
-members of any volunteer corps approved of by his Majesty.&nbsp;
-Such was the state of public feeling generally that the king was
-enabled to review, in Hyde Park, sixty battalions of volunteers,
-127,000 men, besides cavalry, all equipped at their own
-expense.&nbsp; The population of the country at the time was but
-a little over ten millions, about a third of what it is at
-present; yet such was the zeal and enthusiasm that in a few weeks
-300,000 men <a name="page165"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-165</span>were enrolled, armed, and disciplined, in the different
-parts of the kingdom.</p>
-<p>The movement embraced all classes and professions.&nbsp; It
-was successful in providing a powerful reserve of trained men to
-strengthen the ranks and to supply the vacancies of the regular
-army, thus contributing in a remarkable manner to produce a
-patriotic ardour and feeling among the people, and laying the
-foundation of that spirit which enabled Great Britain at length
-to appear as principal in the contest, and to beat down the power
-of France, even where hitherto she had obtained unexampled
-success.</p>
-<p>Thus, after the first Wenlock Loyal Volunteers were disbanded,
-Squire Forester found but little respite; he and the Willey
-fox-hunters again felt it their duty to come forward and enroll
-themselves in the Second Wenlock Royal Volunteers.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&ldquo;Design
-whate&rsquo;er we will,<br />
-There is a fate which overrules us still.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>No man was better fitted to undertake the task; no one knew
-better how</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;By winning words to conquer willing
-hearts,<br />
-And make persuasion do the work of fear.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><a name="page166"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 166</span>And,
-mainly through his exertions, an able corps was formed,
-consisting of a company and a half at Much Wenlock, a company and
-a half at Broseley, and half a company at Little Wenlock;
-altogether forming a battalion of 280 men.&nbsp; For the county
-altogether there were raised 940 cavalry, 5,022 infantry; rank
-and file, 5,852.&nbsp; Mr. Harries, of Benthall; Mr. Turner, of
-Caughley; Mr. Pritchard and Mr. Onions, of Broseley; Messrs. W.
-and R. Anstice, of Madeley Wood and Coalport; Mr. Collins, Mr.
-Jeffries, and Mr. Hinton, of Wenlock; and others, were among the
-officers and leading members.&nbsp; The uniform was handsome, the
-coat being scarlet, turned up with yellow, the trousers and
-waistcoat white, and the hat a cube, with white and red feathers
-for the grenadiers, and green ones for the light company.&nbsp;
-The old hall once more resounded with martial music, the clang of
-arms, and patriotic songs; drums and fifes, clarionets and
-bugles, were piled up with guns and accoutrements in the form of
-trophies, above the massive chimney-piece, putting the
-deer-horns, the foxes&rsquo; heads, and the old cabinets of
-oak&mdash;black as ebony&mdash;out of countenance by their gaudy
-colouring.&nbsp; People became as familiar with the music of
-military bands <a name="page167"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-167</span>as with the sound of church bells; both were heard
-together on Sundays, the days generally selected for drill, for
-heavy taxes were laid on, and people had to work hard to pay
-them, which they did willingly.&nbsp; The Squire had the women on
-his side, and he worked upon the men through the women.&nbsp;
-There was open house at Willey, and no baron of olden time dealt
-out hospitality more willingly or more liberally.&nbsp; The
-Squire was here, there, and everywhere, visiting neighbouring
-squires, giving or receiving information, stirring up the gentry,
-and frightening country people out of their wits.&nbsp;
-<i>Boney</i> became more terrible than <i>bogy</i>, both to
-children and grown-up persons; and the more vague the notion of
-invasion to Shropshire inlanders, the more horrible the evils to
-be dreaded.&nbsp; The clergy preached about Bonaparte out of the
-Revelations; conjurers and &ldquo;wise-men,&rdquo; greater
-authorities even then than the clergy, saw a connection between
-Bonaparte and the strange lights which every one had seen in the
-heavens!&nbsp; The popular notion was that &ldquo;Boney&rdquo;
-was an undefined, horrible monster, who had a sheep dressed every
-morning for breakfast, who required an ox for his dinner, and had
-six little English children cooked&mdash;when he <a
-name="page168"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 168</span>could get
-them&mdash;for supper!&nbsp; At the name of &ldquo;Boney&rdquo;
-naughty children were frightened, and a false alarm of his coming
-and landing often made grown-up men turn pale.</p>
-<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">&ldquo;This way and
-that the anxious mind is torn.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>The impulse was in proportion to the alarm; the determination
-raised was spirited and praiseworthy.&nbsp; Stout hearts
-constituted an <i>impromptu</i> force, daily advancing in
-organization, with arms and accoutrements, ready to march with
-knapsacks to any point where numbers might be required.&nbsp;
-Once or twice, when a company received orders to march, as to
-Bridgnorth, for instance, an alarm was created among wives,
-daughters, and sweethearts, that they were about to join the
-battalion for active service, and stories are told of
-leave-takings and weepings on such occasions.&nbsp; Beacons were
-erected, and bonfires prepared on the highest points of the
-country round, as being the quickest means of transmitting news
-of the approach of an enemy.&nbsp; Of these watch-fire signals,
-Macaulay says:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;On and on, without a horse untired, they
-hounded still<br />
-All night from tower to tower, they sprang from hill to hill,<br
-/>
-<a name="page169"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 169</span>Till the
-proud peak unfurled the flag o&rsquo;er Derwent&rsquo;s rocky
-dales,&mdash;<br />
-Till like volcanoes flared to heaven the stormy hills of
-Wales,&mdash;<br />
-Till twelve fair counties saw the blaze on Malvern&rsquo;s lonely
-height,&mdash;<br />
-Till streamed in crimson on the wind the Wrekin&rsquo;s crest of
-light&mdash;<br />
-Till broad and fierce the star came forth on Elsig&rsquo;s
-stately fane,<br />
-And tower and hamlet rose in arms o&rsquo;er all the boundless
-plain.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Within a mile of Willey Hall a tenant of Squire Forester, and,
-as we have seen, an occasional guest&mdash;John Wilkinson,
-&ldquo;the great ironmaster&rdquo;&mdash;was urging his men day
-and night to push the manufacture of shot, shell, howitzers, and
-guns, which Mr. Forester believed were for the government of the
-country, but many of which were designed for its enemies.&nbsp;
-Night and day heavy hammers were thundering, day and night the
-&ldquo;great blast&rdquo; was blowing.&nbsp; He was well known to
-the French government and French engineers, having erected the
-first steam engine there in 1785, for which he was highly
-complimented by the Duke d&rsquo;Angouleme, M. Bertrand, and
-others, and treated to a grand banquet, given to him on the 14th
-of January, 1786, at the H&ocirc;tel de Ville.&nbsp; Arthur
-Young, in his travels in France, tells us that until this
-well-known English manufacturer arrived the French <a
-name="page170"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 170</span>knew
-nothing of the art of casting cannon from the solid, and then
-boring them.&nbsp; When Wilkinson returned to England, he
-continued to send guns after war had been declared.&nbsp; This
-clandestine proceeding came to the knowledge of Squire Forester,
-who swore, and roared like a caged lion.&nbsp; Here was the
-Squire, who boasted of his loyalty to good King George, having
-the minerals of his estate worked up into guns for those wretched
-French, whom he detested.&nbsp; He declared he would hunt
-Wilkinson out of the country; but the latter took care to keep
-out of his way.</p>
-<p>The exposure ended in a seizure being made.&nbsp; But
-Wilkinson, a money-getting, unprincipled fellow, finding he could
-not send guns openly, sent best gun-iron in rude blocks, with a
-pretence that they were for ballast for shipping, but which, like
-some of his water-pipes, were used for making guns.&nbsp; His
-warehouse was at Willey Wharf, on the Severn, by which they were
-sent, when there was sufficient water, in barges, which took them
-out into the British Channel, and round the coast to French
-cruisers; and it was at this wharf he built his first famous iron
-barge.&nbsp; The proprietors of the Calcutts furnaces, at which
-young Cochrane, <a name="page171"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-171</span>afterwards Earl Dundonald&mdash;one of the last of our
-old &ldquo;Sea Lions&rdquo;&mdash;spent some time, when a boy,
-with his father, Lord Dundonald, <a name="citation171"></a><a
-href="#footnote171" class="citation">[171]</a> were also casting
-and boring guns; but, in consequence of refusing to fee
-Government servants at Woolwich, the manufacturers had a number
-of them thrown upon their hands, which they sold to a firm at
-Rotherham, and which found their way to India, where they were
-recognised by old workmen in the army, who captured them during
-the Sikh war.&nbsp; At the same time cannon which burst, and did
-almost as much damage to the English as to their enemies, were
-palmed off upon the nation.</p>
-<p>Mr. Forester wrote to the Duke of York, who came down,
-accompanied by the Prince of Orange, to examine the guns for
-himself; and a number of 18 and 32-pounders were fired in honour
-of the event.&nbsp; Others were subjected to various tests, to
-the entire satisfaction of the visitors.</p>
-<p>At this period the Willey country presented a spectacle
-altogether unparalleled in Mr. Forester&rsquo;s <a
-name="page172"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 172</span>experience;
-his entire sympathy and that of his fox-hunting friends was
-enlisted in the warlike movements everywhere going forward, for
-the standards of the Wenlock and Morfe Volunteers now drew around
-them men of all classes.&nbsp; Farmers allowed their ploughs to
-stand still in the furrows, that the peasant might hurry with the
-artisan, musket on shoulder, to his rallying point in the fields
-near Wenlock, Broseley, or Bridgnorth.&nbsp; Whigs and Tories
-stood beside each other in the Volunteer ranks, heart-burnings
-and divisions as to principles and policy were for the time
-forgotten, and the Squire, although now unable to take the same
-active part he formerly did, contributed materially by his
-presence and advice to the zeal and alacrity which distinguished
-his neighbours.</p>
-<h2><a name="page173"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-173</span>CHAPTER XV.<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE WILLEY SQUIRE AMONG HIS
-NEIGHBOURS.</span></h2>
-<p class="gutsumm">The Squire among his Neighbours&mdash;Roger de
-Coverley&mdash;Anecdotes&mdash;Gentlemen nearest the Fire in the
-Lower Regions&mdash;Food Riots&mdash;The Squire quells the
-Mob&mdash;His Virtues and his Failings&mdash;Influences of the
-Times&mdash;His Career draws to a Close&mdash;His wish for Old
-Friends and Servants to follow him to the Grave&mdash;That he may
-be buried in the Dusk of Evening&mdash;His Favourite Horse to be
-shot&mdash;His Estates to go to his Cousin, Cecil Weld, the First
-Lord Forester.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Like</span> Addison&rsquo;s Sir Roger de
-Coverley, the Willey Squire lived a father among his tenants, a
-friend among his neighbours, and a good master amongst <a
-name="page174"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 174</span>his
-servants, who seldom changed.&nbsp; He feasted the rich, and did
-not forget the poor, but allowed them considerable privileges on
-the estate; and there are a few old people&mdash;it is true there
-are but few&mdash;who remember interviews they had with the
-Squire when going to gather bilberries in the park, or when sent
-on some errand to the Hall.&nbsp; An old man, who brightened up
-at the mention of the Squire&rsquo;s name, said, &ldquo;Remember
-him, I think I do; he intended that I should do so.&nbsp; I was
-sent by my mother to the Hall for barm, when, seeing an old man
-in the yard, and little thinking it was the Squire, I said,
-&lsquo;Sirrah, is there going to be any stir here
-to-day?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Aye, lad,&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;come
-in, and see;&rsquo; and danged if he didn&rsquo;t get the
-horse-whip and stir me round the kitchen, where he pretended to
-flog me, laughing the while ready to split his sides.&nbsp; He
-gave me a rare blow out though, and my mother found half-a-crown
-at the bottom of the jug when she poured out the
-barm.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Did you ever hear of his being worsted
-by the sweep?&rdquo; said another.&nbsp; &ldquo;He was generally
-a match for most, but the sweep was too much for him.&nbsp; The
-Squire had been out, and, being caught in a storm, he called at a
-public-house to shelter.&nbsp; Seeing that it was Mr. Forester,
-the <a name="page175"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-175</span>customers made way for him to sit next the fire, and
-whilst he was drying himself a sweep came to the door, and looked
-in; but, seeing the Squire, he was making off again.&nbsp;
-&lsquo;Hollo,&rsquo; said Mr. Forester, &lsquo;what news from the
-lower region?&rsquo;&nbsp; &lsquo;Oh,&rsquo; replied the sweep,
-&lsquo;things are going on there, Squire, much as they are
-here&mdash;the <i>gentlemen are nearest the
-fire</i>!&rsquo;&rdquo;&nbsp; A third of our informants remarked:
-&ldquo;He was one of the old sort, but a right &rsquo;un.&nbsp;
-Why, when there was a bad harvest, and no work for men, after one
-of them war times, and the colliers were rioting and going to
-break open the shops, to tear down the flour mill, and do other
-damage, the old Squire was the only man that could stop
-them&mdash;he had such influence with the people.&nbsp; The poor
-never wanted a friend whilst old George Forester lived.&nbsp;
-There were plenty of broken victuals to be had for the fetching,
-a tankard of right good ale, with bread and cheese, or cold
-mutton, for all comers.&rdquo;</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p173b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Willey Church"
-title=
-"Willey Church"
- src="images/p173s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p>The years 1774&ndash;1782 were periods of local gloom and
-distress, when haggard hunger and ignorant force banded together
-to trample down the safeguards of civil rights, and armed
-ruffians took the initiative in violent scrambles for food.&nbsp;
-The <a name="page176"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-176</span>cavalry were called out, and fierce battles were fought
-in the iron districts, where the rioters sometimes took refuge on
-cinder heaps, which supplied them with sharp cutting
-missiles.&nbsp; In 1795 the colliers and iron-workers being in a
-state of commotion, were only prevented from rising by assurances
-that gentlemen of property were disposed to contribute liberally
-to their relief, and thousands of bushels of Indian corn were
-obtained by the Squire and others from Liverpool to add to the
-grain procurable in the neighbourhood to meet immediate
-necessities.&nbsp; A meeting of gentlemen, farmers, millers, and
-tradesmen was held at the Tontine Hotel, on the 9th of July in
-that year, to consider the state of things arising out of the
-scarcity of corn and the dearness of all other provisions, at
-which a committee was formed for the immediate collection of
-contributions and the purchase of grain at a reduction of
-one-fourth, or 9<i>s.</i> for 12<i>s.</i>&nbsp; Mr. Forester at
-once gave notice to all his tenants to deliver wheat to the
-committee at 12<i>s.</i>, whilst he himself gave &pound;105, and
-agreed to advance &pound;700 more, to be repaid from the produce
-of the corn sold at a reduced price.&nbsp; Such were the wants of
-the district, the murmurs of <a name="page177"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 177</span>the inhabitants, and the
-distinctions made between those who were considered benefactors,
-and others who were not, that fear was entertained of a general
-uprising; and application was made to Mr. Forester, both as a
-friend and a magistrate.&nbsp; He assumed more the character of
-the former, and his presence acted like magic upon the rough
-miners, who by his kindness and tact were at once put into good
-humour.&nbsp; Having brought waggons of coal, drawn with ropes,
-for sale, the first thing the Squire did was to purchase the
-coal: he then bought up all the butter in the market, and
-purchased all the bread in the town, he emptied the
-butchers&rsquo; shops in the same way, and advised the men to go
-home with the provisions he gave them.</p>
-<p>We are quite aware that it might be said that Squire Forester
-was not a model for imitation; and it might be replied that no
-man ever was, altogether, even for men of his own time, much less
-for those of one or two generations removed, always excepting Him
-whose name should never be uttered lightly, and in whom the human
-and divine were combined.&nbsp; He had sufficient inherent good
-qualities, however, to make half a dozen ordinary <a
-name="page178"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 178</span>modern
-country gentlemen popular; still his one failing, shared among
-the same number, might no less damn them in the eyes of
-society.</p>
-<p>Some would, no doubt, have liked Dibdin&rsquo;s heroes better
-if he had been less truthful, by making the language more
-agreeable to the ear, by substituting, as one writer has said,
-&ldquo;dear me&rdquo; for &ldquo;damme,&rdquo; and lemonade for
-grog; but such critics are what Dibdin himself called
-&ldquo;lubbers&rdquo; and &ldquo;swabs.&rdquo;&nbsp; In the same
-way, some would be for toning down the characters of Squire
-Forester and Parson Stephens; but this would be a mistake: an
-artist might as well smooth over with vegetation every
-out-cropping rock he finds in his foreground.&nbsp; We might say
-a great deal more about the old Squire, and the Willey Rector
-too, but there is no reason why we should say less.&nbsp; If we
-err, we err with the best and gravest writers of history, who,
-without fear or favour, wrote of things as they found them; and
-those who are familiar with the writings of men of the
-past&mdash;such as the Sixth Satire of Juvenal, will admit that
-men like Squire Forester were examples of modesty.&nbsp; Men of
-all grades, every day, are brought in contact with much that
-might more strongly be objected to in the public Press; and there
-is no reason why the <a name="page179"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 179</span>veil should not be raised in order
-that we may view the past as it really was.</p>
-<p>The fact is, the Squire found the atmosphere of the times
-congenial to his temperament.&nbsp; A very popular Shropshire
-rake and play writer, Wycherley, had done much to lower the tone
-of morality by representing peccadilloes, not as something which
-the violence of passion may excuse, but as accomplishments worthy
-of gentlemen,&mdash;his &ldquo;Country Wife&rdquo; and
-&ldquo;Plain Dealer&rdquo; being examples.&nbsp; Congreve
-followed in his wake, with his &ldquo;Old Bachelor,&rdquo; which
-may be judged by its apothegm:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;What rugged ways attend the noon of
-life;<br />
-Our sun declines, and with what anxious strife,<br />
-What pain, we tug that galling load&mdash;a wife!&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>A fair estimate of the looseness of the time may be formed
-from another representation:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The miracle to-day is, that we find<br />
-A lover true, not that a woman&rsquo;s kind;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>and from the fact that even Pope, in his &ldquo;Epistle to a
-Lady,&rdquo; out of his mature experience could write&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Men some to business, some to pleasure
-take,<br />
-But every woman is at heart a rake.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p><a name="page180"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 180</span>The
-Squire had been jilted, and breathing such an atmosphere, no
-wonder he cast lingering looks to the time</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Ere one to one was cursedly
-confined,&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>or that he never married.&nbsp; It is fortunate he did not,
-for Venus herself, we fancy, could not have kept him by her
-side.&nbsp; His amours were notorious, and some of his mistresses
-were rare specimens of rustic beauty.&nbsp; Two daring spirits
-who followed the hounds were regular Dianas in their way, and he
-spent much of his time in the rural little cottages of these and
-others which were dotted over the estate at no great distance
-from the Hall.&nbsp; As rare Ben Jonson has it:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;When some one peculiar quality<br />
-Doth so possess a man that it doth draw<br />
-All his effects, his spirits, and his powers,<br />
-In their confluction all to run one way,<br />
-This may be truly said to be a humour.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Such a humour the old Squire had.&nbsp; Towards the last he
-found that some of his mistresses gave him a good deal of
-trouble; for in carrying out his desire to leave them comfortably
-provided for, his best intentions created jealousy, and he found
-it difficult to adjust their claims as regarded matters of
-income, Ph&oelig;be Higgs, who survived the Squire <a
-name="page181"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 181</span>many years,
-and lived in a cottage with land attached, on the Willey side of
-the Shirlot, being the most clamorous.&nbsp; She set out one
-night with the intention of shooting the Squire, but was unnerved
-by her favourite monkey, who had stealthily gone on before, and
-jumped unobserved on her shoulder as she opened a gate.&nbsp; On
-another occasion she succeeded in surprising the Squire by
-forcing her way into his room and pointing a loaded pistol at him
-across the table, vowing she would shoot him unless he promised
-to make the sum left for her maintenance equal to that of Miss
-Cal&mdash;t.&nbsp; He had his children educated; they frequently
-visited at the Hall, and some married well.&nbsp; He speaks of
-them as his children and grandchildren in his letters, and
-manifested the greatest anxiety that everything should be done
-that could be done, by provisions in his will for those he was
-about to leave behind him.&nbsp; Indeed the same characteristics
-which gave a colouring to his life distinguished him to the last;
-and if the old fires burnt less brightly, the same inner sense
-and outward manifestations were evident in all he did.</p>
-<p>One thing which troubled him was the chancel of Barrow Church,
-as will be seen by the following <a name="page182"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 182</span>characteristic letter to his agent,
-Mr. Pritchard, asking him to procure a legal opinion about
-certain encroachments upon what he conceived to be his rights,
-and those of the parishioners:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;<span class="smcap">Dear
-Sir</span>,&mdash;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;You must remember Parson Jones has oft been talking to
-me about the pews put up, unfairly, I think, in the chancel of
-Barrow church.&nbsp; The whole of the chancel is mine as patron,
-and I am always obliged to do all the repairs to it, whenever
-wanted.&nbsp; There is a little small pew in it of very ancient
-date, besides these other two; in this, I suppose, it is intended
-to thrust poor me, the patron, into; humble and meek, and
-deprived of every comfort on my own spot, the chancel.&nbsp; The
-parson, you know, has been saucy on the occasion, as you know all
-black Toms are, and therefore I&rsquo;ll now know my power from
-Mr. Mytton, and set the matter straight somehow or other.&nbsp; I
-can safely swear at this minute a dozen people of this parish
-(crowd as they will) can&rsquo;t receive the Sacrament together,
-and therefore, instead of there being pews of any kind therein,
-there ought to be none at all, but a free unencumbered chancel at
-this hour.&nbsp; <a name="page183"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-183</span>Rather than be as it is, I&rsquo;ll be at the expense
-of pulling the present chancel down, rebuilding and enlarging it,
-so as to make all convenient and clever, before I&rsquo;ll suffer
-these encroachments attended with every insult upon earth.&nbsp;
-Surely upon a representation to the bishop that the present
-chancel is much too small, and that the patron, at his own
-expense, wishes to enlarge it, I cannot think but it will be
-comply&rsquo;d with.&nbsp; If this is not Mr. Mytton&rsquo;s
-opinion as the best way, what is? and how am I to manage these
-encroaches?</p>
-<p style="text-align: right">&ldquo;Yours ever,<br />
-&mdash;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;P.S.&mdash;If the old chancel is taken down, I&rsquo;ll
-take care that no pew shall stand in the new one.&nbsp; Mr.
-Mytton will properly turn this in his mind, and I&rsquo;ll then
-face the old kit of them boldly.&nbsp; The old pew I spoke of,
-besides the other two in the chancel (mean and dirty as it is to
-a degree), yet the parson wants to let, if he does not do so now,
-to any person that comes to church, no matter who, so long as he
-gets the cash.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s so small no one can sit with
-bended knees in it; and, in short, the whole chancel is not more
-than one-half as big as the little room I <a
-name="page184"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 184</span>am now
-seated in; which must apparently show you, and, on your
-representation, Mr. Mytton likewise, how much too small it must
-be for so large a parish as Barrow, and with the addition of
-three pews&mdash;one very large indeed, the next to hold two or
-three people abreast, and the latter about three sideways, always
-standing, and totally unable to kneel in the least
-comfort.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Years were beginning to tell upon the old sportsman, reminding
-him that his career was drawing to a close, and he appeared to
-apprehend the truth Sir Thomas Brown embodied in the remark, that
-every hour adds to the current arithmetic, which scarce stands
-one moment; and since &ldquo;the longest sun sets at right
-declensions,&rdquo; he looked forward to that setting and made
-arrangements accordingly, which were in perfect keeping with the
-character of the man.&nbsp; He felt that his day was done, that
-night was coming on; and it was his wish that those who knew him
-best should be those chosen to attend his funeral, that his
-domestics and servants who had experienced his kindness should
-carry him to the tomb.&nbsp; And let it be when the sun goes
-down, when the work of the day is done; let each have a guinea,
-<a name="page185"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 185</span>that he
-may meet his neighbour afterwards and talk over, if he likes, the
-merits and demerits of his old master, as none&mdash;next to his
-Maker&mdash;know them better.&nbsp; The provisions in the will of
-the old Squire, in which he left his estates to his cousin Cecil,
-afterwards Lord Forester, father of the present Right Hon. Lord
-Forester, made about five years before his death, were evidently
-made in this spirit.</p>
-<p>He became ill at one of his cottages on Shirlot, was taken
-home, attended by Dr. Thursfield (grandfather of the present
-Greville Thursfield, M.D.), and died whilst the doctor was still
-with him, on the 13th of July, 1811, in the seventy-third year of
-his age.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<blockquote><p><span class="smcap">Extracts</span> <i>from the
-last Will and Testament</i> (<i>dated the</i> 3<i>rd</i> <i>day
-of November</i>, 1805) <i>of George Forester</i>, <i>late of
-Willey</i>, <i>in the County of Salop</i>, <i>Esquire</i>.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;I desire that all my just debts and funeral expenses,
-and the charges of proving this my Will, may be paid and
-discharged by my Executors hereinafter named, with all convenient
-speed after my decease, and that my body may be interred in a
-grave near the Communion table in the Parish Church of Willey
-aforesaid, or as near thereto as may be, in a plain and decent
-manner.&nbsp; And it is my Will that eight of my Servants or
-Workmen be employed as Bearers of my body to the grave, to each
-of whom I bequeath the sum of One Guinea, and I desire my Cousin
-Cecil Forester, of Ross <a name="page186"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 186</span>Hall, in the County of Salop,
-Esquire, Member of Parliament for the Town and Liberties of
-Wenlock, in the same County, the eldest son of my late uncle,
-Colonel Cecil Forester, deceased, to fix upon and appoint six of
-those of my friends and companions in the neighbourhood of Willey
-aforesaid, whom he knew to have been intimate with, and respected
-by, me, to be Bearers of the Pall at my funeral, and I request
-that my body may be carried to its burial-place in the dusk of
-the evening.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;And I do hereby direct that my chestnut horse, commonly
-called the Aldenham horse, shall be shot as soon as conveniently
-may be after my decease by two persons, one of whom to fire
-first, and the other to wait in reserve and fire immediately
-afterwards, so that he may be put to death as expeditiously as
-possible, and I direct that he shall afterwards be buried with
-his hide on, and that a flat stone without inscription shall be
-placed over him.&nbsp; And I do hereby request my Cousin Cecil
-Forester and the said John Pritchard, as soon as conveniently may
-be after my decease, to look over and inspect the letters,
-papers, and writings belonging to me at the time of my decease,
-and such of them as they shall deem to be useless I desire them
-to destroy.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>His wishes, we need scarcely say, were carried out to the
-letter.&nbsp; He was buried by torchlight in the family vault in
-Willey Church, beneath the family pew, to which the steps shown
-in our engraving lead.&nbsp; Founded and endowed by the lords of
-Willey at some remote period, this venerable edifice has
-remained, with the exception of its chancel, the same as we see
-it, for many generations past.&nbsp; It stands within the shadow
-of the Old Hall, <a name="page187"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-187</span>and might from its appearance have formed the text of
-Gray&rsquo;s ivy-mantled tower, where</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The moping owl does to the moon
-complain;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>being covered with a luxuriant growth of this clinging
-evergreen to the very top.&nbsp; Standing beneath, and peering
-through the Norman-looking windows, which admit but a sober
-light, glimpses are obtained of costly monuments with the names
-and titles of patrons whose escutcheons are visible against the
-wall.&nbsp; The Squire&rsquo;s tomb remains uninscribed; but in
-1821 Cecil Weld, the first Lord Forester, erected a marble tablet
-near, with the simple record&mdash;&ldquo;To the memory of my
-late cousin and benefactor, George Forester, Esq., Willey Park,
-May 10, 1821.&rdquo;</p>
-<h2><a name="page188"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 188</span>THE
-SQUIRE&rsquo;S CHESTNUT MARE.</h2>
-<p style="text-align: center">A NEW HUNTING SONG.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>Written for the present Work
-by</i> <span class="smcap">J. P. Douglas, Esq</span>.</p>
-<blockquote><p><span class="smcap">Away</span> we go! my mare and
-I,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; Over fallow and lea:<br />
-She&rsquo;s carried me twenty years or nigh&mdash;<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; The best of friends are we.<br />
-With steady stride she sweeps along,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; The old Squire on her back:<br />
-While echoes far, earth&rsquo;s sweetest sound,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; The music of the pack.<br />
-Ah! how they stare, both high and low,<br />
-To see the &ldquo;Willey chestnut&rdquo; go.</p>
-<p>Full many a time, from dewy morn<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; Until the day was done,<br />
-We&rsquo;ve follow&rsquo;d the huntsman&rsquo;s ringing horn,<br
-/>
-&nbsp;&nbsp; Proud of a gallant run.<br />
-Well in the front, my mare and I&mdash;<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; A good &rsquo;un to lead is she;<br />
-For&rsquo;ard, hark for&rsquo;ard! still the cry&mdash;<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; In at the death are we.<br />
-My brave old mare&mdash;when I&rsquo;m laid low<br />
-Shall never another master know.</p>
-<p>The sailor fondly loves his ship,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; The gallant loves his lass;<br />
-The toper drains with fever&rsquo;d lip,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; His deep, full-bottom&rsquo;d glass.<br />
-Away! such hollow joys I scorn,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; But give to me, I pray,<br />
-The cry of the hounds, the sounding horn,<br />
-&nbsp;&nbsp; For&rsquo;ard! hark, hark away!<br />
-And this our burial chant shall be,<br />
-For the chestnut mare shall die with me!</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h2><a name="page189"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-189</span>APPENDIX.</h2>
-<h3>A.&mdash;<i>Page</i> <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page10">10</a></span>.</h3>
-<p><span class="smcap">Strutt</span>, quoting from the book of
-St. Alban&rsquo;s the sort of birds assigned to the different
-ranks of persons, places them in the following order:&mdash;</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The eagle, the vulture, and the melona for an
-emperor.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The ger-falcon and the tercel of the
-ger-falcon for a king.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The falcon gentle and the tercel gentle for a
-prince.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The falcon of the rock for a duke.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The falcon peregrine for an earl.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The bastard for a baron.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The sacre and the sacret for a knight.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The lanere and the laneret for an esquire.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The marlyon for a lady.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The hobby for a young man.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The gos-hawk for a yeoman.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The tercel for a poor man.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The sparrow-hawk for a priest.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The musket for a holy-water clerk.</p>
-<p class="gutlist">The kesterel for a knave or a servant.</p>
-<p><a name="page190"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 190</span>Of
-some of the later and milder measures taken to protect the hawk,
-it may be remarked that the 5th of Elizabeth, c. 21, enacts that
-if any person shall unlawfully take any hawks, or their eggs, out
-of the woods or ground of any person, and be thereof convicted at
-the assizes or sessions on indictment, bill or information at the
-suit of the king, or of the party, he shall be imprisoned three
-months, and pay treble damages, and after the expiration of three
-months shall find sureties for his good abearing for seven years,
-or remain in prison till he doth, &sect; 3.</p>
-<p>The last statute concerning <i>falconry</i> (except a clause
-in 7 Jac. c. 11, which limits the time of hawking at pheasants
-and partridges) is that of the 23rd Eliz. c. 10, which enacts
-that if any manner of person shall hawk in another man&rsquo;s
-corn after it is eared, and before it is shocked, and be
-therefore convicted at the assizes, sessions, or leet, he shall
-pay 40<i>s.</i> to the owner, and if not paid within ten days he
-shall be imprisoned for a month.</p>
-<h3>B.&mdash;<i>Page</i> <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page41">41</a></span>.</h3>
-<p>Mr. Eyton, to whose learned and valuable work on the
-&ldquo;Antiquities of Shropshire&rdquo; the author again
-acknowledges his obligations, as all who follow that painstaking
-writer must do, with regard to the holding at the More, says,
-&ldquo;The earliest notice of this tenure which occurs in the
-Roll of Shropshire Sergeantries, is dated 13th of <a
-name="page191"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 191</span>John, 1211,
-and merely says that Richard de Medler holds one virgate of land,
-and renders for the same annually, at the Feast of St. Michael,
-two knives (knifeulos).&nbsp; A second contemporary roll supplies
-the place of payment, viz., the Exchequer; a third writes the
-name, Richard le Mener.&nbsp; In 1245 Nicholas de More is said to
-pay at the Exchequer two knives (cultellos)&mdash;one good, the
-other very bad&mdash;for certain land which he holds of the King
-in capite in More.&nbsp; In 1255 the Stottesden Jurors report
-that Nicholas de Medler holds one virgate in More, in capite of
-the Lord King, rendering at the Exchequer two knives, one of
-which ought to cut a hazel rod, and he does no other service for
-the said land.&nbsp; In that of 1274 Jurors of the same Hundred
-say at length that Nicholas de la More holds one virgate in that
-vill of the Lord King, in capite, by sergeantry, of taking two
-knives to the King&rsquo;s Exchequer, at the feast of St. Michael
-in each year, so that he ought to cut a hazel rod with one knife,
-so that the knife should bend (plicare) with the stroke; and
-again, to cut a rod with the other knife.&nbsp; The record of
-1284 describes Nicholas de la More as holding three parts of a
-virgate and two moors, by sergeantry, &amp;c.&nbsp; The Jurors of
-Oct. 1292 say that William de la More, of Erdington, holds one
-virgate in the More, by sergeantry of taking two knives to the
-King&rsquo;s Exchequer on the morrow of St. Michael, and to cut
-with the same knives two hazel rods.&rdquo;</p>
-<h3><a name="page192"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-192</span>C&mdash;<i>Page</i> <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span>.</h3>
-<p>This bold projecting rock is called, from Major Thomas,
-&ldquo;Smallman&rsquo;s Leap,&rdquo; from a tradition that the
-major, a staunch Royalist, being surprised by a party of
-Cromwell&rsquo;s horse, was singly and hotly pursued over
-Westwood, where, finding all hope of escape at an end, he turned
-from the road, hurried his horse into a full gallop to the edge
-of the precipice, and went over.&nbsp; The horse was killed by
-falling on the trees beneath, but the major escaped, and secreted
-himself in the woods.&nbsp; Certain historical facts, showing
-that the family long resided here, appear to give a colouring to
-this tradition.&nbsp; Thus, in the reign of Henry III. (57th
-year) William Smallman had a lease from John Lord of Brockton par
-Shipton, Corvedale, of 17&frac12; acres of land, with a sytche,
-called Woolsytche, and two parcels of meadow in the fields of
-Brockton.&nbsp; John Smallman possessed by lease and grant, from
-Thomas de la Lake, 30 acres of land in the fields of Larden par
-Shipton, for twenty years from the feast of St. Michael, living
-4th Edward II. (1310) 41st Edward III. (1367), Richard Smallman,
-of Shipton, granted to Roger Powke, of Brockton, all his lands
-and tenements in the township and fields of Shipton, as fully as
-was contained in an original deed.&nbsp; Witnesses&mdash;John de
-Galford, Sir Roger Mon (Chaplain), Henry de Stanwy, John
-Tyklewardyne (Ticklarton), of Stanton, John de Gurre of the same,
-with others.&nbsp; 1st Henry VI. (1422), John Smallman was
-intrusted with the collection of the subsidies of <a
-name="page193"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 193</span>taxes
-payable to the Crown within the franchise of Wenlock.&nbsp;
-Thomas Smallman, of Elton, co. Harford, and Inner Temple,
-barrister-at-law, afterwards a Welsh judge, purchased the manor
-of Wilderhope, Stanway, and the teg and estates, and had a
-numerous grant of arms, 5th October, 1589.&nbsp; Major Thomas
-Smallman, a staunch royalist, born 1624, compounded for his
-estate &pound;140.</p>
-<p>Underneath this bold projecting headland, sometimes called
-&ldquo;Ipikin&rsquo;s Rock,&rdquo; is Ipikin&rsquo;s Cave, an
-excavation very difficult of approach, where tradition alleges a
-bold outlaw long concealed himself and his horse, and from which
-he issued to make some predatory excursion.</p>
-<p>The term <i>hope</i>, both as a prefix and termination, is of
-such frequent occurrence here that it is only natural to suppose
-that it has some special signification; and looking at the
-positions of Prest<i>hope</i>, East<i>hope</i>,
-Millic<i>hope</i>, Middle<i>hope</i>, Wilder<i>hope</i>,
-<i>Hope</i>say, and <i>Hope</i> Bowdler, that signification
-appears to be a recess, or place remote between the hills.&nbsp;
-Easthope is a rural little village about two miles beyond
-Ipikin&rsquo;s Rock, pleasantly situated in one of these long
-natural troughs which follow the direction of Wenlock Edge.</p>
-<p>It appears to have been within the Long Forest, and is
-mentioned in Domesday as being held in Saxon times by Eruni and
-Uluric; it was afterwards held by Edric de Esthop, and others of
-the same name.&nbsp; There was a church here as early as 1240,
-and in the graveyard, between two ancient yews, are two tombs,
-without either date or inscription, in which two monks connected
-with <a name="page194"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 194</span>the
-Abbey of Wenlock are supposed to have been interred.</p>
-<p>Near Easthope, and about midway between Larden Hall and
-Lutwyche Hall, is an enclosure comprising about eight acres, or
-an encampment, forming nearly an entire circle, surrounded by
-inner and outer fosses.&nbsp; The internal slope of the inner
-wall is 12 feet, and externally 25, while the crest of the
-parapet is 6 feet broad.&nbsp; The relief of the second vallum
-rises 10 feet from the fosse, and is about 12 feet across its
-parapet.&nbsp; There is also a second ditch, but it is almost
-obliterated.&nbsp; It is supposed to have been a military post,
-forming an important link in the chain of British entrenchments
-which stretched throughout this portion of the county.&nbsp; Near
-it a mound resembling a tumulus was opened some years since by
-the Rev. R. More and T. Mytton, Esq., and in or near which a
-British urn of baked clay was discovered, on another occasion,
-while making a drain.</p>
-<h3>D.&mdash;<i>Page</i> <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page66">66</a></span>.</h3>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Proavus meus Richardus de isto matrimonio
-susceptus uxorem habuit Annam Richardi dicti Forestarii filiam
-qui quidem Richardus filius erat natu minor pr&aelig;nobilis
-famili&aelig; Forestariorum (olim Regiorum Vigorniensis
-salt&ucirc;s custodum) et famoso Episcopo Bonnero a-Secritis Hic
-Suttanum Madoci incolebat, et egregias &aelig;des posuit in
-urbicula dicta Brugge, sive ad Pontem vel hodie dictas Forestarii
-Dementiam,&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<h3><a name="page195"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-195</span>E.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Pedigree of the Forester
-Family</span>, <i>Page</i> <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page69">69</a></span>.</h3>
-<p>In his &ldquo;Sheriffs of Shropshire,&rdquo; Mr. Blakeway in
-speaking of the Forester family, says: &ldquo;They were
-originally Foresters, an office much coveted by our ancestors,
-which latter seems probable, from the fact, that on the Pipe
-Rolls of 1214, Hugh Forester accounts for a hundred merks that he
-may hold the bailiwick of the forest of Salopscire, as his father
-held it before him.&rdquo;&nbsp; King John, however, remits
-thirty merks of the payment in consequence of Hugh having taken
-to wife the niece of John l&rsquo;Estrange, at <i>His
-Majesty&rsquo;s request</i>.&nbsp; It does not seem clear,
-however, that Hugh, the son of Robert, can be traced to have been
-in the direct line of the Willey family, he having been ancestor
-to Roger, son of John, the first of the king&rsquo;s six
-foresters.&nbsp; The other, Robert de Wellington, the late Mr.
-George Morris, in his &ldquo;Genealogies of the Principal Landed
-Proprietors,&rdquo; now in the possession of T. C. Eyton, Esq.,
-to whose kindness we are indebted for this extract, says was the
-earliest person that can certainly be called ancestor of the
-present family of Forester.&nbsp; His sergeantry is described as
-the custody of the King&rsquo;s Hay of Eyton, of which, and
-several adjoining manors, Peter de Eyton, lineal ancestor of the
-present Thomas Campbell Eyton, of Eyton, and grandson of Robert
-de Eyton, who gave the whole of the Buttery estate to Shrewsbury
-Abbey, was the lord.</p>
-<p>Thomas, a son of Robert Forester of Wellington, in <a
-name="page196"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 196</span>the Hundred
-Rolls, in 1254, is said by the king&rsquo;s justices itinerant to
-hold half a virgate of the king to keep the Hay of
-Wellington.&nbsp; Roger le Forester of Wellington, who succeeded
-Robert, appears to have died 1277&ndash;8, and to have left two
-sons, Robert and Roger.&nbsp; Robert had property in Wellington
-and the Bailiwick of the forest of the Wrekin, and is supposed to
-have succeeded his father, whom he did not long survive, having
-died the year following, 1278&ndash;9.&nbsp; Roger his brother
-succeeded to his possession, and held also the Hay of Wellington,
-of which he died seized in 1284&ndash;5.&nbsp; Robert, the
-Forester of Wellington, Mr. Blakeway says, occurs in the Hundred
-Roll of Bradford in 1287, and is shown to have held the Hay of
-Wellington till 1292&ndash;3, when Roger, son of Roger, proving
-himself of age, paid the king one merk as a relief for his lands
-in Wellington, held by sergeantry, to keep Wellington Hay, in the
-forest of the Wrekin, &amp;c.&nbsp; This is the Roger de
-Wellington before-mentioned, as one of King Edward&rsquo;s
-foresters by fee, recorded in his Great Charter of the forests of
-Salopssier, in the perambulation of 1300.&nbsp; He died 1331.</p>
-<p>John le Forester, as John, son and heir of Roger le Forester
-de Welynton, succeeded to the property, and proved himself of age
-in the reign of Edward III., 1335.&nbsp; With John de Eyton he
-attested a grant in Wellington, and died 24th of Edward III.,
-1350.</p>
-<p>William le Forester succeeded his father, John, in 1377, and
-died 19th of Richard II., 1395.</p>
-<p><a name="page197"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 197</span>In
-1397 Roger Forester de Wellington is described as holding
-Wellington Hay and Chace.&nbsp; He died in 1402.</p>
-<p>Roger, his son and heir, was in 1416 appointed keeper of the
-same haia by the Duchess of Norfolk and the Lady Bergavenny,
-sisters and co-heiresses of the great Thomas Fitz-Alan, Earl of
-Arundel.</p>
-<p>His son and successor, John, died 5th of Edward IV. 1465,
-seized of the lands, &amp;c., in Wellington, and the custody of
-the forest of the Wrekin.&nbsp; He had two sons, William and
-John, also a son Richard; and William, son of the above, appears
-to have been the father of another John, the former John having
-died without issue.&nbsp; John, in 1506, witnesses a deed of
-Thomas Cresset, as John Forester the younger; he married Joice
-Upton, the heiress of Philip Upton, of Upton under Haymond, and
-obtained the estate of that place, which is still inherited by
-his descendants.</p>
-<p>This John Forester first resided in Watling Street, where his
-ancestors for several generations had lived, in the old timbered
-mansion, now occupied by Dr. Cranage, but he afterwards removed
-to Easthope, whilst his son William resided at Upton; and Richard
-Forester, alias Forster of Sutton Maddock, secretary to Bishop
-Bonner, who built the old mansion in Bridgnorth, called
-&ldquo;Forester&rsquo;s Folly,&rdquo; which was burnt down during
-the siege of the castle, when the high town became a heap of
-ruins, appears to have been a son of John Forester, of Easthope;
-and Anthony Forester or Foster of Sir Walter Scott&rsquo;s novel,
-who was born about 1510, was a son of his.</p>
-<p><a name="page198"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 198</span>In
-the 34th of Henry VIII., 1542&ndash;3, Thomas Foster and
-Elizabeth his wife, account in the Exchequer for several
-temporalities in connection with the monastery of St.
-Peter&rsquo;s, Shrewsbury.&nbsp; Sir William Forester, KB.,
-married Lady Mary Cecil, daughter of James, third Earl of
-Salisbury.&nbsp; He was a staunch Protestant, and represented the
-county with George Weld, as previously stated, with whom he voted
-in favour of the succession of the House of Hanover, and the
-family came into possession of the Willey estates by the marriage
-of Brook Forester of Dothill Park, with one of the Welds, the
-famous George Forester, the Willey Squire, being the fruit of
-that marriage.&nbsp; George Forester left the whole of his
-estates to his cousin, Cecil Forester, of Ross Hall, who was
-allowed by George the Fourth, whose personal friendship he had
-been permitted to enjoy for many years, to add the name of Weld
-in 1821.&nbsp; Cecil Weld Forester, Esq., was ennobled the same
-year by George the Fourth, who, when Prince of Wales, honoured
-him with a visit at Ross Hall.&nbsp; He married Catherine,
-daughter of His Grace the fourth Duke of Rutland, and was not
-less renowned than his cousin, as a sportsman.&nbsp; His
-eagerness for the chase was happily characterised by the late Mr.
-Meynell, who used to say, &ldquo;First out of cover came Cecil
-Forester, next the fox, and then my hounds.&rdquo;&nbsp; A famous
-leap of his, thirty feet across a stream, on his famous horse
-Bernardo, has been recorded in some lines now at Willey which
-accompany the portrait of the horse.&nbsp; He is supposed to have
-been one of the first who instituted <a name="page199"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 199</span>the present system of hard riding to
-hounds, and a horse known to have been ridden by him, it is said,
-would at any time fetch &pound;20 more than the ordinary
-price.&nbsp; Speaking of the classic proportions of a horse, and
-the perfection of the art of riding in connection with his
-lordship as a sportsman, Colonel Apperley, remarked some years
-ago, &ldquo;Unless a man sits gracefully on his horse, and
-handles him well, that fine effect is lost.&nbsp; As the poet
-says, he would be incorporated with the brave beast, and such
-does Lord Forester appear to be.&nbsp; His eye to a country is
-also remarkably quick, and his knowledge of Leicestershire has
-given him no small advantage.&nbsp; On one occasion he
-disregarded the good old English custom of &lsquo;looking before
-you leap,&rsquo; and landed in the middle of a deep pool.&nbsp;
-&lsquo;Hold on,&rsquo; a countryman who saw him, shouted to
-others coming in the same direction.&nbsp; &lsquo;Hold your
-tongue&mdash;say nothing, we shall have it full in a
-minute,&rsquo; said Lord Forester.&rdquo;&nbsp; The Colonel
-added, &ldquo;In consequence of residing in Shropshire, a country
-which has been so long famous for its breed of horses, he has a
-good opportunity of mounting himself well.&nbsp; He always
-insisted on the necessity of lengthy shoulders, good fetlocks,
-well formed hind legs and open feet; and knowing better than to
-confound strength and size, his horses seldom exceeded fifteen
-hands.&nbsp; On anything relating to a hunter his authority has
-long been considered classic, and if Forester said so it was
-enough.&nbsp; Lord Forester will always stand pre-eminent in the
-field, whilst in private life he is a very friendly man, and <a
-name="page200"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 200</span>has ever
-adhered to those principles of honour and integrity which
-characterise the gentleman.&rdquo;&nbsp; He died on the 23rd of
-May, 1828, in his 61st year.&nbsp; He had, as we have said, ten
-children, the gallant Frank Forester, as Colonel Apperley styles
-him, being one.&nbsp; The oldest was the present Right Hon. J. G.
-W. Forester, whose popularity in connection with the Belvoir Hunt
-is so well known.</p>
-<p>His lordship, whose portrait we give at the commencement of
-this work, and who is now in the 73rd year of his age, has added
-very much to the Willey estates, both by purchase and by
-improvements, and is very much esteemed by his tenantry.</p>
-<p>The Right Hon. General Forester, who succeeded his brother in
-the representation of Wenlock, has sat for the borough for
-forty-five years, and is now the Father of the House of
-Commons.&nbsp; Whether out-door exercises, associated with the
-pleasures of the chase, to which the ancestors of the Foresters
-have devoted themselves for so many centuries, have anything to
-do with it or not we cannot say; but the Foresters are remarkable
-for masculine and feminine beauty, and the General has frequently
-been spoken of by the press as the best looking man in the House
-of Commons.&nbsp; Neither he nor his elder brother, the present
-Rt. Hon. Lord Forester, are likely to leave behind them direct
-issue.&nbsp; The younger brother, the Hon. and Rev. O. W. W.
-Forester, has one son, Cecil, who has several sons to perpetuate
-the name of Forester, which we hope will long be associated with
-Willey.</p>
-<h2><a name="page201"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-201</span>INDEX.</h2>
-<p class="gutlist">Abbot of Leicester, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page15">15</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Salop, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page6">6</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Tavistock, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page15">15</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Addison, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page80">80</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Albrighton red-coats, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page30">30</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Aldenham, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Alfred, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page19">19</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Algar, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page19">19</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Apley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Apperley, Col., <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page84">84</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Arrows, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page22">22</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Atterley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page22">22</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Bachelors&rsquo; Hall, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page104">104</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Badger, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page52">52</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Barons&rsquo; War, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page25">25</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Barrow, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Battle of Worcester, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page26">26</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Baxter, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page65">65</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Beacons, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page168">168</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Beaver, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page4">4</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Bellet&rsquo;s, Rev. George, Antiquities of
-Bridgnorth, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page66">66</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Belswardine, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Benson, M., Esq., <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page48">48</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Benthall, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Benthall Edge, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page53">53</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Bernard&rsquo;s Hill, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page23">23</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Bishop Bonner, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page66">66</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Percy, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page65">65</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Bittern, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page5">5</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Black Toms, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page182">182</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Bold, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Boney, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page167">167</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Bowman&rsquo;s Hill, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page26">26</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Bow, the weapon of sport and of war, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page22">22</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Brock-holes, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page52">52</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Broseley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page40">40</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Brown Clee, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page96">96</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Brug, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page40">40</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Buck, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page16">16</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Buildwas, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page100">100</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Cantreyne, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Castellan, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page23">23</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Castillon, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page14">14</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Cask of wine, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page24">24</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Castle, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page22">22</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Caughley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Chace of Shirlot, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page31">31</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Chaucer, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page46">46</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Chesterton, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page18">18</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Chester, Earl of, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page25">25</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Chetton, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page31">31</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Childers, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page88">88</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Christmas Day, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page38">38</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Claverley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page25">25</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Clee Hills, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page39">39</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Cliffords, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page40">40</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Coalbrookdale, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page40">40</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Coed, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page19">19</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Colemore, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Collars of gold, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page9">9</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Constable, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page45">45</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Coracle, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page6">6</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist"><a name="page202"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-202</span>Corbett, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page24">24</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Corve Dale, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page51">51</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Cox Morris, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page115">115</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Craft of Hunting, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page16">16</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Cressage, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Creswick, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page45">45</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">D&mdash;n the Church, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page116">116</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Danesford, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page19">19</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Dastardly devils, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page157">157</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Dawley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page58">58</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Dean, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Deer, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page31">31</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page36">36</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page37">37</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page39">39</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Deer Leap, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page36">36</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Dibdin, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page141">141</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Ditton, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page39">39</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Dodos, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page4">4</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Domesday, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page71">71</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Dothill, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page65">65</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Druids, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page46">46</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page50">50</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Drury Lane, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page144">144</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Duke&rsquo;s Antiquities, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page28">28</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Duke of York, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page171">171</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Early features of the country, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page8">8</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Earl of Derby, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page26">26</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Earl Dundonald, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page171">171</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Easthope, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Egret, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page5">5</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Elk, Gigantic, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page11">11</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">England, The, of our ancestor, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page79">79</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Evelith, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page66">66</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Eyton, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page58">58</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Eyton, Sir H, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page63">63</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Eyton, T. C, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page63">63</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Falcon, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page9">9</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">First iron barge, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page170">170</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Fishing a recreation for the sick, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page7">7</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Fishing an attractive art, &amp;c., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page6">6</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; practised by
-primitive dwellers, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page5">5</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Forest Lodge, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page28">28</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Forest Roll, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page58">58</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Forester, Brook, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page76">76</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; George, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page76">76</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Hugh, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page58">58</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; John, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page63">63</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Robert, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page58">58</a></span>, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page60">60</a></span>, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page63">63</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Roger, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page63">63</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Squire, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page76">76</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; William, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page73">73</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Forester&rsquo;s Folly, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page66">66</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Forster, Richard, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page64">64</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Foster, Anthony, Lord of the Manor of Little
-Wenlock, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page64">64</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Foster, Anthony, a different character to what
-Sir Walter Scott represents him, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page67">67</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page68">68</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Fox-holes, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page52">52</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Fox-hunters&rsquo; Christening, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page120">120</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Fox-hunting Moll, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page121">121</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Gammer Gurton&rsquo;s Needle, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page26">26</a></span>, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page29">29</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Gatacre, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page26">26</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Gentlemen nearest the fire, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page175">175</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">George Earl of Shrewsbury, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page29">29</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Goats, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page25">25</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Grant, singular, to John Forester, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page63">63</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Hangster&rsquo;s Gate, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page145">145</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Harold, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page48">48</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Harpswood, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page33">33</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hay Gate, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page59">59</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Haye, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page60">60</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Haye of Shirlot, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page40">40</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Wellington, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page58">58</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hawking, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page10">10</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hermitage, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page26">26</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page27">27</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Heron, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page10">10</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hill Top, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hinton, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page115">115</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Honest old Tom, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page89">89</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hope Bowdler, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hughley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hugh Montgomery, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page39">39</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hunting as old as the hills, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page1">1</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Hunting-matches, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page61">61</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Imbert, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page40">40</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Incledon, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page143">143</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Ipikin&rsquo;s Rock, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Iron, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page41">41</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist"><a name="page203"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-203</span>Kennels, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page86">86</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">King Canute, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page12">12</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Edward I., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page24">24</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, &bdquo; VI., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page29">29</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Henry I., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page13">13</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; &bdquo; III. in
-Shrewsbury, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page14">14</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, ,, III., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page28">28</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, ,, VII., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page29">29</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; &bdquo; VIII., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page10">10</a></span>, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page63">63</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; John, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page10">10</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Richard I., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page13">13</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; &bdquo; II., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page28">28</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; William I., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page12">12</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Lacon, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page73">73</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Lady Oak, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page50">50</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Larden, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page48">48</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Larry Palmer, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page109">109</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Latimer, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page15">15</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Legend, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page20">20</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Leland, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page41">41</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Lilleshall, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page5">5</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Linley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page42">42</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Little Wenlock, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page10">10</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Lodge Farm, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page36">36</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Long runs, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page96">96</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Lutwyche, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page48">48</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Major Forester and his Volunteers, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page159">159</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Marsh and forest periods, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page8">8</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Maypoles, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page86">86</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Merrie days, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page16">16</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Mog Forest, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Moody, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page11">11</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Moody&rsquo;s Horn, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page127">127</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Morfe Forest, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page17">17</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Volunteers, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page172">172</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Morville, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page31">31</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Mount St. Gilbert, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page57">57</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Muckley Row, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page34">34</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Needle&rsquo;s Eye, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page56">56</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Oaks, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page51">51</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Offenders in forests, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page14">14</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Old boots, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page138">138</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Old Hall, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page73">73</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Lodge, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page29">29</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; names, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page27">27</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; records, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page96">96</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; style of hunting,
-<span class="indexpageno"><a href="#page84">84</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Simkiss, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page96">96</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; tenures, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page41">41</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Tinker, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page96">96</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; trees, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page50">50</a></span>, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page55">55</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; Trojan, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page130">130</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Ordericus Vitalis, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page13">13</a></span>, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page18">18</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Original letters, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page90">90</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page91">91</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Parson Stephens in his shirt, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page111">111</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Parson Stephens and the poacher, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page119">119</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Pendlestone Mill, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page57">57</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Ph&oelig;be Higgs, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page95">95</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Pigmy, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page88">88</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Pilot, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page88">88</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Piers Plowman, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page14">14</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Prince Rufus, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page13">13</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Quatford, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page21">21</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Red deer, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page30">30</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Robin Hood, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page23">23</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Roger de Montgomery, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page21">21</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Savory, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page92">92</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Seabright, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page130">130</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Second Wenlock Loyal Volunteers, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page165">165</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Shade of Tom Moody, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page146">146</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Sherwood, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page47">47</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Shirlot, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page34">34</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Shipton, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page51">51</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Smallman&rsquo;s Leap, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page49">49</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Smith, Sidney Stedman, Esq., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page66">66</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Smithies, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page42">42</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Sore sparrow-hawk, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page9">9</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Spoonhill, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page48">48</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Sporting priors, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page37">37</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Sporting visitations, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page38">38</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Sportsmen attend, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page136">136</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist"><a name="page204"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-204</span>Squire Forester&rsquo;s gift to Dibdin, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page143">143</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Squire Forester among his neighbours, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page173">173</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Squire Forester and the rioters, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page177">177</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Squire Forester in Parliament, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page151">151</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Squire Forester not a model for imitation,
-<span class="indexpageno"><a href="#page177">177</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Squire Forester notorious for his amours,
-<span class="indexpageno"><a href="#page180">180</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Squire Forester, Death of, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page185">185</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, &bdquo; Extracts from the
-will of, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page185">185</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Stoke St. Milburgh, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page40">40</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Stubbs, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page89">89</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Sutton Maddock, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page65">65</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Swainmote, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page24">24</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page37">37</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Swine, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page20">20</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Sylvan slopes, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page47">47</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Tasley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page32">32</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Taylor, the water-poet, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page60">60</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Tevici, huntsman to Edward I., <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page12">12</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Thursfield, Thomas, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page44">44</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; William, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page84">84</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Tickwood, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page100">100</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Tom Moody, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page122">122</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Tom Moody&rsquo;s last request, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page135">135</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Trencher hounds, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page130">130</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Tumuli, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page18">18</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Turner, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page114">114</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">Venison, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page35">35</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Vivaries, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page5">5</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Volunteers, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page158">158</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page166">166</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-<p class="gutlist">&ldquo;Walls,&rdquo; The, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page18">18</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wastes, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page25">25</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Weirs, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page5">5</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Welds, The, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page73">73</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wenlock (Loyal Volunteers), <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page159">159</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wenlock, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page38">38</a></span>, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page152">152</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wheatland, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page45">45</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Who-who-hoop, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page129">129</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wild boar, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page29">29</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wilkinson, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page114">114</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Willey, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page70">70</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Church, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page173">173</a></span>, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page186">186</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&bdquo; rector, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page118">118</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;,, Wharf, <span
-class="indexpageno"><a href="#page170">170</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Williley, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page72">72</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wilton, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page79">79</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Windfalls, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page35">35</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Woodcraft, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page14">14</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Worf, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page18">18</a></span></p>
-<p class="gutlist">Wrekin, <span class="indexpageno"><a
-href="#page55">55</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">PRINTED BY
-VIRTUE AND CO., CITY ROAD, LONDON.</span></p>
-<h2><a name="page2_1"></a><span class="pagenum">p.
-1</span>ADVERTISEMENTS.</h2>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>Price One Shilling</i>.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>HANDBOOK</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">TO
-THE</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>SEVERN VALLEY RAILWAY,</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">With
-Twenty-five Illustrations.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">By</span> J.
-RANDALL, F.G.S.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">Author of
-&ldquo;The Severn Valley,&rdquo; &ldquo;Old Sports and
-Sportsmen,&rdquo; &ldquo;Villages</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">and Village Churches,&rdquo;
-&amp;c.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">
-<a href="images/p2.1b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Illustration of from Severn Valley Railway book"
-title=
-"Illustration of from Severn Valley Railway book"
- src="images/p2.1s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">VIRTUE &amp; CO., 26, IVY LANE,
-LONDON;<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">J. RANDALL, MADELEY,
-SHROPSHIRE.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_2"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 2</span><b>TENT LIFE</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall">WITH</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>ENGLISH GIPSIES IN
-NORWAY.</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">By</span>
-HUBERT SMITH,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">Member of
-the English Alpine Club; Norse Turist Forening; and
-Fellow</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">of the Historical Society of Great
-Britain.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>With Five full-page
-Engravings</i>, <i>Thirty-one smaller</i><br />
-<i>Illustrations</i>, <i>and Map of the Country</i>, <i>showing
-Routes</i>.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p>The following is a recent Review of the Book:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;We do not know any similar kind of work,
-and we believe that it will stand alone in the speciality of its
-interest.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;In addition to much adventure resulting from a nomadic
-life in a foreign country, it contains descriptions of scenery,
-besides information which may instruct the philologist.&nbsp; A
-carefully prepared map shows the routes and camp grounds of the
-Author&rsquo;s nomadic expedition.</p>
-<p>&ldquo;The work, in consequence of the death of his late
-Majesty, Carl XV., on the 18th Sept., 1872, is dedicated by
-permission of his present Majesty, Oscar II., &lsquo;<i>In
-Memoriam</i>.&rsquo;</p>
-<p>&ldquo;The work has clearly been undertaken at considerable
-cost, and the scenes of travel described extend over nearly 2,000
-miles of sea and land traversed by the Author with tents,
-gipsies, animal commissariat, and baggage, independent of any
-other shelter or accommodation than what he took with him.&nbsp;
-In the course of the expedition one of the highest waterfalls of
-Norway was visited, &lsquo;Morte fos,&rsquo; and the highest
-mountain in Norway, the &lsquo;Galdhossiggen&rsquo; was
-ascended.&nbsp; The book is cheap at a guinea, being illustrated
-with five full-page engravings, all of which are taken from the
-Author&rsquo;s original sketches, or photographs specially
-obtained for the purpose; they are beautiful works of Art, and
-are admirably executed by the celebrated Mr. Edward Whymper,
-Author of &lsquo;Scrambles amongst the Alps.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center">LONDON: S. KING &amp; CO., 63,
-CORNHILL;<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">AND 72, PATERNOSTER ROW.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_3"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 3</span>
-<a href="images/p2.3b.jpg">
-<img alt=
-"Decorative graphic with letters C S N on it, underneath which is
-written Coalport"
-title=
-"Decorative graphic with letters C S N on it, underneath which is
-written Coalport"
- src="images/p2.3s.jpg" />
-</a></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>JOHN ROSE &amp; CO.,</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap"><b><i>Porcelain
-Manufacturers</i></b></span>,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">COALPORT, SHROPSHIRE.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>Five minutes&rsquo; walk from
-Coalport Station on the Severn Valley and</i><br />
-<i>Shropshire Union Railways</i>.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center" class="gutlist">MEDAL OF THE
-SOCIETY OF ARTS, 1820.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center" class="gutlist">FIRST CLASS MEDAL,
-EXHIBITION, 1851.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center" class="gutlist">First Class Medal,
-Paris Exhibition, 1855.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center" class="gutlist">FIRST CLASS MEDAL,
-EXHIBITION, 1862.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortdoubleline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p>The <i>Court Journal</i>, speaking of the productions
-exhibited by William Pugh, Esq., May, 1871, says&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;We do not think that any porcelain
-productions would equal those of the Coalport works.&nbsp; The
-show-case that the owners exhibit independently, and their
-manufactures, displayed by various firms, have, in all instances,
-the highest merit.&nbsp; We are well aware we shall be informed
-that our praise is but a stale echo, as this firm is renowned of
-old for producing the finest china, having some process of
-blending or applying chemical agencies known only to themselves,
-and being celebrated over Europe for the beautiful colour of the
-gold&mdash;a matter of course of very considerable consequence,
-as it is used so bounteously in the ornamentation of
-china.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>In an article on the &ldquo;world&rsquo;s great show,&rdquo;
-as the Viennese were pleased to call it, the same Journal
-remarked&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;We have latterly challenged the continental
-world to compete with us and to contend for equality in many
-branches of manufacture into which art excellence <a
-name="page2_4"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 4</span>and
-refinement of taste enter, and we have carried off the
-palm.&nbsp; Neither S&egrave;vres nor Dresden has of late years
-compared with the best English productions.&nbsp; There is no
-doubt of this; and most especially we might instance as
-successful rivalry the progress that the Coalport Works have
-made.&nbsp; The marked patronage of Royal circles on the
-Continent and at home for their productions is, perhaps, the best
-proof of the truth of our statement. . . .&nbsp; They have been
-especially practical in their catering for the Vienna Exhibition,
-and met the foreigner at his weak point rather than courted
-rivalry at his strongest.&nbsp; No nation on the Continent can
-compete with the French as regards the painting, though Coalport
-could and will challenge with every hope of success for the first
-place when it comes to the question of rivalry in design,
-exquisite form, graceful ornamentation, brilliancy of colour,
-bright burnish of gold, and tenderness of glaze in merely
-decorative porcelain works.&nbsp; The specimens of this character
-which are sent will, we are sure, worthily maintain the
-reputation of Coalport.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p>The <i>Standard</i> also, May 23, 1873, in an article on the
-&ldquo;Ceramic Art,&rdquo; had the following:&mdash;</p>
-<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Messrs. Daniell have so many good things
-from Coalport Works that it would be difficult to present even a
-brief mention of them all.&nbsp; There is one beautiful pair of
-vases in imitation Cashmere ware which Sir R. Wallace has already
-purchased, and the same gentleman has also secured a number of
-plates delightfully painted by Faugeron with exotic leaves.&nbsp;
-Two portrait vases of the Emperor and Empress of Austria are of
-old S&egrave;vres shape, the bodies being of turquoise and gold,
-and the paintings by Palmere, almost miniatures in their fine
-detail.&nbsp; Two gros bleu vases, with raised and chased gold
-ornamentation and panels, choicely painted with birds by Randall,
-are as elegant as a pair of jardini&egrave;res, with a cobalt
-ground and gold ferns and grasses in relief, butterflies touched
-up in bright enamel, toning the otherwise too great richness of
-the dark gold and blue.&nbsp; These are only a few of the
-attractions of one of the finest, though not largest, cases in
-the section.&nbsp; Messrs. Pellatt exhibit some Coalport ware,
-which is in every respect worthy of the high repute of that
-renowned manufactory.&rdquo;</p>
-</blockquote>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>MARBLE AND STONE WORKS, SWAN
-HILL, SHREWSBURY.</b></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>R. DODSON</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center" class="gutusage"><span
-class="GutSmall">Respectfully begs to intimate that the Show
-Rooms contain a large</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">collection of</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>MARBLE, STONE, &amp; ENAMELLED
-SLATE CHIMNEY PIECES,</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">MARBLE AND STONE MURAL
-MONUMENTS,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>CEMETERY AND CHURCHYARD
-MEMORIALS,</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">FONTS,
-FOUNTAINS, VASES, SLATE CISTERNS,</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">&amp;c. &amp;c. &amp;c.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>Designs forwarded for
-inspection</i>; <i>and communications by letter will</i><br />
-<i>receive immediate attention</i>.</p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_5"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 5</span><b>THE COALBROOKDALE CO.</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall">MANUFACTURERS OF ALL KINDS OF</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>BRICKS AND TILES,</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">RIDGING, FLOORING,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">FIRE BRICKS, SQUARES, CHIMNEY<br />
-TOPS, &amp;c.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b><i>PRESSED &amp; MOULDED
-BRICKS</i></b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">FOR FACING
-STRING COURSES,</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">And other Architectural Purposes,
-in Blue, White,<br />
-and Red.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>ALSO PLAIN AND
-ORNAMENTAL</i></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>RADIATING ARCH BRICKS,</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">FOR WINDOWS
-AND OTHER OPENINGS,</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">IN THE ABOVE COLOURS.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>FLOWER POTS, BOXES,
-PENDANTS,</b><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">&amp;c.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">ALL
-MATERIALS OF THE BEST AND MOST DURABLE DESCRIPTION.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_6"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 6</span><b>CRAVEN, DUNNILL, &amp; CO.</b><br
-/>
-<span class="GutSmall">(LIMITED),</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">Encaustic &amp; Geometrical
-Tiles,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>JACKFIELD WORKS,</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">NEAR IRONBRIDGE, SHROPSHIRE.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">PATTERN
-SHEETS, SPECIAL DESIGNS, AND</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">ESTIMATES,</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">ON
-APPLICATION TO THE WORKS.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p>Elementary Geological Collections, at 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, to 100
-guineas each, and every requisite to assist those commencing the
-study of this interesting branch of Science, a knowledge of which
-affords so much pleasure to the traveller in all parts of the
-world.</p>
-<p>A collection for Five Guineas, to illustrate the recent works
-on Geology, by Ansted, Buckland, Lyell, Mantell, Murchison, Page,
-Phillips, and others, contains 200 specimens, in a plain Mahogany
-Cabinet, with five trays, comprising the following specimens,
-viz.:&mdash;</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Minerals</span> which are either the
-components of Rocks, or occasionally imbedded in
-them&mdash;Quartz, Agate, Chalcedony, Jasper, Garnet, Zeolite,
-Hornblende, Augite, Asbestos, Felspar, Mica, Talc, Tourmaline,
-Spinel, Zircon, Corundum, Lapis Lazuli, Calcite, Fluor, Selenite,
-Baryta, Strontia, Salt, Sulphur, Plumbago, Bitumen, &amp;c.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Native Metals</span>, or <span
-class="smcap">Metalliferous Minerals</span>; these are found in
-masses or beds, in veins, and occasionally in the beds of
-rivers.&nbsp; Specimens of the following Metallic Ores are put in
-the Cabinet:&mdash;Iron, Manganese, Lead, Tin, Zinc, Copper,
-Antimony, Silver, Gold, Platina, Mercury, Titanium, &amp;c.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Rocks</span>: Granite, Gneiss, Mica-slate,
-Clay-slate, Porphyry, Serpentine, Sandstones, Limestones, Basalt,
-Lavas, &amp;c.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Pal&aelig;ozoic Fossils</span> from the
-Cambrian, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, and Permian
-Rocks.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Secondary Fossils</span> from the
-Rh&aelig;tic, Lias, Oolite, Wealden, and Cretaceous Groups.</p>
-<p><span class="smcap">Tertiary Fossils</span> from the Plastic
-Clay, London Clay, Crag, &amp;c.</p>
-<p>In the more expensive collections some of the specimens are
-rare, and all more select.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>JAMES TENNANT, Mineralogist (by
-Appointment)</b><br />
-<b>to Her Majesty, 149, Strand, London, W.C.</b></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_7"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 7</span><span class="GutSmall">THE</span><br
-/>
-<b>OLD HALL SCHOOL,</b><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">WELLINGTON, SALOP.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>RESIDENT MASTERS</b>:</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>Principal</b>.</p>
-<p>J. EDWARD CRANAGE, M.A., Ph.D. of the University of Jena;
-Author of &ldquo;Mental Education;&rdquo; Lecturer to the Society
-of Arts, &amp;c., &amp;c.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>Head Master</b>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">DAVID JOHNSTON, Esq., M.A.,
-Aberdeen.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>Second Master</b>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">THOMAS WILLIAMS, Esq., B.A.,<br />
-(In Mathematical Honours) Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>Modern Languages Master</b>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">MONSIEUR VIDAL, of the University
-of Louvain.</p>
-
-<div class="gapmediumline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>TERMS FOR BOARD AND
-LODGING</b>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">(EXCLUSIVE
-OF SCHOOL FEES, FOR WHICH SEE SEPARATE CIRCULAR.)</span></p>
-<table>
-<tr>
-<td><p>PER QUARTER.</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">&pound;</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><i>s.</i></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><i>d.</i></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Private pupils above 18 years of age, with separate
-bedroom, horse riding, and other privileges</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">42</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Ditto, without horse exercise, under 18</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">26</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">5</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Boarders</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">12</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">12</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Ditto, under 10 years of age</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">10</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">10</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Separate bedroom for one boy</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">5</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">5</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Ditto, for two boys (each)</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">4</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">4</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Ditto, for three boys (each)</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">3</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">3</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p>Washing, according to clothes used, generally</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">15</p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right">0</p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-</table>
-<p><a name="page2_8"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 8</span><span
-class="smcap">Dr. Cranage&rsquo;s</span> undeviating aim is to
-train the boys committed to his care, not only in mental
-acquisitions, but in their whole moral and physical being;
-believing, that as much pains and unremitting attention are
-required for the latter as the former.&nbsp; Attention is given
-not only to the studies which the boys pursue, but to their
-recreation, games, and amusements&mdash;upon the principle that
-almost every incident affords materials for improvement, and
-opportunities for the formation of good habits.</p>
-<p>His main object in the intellectual culture is to teach the
-boy to think; without omitting the positive work and hard study
-to brace &ldquo;the nerves of the mind&rdquo; for the making of a
-scholar.</p>
-<p>The system of rewards and punishments is peculiar, with the
-general absence of corporal punishment; but the experience of
-more than twenty-four years has fully proved its efficiency.</p>
-<p>Above all, his desire is to bring them to Christ as their
-Saviour, and then to help them to walk like Christ, as their
-example.</p>
-<p>Dr. Cranage finds the most wonderful difference in the
-progress and conduct of the boys committed to his care according
-to the measure of moral support he receives from the parents and
-guardians of the boys.&nbsp; He earnestly solicits their hearty
-and constant co-operation in his anxious labours.</p>
-<p>The skeleton Report will give a succinct view of the subjects
-of study.&nbsp; The aim is to give a thoroughly liberal
-education, without too exclusive attention to Latin and
-Greek.&nbsp; In the study of languages the system of Arnold is
-considered admirable, but not perfect; the grammar is therefore
-supplied, and iteration and reiteration of declensions,
-conjugations, and rules to impress indelibly, by rote even, all
-the fundamentals are resorted to.&nbsp; Latin, as the basis of
-most of the modern European languages, is considered&mdash;even
-to boys not going to college&mdash;very important; it is deemed
-also very desirable for <i>all</i> boys to be able to read the
-Greek Testament before leaving school.</p>
-<p>Some objects are taught by familiar Lectures only, illustrated
-by extensive apparatus; while many other subjects are
-occasionally thus exemplified.</p>
-<p>A report of each boy&rsquo;s improvement and conduct is sent
-to his parents or guardians eight times in each year.</p>
-<p>At the end of each year the School is examined by the
-authority and direction of the Syndicate appointed by the
-University of Cambridge, and a copy of the Report is sent to the
-parents or guardians of each boy.&nbsp; There is also an
-examination at midsummer by the masters of the school on the work
-of the previous half-year; a report of which is sent to the
-parents.</p>
-<p>The boy&rsquo;s Reading Room is furnished with good
-Periodicals and a well-selected Library.</p>
-<p>There is a well-furnished Laboratory for the study of
-Chemistry, Photography, &amp;c.; Dr. Cranage himself instructing
-in science in the school.</p>
-<p>A Museum is established for collecting specimens to illustrate
-natural history, arts, and sciences, together with articles of
-virt&ucirc; and antiquity&mdash;the boys themselves being the
-principal collectors and contributors.</p>
-<p>There are three orders of distinction in the school conferred
-for proficiency, combined with good conduct:&mdash;1st, Holder of
-a Certificate; 2nd, Palmer, or Holder of the Palm; 3rd, or
-highest, Grecian.</p>
-<p>The School-house is delightfully situated within a mile of the
-railway-station of Wellington; it is well adapted for its
-purpose, and fitted up with the necessary appliances.&nbsp; The
-school-room, reading-room, dining-room, lavatory, bath-room, and
-dormitories are spacious, airy, and convenient; the playgrounds
-very extensive, and well fitted for healthy recreation.</p>
-<p>There is a swimming-bath on the grounds.</p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_9"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 9</span><b>BUNNY AND EVANS</b></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">(LATE J. D.
-SANDFORD),</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">25, HIGH STREET, SHREWSBURY,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">GENERAL PRINTERS, BOOKSELLERS,<br
-/>
-BOOKBINDERS, STATIONERS,</p>
-<p>Beg to inform the Nobility, Gentry, Clergy, and the General
-Public that they have every facility for the execution of all
-orders with which they may be entrusted with the utmost
-promptitude and on the most reasonable terms.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">PRINTING.</p>
-<p>This branch includes the production of Maps and Plans of
-Estates, &amp;c., in Lithography; and the Letter-press Printing
-that of Pamphlets, Sermons, Reports of Societies, Particulars of
-Sales, Posters and Handbills, Billheads, Memorandum Forms,
-&amp;c.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">STAMPING,</p>
-<p>in colours or plain, in the best London fashion.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">BOOKBINDING,</p>
-<p>plain and ornamental.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">STATIONERY.</p>
-<p>Note Papers from 2s. to 10s. per ream, Envelopes from
-4<i>s.</i> per 100 upwards.&nbsp; Ledgers, Journals, and Cash
-Books in stock, or made to any pattern.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>Bibles</i>, <i>Church
-Services</i>, <i>Prayers</i>, <i>and devotional books in
-great</i><br />
-<i>variety</i>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">Magazines and
-Newspapers supplied</span>.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>URICONIUM</b>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">Mr. W. Wright&rsquo;s valuable and
-comprehensive work on this<br />
-ancient Roman city is still on sale at 25<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_10"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 10</span><i>ESTABLISHED</i> 1772.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall">THE</span><br />
-<b>SHREWSBURY CHRONICLE</b>,<br />
-<span class="GutSmall"><b>AND SHROPSHIRE AND MONTGOMERYSHIRE
-TIMES.</b></span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>THE COUNTY NEWSPAPER</b>,</p>
-<p>And <span class="smcap">Leading Journal</span> for Shropshire
-and North Wales, has the <span class="GutSmall">GREATEST
-CIRCULATION</span> through a most extensive district and
-possesses a wide-spread influence amongst the most important
-classes of the community.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>Best Medium for
-Advertisers</b>.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center">Published every Friday morning by
-the Proprietor, <span class="smcap">John Watton</span>,<br />
-at the Offices, St. John&rsquo;s Hill, Shrewsbury.</p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall">EDDOWES&rsquo;S</span><br />
-<b>SHREWSBURY JOURNAL,</b><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">AND SALOPIAN JOURNAL,</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">(Established
-1794.)</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">Advertiser
-for Shropshire and the Principality of Wales.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">Published every Wednesday morning
-at the Offices,</p>
-<p style="text-align: center">MARKET SQUARE.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>PRICE 2d.</b></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p><span class="smcap">Eddowes&rsquo;s Journal</span> is the only
-Conservative Paper published in the County of Salop and is the
-recognised organ of the <span class="smcap">Church of
-England</span>, and the Constitutional Party in the district.</p>
-<p>It has a guaranteed circulation throughout the county of Salop
-and the whole principality of Wales, and also an Advertising
-patronage amongst Capitalists, Solicitors, Auctioneers,
-Merchants, Land Agents, and Traders, <span class="smcap">superior
-to that of any other Newspaper</span> published in the
-district.&nbsp; It also circulates extensively in the
-neighbouring Counties, and will be found at the principal hotels
-and commercial offices in London, Birmingham, Liverpool,
-Manchester, and other important towns.&nbsp; It is thus <span
-class="GutSmall">UNQUESTIONABLY THE BEST MEDIUM FOR
-ADVERTISING</span>, and affords a safe and widely-spread means of
-publicity amongst all those classes most likely to be useful to
-advertisers.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>Annual Subscriptions</i>,
-<i>free by post</i>, 13<i>s.</i>; <i>if paid in advance</i>,
-11<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><a name="page2_11"></a><span
-class="pagenum">p. 11</span><span class="GutSmall"><i>VALUABLE
-MEDIUM FOR ADVERTISING</i></span><span
-class="GutSmall">.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center">THE IRONBRIDGE WEEKLY JOURNAL</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall">AND</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>Borough of Wenlock
-Advertiser,</b><br />
-<span class="GutSmall"><b>Published every Saturday.&nbsp; Price
-One Penny.</b></span></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">SCALE OF
-CHARGES FOR ADVERTISING.</span></p>
-<table>
-<tr>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><b>Not exceeding 24
-Words</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><b>1s.</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><b>0d.</b></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><b>Ditto 40 Words</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><b>1s.</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p style="text-align: right"><b>6d.</b></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-</table>
-<p>The Charges above apply to the class of Advertisements
-enumerated below and are strictly confined to those that are
-<i>paid for in advance</i>.</p>
-<table>
-<tr>
-<td><p><b>Situations Wanted.</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p><b>Apartments Wanted.</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p><b>Articles Lost.</b></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
-<td><p><b>Situations Vacant.</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p><b>Apartments to Let.</b></p>
-</td>
-<td><p><b>Articles Found, &amp;c.</b></p>
-</td>
-</tr>
-</table>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">PUBLISHED
-AT</span><br />
-JOSEPH SLATER&rsquo;S STEAM PRINTING OFFICE,<br />
-<span class="GutSmall">THE MARKET SQUARE,</span><br />
-IRONBRIDGE, SALOP.</p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center">BRIDGNORTH.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>CROWN AND ROYAL HOTEL.</b><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">FAMILY, COMMERCIAL, AND POSTING
-HOUSE.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><i>Every attention paid to the
-Comfort and Convenience of Visitors</i>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall"><b>BILLIARD-ROOM</b></span><span
-class="GutSmall">.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center">Post Horses and Carriages.&nbsp;
-Omnibus to and from each<br />
-Train, and Refreshment Rooms at Station.</p>
-<p style="text-align: right"><b>T. WHITEFOOT</b>,
-<b>Proprietor</b>.</p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span
-class="GutSmall">N.B.&mdash;RAILWAY PARCELS OFFICE.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>WREKIN HOTEL COMPANY,
-LIMITED.</b><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">WELLINGTON, SALOP.</span></p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center">FAMILY AND COMMERCIAL HOTEL.</p>
-
-<div class="gapshortline">&nbsp;</div>
-<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">EXTENSIVE
-LOCK-UP BAIT AND LIVERY STABLES, COACH</span><br />
-<span class="GutSmall">HOUSES, LOOSE BOXES, &amp;c.</span></p>
-<p style="text-align: center"><b>Posting in all its
-Branches</b>&mdash;<b>Billiards</b>&mdash;<b>Hot and Cold
-Baths</b>.</p>
-
-<div class="gapline">&nbsp;</div>
-<h2>FOOTNOTES.</h2>
-<p><a name="footnote10"></a><a href="#citation10"
-class="footnote">[10]</a>&nbsp; Appendix A.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote28"></a><a href="#citation28"
-class="footnote">[28]</a>&nbsp; Inquis. Henry III., incerti
-temporis, Nu. 6, 156.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote41"></a><a href="#citation41"
-class="footnote">[41]</a>&nbsp; For additional particulars
-respecting this interesting tenure we refer the reader to the
-Appendix B.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote49a"></a><a href="#citation49a"
-class="footnote">[49a]</a>&nbsp; There is a legend that Major
-Smallman, a staunch royalist, surprised by some of
-Cromwell&rsquo;s troopers, hotly pursued over Presthope, turned
-from the road, spurred his horse at full gallop to the edge of
-the precipice, and went over.&nbsp; The horse is said to have
-been killed on the trees, whilst the Major escaped, and secreted
-himself in the woods.&nbsp; Facts and local circumstances concur
-in giving a colouring to the tradition, and deeds extant show
-that the family resided here from the reign of Henry III. to the
-time mentioned.&nbsp; See Appendix C.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote49b"></a><a href="#citation49b"
-class="footnote">[49b]</a>&nbsp; See Appendix.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote63"></a><a href="#citation63"
-class="footnote">[63]</a>&nbsp; In 1390, Sir Humphrey de Eyton,
-an ancestor of T. C. Eyton, Esq., of Eyton, was ranger of this
-forest.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote64"></a><a href="#citation64"
-class="footnote">[64]</a>&nbsp; The Old Hall, which we suppose to
-have been the old hunting lodge, the residence of Dr. Cranage,
-Watling Street, is another interesting specimen of the residences
-of the Forester family, and of the style of building and
-profusion of wood used therein during the great forest
-periods.&nbsp; Dothill, now the residence of R. Groom, Esq., is
-another of the old family residences of the Foresters.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote66"></a><a href="#citation66"
-class="footnote">[66]</a>&nbsp; Appendix D.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote69"></a><a href="#citation69"
-class="footnote">[69]</a>&nbsp; For a more complete account of
-the Forester family, we refer the reader to the Pedigree given in
-the Appendix E.</p>
-<p><a name="footnote171"></a><a href="#citation171"
-class="footnote">[171]</a>&nbsp; Lord Dundonald, who lived in the
-old mansion, still standing, at the Tuckies, was an excellent
-chemist, and constructed some ingeniously contrived ovens, by
-which he extracted from coal a tar for the use of the navy, and
-which also became an article of general commerce.</p>
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD SPORTS AND SPORTSMEN***
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