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SUSSEX

AUGUSTUS J. C. HARE
AUTHOR OF "WALKS IN LONDON," " WALKS IN ROME,' ETC.

SECOND EDITION

LONDON
GEORGE ALLEN, 156, CHARING CROSS ROAD
1896
[All rights reserved^

PREFACE
TO THE SECOND EDITION
TT has been a great pleasure to collect materials
about the county of Sussex, which has always
been my home ; but my little book is doubtless full
of faults, and it will be most kind of those who
detect them, if they will continue to send me their
corrections. I have already received most welcome
help and criticisms since " Sussex " appeared, which
I hope has made its second edition much better
than the fist. It is only by such kind assistance
that any book of the description can be made really
useful. The illustrations. — somewhat increased in
number in the present edition — are from my sketches,
taken on the spot, and photographed or drawn on
wood by Mr. T. Sulman.
AUGUSTUS J. C. HARE.
h.olmhurst, St. -Leonards-on-Sea.

CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. TunbridgeWells I
II. Hastings and St. Leonards . . . 19
III. Eastbourne . . 65
IV. Lewes . . 104
V. Brighton . 140
VI. Chichester 181

'3
32
4445

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

HASTINGS FROM HOLMHURST Frontispiece PAGE
THE TOAD ROCK, TUNBRIDGE WELLS 3
GROOMBRIDGE PLACE . . 6
GATEWAY, OLD BUCKHURST 8
SCOTNEY CASTLE .
THE DEANERY, BATTLE
BODIAM CASTLE— SOUTH SIDE
BODIAM CASTLE — NORTH SIDE
BREDE PLACE . . 47
THE STRAND GATE, WINCHELSEA 53
S. THOMAS A BECKET, WINCHELSEA 55
RYE . . 6l
WILMINGTON PRIORY . . 69
AT PEVENSEY CASTLE . , . 73
HURSTMONCEAUX . 76
HURSTMONCEAUX CASTLE 77
GATEWAY, HURSTMONCEAUX CASTLE 79
HURSTMONCEAUX CHESTNUTS . . 82
HURSTMONCEAUX CHURCH . 83
VESTRY, HURSTMONCEAUX CHURCH . . 85
HURSTMONCEAUX RECTORY . . 87
OLD BEECH TREES, HURSTMONCEAUX 88
THE DACRE FARM, HURSTMONCEAUX . 89
GATEWAY, MICHELHAM PRIORY .... 90
HORSELUNGES . -91

xii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
MAYFIELD 9&
CASTLE GATE, LEWES . 106
LEWES .... 109
EADRIC'S PORCH, BISHOPSTONE 1 1 7
CHURCH OF WEST DEAN . 120
PARSONAGE HOUSE, WEST DEAN 121
ALFRISTON . I23
LAUGHTON PLACE — THE TOWER 127
AT LAUGHTON PLACE . 1 28
HORSTED KEYNES 1 36
BROADHURST 137
POYNINGS 144
ANGLO-SAXON ARCHES, WORTH 1 53
NEW SHOREHAM CHURCH 160
BRAMBER 1 62
SOMPTING CHURCH 176
CHICHESTER CATHEDRAL FROM THE PALACE GARDEN 189
RUINS OF THE CHAPTER HOUSE, BOXGROVE . . 201
COWDRAY . 211
ENTRANCE TO AMBERLEY CASTLE . 234

INTRODUCTORY

SUSSEX commemorates in its name the settlement of
the South Saxons, who gave the name of Sud-seax to
their territory. It has memorials of Celtic times in the hill-
forts of Cissbury, Chanctonbury, Wolstanbury, Hollingbury,
and Caburn, the termination bury showing that the Saxons
afterwards occupied these places. Of Roman times there
are traces at Chichester, Bramber, Bignor, and Pevensey —
Regnum, Portus Adurni, Ad Decimun (on the Stane
Street), and Anderida ; indeed, the latter is one of the
finest memorials of the Roman occupation remaining in
England. Aella the Saxon landed in 477 with his three
sons, of whom Cissa gave a name to Chichester (Cissan-
ceaster) and Cissbury, Cymen to Kynor in Sidlesham
(Cymenes-ora), and Wencheling to Lancing. Under Edil
walch, the successor of Aella, Wilfrid brought Christianity
to the shores of Selsey, Sussex being the last district in Eng
land to embrace the new religion. Edilwalch was succeeded
by Berthun and Authun, two brothers, joint rulers, till
they were vanquished by Ceadwalla, king of Wessex, who
annexed Sud-seax to his domains. Then it remained a
part of Wessex till Egbert became king of all England.
Some of the names of places in the county, such as
Lewes, Glynde, and Caburn have Celtic roots. No county
more abounds in Saxonisms. Most of the local names have
Anglo-Saxon terminations, such as dun, a down (Willing-
don, Slindon, &c.) ; denn, a sheltered place providing food
for beasts (Ovingdean, Rottingdean, Iden, &c.) ; bury or
burgh, a fortified place (Pulborough, Burwash, &c) ; ea,

xiv INTRODUCTORY
water, or ig, an island (Pevensey, Selsey, Glynley, &c.) ;
stow or itoc, a dwelling (North and South Stoke, Stockbridge,
&c.) ; bourne, a rivulet boundary (Easebourne, Eastbourne,
&c. ; cumb, a valley (Sedlescombe, Balcombe, &c.) ; cote, a
cottage (Sealcote, Woodmancote) ; ham, a manor (Westham,
Stopham, Michelham, &c.) ; ley or ly, a field near a wood
(Chidingly, Hellingly, &c.) ; tun, a village or town (Alfriston,
Storrington, Jevington, &c.) ; ing, a meadow (Worthing,
Steyning *) ; hurst, a wood yielding food for cattle (Midhurst,
Chithurst, Hurstmonceaux) ; wudu, a wood (Goodwood,
Inwood, &c.) ; wic, a village (Ardwick, Southwick, &c.)
stede, a station or stead (Grinstead, Horstead, &c.) ; feld,
open ground (Linfield, Cuckfield, &c). The names of
Danehill, Danefield, Danny (Dane eye), and Daneworth, are
among the rare memorials of the Danish invasion.
Sussex measures 73 miles at its longest point, and 27
at its broadest. It has no hills of importance. Ditchling
Beacon and Firle Beacon are only 820 feet ; Chanctonbury
Ring, 814; Crowborough Beacon, 804; Beachy Head, 532.
Its rivers — the Rother, Cuckmere, Ouse, Adur, Arun,
Lavant— -are all very sluggish, and very small in size and
short in length, rising and entering the sea within the
county. The Normans divided the county into the six
Rapes of Hastings, Pevensey, Lewes, Bramber, Arundel,
and Chichester, each with a port and a castle — a unique
mode of division; for though there are Ridings in York
shire, in no other county are there Rapes. The whole
county was given by William the Conqueror to his chief
followers — the Rape of Hastings to Robert d'Eu, the
Rape of Pevensey to Robert de Moreton, the Rape of
Lewes to William de Warenne, the Rape of Bramber to
William de Braose, the Rapes of Arundel and Chichester
to Roger de Montgomeri.
' The word Rape seems to be peculiar to Sussex, unless it may be
considered identical with the Hrepp of Iceland. That interesting
island was divided into four quarters, each of which was partitioned
into prefectures or sheriffdoms, and these again were subdivided into
1 Sussex has also more tribal names ending in ing than any other county.

INTRODUCTORY xv
small districts called hrepps, consisting of families who lived contiguous
to each other. Generally they were of the size of the present Icelandic
parishes, and over each of these was appointed a hreppstiori or bailiff,
who had the immediate inspection of his own bailliwick. From this it
would appear that the Icelandic hrepp was a much less important terri
tory than the Sussex Rape. The etymology of the word is uncertain ;
but it seems to be connected with the Welsh rhaff, the Anglo-Saxon
rap, reap, the Danish reep, reeb, and the Gothic raip, signifying a rope.
It was a practice amongst the Teutonic tribes to set out allotments by
means of a cord or rope, just as a modern land-surveyor employs his
Gunter's chain, and in Iceland the measure of land is still by the rope.'
— iV. A. Lower, ' History of .Sussex.'
Hastings, alone of Sussex towns, was one of the five
original Cinque Forts (Dover, Hythe, Sandwich, Romney,
and Hastings), instituted by Edward the Confessor for the
better defence of the coast. Then Rye and Winchelsea
were added under Hastings as 'nobiliora membra,' after
which the Cinque Ports were enumerated in the Memoria
Technica — ' Has, — Dov, — Sea, — Hy, —
Sand, — Rum, — Win,— Rye,'
Later on, Pevensey and Seaford were added as corporate ;
then five almost unknown places — Bulverhithe, Petit Shaw,
Hidney, Beakesbourne, and Grange — as unincorporate.
' Long ere the Aula Regis had any fixed habitat, or Magna Charta
was won at Runnymede, or our ' ' two Houses " were heard of, the
barons of Cinque Ports were great men. Who were they? Plain,
simple inhabitants of the privileged town and port. Yet these hardy
seaside mariners manned the wooden walls of England. And kings
knew it ; and so the contract ran between them : " If you will do us
service, and be always ready to equip us ships, you shall be among
our favoured ones." So Hastings found three, and Seaford one, and
Winchelsea five, and Rye four, and Pevensey one, and the compact
was sealed.' — Quarterly Rev., No. 223.
The soil of the county consists of the Wealden clay,
undergirded by sand and ironstone, the chalk, the plastic
clay, and the diluvial. The mud of
' Sowsexe full of dyrt and' myre ' x
1 See Leland, ' Itinerary, vol. v.

xvi INTRODUCTORY
is proverbial. Matters are improved, however, since it was
written, ' It cost us six hours to conquer the last nine
miles of the way,' when Prince George of Denmark went to
Petworth, and when the judges never ventured beyond the
border towns of Horsham and East Grinstead.
' Why is it that the oxen, the swine, the women, and all other ani
mals, are so long-legged in Sussex ? May it be from the difficulty of
pulling the feet out of so much mud by the strength of the ankle that
the muscles get stretched as it were, and the bones lengthened?' — Dr.
fohn Burton, ' Iter Snrriense el Sussexiense,' 177 1.
Gilpin 1 says, ' Sussex contains no less than seven
nominal forests — St. Leonards, Worth, Ashdown, Water-
down, Dallington, Arundel, and Charlton, but all their fine
trees have perished in the ironworks, the one manufacture
of Sussex, and that one which is now extinct'
' The Romans knew how rich this county was, and perhaps the
Britons before them ; and Roman coins are not unfrequently discovered
in the older cinder-beds. Whether or not the Anglo-Saxons continued
their works, I know not ; but in the time of the Plantagenets the manu
facture became flourishing. After the Mise of Lewes, the corporation
had a grant of a penny on every cartload of iron entering the town : —
Lewes manufactured the iron rails for the tomb of Henry III. ; Sussex
sent three thousand horseshoes, the greater part to be left at Bannock-
burn ; county rectors took tithe of iron ; and when artillery came in,
Sussex was the first to cast it. At Eridge Green, in the parish of Frant,
there was a hooped cannon, or rather mortar, said to be our earliest
example, which lay on the village green and was fired as an amusement
whenever holiday-makers could raise the money for a few pounds of
powder. ' The fires were of course fed by wood. Sussex, till the end of the
fifteenth century, was one huge forest. Wych-cross was about the centre
of the densest part; and up to 1500 the clearance occasioned by the
furnaces might be beneficial. But in the reign of Henry VIII. far-seeing
men began to perceive that the forests were in a fair way of being
destroyed, though the general cry was, "the more riddance the better,
because we can plant corn." In 1543 an Act was passed ordering that
in cutting wood such a percentage of storers should be left. This was
evaded ; whence, in Elizabeth's time, a stringent series of enactments
against fresh forges, all more or less evaded. And first the wilder ani
mals became extinct ; wild cats, which were to be found in Ashdown
1 ' Remarks on Forest Scenery.'

INTRODUCTORY xvii
in the sixteenth century, polecats, buzzards, and (it is said) eagles. The
poisonous vapours destroyed many trees, and were specially injurious
to the beeches. It is remarkable how few beeches are now to be found
among the poor remains of the great Sussex forest. Still the manufac
ture went on, and at the beginning of the seventeenth century 140 forges
were at work. ... It was about 1700 that the manufacture began to
decay, when the Midland ironmasters, having learnt something of the
exhaustless hoards of coal within their reach, brought capital to bear on
and to be invested in the works, with which Sussex could not cope.' —
M. A. Lower, ' Sussex Papers.'
Charnock 1 and Fuller say that glass was formerly made
in Sussex, but it can only have been on a very small scale.
The prettiest scenery in the county is to be found in the
high wooded uplands between Lewes and Tunbridge Wells,
near Midhurst, and on the banks of the Aran near Arundel.
Very fine remains of ancient castles may be seen at Bodiam
and Hurstmonceaux, and castellated remains of less import
ance at Amberley, Arundel, Halnaker, Bramber, Knepp,
Lewes, Scotney, Hastings, Camber, and Rye. Of monastic
remains, Battle Abbey and Michelham Priory have noble
gateways j Bayham is a beautiful ruin, and there are smaller
remnants at Boxgrove, Tortington, Hardham, Shulbrede,
Lewes, Wilmington, May field, Warbleton, Robertsbridge,and
Winchelsea. Ignorant clergy have — more in this county
than in most — been permitted to amuse their leisure and
seek temporary exaltation for themselves by restoring away
all the interest of their churches. Monuments have been
constantly removed from the graves they are intended to
commemorate ; old roodlofts, porches, and pulpits have
often, and old ' mothering pews ' have universally been
destroyed. The result is that scarcely a single village church
remains important as a whole, though many contain some
point worth attention. Worth (1 066-1 145), Sompting, and
Bosham ( 1 1 90- 1 2 45 ) still retain traces of Saxon architecture ;
Jevington and West Hampnett once had the same. Bosham
has some traces of, possibly, Roman times. Climping,
Tarring, Fletching, Steyning, Shipley, Bramber, Newhaven,
1 ' Breviary of Philosophy,' cap. 1.

xviii INTRODUCTORY
and Icklesham are among the churches which have por
tions of Norman work (1066-1165), of which Old and New
Shoreham are very fine specimens. Chichester, Boxgrove,
Eastbourne, Broadwater, Bishopstone, and Rye are transi
tional churches (1145-1190). Bosham, Arundel, Pulbor-
ough, and Mayfield combine early English and decorated
(1190-1315). Winchelsea, Brede, Alfriston, Etchingham,
and the Lady Chapel at Chichester are good specimens of
later decorated (1315-1360). Poynings is a good perpendi
cular church. With one exception, the tombs, in Chichester
Cathedral have been restored into worthlessness, but a few
interesting early effigies remain in remote village churches.
At Winchelsea are the grand decorated monuments of the
Alards, and at Arundel of the Fitzalans. At Hurstmonceaux,
Boxgrove, and Broadwater are noble tombs of the Re
naissance. At Withyham, Ashburnham, and Chiddingly
are fine XVII. c. monuments. Few counties possess such
glorious brasses as those at Trotton, West Grinstead, Cow-
fold, Broadwater, Warbleton, and Hurstmonceaux. In many
places the Sussex churches are built of flint and chalk, in
others of sandstone, in others entirely of round stones and
mortar : low shingled spires are a feature. Southease and
Piddinghoe have round towers. There are interesting
specimens of domestic architecture at Parham, Wiston,
"Rowfant, Danny, Gravetye, Paxhill, East Mascalls, Wake-
hurst, Plumpton, Street, Glynde, Laughton, Chiddingly,
Glynley, Brede, Brickwall, Tanners, Mayfield, Groombridge,
and Buckhurst. The ruins of Slaugham present exquisite
specimens of Renaissance decoration. The collection of
pictures at Petworth is magnificent. At Arundel, Good
wood, and Stanmer there are a few fine portraits, and a
great many at Knepp.
The ornithologist will be chiefly interested in the Downs
near Beachy Head, and the flats of Pevensey, Pagham, and
at the mouth of the Adur. The chief natural delicacy is
the wheatear. Fuller says : ' Sussex aboundeth more with
carpes than any other of this nation. '
The artist will chiefly delight in deserted Winchelsea

INTRODUCTORY xix
and the foreign element of Rye, in many of the coombes
of the South Downs, in the river scenery near Arundel, the
wild scenery and ruins of Hurstmonceaux, and the tamer
beauties of Cowdray. At Chichester, Bosham, Boxgrove,
Pulborough, Scotney, Bodiam, Wilmington, and Michel
ham, other attractive ' subjects ' are to be found.
The few illustrious natives of Sussex are noticed where
they occur.
' As for the nativities of archbishops, one may say of this county,
" Many shires have done worthily, but Sussex surmounteth them all,"
having bredyfoe Archbishops of Canterbury.' — Fuller.
Some of the villages have their own proverbs and
customs, but there are few of general use in Sussex.
Brand's ' Popular Antiquities ' says : ' In West Sussex there
is a curious belief that when an infant dies, it communicates
the fact itself by a visit, as if in the body, to some near
relative.' ' "Drinker Acres" are so named from the practice of having "a
drinking " by spending the rent arising from particular pieces of land,
locally called "Drenkers," or Drinker Acres.
'Apple-howling is a charm supposed to increase the fruitfulness of
the orchard, in which a number of lads congregate, and surrounding
the tree sing — ' Stand fast, root, bear well, top,
Pray God send me a good howling crop ;
Every twig apples big,
Every bough apples enow ;
Hats full, caps full,
Tall quarters, sacks full.'
/. D. Fenton, ' Once a Week,' Sept. 1865.
The Sussex dialect has many traces of Saxon. Oi is pro-
pounced i (as spile for spoil). A before t is extended to ea ,
gate is ge-at. The a is always broad and as if followed by
a u, changing words of one syllable into words of two — as
taiist (taste), rails (race). A before double d, becomes ar,
as in ladder for ladder. Many French expressions linger in
Rye and Winchelsea, left by the refugees in the XVI. and
XVII. c, such as coasts (costes) of beef, and broach (broche)

xx INTRODUCTORY
for a spit. Many old English expressions linger. A cold
wind is a bleat wind ; a pig-stye is a hog-pound ; superior is
bettermost , a. ne'er-do-weel is a runagate , exactly is justly,
a pig bought in a sack is & pig in a poke , to work in and
about the house is to nestle about the house ; a garden in
good condition is a garden in good heart , being out of
temper is being top of the house , very is lamentable, pro
nounced lament-able, or terrible — " I be terble glad." Fre
quent use is made of may be and may hap. We hear of /
reckon in Sussex, as often as ' I guess ' in America.1 The
following Sussex whistling song is sung at village taverns to
the tune of ' Lilibulero ' : —
There was an old farmer in Sussex did dwell
(Chorus of whistlers).
There was an old farmer in Sussex did dwell,
And he had a bad wife, as many know well
(Chorus of whistlers),
Then Satan came to the old man at the plough —
' One of your family I must have now.
It is not your eldest son I do crave,
But 'tis your old wife, and she I will have.'
'Oh, welcome, good Satan, with all my heart ;
I hope you and she will never more part ! '
Now Satan he got the old wife on his back,
And he lugged her along like a pedlar's pack.
He trudged away till he came to his gate ;
Says he, ' Here take an old Sussex man's mate.'
Oh, then she did kick all the young imps about ;
Says one to the other, ' Let's try turn her out ! '
She spied seven devils all dancing in chains ;
She up with her pattens and knocked out their brains.
She knocked old Satan against the house wall :
' Let's try turn her out or she'll murder us all.'
' For much interesting information see W. D. Parish, ' Dictionary of Sussex
Dialect.'

INTRODUCTORY xxi
Now he's bundled her up on his back amain,
And to her old husband he's took her again.
' I've been a tormentor the whole of my life ;
But I ne'er was tormented till I took your wife ! '
The chief materials for the History of Sussex are to be
found in the invaluable ' Collections of the Archaeological
Society,' published every year since 1848. Dallaway's 'His
tory of Western Sussex ' is an admirable book of reference ;
but Horsfield's History of the entire county is both dull and
inaccurate. Tierney's ' History of the Castle and Town of
Arundel ' is a valuable work. The contributions of W. H.
Blaauw and M. A. Lower to county history are of great
interest, though the latter cannot be relied upon. Mantell's
' Sussex Geology ' and Borrer's ' Birds of Sussex ' may be
studied with advantage.

SUSSEX

TUNBRIDGE WELLS
npUNBRIDGE WELLS— half in Kent and half in
-¦- Sussex — formerly consisted of the three divisions of
Mount Ephraim, Mount Sion, and Mount Pleasant, fanciful
names which dated from the time when Dudley, Lord
North, first brought its mild chalybeate waters into fashion
in the first years of the XVII. c. Henrietta Maria, queen of
Charles I., liked the place, and visited it several times, and
after the Restoration it became one of the most fashionable
resorts in England.
' Tunbridge is at the same distance from London as Fontainebleau
from Paris. All that are handsomest and best of both sexes meet at
the waters during the season. The company there, though always
numerous, is always select. As those who seek to amuse themselves
always outnumber those who come for their health, a sense of joy and
pleasure pervades everything. Constraint is banished, a friendship is
established on first acquaintance, and the life which one leads there is
delightful. ' For lodgings one has clean, comfortable cottages, standing detached,
and scattered at half a mile from the waters. The morning meeting-
place is at the point where the fountains are. It is a wide avenue of
tufted trees, under which those who take the waters walk up and down.
On one side of this avenue is a line of shops, filled with all kinds of
trinkets, lace, stockings and gloves, in which there are lotteries as at a
fair. On the other side of the avenue is a market, and as every one
goes to choose and bargain for his own provisions, nothing is set out
which is unpleasant to look upon. Pretty, fresh-coloured village girls,
A

2 SUSSEX
dressed in clean linen, little straw hats, and natty little shoes, sell the
game, vegetables, flowers and fruit. It only rests with oneself to live
as well as one likes. There are tables for high play, and a facility for
love affairs. As evening closes in, every one leaves his own little palace
to meet at the bowling-green. There, if you like, you may dance in
the open air, on a turf as soft and compact as the most beautiful carpet
in the world.' — Memoires de Grammont.
' When the Court, soon after the Restoration, visited Tunbridge
Wells, there was no town ; but within a mile of the spring, rustic
cottages, somewhat cleaner and sweeter than the ordinary cottages of
that time, were scattered over the heath. Some of these cabins were
movable, and were carried on sledges from one part of the common to
another. To these huts, men of fashion, wearied with the din and
smoke of London, sometimes came in the summer to breathe fresh air
and to catch a glimpse of rural life. During the season, a kind of fair
was daily held near the fountain. The wives and daughters of the
Kentish farmers came from the neighbouring villages with cream,
cherries, wheatears, and quails. To chaffer with them, to flirt with
them, to praise their straw hats and tight heels, was a refreshing pas
time to voluptuaries sick of the airs of actresses and maids of honour.
Milliners, toymen, and jewellers came down from London and opened
a bazaar under the trees. In one booth the politician might find his
coffee and the London gazette ; in another were gamblers playing deep
at basset ; and on fine evenings the fiddlers were in attendance, and
there were morris-dancers on the elastic turf of the bowling-green. In
1685 a subscription had just been raised amongst those who frequented
the Wells for building a church, which the Tories, who then domi
neered everywhere, insisted on dedicating to S. Charles the Martyr.' —
Macaulay, Hist, of England, i. 346.
Tunbridge Wells probably attained its apotheosis in
the reign of Queen Anne, who gave money for paving the
parade ofthe Pantiles (so called from the tile-covered pentice-
roofs which sheltered it) ; and the fashion continued through
the reign of George II. , under whom Thackeray describes
the society of Tunbridge Wells in ' The Virginians.' Under
George III. faith in the efficacy of Tunbridge chalybeate
began to fail, and few of those who resort to its hotels
and villas for the sake of the fine air now think of drinking
the water.
The immediate neighbourhood of Tunbridge Wells, which
Evelyn found ' a very sweet place, private and refreshing,'
is now so besprinkled with villas as to have lost much of

TUNBRIDGE WELLS 3
its beauty. In the place itself the only point of interest is
the quaint old street of the Pantiles, with its raised, tree-
shaded parade, lined by shops, of which many are filled
with the inlaid woodwork called Tunbridge ware, and
ending in a little portico (of 1847) over the chalybeate
spring, where the devil cooled his nose, after S. Dunstan had
pinched it, in the tenth century, with red-hot tongs at May-
field. The Church of .S. Charles the Martyr is said, with
out any foundation, to be situated in three parishes. James
Brydges, first Duke of Chandos, celebrated by Pope, died

The Toad Rock, Tunbridge Wells.

at Mount Pleasant House in 1744. On the outermost
common, called Rusthall, is the curious mass of stone called,
from its form, the Toad Rock. A mile and a half from the
Wells are the High Rocks, where Evelyn (1661) 'greatly
admired the extravagant turnings, insinuations, and growth
of certain birch-trees amongst the rocks ; ' and through
' the Salvator-like scenes ' of which Mrs. Elizabeth Carter
walked, not without contriving to feel ' a kind of pleasing
terror.' It is a pleasant walk to the Rocks (admission 6d.),

4 SUSSEX
which are about 60 feet high. On one of them is inscribed
a lament for Bow, the lapdog of a visitor to the Wells in
1702, lost in one of its fissures : —
' This scratch I make that you may know
On this rock lyes ye beauteous Bow ;
Reader, this rock is the Bow's bell,
Strike't with thy stick, and ring his knell ;'
and the rock called the Bell Rock, when struck, does give
a metallic sound.
The excursions most worth making from Tunbridge
Wells are the more distant ones — to Penshurst, Hever,
Knole, and Ightham Mote, all in Kent. In Sussex one
may drive 2^ m. south to Frant, a village possessing an
ugly church in a lofty situation, with wide woodland views
of great beauty. In the churchyard is the tomb of Strat
ford Canning, Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, the famous
ambassador in Turkey, who died at Frant Court, 1880, at
the age of 93.
Beneath Frant stretch the park and woods of Fridge,
an estate which has been in the hands of the Nevills for
above five hundred years. The Castle (Marquis of Aber
gavenny) is an ugly gingerbread-gothic building, in a vast
park, said to have seventy miles of rides and drives, whose
abundant woods have been spoilt for centuries by want of
thinning. Fridge Rocks are picturesque — 'the wondeross
rocks ' of which Lord Burleigh speaks when describing the
stay of six days which Elizabeth made here in 1578. About
2 m. from these, and nearer the Brighton road, are Har
rison's Rocks, and Penn's Rocks — named from the famous
Quaker, who had an estate here. Aaron Hill calls the
park 'an assemblage of all nature's beauties^hills, vales,
brooks, lawns, groves, thickets, rocks, waterfalls, all wildly
noble and irregularly amiable.'
I. 6 m. south-east (only visible on Tuesdays and Fri
days), reached through a lovely wooded country, is Bay
ham Abbey (Marquis Camden), with 'its emerald lawns

HAY HAM, GROOMBRIDGE 5
and grey-ivied arches reflected in the bosom of its own
sweet lake.' 1 The ruins are those of an abbey to which
the Premonstratensian Canons of Ottham, near Hailsham,
were moved in 1203. The place was first called Beaulieu,
from the charm of its site. The buildings are due to
Sir Robert de Turneham, a distinguished crusader under
Richard I. ' Robert of Turnham with his fauchion
Gan to crack many a crown,'
but he was eventually slain by the Saracens. The prin
cipal ruins, exceedingly graceful and picturesque, are those
of the church, early English with decorated additions.
It was one of the many burial-places of the Sackvilles.
In 1 7 14 the Bayham property was bought by Chief-Justice
Pratt. About 1 m. from the Abbey are the remains of the
Gloucester Furnace, an iron-foundry named from the son of
Queen Anne.
The drive in this direction may be continued to Lamber-
hurst and Scotney Castle. (See p. 11.)
II. 3^ m. west is Groombridge (which has a station on
the line to Polegate and Eastbourne). A public footpath
turning to the right of the road below the station leads
past Groombridge Place (only shown by permission), a
most picturesque moated house, with three ancient terraced
gardens, flocks of peacocks, and a beautiful transparent
'mill-pond.' The house itself is just across the Kentish
border. Charles, Duke of Orleans, found by Sir Richard Waller of
Groombridge buried under a pile of dead and wounded after
the battle of Agincourt, was intrusted to his charge, and
lived here as a prisoner for twenty-five years in the reigns
of Henry V. and VI. This was in the old castle, which
occupied a much larger site than the existing building,
its walls being bathed by the moat, supplied by running
a Quarterly Review, No. 223.

6 SUSSEX
water. There is a tradition that the Duke rebuilt the
house during his captivity, and also the neighbouring church
of Speldhurst in Kent (again rebuilt), where a stone bears
his arms. After the Wallers sold Groombridge, it passed
through several hands, and eventually to the Packers, who
pulled down the" old castle, and built the existing house
in the time of Charles II. The panelling and ceiling of
the principal room is of the date of the house, which also
contains older inlaid panelling, evidently saved from the

Groombridge Place.

earlier building, and perhaps as old as the time of the Duke
of Orleans and Henry V. The family of Packer ended in
two daughters, and after their marriage the place was sold,
their own and others of their family portraits being left
there. Evelyn mentions (1652) coming to visit Mr. Packer
here in the old house, 'a pretty melancholy seate, well
wooded and watered ; ' and coming again, after the present
house was built, in 1674.
Attached to the church is a chapel built by the Packer
of that day— the father of Evelyn's friend— who was a great

WITH YH AM, BUCKHURST 7
courtier, in honour of the safe return of Prince Charles
(Charles I.) from Spain.i
III. 11 m. south is Mayfield. See Ch. iii.
A line runs west to join the London and Brighton line,
by- 3 m. Groombridge Stat. See above.
5 J m. Withy ham Stat. The Church (of S. Michael)
was partially burnt by lightning in 1663, when the monu
ment of Thomas, Lord Buckhurst, the famous Lord High
Treasurer of Elizabeth's time, was destroyed. The Sackville
Chapel, at the end of the south aisle, contains a magni
ficent altar-tomb with the figure of a child lying upon it,
by the side of which, in eternal grief, kneel the white marble
figures of Richard, Earl of Dorset, 1677, and his wife. A
monument by Nollekens commemorates the first Duke of
Dorset, 1749; and one by Flaxman, the second Duke of
Dorset, 18 15. Beneath the chapel, are vaults filled with
the sumptuously ornamented coffins of the Sackvilles, Earls
and Dukes of Dorset, and their relations. Amongst them
lie Thomas Sackville, the counsellor of Elizabeth and High
Treasurer of England, author of 'Gorboduc,' the first
important English tragedy, 1608, whose monument was
destroyed in the fire, and Charles Sackville, the poet-Earl
of Dorset, who died 1706, commemorated by Pope as —
' Dorset, the grace of courts, the muse's pride
Buckhurst — the beech wood — (Earl De la Warr), \ m.
distant, for above six hundred years the residence of the
Sackvilles, came to them through the marriage of Ella,
daughter of Ralph de Dene and foundress of Bayham
Abbey, with Jordan de Sackville.
' A Wallet Oak,' as the Sussex expression goes, stands in
front of the entrance of the house, which contains some
fine works of Sir J. Reynolds, but is in itself a very feeble
representative of the old moated house of Buckhurst, which
1 Inscribed over the door ' D. O.M. 1625. ob felicissimi Caroli Principis ex His-
a nia reditum sacellum hoc d.d. I. P.'

8 SUSSEX
stood on a site ,three-quarter mile distant, and had a grand
hall and eight noble towers. Of this nothing now remains
except the solitary tower of the Tudor gateway, and some
picturesque out-buildings, occupied as a farmhouse. Old
Buckhurst was abandoned to decay when the family, terri
fied at the ' extreme bad ways ' which led to it, removed to
Knole about 1630; after which Sackville College, at East
Grinstead, was built from its ruins. The infant Medway

Gateway, Old Buskhurst.

flows through the valley and lake beneath the modern
house. Scarcely any other English park has the extreme and
forest-like beauty of Buckhurst, with its grand old beeches,
its deep glades, and its clear silent pools. At about 3 m.
is the old house of Bolebrook, which came to the Sackvilles
in 1400 by marriage with an heiress of the Dalyngrudge
family. Its grand tower of the XV. c. is a very early

ASHDOWN FOREST, BRAMBLETYE g
specimen of English brickwork. It is doubtful whether
the tower was originally intended as a gateway, or a casino,
like that at Sissinghurst Castle near Cranbrook.
The Sackvilles belong to one of the families which un
doubtedly came over with the Conqueror, in the person of
Herbrand de Salchevilla, being the seventh of his line whose
name was then known to history.
6| m. Hartfield Stat. Hartfield, i m. from Withyham,
has a handsome church (S. Mary), approached by a pic
turesque half-timber gateway of 152 1. It has a broach
spire — i.e., one which rises direct from the outside of the
wall — and it contains a window and tablet in memory of the
Rev. H. Polehampton, one of the truest heroes of the Indian
Mutiny year, killed whilst fulfilling the duties of his sacred
office as chaplain at Lucknow, 1857. 'The Dorset Arms'
is a curious old house.
Behind Hartfield spreads the beautiful region oi Ashdown
Forest, or Lancaster Great Park, which — all now the pro
perty of Lord De la Warr — once belonged to the ' Honour
of the Eagle of Pevensey.' The term ' forest ' is nominal,
all the old trees having been cut down.
North of the station is Bolebrook. See above.
io| m. Forest Row Stat. Here nothing but the name
remains of the forest. A footpath diverging from the
street near the Post-office leads to Brambletye — the Bran-
bertie of Domesday — celebrated in the novel of Horace
Smith. Brambletye House, of which little remains except
the principal entrance and portions of two square turrets,
was built by Sir Henry Compton in the time of James I.
Over the entrance are the arms of Compton. During the
Civil War the house was taken by the Parliamentarians,
and in 1683, whilst Sir James Rickards, its then owner,
was hunting in Ashdown Forest, it was searched by royal
commissioners, and a vast quantity of arms and ammunition
were found there. Sir James was warned not to return
home, and succeeded in making his escape to Spain, but
Brambletye was thenceforward left desolate, and speedily
fell into ruin.

io SUSSEX
Kidbrooke (H. R. Freshfield, Esq.), south of the station,
built by Mylne for Lord Abergavenny, was the residence
of the Speaker Abbot, afterwards Lord Colchester.
The Medway, which rises at Turner's Hill, on the west,
here flows through the meadows
13! m. East Grinstead Stat. The pleasant irregular
town takes its name from Gronestede, a clearing in the
forest of the Weald. One house bears the date 1599.
East Grinstead sent two members to Parliament till 1832,
and the Lent Assizes were held there, alternately with
Horsham, till 1799, though the courthouse had tumbled
down in 1 684. The church (S. Swithin) is the third on the
site within a hundred and fifty years. From the oldest
church is the marble tomb, with brasses (which possibly do
not belong to it) of Dame Elizabeth Grey, daughter of Lord
Scales, lady-in-waiting to Elizabeth of York, and her two
husbands (Sir T. Grey and R. Lewknor of Brambletye),
' who founded, indued, insured this present church to the
lawde and honore of God with dyvers ornaments, and
an almshouse for three persons.' Speaker Abbot, the first
Lord Colchester, 1829, has a stately monument. William,
Lord Abergavenny, 1745, has a tablet: his funeral helmet
hangs over it. An iron tombstone is dated 1570.
A Sussex proverb says —
' Large parish, poor people,
Large new church, no steeple.'
Sackville College is an interesting building, erected 1 608,
by Robert, 2nd Earl of Dorset, from the ruins of Old
Buckhurst, ,as an almshouse for five brothers and six
sisters ; but its hall and chapel are paltry rebuildings by
Butterfield, executed under the wardenship of Dr. J. M.
Neale, the well-known hymnologist. S. Margarefs Sister
hood, founded by Dr. Neale, was opened in 1856.
' Within ten miles of the town of East Grinstead are these names, all
clearly derived from the Sussex iron manufacture : — Furnace Pond, in
the parish of Worth ; Forge Pond, half a mile to the north, and in
Surrey ; Wiremill Pond, still to the north-east ; Mammerwood, on
the borders of Kent ; Casiron Farm, more to the south ; Shovelstrode

LAMBERHURST, SCOTNEY ii
and Horseshoe farms, both near the town ; Mount Noddy, within a
quarter of a mile of the church ; Cinder Hill, near Horsted Keynes ;
and Cinder Banks, towards Ticehurst.' — M. A. Lozuer, ' Sussex Papers.'

The line from London to Hastings, after leaving Tun
bridge 'Wells, passes —
21- m. Frant Stat. The village (see p. 4) is 1 m.
distant. 5 m. Wadhurst Stat. The church (SS. Peter and Paul),
1 m. east, partly early English, is interesting as contain
ing thirty grave-slabs of Sussex iron. The tomb of Mary
Dawson is of 1650.
[6 m. east is the large village of Lamberhurst?-
' This Lamberhurst is a very pretty place. It lies in a valley with
beautiful hills around it. The pastures here are very fine, and the
roads are as smooth and as handsome as those in Windsor Park.' —
Cobbett's ' Rural Rides'
The village is partly in Kent, but was the capital of the
Sussex iron district. Lamberhurst Church has a good oak
pulpit of 1630. The great Lamberhurst furnace, which con
sumed 200,000 cords of wood annually, was of the time of
Anne. The railing of S. Paul's, London, which weighed 200
tons, was cast there, at a cost of j£i 1,202, and was known as
the finest railing in the world, though the City of London
saw most of it removed a few years since without opposition,
to flatter a whim of Dean Milman. Under Dean Church
(1874) it was sold. Cannon were first cast of iron in Eng
land in the first year of Edward VI.
'It is almost incredible how many are made of the iron in this
county. Count Gondomer well knew their goodness, when of King
James he so often begged the boon to transport them.' — Thomas
Fuller, ' The Worthies of England.'
1 m. distant, in a beautiful wooded hollow beneath a
modern house (E. Hussey, Esq.), and most picturesquely
situated on an island in a lake formed by the little river
Teise, is Scotney Castle, which belonged in the time of
1 From the Anglo-Saxon, Lambrn, ' lambs,' and hyrst, ' a woody place.'

12 SUSSEX
Henry III. to Walter de Scotney, executed at Winchester in
1259, for giving poison to Richard, Earl of Gloucester. He
gave Scotney to his niece Florence on her second marriage
with John Darrell, in whose family it long remained. In
1418 it was the residence of Archbishop Chicheley. Father
Blount was long concealed under the staircase of the castle
in 1598, and eventually escaped by swimming across the
moat. Three of the four towers of the castle were pulled
down to build Court Lodge in this parish. The remaining
fourth tower, of the time of Richard II. , has been frequently
painted. The later buildings, partially ruined, belong to
a manor-house erected by Inigo Jones for the Darrells, a
family celebrated in the smuggling stories which fill the
country-side.1 Goudhurst Church (in Kent), which crowns
a steep hill-set village on the horizon of hills opposite Scot
ney, was their stronghold, and they held out there for three
days against the military sent against them in George III.'s.
time. The smugglers were forced to capitulate at last, and
a number of them were executed, one of them, no one
knows why, being buried under the hearthstone in a cottage
on the Scotney estate. On another occasion in 1747 the
church tower was held by the militia — i.e., townspeople of
Goudhurst, who had formed themselves into an armed body
to resist the smugglers, and one of the smuggler leaders,
named Hurd,2 was shot from the church tower as he was
attempting to leap his horse over the churchyard gate to
break down the church door. This siege of Goudhurst
Church is described in a novel of G. P. R. James. One of
the best-remembered instances of successful smuggling was
when a great funeral was announced as arriving from the
Continent. A gentleman who had died in France, and who
had belonged to a place on the other side of London, was
being taken home to be buried with his ancestors. A hearse
with four horses met the coffin at Dover. Relays of horses
were ordered, and they were changed at Ashford, Lamber
hurst, and several other places. But the funeral never went
1 See Shore's ' Smuggling Days and Smuggling Ways.'
2 Another name is sometimes incorrectly given.

SCOTNEY CASTLE 13
beyond London, for the coffin was full of lace, which was
soon dispersed over the city.
To the same wild times belongs the story of the outlawed
Arthur, son of William and Elizabeth Darrell, former owners
of Scotney. News came that he had died abroad, and that
his body was to be brought home to be buried at his native
place. Great was the concourse of neighbours and acquaint
ances at his funeral on the 12th of December 1720; but
amongst the mourners stood a tall figure wrapped inj a

Scotney Castle.

cloak, who, as the body was lowered, whispered ' That is
not me ! ' to a fellow-mourner by the side of the grave, and
immediately disappeared. Only a few years ago the owner
of Scotney mentioned the tradition that Darrell had attended
his own funeral to the old sexton, and asked if he could
throw any light upon it. The sexton answered, ' Yes.
Forty years ago, when your uncle was buried, the coffin
next to which his was placed was that of Mr. Darrell,fand it

14 SUSSEX
was falling to pieces, so that I looked into it, when I was
surprised to see no remains whatever of a body, but only
fragments of stone.'
Scotney Castle was bought by Mr. E. Hussey in 1778,
and the new house, on the hill above the castle, built by
Salvin in 1837. Its delightful gardens, partly formed from
an old stone-quarry, are famous for their glorious azaleas in
spring.] 9J m. Ticehurst Road Stat. 4 m. east is the village of
Ticehurst (the wood of the fairy or nymph Tys). The Bell
Inn is XIV. c. The perpendicular church (S. Mary) has
remains of good stained glass, given by John Wybarne, of
whom there is a fine XV. c. brass, on which he is repre
sented in armour, between his two wives, whose figures are
much smaller than his own.
The Courthopes, of Whileigh, in the parish of Ticehurst,
are mentioned by Shirley as one of the two Sussex families
which have resided, in unbroken descent, on the same lands
for three hundred and fifty years.
Boarzell and Pashley are rebuildings of old houses in '
this parish. The latter, formerly moated, has the date 16 12
and much good carving of that period. The private lunatic
asylum of Highlands has a great reputation.
il\ m. Etchingham Stat, (properly Echyngham).
There is no village. The Church (of the Assumption of
the Blessed Virgin), close to the station, is one of the
finest decorated buildings in the county — 'its sandstone
mellowed into grey, simple in its construction, and bold
and beautiful in its outlines.' 1 It was once moated.
Legend says a great bell lies at the bottom of the moat,
which will never be seen till six yoke of white oxen are
brought to drag it up.3 The heavy square tower has a
stair-turret and a pyramidal roof with its original XIV. c.
banner-shaped vane. The east window is a specimen of
Flamboyant, rare in England. The early English font must
have belonged to an earlier church. It is evident that the
church once had splendid stained glass, though little re-
1 Quarterly Review, No. 223. 2 Sussex Arch. Coll., xiii.

BURWASH 15
mains. In the chancel, with its old carved stall- work, is
the fine brass of the founder, Sir William de Echyngham,
1387, with a French inscription. The head is gone, but
this is still the finest brass of the curvilinear period in
Sussex. Beneath a canopy is a brass of another Sir William,
1444, with his wife and his son Thomas. Against the south
wall is the altar-tomb of Thomas Echyngham and his
wife Margaret, daughter of Reginald West, Lord De la Warr.
The south aisle of the nave contains the brass of Elizabeth
Echyngham and her sister Agnes Oxenbrigg, 1480. A
helmet belonging to Sir G. Strode hangs in the south aisle.
The railway line passes over the site of the old moated
manor of the Echynghams. The fine old brick house of
Haremare, to the left of the line, is quite modernised, and
its great mulberry cut down. The old house at Seacox Heath
(Rt. Hon. G. J. Goschen) was said to have been built by
the smugglers who had their headquarters at Goudhurst.
Etchingham is the station for Hawkhurst, in Kent, a
much-frequented and pleasant place, with a handsome
church, probably by the same architect as Etchingham.
Each of its two porches has a parvise-chamber. Bodiam
Castle (see Ch. ii.) may be visited from Etchingham.
[3 m. west, on the hills, is Burwash (from Burghersh,
having once belonged to that family, which gives a second
title to the Earls of Westmoreland).
' On the hill-top, behold
The village steeple, rising from the midst
Of many a rustic edifice ; 'tis all
The pastor's care.'
— Hurdis, ' The I 'Mage Curate. ' 1
The Church of S. Bartholomew has the Pelham buckle
on the head of a mullion window and on the font. The
oldest known specimen of Sussex ironwork is a slab here,
made at Socknersh, probably of a Sussex iron-mistress,
inscribed ' Orate p. annema Jhone Coline.' In the church
yard is the grave of the Rev. John Coker Egerton, author
1 Hurdis was curate of Burwash from 17S6 to 1791, and lived at the house called
Fryls.

1 6 SUSSEX
of ' Sussex Folk and Sussex Ways.' The manor farms of
Holmeshurst and Batemans are very picturesque, and in
the village street is the old house of Rampyndens.
' As a rule, our people are scarcely scientific in their attempts at
derivation. The name of our parish, which was spelt in the 33rd of
Henry III, "Borwese," and which has besides Burwash many other
variations of its spelling, I once heard accounted for as follows by one
of my own parishioners, who spoke most seriously —
' " When the Romans landed in Pevensey Bay, they had with them
a dog called ' Bur ; ' and after a while the dog got so bemired with the
Sussex clay that he couldn't travel any farther, so they washed him,
and the place where they washed him was called ' Burwash.' "—J. Coker
Egerton {Rector of Burwash), ' Sussex Folk and Sussex Ways.'
Henry Burwash, Bishop of Lincoln {ob. 1340), twice
Lord Treasurer, once Lord Chancellor, was a native of this
place. 1 m. left of the road which leads from Burwash to
Cross-in-Hand is Pounceford Farm.
' Descending the narrow winding way that leads to Pounceford,
occasional openings occur in the white varieties of the sandstone, along
the sides of the deep valleys ; shale and blue clay appear on the sur
face, and springs issue from the defiles of the glens, the water being
thrown out by the argillaceous partings of the strata. Before reaching
the bottom of the valley, limeworks are seen on a rising ground on the
left hand ; and, to the right, a pathway leads by a farmhouse to a deep
glen, where a quarry has' been opened, and from whence an incrusting
spring has its source. This quarry, moreover, presents a most interest
ing section to the geologist. For there in situ is seen a bed of the
Tilgate stone, beneath a layer ofthe Ashburnham bivalve limestone.' —
G. Mantell, ' Geology of the South- East of England.'
The famous ' Netherfield Boring,' carried out at Pounce
ford, though it reached no coal, demonstrated that the strata
expected by geological theory was there in situ, and con
nected Fairlight Clays with the Purbeck Beds.
15^ m. Robertsbridge Stat. Robertsbridge — Rother-
bridge — is a straggling village on the Rother. By the pictu
resque inn of the ' Seven Stars,' with its outside staircase, one
must turn up to reach (1 m.) Salehurst Abbey Farm, where
some gothic arches in the outer wall, and some scattered

BRIGHTLING 17
fragments, indicate a small Cistercian Abbey, founded by
Robert de S. Martin in n 76. The principal remnant is a
double crypt, groined and pillared, and partially used as a
dairy. With its old pans and crocks, and the light pouring
down its steps from the open air, it is a picture worthy of
the best Dutch masters. A mutilated effigy of Sir Edward
Dalyngrudge, the builder of Bodiam, was found here in 1823,
and, after many vicissitudes, is now in the Archaeological
Museum at Lewes. Here, 16 m. from Rye, begin the inland
marshes, watered by the Rother, which often divides Kent
and Sussex, and runs by Bodiam Castle.
There is a ferry across the Rother, but it is necessary for
a carriage to return to Robertsbridge to reach Salehurst
Church (S. Mary), partly early English. In the slight inclines
of Silver Hill it will be difficult to discover the ' famous
precipice ' of Horace Walpole's Sussex Journal.
The farm of Bugzell, in this parish, is named from the
ancient family of Boxshall or Buxhull, of whom was Sir
Alan Buxhull, Constable of the Tower of London, a
Knight of the Garter, one of those who slew the knight
Hawle and his servant (1378) in Westminster Abbey, where
they had taken sanctuary. There are traces near the farm
house of the old mansion of the Buxhulls.
Bodiam Castle is 3! m. from Robertsbridge by the field-
path. See Ch. ii.
On the ridge of the hill on the south-east is Mountfield
Court (Lady Mary Egerton), built by the Nicholls, who
came over from Holland with William III. and planted
its old chestnut avenue when the King planted that at
Greenwich. The prettily-situated old church of All Saints,
approached by a picturesque deep-cut rocky lane, has a
low, heavy Sussex spire.
[4 m. west is Brightling, a lofty ridge — ' twin eminence
with Crowborough of the Forest district ' — with wide and
beautiful views. The church is dedicated to S. Thomas a,
Becket. In the churchyard is a mausoleum by Smirke to
John Fuller, the patron of Turner, for whom his best Sussex
views — ' The Vale of Heathfield,' ' Brightling Observatory,'

1 8 SUSSEX
' Ashburnham,' &c, were painted.1 At 646 feet above the
sea is an Observatory erected by Mr. John Fuller of Rose
Hill. Brightling Park, formerly Rose Hill, has good stucco
ceilings, and retains its cockpit ! Brightling was long the
residence of the Fullers, of whom the first to settle in Sussex
was a silversmith, and who avowed their humble origin
in the motto Carbone et faucibus. The family lived first at
' the Court ' at Hooe, now a farmhouse ; many generations
of them are buried in Hooe churchyard.
' On the high ground of Brightling parish, about two miles and a
half south of our village, stands an obelisk called " Brightling Needle,"
built as a landmark by old Mr. John Fuller, formerly M.P. for the county.
It occupies, I believe, the spot on which, in the old war-time, was a
beacon always ready to be lighted the moment the long-expected land
ing of the French in Pevensey Bay should begin to take place.
' Some years ago, I was talking to an old man, who in his youth had
been one of our bolder spirits. He soon became very earnest in his
manner, and in thesepeaceful days it gave a curious zest to my con
versation to feel that I was speaking to a man who had seen people's
household goods actually packed on waggons ready to be driven inland.
He told me that he was one of the " Sussex Guides ; " and when I asked
him what the Sussex Guides had to do, he said with a ring of well-
remembered instructions : —
' " It was our duty, sir, as soon as we heard of the landing of the
French, to repair to the George Inn at Battle, and thence to guide the
army the nearest way to the enemy." '—J. Coker Egerton, ' Sussex Folk
and Sussex Ways. ']
2i| m. Battle Stat. See Ch. ii.
26J m. St. Leonards-on-the-Sea Stat. (Warrior Square).
See Ch. ii.
1 These are now in the possession of Lady Acland Hood, the heiress of the Fullers,
at S. Audries, in Somersetshire.

II
HASTINGS AND ST. LEONARDS
TTASTINGS and St. Leonards, divided till nearly the
¦*- ¦*- middle of the nineteenth century by a mile of open
country, are now practically one town, and present a sunny
sea-front three miles in length. The monotony of its weari
some line of featureless parades and terraces is somewhat
redeemed by the view eastwards of the cliff and the ragged
ruins of the castle. Two ugly piers break the shore-line, and
the swimming-baths at White Rock, east of the larger pier,
have the reputation of being the finest in England. Near the
entrance of Robertson Street, a pretty little fountain, erected
in her lifetime, commemorates the beneficent charities of
Sarah, Countess Waldegrave. At the extreme east is the
fishermen's quarter, where the beach is occupied by black tim
ber storage towers,1 boats, and fishing-tackle, and is backed
by sandstone cliffs,2 the whole very attractive to an artist.
There is nothing whatever worth notice in modern St.
Leonards, of which two gateways (one recently destroyed)
were boundaries on the north and east, but which has long
outgrown those limits. The view to the west was once
rather pretty, but the point which accentuated it has recently
been destroyed by the wanton blowing up of the martello-
tower on Bulverhythe cliff. In the Public Gardens a rock
slab is pointed out as having served as a dining-table for the
Conqueror after he landed ; when, as the Bayeux tapestry
represents, he hurried at once to Hastings to obtain pro-
i Twenty-six of these were swept out to sea by the high tides of 1875.
2 ' Sand and clay, with interspersions of lignite, laminated shale, grit,*and sand
stone. '— Mantell, 'Wonders of Geology.' 19

20 SUSSEX
vision for his army. Others say that the stone covered
the first grave of Harold on the wild sea-shore. On the
hill behind Eversfield Place is a large Roman Catholic
Convent of the Holy Child Jesus. It was at 57 Marina that
Princess Victoria was staying, with the Duchess of Kent,
when her runaway horses were stopped by Mr. (afterwards
Sir) Peckham Micklethwait. Thomas Campbell wrote a
feeble poem on the sea-view from St. Leonards.
Behind Wellington Square a steep ascent leads to the area
— now a garden — of Hastings Castle — entrance 3d. (which
can now also be reached by a lift !). Besides a few rags of
outer wall, some remains exist of a XII. c. chapel, which at
least occupies the site of the chapel where Anselm conse
crated Robert Bloet as Bishop of Lincoln. It was probably
this chapel, which had a dean and canons of its own,
Thomas a Becket being once dean and William of Wyke-
ham canon there.1 The church of S. Mary in the Castle,
in Pelham Crescent, under the rock,2 bears the pompous
inscription — ' Aedes Sanctae Mariae in castello extructa
a.d. mdcccxxviii.' St. Clement's Caves, occasionally lighted
up, are amusing to children.
The valley between the Castle Hill and the East Cliff is
occupied by the old town of Hastings, which had an exist
ence at the time of the Conquest, and which heads the list
of the Cinque Ports, though it had never the wealth or
prosperity which were enjoyed by its neighbour Winchelsea
in the XIII. and XIV. c. ; and after that time continued to
decline, till it began to be frequented as a health resort at
the end ofthe XVIII. c. The old town consists of only two
streets — High St/ret and All Saints Street, which fill up
the narrow valley, and have much quaint character, espe
cially at the northern end, where the pavement of High
Street rises high above the roadway. From the middle of
this street is the approach to the large perpendicular
four-aisled church of .S. Clement, which contains brasses of
1 See Stubb's ' Registrum Sacrum.'
- In 1331, however, the Canons describe this chapel as 'infra claustrum,' i.e.,
apparently, below the castle.

HASTINGS 21
Thomas and Alice Wekes, 1563, and of John Barley,
mercer, 1601, with his children. In the tower is a ball,1
fired by the French and Dutch fleet in 1720. Here, above
the street, on the left, are the old-fashioned houses of the
Croft, many of them faced with glazed brick. On the
right is the Tackleway. The large Roman Catholic Church
of S. Mary, Star of the Sea, from designs of Basil Champ-
neys, has a fine stone triple- vaulted roof. Almost opposite
is a handsome old house, — the mansion occupied for about
sixteen years by Coventry Patmore, author of ' The Angel
in the House ' — the residence of the Milwards, who in
herited it from the Collier family. A cluster of elms sepa
rates it from the churchyard of All Saints, which contains
the tomb of Old Humphry (George Mogridge, 1854), and
the quaint rhyming epitaph of John Archdeacon, a boy
of nine, who died of the thrashing he received from an
old man, whose donkey he had teased. In the XV. c.
church, which is beautifully situated under the hill, the
notorious Titus Oates was baptized in 1659, being then
ten years of age, and his father being then its rector. The
church contains a good brass of Thomas Goodenough,
' sometime burges of this towne,' and his wife Margaret.
Near All Saints Church, at a spot in the western side ofthe
East Hill called the Minnis Rock, was one of the few hermi
tages which Sussex possessed. In the last century it contained
a cross and a niche for a saint carved out of the cliff.2 Its
caves are now almost filled up. In All Saints Street lived
the mother of Sir Cloudesley Shovel — a poor woman, in a
little house ; and there is a pretty account of how the great
admiral desired to be put on shore at Hastings, and knocked
at her door, when out came 'a poor old woman, upon
which Sir Cloudesley kissed her, and then, falling on his
knees, begged her blessing, calling her "mother."'3 The
street is now chiefly inhabited by the Hastings fisherfolk,
who lead a life apart and intermarry. The name ' Chopback '
1 With a stone put in to match !
2 See M. A. Lower, 'Compendious Hist, of Sussex.'
3 De la Pryme's Diary.

22 SUSSEX
infuriates them. Hastings pirates used to torture their cap
tives in that way, and even in the middle of the last century
' Ruxley's crew ' were hanged for torturing the master of a
Dutch brig to death by chopping down the ribs from the
spine — a cruelty handed down from Danish times.
The East and West Hills have been purchased by the Cor
poration, and much land is left as a free and most enjoyable
pleasure-ground to the people. It is a pity that the approach
to Hastings through an avenue of old trees, whose gnarled
stems and twisted roots had been painted by a thousand
artists, should have been much spoilt of late years.
It is from hence, by the east hill towards Ecclesbourne,
that the only country walks in the immediate neighbour
hood of Hastings are attainable ; otherwise the so-called
country roads are lined for miles in every direction by
miserable, shabby, stucco villas, each more piteously ugly
than the last, which make St. Leonards and Hastings a
most undesirable residence for those who are too well to be
confined to its sunny parades, and yet unable to reach the
really beautiful country — some of the prettiest country in
the south of England — which lies beyond a three-mile
circuit. Even in Charles Lamb's time the cockneyfied
character of the place was lamented over.
' I love town or country ; but this detestable Cinque Port is neither.
. . . There is no sense of home at Hastings. It is a place of fugitive
resort, an heterogeneous assemblage of seamews and stockbrokers,
amphitrites of the town, and misses that coquet with the ocean. ... It
is the visitants from town, that come here to say that they have been
here, with no more relish of the sea than a pond-perch or a dace might
be supposed to have, that are my aversion. I feel like a foolish dace
in these regions, and have as little toleration for myself here as for
them. What can they want here ? If they had a true relish of the
ocean, why have they brought all this land- luggage with them? or why
pitch their civilised tents in the desert ? What mean these scanty book-
rooms — marine libraries, as they entitle them — if the sea were, as they
would have us to believe, a book " to read strange matters in " ? What
are their foolish concert-rooms, if they come, as they would fain be
thought to do, to listen to the music of the waves ? All is false and
hollow pretension. They come because it is the fashion, and to spoil
the nature of the place. They are mostly, as I have said, stock-

FAIRLIGHT 23
brokers ; but I have watched the better sort of them. Now and then
an honest citizen (of the old stamp), in the simplicity of his heart, shall
bring down his wife and daughters to taste the sea-breezes. I always
know the date of their arrival. It is easy to see it in their countenances.
A day or two they go wandering on the shingles, picking up cockle
shells, and thinking them great things ; but in a poor week imagination
slackens ; they begin to discover that cockles produce no pearls, and
then — oh, then ! — if I could interpret for the pretty creatures (I know
they have not the courage to confess it themselves), how gladly would
they exchange their seaside rambles for a. Sunday-walk on the green
sward of their accustomed Twickenham meadows ! ' — Essays of Elia.
Excursions are : —
1. 21- m. Fairlight. Ascending the old north road
from old Hastings, and turning to the right at the suburb
of New Ore, we reach (after 1 m.) a stile on the right,
whence a field-path leads to Fairlight Glen, a pretty wooded
dip in the hill, with a ' dripping well ' over-shadowed by
an old beech-tree. Thence a delightful walk above wood
and down brings us to the Lovers' Seat, in a pleasant niche
of the cliff- side, where boys are always waiting to relate a
— partly imaginary — story of the secret meetings of a small
local heiress (Miss Boys, of Elfords, near Hawkhurst) with
a sea-captain (Lieutenant Lamb) on that spot.
Pedestrians may return to Hastings by the hills, skirting
the top of Ecclesbourne Glen, a ravine opening towards the
sea, which has still some beauty and wildness, and much
tender delicacy of colouring in the contrasts of its scrubby
brushwood with calm summer seas.
From the site of Fairlight Mill (now burnt down), on a
very clear day, the French coast from Boulogne to Calais
may be seen, with ten towns, sixty-six churches, and (at
least till recently) seventy martello-towers in England.
' When Fairlie Down puts on his cap,
Romney Marsh will have its sap,'
says a Sussex weather proverb.
2. An omnibus may be taken through the shabby suburb
which skirts Alexandra Park as far as 5. Helen's Spa ,

24 SUSSEX
hence a road winds pleasantly through wooded hills (keep
ing to the right at ' Kite's Nest ') to the entrance of the
Cemetery, nearly opposite which a field-path leads to (2^
m. from the town) the XV. c. ruins of Old Ore1 Church
(S. Helen), which are rather picturesque. Under their
shadow is the grave of the aged Devey Fearon, 1847, once
well known as a preacher. Close by is Ore Place, on the
site of a recently destroyed house, which was said to contain
fragments of one built for John of Gaunt, but nothing of
interest remained. Hence pedestrians may either continue
along 'The Ridge' to Baldslow — passing Holmhurst, to
which the statues of Queen Anne and her attendant figures
— Britannia, France, Ireland, and the American Colonies
(by Bird, the great sculptor of Queen Anne's reign), formerly
in front of S. Paul's, London,2 have been removed ; or they
may take the second turn on the left (then right), when, after
passing a sort of green, a narrow path between villa-gardens
leads to a bridge over The Old Roar, a so-called waterfall.
' Probably no one ever visited Old Roar without being told that it
was not the season for the water, and that it was never known to be so
dry as at present.' — The Lost Broach.
Hence a pleasant field-path brings the pedestrian back,
past the reservoirj to Alexandra Park.
3. An omnibus may be taken near the Saxon Hotel at
St. Leonards, up the London Road, and through the squalid
' genteel suburb ' of Silverhill to New Hollington. Thence,
turning to the left, and skirting the grounds of ' Castle-
ham,' one may look down upon a pleasant landscape of
woods and sea, with Pevensey Bay and Beachy Head in
the distance. A rough road through fields and gates leads
down to the quaint little church of Hollington in the Wood.
1 The name Or dates from Anglo-Saxon times.
2 ' In the area of this front, on a pedestal of excellent workmanship, stands a statue
of Queen Anne, formed of white marble with proper decorations. The figures on the
base represent Britannia with her spear ; Gallia with a figure in her left hand which
should imitate a crown, but by mistake of the carver its meaning is unintelligible ;
Hibernia with her harp ; and America with her bow.'— Thornton V ' History of Lon
don and We.il minster.'

BEAU PORT 25
' A little churchling in the midst of a wood, that seems dropped by
the angel that was tired of carrying two packages ; marry, with the
other he made shift to pick his flight to Loretto. Inquire out, and see
my little Protestant Loretto. It stands apart from trace of human
habitation ; yet hath it pulpit, reading-desk, and trim font of massiest
marble, as if Robinson Crusoe had reared it to soothe himself with old
church-going images. I forget its Christian name, and what she-saint
was its gossip.' — Lamb's Letters.
The church (S. Leonard) is partly XIII. c, with a low
quaint tiled spire. The interior is ' restored ' out of all
interest. ' When a church was begun in the neighbouring village, the Evil
One, jealous of the encroachment on a spot he had marked as his own,
every night undid what the workmen had accomplished in the course
of the day. Priests were summoned to lay the fiend, and they had
prepared to commence their duties, when a voice was heard offering
to desist from opposition if the building were erected on the spot he
should indicate. The offer was accepted. The church was raised, and
there sprung up all around it a thick wood concealing it from the
general gaze.' — Thorne.
Unfortunately much of the surrounding wood has been
destroyed in the last few years, and thus the characteristic
of the place is gone. Following the lane along the ridge
of hill south-east of the church, one may descend upon the
entrance of Bulverhythe Marsh, just beyond the western
extremity of St. Leonards.
4. Ascending the London Road again as far as the high
narrow ridge which separates the Weald of Sussex from the
seaboard, we may turn left, when the Battle Road is skirted
on the right by the wall of Beauport (Sir Archibald Lamb,
Bart). Its pleasant woods contain many rare trees, and
the very curious Dog's Cemetery of Lady Montgomerie,
wife of Sir Charles Lamb, ob. 1848. The house was built
by General James Murray, governor of Quebec, in 1757.
An obscure cart-road on the left, leading to a farmhouse, is
called TelVem Lane, from a tradition of its having existed
at the time of the Conquest, and that the Conqueror, seated
on his horse, 'told over his men,' as they passed through

26 SUSSEX
the narrow lane, before the battle of Hastings. Within the
palings of Crowhurst Park (P. Papillon, Esq.) is a mound,
now covered with trees, said to be a Danish sepulchre.
The house of Crowhurst (the wood of crows), which de
scended to the present owner from the Pelhams, is beauti
fully situated on the edge of a wooded glen, the subject of
one of Turner's best Sussex pictures : its long reaches of
land and sea, backed by the hazy downs, being thrown into
exquisite atmospheric effect by the groups of old pines or
oaks which stand out against them in strong relief. In the
house are many good portraits, including that of Anthony
Papillon, the friend of Erasmus, who died in Venice for
the Protestant faith, as well as of his son, who fell in the
massacre of S. Bartholomew. Thomas, son of the martyr,
gentleman of the bedchamber to Henri IV., left the king's
service on his renouncing the Protestant faith. His grandson
David was imprisoned for his faith through three years at
Avranches, and afterwards flying to England with his uncle
David Papillon, married Anne Mary Calandrini, of a family
also famous from their sufferings for the Reformed faith, and
founded the family of Acrise, afterwards of Crowhurst.
Turning by the lodge of Crowhurst Park, a lane winds
down (i\ m.) into the hollow, where (5 m. from St. Leonards)
Crowhurst Church (S. George) stands in a lovely situation,
with a glorious yew-tree, said to be 3000 years old, which
is 37 J feet in circumference at the base1 and 27 feet at
6 feet from the ground. The old ridge-tombstones are
interesting. The church was rebuilt in the last century,
except its tower, which has the Pelham buckle over the
door. Another buckle, in wood, formerly hung on the
front of the gallery. The badges of the buckle 2 and the
crampette (or metal point of the scabbard) were granted,
in 1356, to two Sussex knights, Sir Thomas Pelham and
1 Crowhurst Church, in Surrey, also dedicated to S. George, has also a yew-tree
of precisely the same wonderful dimensions. See Sussex A rch. Coll.
2 Among other places, we find the Pelham buckle on the stonework of the church
doors of East Hoathly and Laugh ton ; on the towers of Dallington and Crowhurst ;
on the moulded bricks of Laughloii Place; on the wall ofthe aisle of Wartling; and
on the ornaments of Robertsbridge Abbey.

BEX HILL 27
Sir Roger De la Warr, to whom King John of France
surrendered his sword at the battle of Poitiers.
Below the churchyard are the picturesque ruins of a
Manor-house, dating from 1250. The house is believed
to have been built by Walter de Scotney, chief steward
of Clare, Earl of Gloucester, whom, and his brother, he
was accused of having poisoned, a crime for which he was
executed in 1259.
About 1 J m. north-west of Crowhurst, on high ground,
is the little church of Catsfield (S. Lawrence), thoroughly
Sussex in character, on a height, with a low, shingled spire,
and the remains of a curious old oak-tree at its church
yard gate. It contains a memorial brass to the ever-
popular Annie, Lady Brassey, authoress of the 'Voyage of
the Sunbeam] who died at sea, September 14, 1887. Cats-
field Place (Mrs. Hayley) contains several objects which
belonged to Marie Antoinette, brought over by the Prin
cesse de Lamballe at the time of the flight to Varennes,
and deposited by her for safety with her friend Lady Gibbs,
grandmother of the present owner.
The return from Crowhurst to St. Leonards maybe varied
by following the winding lanes to Hollington, and this is
the nearer way.
5. Beyond the western extremity of St. Leonards, the
Brighton Road passes the Bull Tavern, behindwhich are some
small remains of the gothic church of S. Mary Bulverhythe,
¦ founded by a Comtesse d'Eu in the XIII. c.1 When the sea
makes a raking noise on the shore near this, the fishermen
say they ' hear Bulverhythe bells,' and it is held as a sure
sign of bad weather from the westward.2 Passing a strip
of marsh edged with low hills and wind-blown trees, which
feebly recalls the Roman Campagna, we reach, on a rising
ground (3 m.), the village of Bexhill. The Church of S.
Mary is partly XII. and XIII. c. Its fine east window, with
1 The last Countess of Eu who held the Rape of Hastings lived in the early part
of the XIII. c.
2 See ' Notes and Queries,' vi. 9, 403.

28 SUSSEX
representations of Henry III. and Eleanor of Provence, was
sold by the church authorities to Horace Walpole. From
Strawberry Hill, where it only fetched ,£30, 9s. 6d. at the
sale, it passed tq Hardwick House, near Bury St. Edmunds,
where it is now carefully respected and preserved. A new-
seaside resort is rapidly springing up, f m. from the old
village, under the name of Bex hill-on- Sea.
In the upland districts, 4 m. north-west, is the little
church of Hooe (S. James or S. Oswald), which still con
tains a window, with figures of Edward III. and Philippa,
somewhat similar to that sold at Bexhill.
6. Continuing the walk No. 3 to Battle along the high
ground which was the scene of the battle of Hastings, and
crossing the hollow (where the railway line runs) which was
of such importance in the combat, we reach —
6 m. Battle, 'the grave of the pride and glory of
England,' 1 now a pretty little town of quaint old-fashioned
houses. The main street ends in the fine gateway of the
famous Abbey (Duchess of Cleveland).2
Tickets for the Abbey are given (free) at the stationer's
shop a little way down the street, provided with which, on
Tuesdays, visitors are shown round the ruins in parties —
which are often great crowds — by the gardener, who receives
a small fee at the end.
The beautiful decorated Abbey Gateway is attributed to
Abbot Retlyng in the time of Edward III., when a license
was granted to fortify and crenellate the Abbey. Passing
the gate, the visitor sees the dwelling-house formed by Sir
Anthony Browne out of the ruins, and enlarged by the late
Duke of Cleveland as Lord Harry Vane. The Abbatial
hall, greatly modernised, serves as the hall of the house.
The handsome library is modern. The drawing-room, with
the housekeeper's and butler's rooms, and the passage lead
ing to them, are formed from part of the Abbot's residence
contiguous to the ancient cloisters.
1 Palgrave.
2 Battle Abbey was sold to Lord Harry Vane, afterwards Duke of Cleveland by
Sir Godfrey Webster in 1857.

BATTLE 29
At the end of the terrace, two slender octagonal towers
remain, marking the end of the dining-hall belonging to the
manor erected by Sir Anthony Browne and his son on the
site of the ancient guest-house (which he pulled down)
and beyond it.
On the north side of the house are remains of the tomb
of an abbot, already indicating the nave of the gigantic
abbey church, of which the substructures of the choir have
been excavated farther on in the garden, backed by a group
of fine cedars. Here is the site of the high-altar, which
marked the spot where Harold fell beneath the Saxon stan
dard, and where William the Conqueror offered his battle-
sword and the robe of his coronation.
' Here rose the dragon-banner of our realm ;
Here fought, here fell, our Norman-slander'd king.
O garden blossoming out of English blood !
O strange hate-healer Time ! We stroll and stare
Where might made right eight hundred years ago ;
Might, right? ay good, so all things make for good—
But he and he, if soul be soul, are where
Each stands full face with all he did below.'
— Tennyson, 'Show Day at Battle Abbey,' 1876,
Prologue to ' Harold. '
Beneath a building — which, from its position, was pro
bably the Dormitory x — with early English windows, are
two very fine crypts, one much loftier than the other.
' The Abbey of Battle, in which prayer was to be offered up per
petually for the repose of the souls of all those who had fallen in the
conflict, was at once the monument of the Conqueror's triumph and the
token of his piety. The Abbey was most richly endowed ; and all the
land, for one league round about, was annexed to the Battle franchise.
The abbot was freed from the authority of the metropolitan of Canter
bury, and invested with archiepiscopal jurisdiction. The high altar was
erected on the very spot where Harold's standard had waved ; and the
Roll, deposited in the archives of the monastery, recorded the names of
those who had fought with the Conqueror, and amongst whom the lands
of broad England were divided. But all this pomp and solemnity has
passed away like a dream. The "perpetual prayer" has ceased for
1 The kitchen was undoubtedly south of the buildings surrounding the Cloister
Garth, so that this is not likely to have been the Refectory, as it is sometimes called.

30 SUSSEX
ever ; the roll of Battle is rent ; the shields of the Norman lineages are
trodden in the dust ; the Abbey is levelled with the ground.' — Palgrave.
The famous Roll of Battle Abbey — the roll-call of the
Norman knights — is said to have been removed at the dis
solution to Cowdray, and to have perished there in the
burning house, September 24, 1793. When Sir Anthony
Browne was taking possession in 1538, the last monk who
left the abbey cursed him that ' by fire and water his line
should come to an end and perish out of the land ; ' and
this, since called 'the curse of Cowdray,' has been terribly
fulfilled to his descendants.1 Another ' curse of sacrilege '
is believed to have fallen on the family of Webster (Sir
James Webster having purchased Battle Abbey in the
beginning of the XVIII. c), no head of the house ever
being permitted to die 'according to the course of nature.'
Battle Abbey has long been considered a ' haunted house,'
the ghost of later times being an old woman of weird and
terrible aspect.
Outside the Abbey gate, on the left, is a picturesque old
house called The Almonry, said to have been the Hospitium
of the pilgrims. It was the immense number of these
pilgrims, who crowded even the vast aisles of the Abbey
church, which led to the building of the Parish Church
in the time of Henry I. No buildings now remain of
that date, and the interest of the present church, chiefly
decorated, has been completely annihilated by ' restoration,'
which has modernised the interior, and destroyed its only
remarkable feature, the steps of its ancient rood-loft.
A noble marble altar-tomb commemorates Sir Anthony
Browne, the first lay owner of Battle. Sir Anthony, stan
dard-bearer to Henry VIIL, active in promoting the divorce
of Catherine of Arragon, acted as proxy for Henry VIII.
in the marriage with Anne of Cleves. He was brought
from Byfieet, where he died, May 6, 1548, to be buried
here by Alis, his first wife. His armour (coat of arms,
terge, sword, helmet, &c.) was 'offered' at his funeral,
and there is a charge in the funeral accounts for the
1 See the description of Cowdray.

THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS 31
'brasses' (braces) of iron by which they were to be hung
over his tomb.
On the floor of the church are brasses to Dean Robert
Clare, 1440; Dean John Wythines, 1615; Sir W. Arnold,
1435; and a knight in plate-armour, John Lowe, 1423,
On the grave of Thomas Alfraye, 1509, he is described
as one who — ' Soe in active strength did passe,
As none was found his peere.'
The gravestone of Isaac Ingall in the churchyard re
cords that he died at the age of a hundred and twenty in
1798, having been for ninety years a servant at the Abbey.
The patron of the Abbey is still called the abbot. The
ministering monk of the church (at first only a chapel of
the Abbey) was called Decanus, and the lay abbot or owner
of Battle has still the power of appointing a ' Dean,' who
was till recently free from the jurisdiction of the Bishop.
Close to the churchyard is the Deanery, a very fine old
Jacobean house. Several houses in the little town are
good specimens of domestic architecture.
From its connection with the story of the famous Battle
of Hastings, the tiny town of Battle has a greater interest
than any town of similar size in England. The story, briefly
told, is as follows : —
When the saintly Edward the Confessor lay upon his
death-bed at Westminster, on the 5th of January 1066, he
named as his successor his brother-in-law, the Saxon Harold,
son of the great Earl Godwin, and brother of Edith the
queen. Thus, when the holy king was dead, Harold was
raised to the throne by the voice of the English people, and
his power was strengthened by his marriage with Algitha,1
sister of the great Earls Edwin and Morcar, who, more
than any other, had influence in the north of England.
But, the year before, Harold had met with a great misfor
tune ; he had been wrecked upon the coast of France, and
taken prisoner by Guy, Count of Ponthieu, who shut him
1 Or Edith, Aelfgya, Aldith, Adgiva, Eddiva

32 SUSSEX
up in the castle of Belrem near Montreuil. William, Duke
of Normandy, compelled Guy, who was his vassal, to deliver
up his prisoner to himself, treated Harold with every honour,
and made him promises of lasting friendship ; yet William,
who was first cousin to the sainted king on the mother's
side, also had hopes of the English succession, and when
he once held the most powerful English subject in his

The Deanery, Battle.

hands, would not let him return to his own country till
he had secured an oath on the relics of the saints most
honoured in Normandy that he would support his— Wil
liam's— claim to the throne. Then he sent him home.
When Edward was dead, and Harold had succeeded by
his death-bed choice as well as by popular election, he
declared that his oath to the Norman duke was null and
void because it was not obtained by free-will, but by force.

THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS 33
Then William, who had no shadow of a real claim to the
English throne, dwelt upon the insult to the Norman saints
contained in the perjury of Harold, and invited his followers
to a crusade of vengeance, which he undertook to reward
with the plunder of England.
Important aid was given to William's cause by the con
duct of the outlawed Tostig, who was himself a brother
of King Harold, but whose wife was Judith, aunt of the
Norman Duchess Matilda. In May 1066, Tostig landed in
England, ravaging the coast of Yorkshire, and brought over
Harold Hardrada, king of Norway, as his ally, persuading
him to attempt the conquest of England. In their first en
gagement with the king's brothers-in-law, Edwin and Morcar,
they were successful ; but Harold of England marched
rapidly to the rescue, and gained the great battle of Stam
ford Bridge, September 25, 1066, in which both Tostig and
Harold Hardrada were killed.
It was only three days after Harold's victory at Stamford
Bridge that Duke William landed on the English coast. He
had collected a vast fleet of the small ships of that time at
the mouth of the Dive, and, proceeding to S. Valery, had
set sail thence on the 27 th of September, guiding his fleet
across the Channel by the lights on his own vessel, the
Mora, which was the gift of his Duchess, Matilda, and
(Thursday, September 28) he landed in Pevensey Bay, in
the haven which then existed under the walls of the Roman
fortress, Anderida. The coast was defenceless. All the
warriors of the south had gone to assist Harold against the
northern invaders. Not an armed man was found to resist
the landing, which was accomplished in perfect order — first
the archers with their bows and quivers, then the knights in
full armour, bringing their horses with them. To protect
the ships, Pevensey was hastily fortified with a trench, and
then, after one day's rest, the army moved eastwards to
seek for supplies of provision at Hastings, ravaging the
intervening country and burning its houses, as the Bayeux
tapestry represents.
Meantime news arrived of the great victory in the north,
c

34 SUSSEX
that Harold Hardrada and Tostig had fallen, and that King
Harold was already on his way to protect his subjects in
the south. In an armed council he had told the leaders of
his army of the landing of the Norman enemy and the
horrors which followed, and every man swore to die in
arms rather than to acknowledge any king but Harold. Of
the great English lords, Edwin and Morcar were induced
to hold back by the hope of securing Northumbria for
themselves, but all the other great nobles, two bishops, the
mighty Abbot of Peterborough, and a vast host, followed
the king from York to London. Thence Harold went to
his newly -founded minster of Holy Cross at Waltham,
and vowed himself and his wealth to the special service
of God if victory were vouchsafed to him. Flat on the
pavement he lay before the Holy Rood of Montacute and
Waltham, and the Blessed Image is said to have bowed
its head silently and sadly towards him, which was after
wards interpreted as an omen of evil, and to have meant ' It
is finished : all is over ! ' A short rest in London followed,
during which one Hugh Margot, a monk of Fecamp, pre
sented himself before Harold as he sate upon his throne
in the palace of Westminster, and audaciously bade him,
in the name of the Norman duke, to come down from
thence, and, by laying aside his crown and sceptre, to save
further bloodshed. The king was restrained by his gentle
brother Gurth from punishing the presumptuous messenger,
and deigned to answer that he was free from an oath which
had only been taken under compulsion : that he should
guard the kingdom which was his by the will of the Con
fessor, and, at the same time, he challenged the Duke to
meet him in battle on the following Saturday.
Harold was eager for personal warfare, but Gurth, the
dearest of his brothers, implored him not to expose a life
which was of such infinite value to the nation, but, remain
ing himself to defend London, to allow him, his brother, to
lead the English armies against the invader; then, if he
was conquered or fell, Harold would still be alive to gather
another army and avenge him. If he, Gurth, were to ravage

THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS 35
the country between London and the sea, William would be
unable to maintain his forces in a desert, and would speedily
be compelled to withdraw to his own country. Those who
heard the words of Gurth said that they were good, and im
plored the king to follow his counsel, but Harold steadfastly
refused. Never, said the patriot king, would he burn one
English village or house ; never would he harm one of
those whom he was appointed to govern, and whom he only
lived to see flourishing under his rule.
A week after he had reached London from the north,
Harold himself set forth with all the forces he could muster.
He knew the country well, and having probably chosen in
his own mind the best site for a battle, he marched direct
to the then uncultivated ridge 1 called Sant Lache,*and after
wards Senlac, which is now occupied by the abbey and town
of Battle. This was seven miles from Hastings, then the
headquarters of the invaders, and there, ' by the hoar apple-
tree,' probably a relic of some woodland shrine, he pitched
his camp on Friday the 13th October, fortifying it roughly,
as well as time permitted, with a threefold palisade, having
a triple gate of entrance, and defended on the south, where
the road from Hastings now ascends into Battle, by an
artificial trench.
That night, the eve of S. Calixtus, the Norman chro
niclers — probably to predispose sympathy — affirm to have
been spent by the Normans in prayer and confession, but
by the English in songs and libations. It was then cer
tainly for the last time that the old English battle-songs
were heard in a free England, whilst Odo, Bishop of Bayeux,
and Geoffrey, Bishop of Coutances, were rousing the Nor
man soldiery to regard their cause as a religious crusade.
With the dawn, Harold went into a chapel to hear mass ;
but before the Agnus D'ei was sung he was summoned forth
to battle. William Fitz-Osbert had warned the Norman
duke of the imprudence of further delay, and he had led
forth his host by Telham and Heathland (Hechelande) to
1 ' Mons silvae vicinus erat, vicinaque vallis,
Et non cultus ager asperitate sua.' — Guy of Amiens.

36 SUSSEX
the ridge oposite Senlac, where the road from Hastings
now descends towards Battle Station. Here the knights
lingered to put on their heavy armour over the lighter
dress in which they had ridden from Hastings. As he was
arming himself, Duke William put on his coat of mail
wrong, so that the hind part came in front ; and some of
the bystanders would have regarded it as an evil omen,
when his ready wit declared that it was a good one, and
to mean that he was 'about to be turned from a duke
into a king.' He then mounted the Spanish war-horse,
which- had been a gift from his intended son-in-law, King
Alphonso. So noble was his gallant appearance, that
Hamon de Thouars declared that so glorious a knight
had neve"r been seen under heaven, and that the noble
knight would make a nobler king.1
Meantime, the height on the other side of the little
ravine which lay beneath the Norman duke was covered
with the closely-packed multitudes of the English host, who
had made shield-like palisades of ash and other kinds of
wood (abundant in the Andredes Weald), close set and
tightly joined together like hurdles.2 Whilst William, now
fully equipped, was gazing upon the ranks, one Vital, a
follower of his brother Odo, rode up to him and announced
that on the summit of the hill he recognised the royal
standard, showing that Harold was present there in person.
Then the Duke vowed that if God would grant him victory,
he would found on that spot a mighty minster to His
praise. And amongst those who heard him was William,
a monk of Marmoutiers near Tours, who was there because
he was famous as an arrow-maker, and who now besought
that the Duke would consecrate his promised foundation
to S. Martin, the apostle of the Gauls, to whose metro
politan throne of Tours he owed his spiritual allegiance.
1 ' Li visquens de Toraz guarda
Coment li Dus armes porta ;
A sa gent a entor sei dit :
Horn mez si bel armd ne vit,
Soz ciel tel chevalier n en a
Beau quens e beau Rei sera. — Roman de Rou.
2 See Wace, ' Roman de Rou.'

THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS 37
The Norman army began to move forward in three
divisions. In the centre was the flower of the knights,
commanded by William himself. The right wing was
under Roger de Montgomeri ; the left, formed of men
from Brittany, Poitou, and Maine, was led by Alain Fer-
gant, who had married William's daughter Constance.
Around the neck of William hung an amulet containing
some of those relics of Norman saints upon which he had
made Harold swear fealty to him. By his side rode his
half-brother Odo, the warrior-bishop of Bayeux,1 and Robert,
Count of Mortain, besides whom the aged Norman hero,
Toustain the White, bore a consecrated banner which Pope
Hildebrand had sent from Rome. It was at nine in the
morning that the Normans crossed the low ground between
Telham and Senlac (Battle). Before them rode at first
in mockery the juggler Taillefer, throwing up his sword
and catching it again ; but he was soon cut down by the
English. The English army, on the top and side of Senlac
hill, did not flinch, but stood firm with their battle-axes as
the Norman infantry, and afterwards the Norman cavalry,
burst upon them. The Breton auxiliaries, on the left, were
driven back, and fled in confusion. Then through the
Norman host a panic began to spread, and the English had
almost gained the day. The report was heard with terror
that the great Duke himself had fallen, when, tearing off
his helmet, he cried out, ' Why do you retreat ? Death is
behind you and victory in front ; and as for me, I am still
living, and by God's grace I will be victorious.' Upon
which his troops, taking heart, renewed the attack.
Then the three Norman brothers, William, Odo, and
Robert, pressed forward to the centre, where the three
noble English brothers, Harold, Gurth, and Leofwine, stood
defending the standard. Straight against the English king
rode the Duke. A spear, hurled by Gurth, killed his
Spanish war-horse, but he still advanced on foot. Gurth,
giving his own life for that most precious to him, flung him
self in front of the king, and fell at his feet crushed by a blow
from the heavy Norman mace. Almost at the same moment

38 SUSSEX
died Leofwine, perhaps by the hand of Odo or Robert.
Harold alone survived those who were dearest to him.
William now seized the horse of a knight of Maine and
remounted. His second charger was killed under him : a
third was offered by Count Eustace. Already, at several
points, the first English barricade was broken down ; but
behind it the rude palisaded barriers still stood, before
which every Norman who had yet attempted an entrance
had fallen. Then the invading chieftains, feeling that subter
fuge was their only chance, ordered the left wing of their
army to take to flight, and the English, who were nearest
to them, fell into the trap and pursued, leaving the western
portion of the hill of Senlac exposed to the enemy. By
this side then the Normans made good their entrance.
' Long was the day and terrible. The cries
Of " God to aid ! " " The Cross ! " " The Holy Cross ! "
With songs of Roland and of Roncesvalles,
Were heard, then lost in dumbness and dismay.
A mighty roar ensued, pierced thro' and thro'
By shrillest shrieks incessant, or of man
Or madden'd horse, that scream'd with fear and pain.
Death agonies ; the battle, like a ship
Then when the whirlwind hath it, torn and tost,
Staggered from side to side. The day was long :
By dreadful change of onset or feign'd flight,
And rout and rally, direfully drawn out,
Disastrous, dismal.' '
Even when the Normans had broken through their
palisades, the serried ranks of the English never gave way
but in death. Harold lived still, and horse and rider
continued to fall beneath his mighty battle-axe. He was
equally sagacious as a general and brave as a soldier, and
whilst he lived the cause of England was not hopeless. It
was to take that precious life then that the Norman duke
ordered all efforts to be directed. A shower of countless
arrows was fired into the air at a venture in his direction ;
and at length one of these pierced the right eye of the hero-
king, who sank in his death agony at the foot of the standard.
1 Sir Henry Taylor.

THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS 3g
Four Norman knights rushed upon him and despatched him
with many blows. Their chief was Eustace, son of that Guy
de Ponthieu who had taken Harold prisoner when he was
shipwrecked. One of the knights stabbed the king in his
breast, a second cut off his head, a third pierced him in the
body, and a fourth cut off one of his legs when he was
already dead. Still around the king's mangled body the
pride of England continued to fight and fall, and it was here,
at the very centre of the Saxon army, that the battle was won.
No quarter was ever asked or given, no Englishman fled, and
none were taken prisoners ; England died gloriously with its
king. None survived except those who had fallen wounded
and in time recovered. The nobility of England was utterly
destroyed. On the north side of Battle, the name of Maufosse
(Malfosse?) has been supposed to commemorate a steep
edge of Senlac, where the English had their last revenge.
The description in the Chronicle of Battle Abbey and the
account in the ' Roman de Rou,' and the picture in the
Bayeux tapestry, however, rather point to a spot south of
the lane leading from Battle Station to Catsfield as that
whither Norman horse and rider were tempted to pursuit,
only that they might fall in the twilight and be slain. At
one time the English success at this point was even so
alarming to the invaders, that Count Eustace urged William
to flight, deeming that a fresh force was coming upon him.
As the night of the 14th of October closed in, William
' the Conqueror ' knelt in thanksgiving where he had planted
his own banner on the spot occupied in the morning by
the royal standard of England. The next morning the
Frenchmen were buried. The English, also, where they
could be recognised, were permitted to be removed by their
relations. One woman alone, the Danish princess Gytha,
mother of Harold, begged in vain for the body of her son.
She offered to give its weight in gold, but was sternly
refused. Indeed, for some days the body could not be
found. Eventually Edith the Swan-necked, the king's for
mer mistress, recognised

40 SUSSEX
1 The pale majesty severe
Of him whom Death, and not the Norman Duke,
Had conquer'd ; him the noblest and the best
Of Saxon kings.' 1
The body was buried by one William Malet on the seashore,
near Hastings, at which a cairn of stones long marked the
place where Harold had been laid. This grave on the sea
shore bore the insolent inscription —
' Per mandata Ducis, Rex, hie, Heralde, quiescis
Ut custos maneas litoris et pelagi.'2
But it is believed that the king's body was soon privately
removed to Waltham, to rest in the minster he had founded.
A favourite legend tells that the inanimate body of
Harold was carried away from the battle-field, and that
he was transported by Osgood and Ailric, monks of Wal
tham, who had accompanied him, or, as some say, by
a poor peasant-woman, to Winchester, where a Saracen
woman, learned in surgery, revived him by her skill, and
nursed him for two years. Then he went to Saxony and
Denmark, to seek help for the reconquest of his kingdom,
but failing, returned to England to live as a hermit near
the Abbey of S. John at Chester, where he died at a great
age, after he had been visited — an aged, one-eyed anchorite
— by Henry I., to whom his secret was disclosed.
' But of all this history knows nothing. In her pages Harold died,
without a shadow of doubt, on the hill of Senlac, on the day of S.
Calixtus. Florence tells a true tale, in words speaking straight from
the depths of England's grief — "Heu, ipsemet cecidit crepusculi tem
pore." In that twilight of the gods, when right and wrong went forth
to battle, and when wrong for a moment had the victory, the brightest
light of Teutonic England sank, and sank for ever. The son of God
wine died, as such king and hero should die, helm on head and battle-
axe in hand, striking the last blow for his crown and people, with the
Holy Rood of Waltham, the last cry, rising from his lips, and ringing in
his ears. Disabled by the Norman arrow, cut down by the Norman
sword, he died beneath the standard of England, side by side with his
brothers in blood and valour. His lifeless and mangled relics were all
that was left either for scoffs of enemies or for the reverence of friends.'
— Freeman, ' Hist, of the Norm. Conquest.'
1 Henry Taylor's ' The Eve of the Conquest.'
2 ' By order of the Duke, here you, King Harold, rest, keeper of the land and sea.

ASHBURNHAM 41
There is a tradition that the ground still weeps blood
on account of the terrible slaughter of Senlac.1 Drayton
refers to it in mentioning the brook near Battle : —
' And Asten, once distain'd with native English blood,
Whose soil, when yet but wet with any little rain,
Doth blush, as put in mind of those there lately slain,
When Hastings harbour gave unto the Norman powers,
Whose name and honour now are denizen'd for ours.'
— Polyolbion, xvii.
The story of the ground of Senlac weeping blood origi
nated with William of Newbury. Fuller says it is ' to be
counted rather amongst the untruths than wonders.' There
is, however, ' a substratum of truth, for, owing to the quan
tity of iron in the Sussex soil, salts of iron are formed and
streams reddened with rain.' 2
It is a pleasant drive along the uplands, passing the
Union Workhouse and a lodge of Ashburnham Place to
(z\ m.) Normanhurst (Lord Brassey), a very ugly house of
bastard renaissance, in a beautiful situation, with lovely views
over sea and land. It contains a collection of South Sea and
other curiosities formed by Annie, Lady Brassey, during the
voyage of the Sunbeam. It is shown on Tuesdays.
Beyond Normanhurst, the road plunges on the outskirts
of Ashburnham (the house by the Ash brook3) into unusually
beautiful forest scenery. The fine old oaks, beeches, and
pines rise from a carpet of bluebells in spring, and grey
reaches of the Sussex Downs are hazy beyond the flat lines
of the Levels, with their ever-varying lights and shadows.
A lane to the right descends into a deep hollow, where,
4J m. from Battle, Ashburnham Place, a large brick house
of many dates, re-faced, and with no architectural im
portance, almost encloses the parish church (of S. James),
built by John Ashburnham, groom of the bed-chamber
to Charles I. and Charles II. {ob. 167 1), and contain
ing his stately tomb, by which his two wives, Frances
Holland and Elizabeth Kenn, and his brother, Sir William,
1 See Fuller's ' Worthies of England,' from William of Newbury.
2 See F. E. Sawyer in Notes and Queries, Ser. vi. vol. g, p. 343.
3 Which enters the sea at Pevensey.

42 SUSSEX
cofferer to Charles I. and IL, with his wife, the 'young,
beautiful, and rich widow ' of James, Earl of Marlborough,
are also commemorated. Sir John was the devoted com
panion of Charles I. in his flight from Oxford, and the
only person with him except Mr. Hudson, a clergyman,
who served as guide. He also accompanied the king in
his flight from Hampton Court on nth November 1647.
Cromwell imprisoned him in the Tower, and he was only
released on the death of the Protector. To this faithful
friend were given the blood-stained shirt with ruffled wrists,
marked with C. R. and a crown, which the king wore at
his execution, his white silk drawers, his watch and key,
and the sheet which was thrown over the king's headless
body. These relics were long exhibited in the church, for
the convenience of people who used to come from far and
near to touch them for the king's evil. Some years ago,
however, they were removed to the house, not on account
of their being objects of superstitious reverence, but because
the case of the watch was stolen, and the other objects
believed to be in danger.1 The initials of John Ashburn
ham and the date 1665 are over the church door. The
Pelham buckle appears in the mouldings.
Ashburnham has been more than eight hundred years
in the same family, which had barons in the time of Henry
III. Fuller speaks of it as 'a family of stupendous antiquity.'
Bertram de Eshburnham, constable of Dover under Harold,
was here at the Conquest. The Place (never shown) con
tains, or contained, a vast collection of valuable books and
MSS., including a Pentateuch of the fifth and an Apocalypse
of the sixth century. The greater part of the park is closed
to strangers, but a public footpath runs through part of it.
When the manufacture of iron was driven out of Sussex
by the consumption of the woods and the discovery of iron
in the coal districts, Ashburnham and Penhurst were the
last places to give it up. A forge existed here till 1809.
To the north of Ashburnham Park lie the old church and
1 A boy touched for the King's evil in the church as late as 1828. The shirt was
last used for the purpose in i860.

HURSTMONCEAUX 43
manor of Penhurst. The church has a cast-iron monument
to Peter Gower, 1703, and the manor farm has good iron
fire-backs from the forge here, which lasted till 181 1.
The return to Hastings may be varied by taking the
lanes through Catsfield. See p. 27.
6. Hurstmonceaux, 14 m. from St. Leonards (see Ch.
iii.), may be visited by the pleasure-vans which perpetually
conduct tourists thither; but these allow of a very short
stay, and are often over-crowded. In a carriage the Lewes
road may be taken, which passes Bexhill on the left, and
goes through Sidley Green and Ninfield, which has a charac
teristic Sussex church (S. Mary) and old yew-tree. A little
farther the road passes on the left, embosomed in grand
Spanish chestnuts, the fine old farmhouse called Standard
Hill, with scriptural mottoes on its front,1 marking the spot
where a popular error describes the Conqueror as having
planted his standard after the battle of Hastings. Descend
ing thence into the valley of the Ash burn, the highroad
winds through a wild, forest-like bit of scenery — a grove
of old oaks, with lovely glimpses of blue downs and yellow-
green level. The opposite hill is crowned by the weird
group of wind-blown pines known as The Crooked Aunts,
near the entrance of the old-fashioned village of Boreham
Street, beyond which are remains of a XVI. c. mansion
of the Colbrond family, settled here from the time of
Edward III., with a sundial and Corinthian window as
marked features. The Castle of Hurstmonceaux (see
later) is about 1 m. from hence, taking a narrow lane to
the left.
The return may be most pleasantly varied by taking
the road to the left from the valley below Boreham Street,
skirting the beautiful Ashburnham Park and woods, and
passing through Battle. See p. 28.
7. Bodiam Castle. The London Road, running directly
1 'God's Providence is my inheritance,' as on the 'God's Providence House' at
Chester. Also ' Except the Lord build the house, they labour but in vain that build
it. Here we have (1659) no abidence.'

4-1

SUSSEX

north from St. Leonards, reaches at 6 ///. the pretty village
of Sedlescombe, with a green surrounded by old-fashioned
timbered houses, and a church (S. John Baptist) remarkable
for its perpendicular font-cover. Titus Oates was at school
at Sedlescombe, when his father was rector of All Saints at
Hastings. ' The village is built on the long rise of a hill, among the woods and
hop-gardens in which the marsh comes to an end. It is divided in the

Bodiam Castle — South Side.

midst by a long straggling green, and, to the best of my knowledge,
surpasses all other Sussex villages except Mayfield in its wealth of
beautiful half-timbered houses of the XVI. and XVII. c. The chief inn
of the place is a model of many-gabled beauty and bad interior arrange
ment ; and, as far as one can see, no bricklayer's trowel has touched it
since its edification in 1625.' — Coventry Patmore.
Winding lanes lead on by Cripp's Corner through the
hazel copses, which are so abundant in this part of Sussex.
' If you go nutting on Sundays, the devil will come to help,

BODIAM CASTLE

45

and hold down the boughs for you,' is an old Sussex pro
verb ; and ' as black as the devil's nutting bag ' is another.
In the valley of the Rother, which flows into the sea
at Rye, and is navigable as far as this, we find, at 13 m.,
Bodiam Castle, standing very picturesquely in a miniature
lake covered with water-lilies, ' all round and martial, and
still defiant, as in the palmy days of the Dalyngrudges.' 1
On the north it overlooks a jousting-field, and is ap-

I
111

^mmmAiAi

ii- \ ( ...

mAf*-

Bodiam Castle — North Side.

proached over the lake by a causeway, in the centre of
which, on an island, it was entered by a gate which had been
a barbican, with a triple portcullis and drawbridge. Over
the entrance are three shields with arms of Bodiam, Dalyn
grudge, and Wardieux, and above them the Dalyngrudge
crest — a unicorn's head. Around its little court ten towers,
about 70 feet high, rise abruptly from the water. The
round-headed windows have a Norman aspect, but the
whole building is perpendicular. i. Quarterly Review, No, 223.

46 SUSSEX
We find notice of Osbern de Bodiam in 1087. His
great-grandson, William, was a crusader under Coeur de
Lion. Margaret, the crusader's great-grand-daughter, pro
bably married into the family of Wardieux or Wardedieu,
who next possessed Bodiam, and whose heiress, in the
reign of Edward III., married Sir Edward Dalyngrudge,
a hero of Crecy and Poitiers, and one of the most success
ful knight adventurers of his time, by whom the present
castle was built, 1386, in the time of Richard II. Sir
Edward entailed Bodiam on his first cousins, excluding
his sister Margaret, who had married Sir Thomas Sack
ville. Thus it came to the family of Lewknor, who held it
till the Civil Wars, when Bodiam and Amberley, the two
castles of the Royalist Sir Lewis Lewknor, were dismantled
Before the end of the XVII. c. Bodiam was sold to the
Levetts. At the Restoration it belonged to the Tupton
family, from whom it passed to the Welsh Powells, who
sold it to the Websters of Battle, who re-sold it (1828) to
the Fullers of Rosehill. It has since been again sold to
the Cubitts, its present owners.
The Castle Field, on the north, has remains of earth
works. It was formerly called ' the gun-garden,' from the
idea that guns were planted there by troops of Richard III.
to take the castle from the Lewknors. The Church, dedi
cated to S. Giles, has a brass of W. Wetherden, 15 13, and
fragments of others.
8. Brede and Northiam (which in a long summer day
may be combined with the preceding excursion to Bodiam).
The Sedlescombe road must again be taken till after it
passes under an arch 21- m. from St. Leonards. Then we
must turn right, down lanes winding through woods, to the
church of Westfield (5 i?i.).
Two miles farther, across a stream known as the Brede
river, and at the top of a hill, is Brede, with a rather hand
some church (S. George). The south aisle of the chancel,
with traceries almost Flamboyant in character, was built early
in the XVI. c. by Sir Goddard Oxenbridge {ob. 1531), whose

BREDE

47

handsome tomb bears his effigy in armour. His legend
is picturesque. A cannibal giant, he is supposed to have
eaten a child every night for his supper. The children of
Sussex thereupon held a council for self-protection. They
invented a decoction of hops — the origin of beer manufac
ture — which he was persuaded to drink till he was stupefied,
and then they brought a gigantic wooden saw and laid it
across him, and the children of East Sussex rode upon one

Brede Place.

end, and the children of West Sussex upon the other, until
the ogre was sawn through ; and ' is not the tomb of Sir
Goddard Oxenbridge in Brede Church to prove it ? '
Turning to the right from the village, and descending the
hill — on the other side of the stream and the ' Wish,' as such
a hollow is called in Sussex — we reach Brede Place, one of
the best existing specimens of the small country-houses of
the time of Henry VII., of which Brympton in Somerset is
so fine an example. The earlier part of the house was built

48 SUSSEX
by Sir Thomas Oxenbridge, who died November 1497, and
Sir Goddard, who died February 1531. It is of stone, with
foliated windows, and two fine chimneys with diagonal shafts
battlemented. Additions in brick with stone dressings were
made under Elizabeth. The entrance was originally in the
centre. The house is strangely ill-arranged internally. The
hall, which once rose to the whole height of the building,
has been subdivided into an upper and lower floor. The
present porch leads at once into the principal chamber.
South of this is another large but low room, with an arched
chimney. Hence a door opens into a chapel, divided by
an oak screen. The staircase is dark. The Place was long
a satisfactory resort of smugglers, as the legends attached to
Sir Goddard kept people away, and accounted to them for
all the strange sounds which were heard there.
Groaning Bridge is pointed out as the spot where Sir
Goddard Oxenbridge was sawn in half by the children. In
Great Sowdens Wood is a heronry.
Udimore, 1 nt. east, has an old church (S. Mary), be
yond a pool, which is the subject of a delightful legend. It
was begun originally on the other side of the water, but the
work done by day always mysteriously disappeared during
the night. Then the parishioners sat up and watched, and
behold, in the night, the air was full of the rushing and
glistening wings of angels, who took up the materials of the
church and carried them across the water, as the night winds
bore back their chaunt — ' Over the mere ! over the mere ! '
So the church was finished where they willed it, and the
place was called 'Over the Mere' — Udimore — to this day.1
A license to crenellate Udimore Court Lodge was granted in
1 9th Edward IV. to John Elrington, treasurer of the king's
household. Winding northward through the lanes from Brede village,
we pass the Well House, a fine old timbered XVI. c. farm,
and reach (10 m. from St. Leonards) Northiam — the Norgem
of the old distich —
1 Horsfield derives the name Udimore from eau de vter, and says that the sea-
water formerly flowed on one side of il.

NORTHIAM 49
' O rare Norgem ! thou dost far exceed
Beckley, Peasemarsh, Udimore, and Brede.'
Accepted Frewen, Archbishop of York, was born here
in 1588. His father, the Rev. John Frewen, lived first
(1583) at the farmhouse called the Carriers, and then (1593)
at the still existing Church House, a building of the time of
Henry VIIL, where his son Thankfulle resided, and many
other of his children and descendants, till the purchase
of Brickwall. In 162 1 John Frewen published 'Certaine
choise grounds and principles of our Christian religion,
wherein the people of the parish of Northiham have been
instructed and catechized for the settling of their hearts
and mindes in the mysteries of Salvation.' He was buried
in the chancel ofthe church, April 1628. His son Thank
fulle and several of his descendants were rectors of Northiam
after him. In the church is some stained glass brought
from the chapel of Brede Place. There are brasses of
Robert Benford, rector, 15 18, and Nicholas Tupton, 1538.
Beneath a mausoleum (of 1846) are many coffins of the
Frewens. On the village green are remains of the oak beneath
which Elizabeth rested and dined, and where she is said
to have taken off her shoes. The Queen dined twice at
Northiam, on the nth and 14th August 1573, on her way
to and from Rye. After her visits an avenue was planted
with acorns from her oak as an approach to Brickwall, but
of this avenue only one gigantic tree remains.
Brickwall is a fine timbered Elizabethan house, with
some additions made under Charles II. Opposite the back
or later side of the house is a noble ancient garden with
quaint clipped yews and old-fashioned flowers. The fine
old rooms contain interesting portraits — John Frewen,
rector of Northiam, by Mark Gerard ; two of his sons,
Archbishop Accepted Frewen and Stephen, by Gerard
Loest ; the Lord Keeper Coventry and his second wife,
by Cornelius Jansen, having been presents to Thankfulle
Frewen, who was the Lord Keeper's secretary ; ' Lady
Guldeforde,' by Holbein. On the staircase are preserved D

50 SUSSEX
Queen Elizabeth's green silk shoes and Archbishop Frewen's
barometer. Dixter, in this parish, is a curious old farmhouse, and
Tufton Place was the original home of the Tuftons, Earls
of Thanet. 9. Pett, Guestling, and Icklesham. From Fairlight, or
following the Old London Road from Hastings to New
Ore, and then continuing north over the hill and turning
to the right, the lanes take us to Pett, where the church
contains a monument by Westmacott to Cordelia Sayer,
1820. An inscription of 1641 tells that —
1 Here lies George Theobald, a lover of bells,
And of this house, as that epitaph tells ;
He gave a bell freely to grace the new steeple,
Ring out his praise, therefore, ye good people.'
Below Pett, at Cliff End, the artist will find a very
picturesque view over the Levels towards Winchelsea and
Rye. The rare gadwall, Anas strepera, was shot on Pett
Level in 1881, and a great bustard, Otis tarda, in 1891.
Pedestrians may reach Winchelsea from hence by a walk
along the bank of the Military Canal, constructed to protect
Pett Level.
' Crowds of cattle and horses are likely to follow you, galloping and
" galumphing" round you, and kicking up their heels in fearless joy at
the wonderful sight of a man. Herons, ducks, and coots, not expecting
such a phenomenon, allow themselves to be surprised at very close
quarters. Contrastingly suggestive of remote and noisy convivialities,
the seashore just about here is literally lined with old corks.' — Coventry
Patmore, ' In tlie Sussex Marshes. '
Guestling Church (S. Andrew or S. Lawrence) (4! m.
from Hastings) is partly transition Norman, and contains
monuments of the Ashburnham family: much of it was
destroyed by fire in 1890. Broomham Hall, described
in Gilpin's 'Picturesque Tour,' has belonged to the family
of Ashburnham from the time of Edward IV. In the old
timbered farmhouse of ±Maxfield was born Gregory Martin
{ob. 1582), the translator of the Rheims edition of the Bible,

WINCHELSEA 51
and a number of various XVI. c. religious books. He is
buried at S. Etienne at Rheims, where his epitaph alludes
to his birthplace —
' Quem tulit umbrosis tenerum South Saxia sylvis
Gallica qua spectat regna Britannus ager.'
2.\ m. farther on the road is Icklesham, where the church,
dedicated to S. Nicholas, the patron of mariners, has a
Norman tower, nave, and aisles, to which an early English
chancel and a decorated south chancel have been added.
An altar-tomb commemorates Henry Finch, 1493. It is
only i\ m. farther to Winchelsea.
10. Winchelsea, 9 m., and Rye, 11 m. from Hastings,
may be reached by stations on the Ashford Railway line,
or by continuing the last excursion a little farther by road.
There was once an older Winchelsea,1 3!- m. to the
south-east of the existing village, occupying a narrow penin
sula — ' Gwent chesel ey ' — the shingle island on the Level.
It was here that William the Conqueror landed, when he
arrived from Normandy the second time, 1067 : here, also,
two of the knights who murdered Thomas a Becket landed
in 1 1 70 ; and, though it belonged till the time of Henry III.
to the Abbey of Fecamp, to which it had been granted by
Edward the Confessor, Old Winchelsea at one time supplied
ten out of the fifty-seven ships which were furnished by the
Cinque Ports. Robert of Winchelsea, the Archbishop of
Canterbury who married Edward I. to his second wife
Margaret, was born here.2 As one of the lesser Cinque
Ports, the town undertook to provide five ships, while
Hastings could only support three and Rye four. But in
1236 the sea began to invade Old Winchelsea; 300 houses
and several churches were 'drowned' in 1250, and all the
rest ofthe town on S. Agatha's Eve, 1287.
1 The rhyme — ' Dovor, Sandivicus, Ry,
Rum, Frig-mare-ventus,'
in Jeake's 'Charters of the Cinque Ports,' refers to the barbarous Latin name for
the place — Friget-mare-ventus, 'Wind chills Sea.' (See Notes and Queries, S. vi.
vol. ix.)
2 See Fuller.

V- SUSSEX
The eminence which we now see rise from the level
marshes, dark with tufted trees, interspersed with old build
ings, was then surrounded by the waves on the north and
east ; and it was here that the surviving inhabitants of Old
Winchelsea took refuge. But the hill, then called Higham,
was a strong position, easily defensible, and Edward I. saw
its advantages and surrounded it with strong walls and gates,
within which — as at the bastide of Montpazier, in France,
where a similar work of the English king remains in per
fection — he laid out a town on a regular rectangular plan,
dividing it into thirty-nine blocks of building, with great
churches in open and central positions, two monasteries,
municipal buildings, and storehouses. The exact sites of
the streets and squares, together with the names of the first
owners, are fully set forth in a return made in 20 Edward I.
The distance from the Landgate to the Newgate is one
mile, and the space enclosed about a hundred acres. When
the plan was completely marked out, the king came to
inspect it. Edward III. also was here in 1350, and em
barked beneath the walls of Winchelsea to defeat the Span
ish fleet within sight of its ramparts on the 29th August.
But, while the king was occupied with his French wars,
eight thousand Frenchmen landed here in 1359, massacred
the mass of the inhabitants, who had taken refuge in the
great church, and set fire to the town. Nine years after
wards it was taken a second time and sacked by the French
under the Comte de S. Pol. In 1377 a French fleet ap
peared again, and Rye was taken and plundered. ' Then the
French let fly their great guns,' says Fuller, ' and I take it to
be the first and the last time they were planted by a foreign
enemy on the English continent.' But Haymo, Abbot of
Battle, came to the rescue of Winchelsea, and successfully
defended it, whilst it saw the destruction of its neighbour
city. In 1380, however, Winchelsea was again taken and
sacked by Jean de Vienne, who destroyed the nave of the
existing church; and the town was once more taken and
fired by the French in 1449, in the time of Henry VI.
Meantime the capricious sea, which had encroached upon

WINCHELSEA

53

Old Winchelsea and destroyed it, now began to forsake the
second town.
In 1 60 1 Raleigh speaks of New Winchelsea as ' gone to
decay.' After a fashion, however, it survived all its catas
trophes. The immense vaults for merchandise, which still
remain, show that it had some commercial importance in
the XV. and XVI. c. ; and when Queen Elizabeth was here

The Strand Gate, Winchelsea.

in 1573, and its officials dressed up in scarlet to receive
her, she was so pleased with the place — though only sixty
families were living there then — that she called it 'Little
London.' Three churches, S. Giles, S. Leonard, and S.
Thomas, were then in existence. During Elizabeth's reign
also, Winchelsea, as well as Rye, began to be colonised by
French Protestant refugees.
' The world knows how the bigotry of Louis XIV. drove many fami
lies out of France into England, who have become trusty and loyal sub-

54 SUSSEX
jects of the British crown. Among the thousand fugitives were my
grandfather and his wife. They settled at Winchelsea in Sussex, where
there has been a French church ever since Queen Bess's time and the
dreadful day of S. Bartholomew. Three miles off, at Rye, is another
colony and church of our people, another fester Burg, where, under
Britannia's sheltering buckler, we have been free to exercise our fathers'
worship, and sing the songs of our Zion.' — Thackeray, 'Denis Duval!
' Shall we go see the reliques of this town ? ' * we may
well say as we leave the station, for there is no longer any
town at all, only its relics. It is doubtful, indeed, whether
the city, as planned out by Edward I., was ever finished,
though in early summer mornings the foundations of
streets and squares, where nothing exists now, where per
haps nothing was ever completed, may be seen mapped out
in the dew. But the place is full of a quiet melancholy
beauty, very dear to the artist, with its ivied walls and
venerable gateways, and streets so green with grass, that a
century ago the herbage was let for some years for ^g.'2
' The panoply of a tender grey sky, fashioned of many and many soft
clouds, floating over and past one another, and lightening a little where
the sun should have been, was spread over the placid ground. The sea
was grey, too, beyond the flats, melting into the grey sky ; the white
headland in the distance, and the grey towers along the shore seemed
very near and distinct : sheep wandered up and down the banks of
the dyke, cropping steadily ; the air was soft and kindly.' — Margaret
Maliphant. On coming up from the station, we first meet with the
Land or Pipe Well Gate, a square mass of masonry now
standing alone. More picturesque is the Strand Gate, on
the same line, through which the road runs to Rye, and
through the arch of which there is such a striking view of
the grey buildings and red roofs of that most picturesque
old town, rising beyond the long flat lines of marsh, amid
which Camber Castle appears, a fortress of defence built
by Henry VIII. Its walls were formerly washed by the
sea, and the old men of 1624 remembered the time when
four hundred tall ships of all nations ' were anchored in
1 Twelfth Night.
2 Quarterly Review, No. 223,

WINCHELSEA

55

the Camber,' where the sheep now feed. The Strand
Gate appears in Turner's Liber Studiorum, and, with its
massy ivy-mantled towers standing out against the exquisitely
soft pink and blue shadows of the Levels, has been painted
by a thousand artists. It was on the steep bank close by
that Edward I. was nearly killed by his horse taking fright
at a windmill and leaping over the parapet.
In the centre of the remains of the old town stands the
massy fragment of its greatest church, ¦S'. Thomas a Becket,
being only the chancel of the huge original intention with

S. Thomas a Becket Winchelsea.

its aisles, and a porch bearing the arms of Winchelsea,
which is a later addition. There are some picturesque
ruined fragments of transepts and nave, but a doubt exists
as to whether even these were ever finished, or whether the
repeated misfortunes which fell upon the town did not cut
short their completion. The existing building is a fine
example of early decorated architecture, in the construc
tion of which Caen stone and Sussex marble are combined.

56 SUSSEX
The south aisle, dedicated to S. Nicholas, is the A lard
Chantry, and contains two grand tombs, greatly dilapidated.
The earlier of these bears the noble cross-legged effigy of
Gervase Alard, Admiral of the Cinque Ports in 1303 and
1306. Living at the time when the church was built, he
was probably its principal benefactor. He wears a coat of
mail and his hands clasp a heart. Heads of Edward I. and
Eleanor are amongst the ornaments of the canopy, which
is rich in quaint and exquisite sculpture, a decoration of
oak-leaves being principally used. It was on this tomb
that Millais has placed a child in his picture of ' Safe from
the Battle's Din.' The second tomb is that of Stephen
Alard, grandson of Gervase, Admiral of the Cinque Ports
in 1324. Here also the oak foliage of the canopy springs
from a human head. Beyond the tombs, sedilia and a
piscina remain. Removed to the centre of the pavement
is a very beautiful foliated cross of 1354, which formerly
lay close to the great tomb. It is inscribed to Reynaud
Alard, and is the only one of the monuments which bears
the family name.
The north aisle contains three canopied tombs of the
time of Henry III., probably also of the Alard family — a
knight in a coat of mail, a lady, and a young man in a robe.
The aisle was the chantry of John Godfrey, 1441, and his
wife Maline. In the central aisle is the brass of a priest.
A monument to Richard Maliphant, 1820, on the west wall
of the south aisle, suggested the name of Mrs. Comyns
Carr's novel.
The remains of a detached campanile existed on the
south-west of the churchyard till 1790. Near the church
stands the ash-tree beneath which John Wesley preached.
'Oct. 7, 1790. — I went ovei to that poor skeleton of ancient Win
chelsea. It is beautifully situated on the top of a steep hill, and was
regularly built in broad streets crossing each other and encompassing a
very large square, in the midst of which was a great church, now in
ruins. I stood under a large tree on the side of it, and called to most of
the inhabitants of the town, "The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand,
repent, and believe the Gospel." It seemed as if all that heard it were,
at the present, almost persuaded to be Christians.'

WINCHELSEA 57
Hard by is the primitive little Town-Hall (the magis
trates now sit at Rye), the base of which was used as a
prison. It is a curious and interesting building, with
peculiar romanesque windows and entrance gate.
To the south of the church is the entrance to The Friars
(Major Stileman), to which visitors are only admitted on
Mondays. The present house was only built from the
ruins of the Franciscan Monastery in 18 19, but the apsidal
choir of the Chapel of the Virgin was spared, and stands in
the garden — a very picturesque and graceful ruin. It was
founded in 1310. The famous highwaymen, George and
Joseph Weston, resided at the Friars under assumed names,
and enjoyed the highest consideration, one of them being
churchwarden of Winchelsea, They were taken after
robbing the Bristol mail, and one of them was hung.
Thackeray's novel of 'Denis Duval' is founded on their
story. One of the last occasions on which life was sacrificed
in a struggle with smugglers was at Winchelsea in 1838.1
Beyond the Friars, about f m. from the village, a deep
lane, overhung with trees, is crossed by the arch of the
New Gate, a picturesque and singular relic, in this lonely
spot, of the departed glories of the town.
Beneath several of the houses are crypts — storehouses of
the merchants when Winchelsea had the monopoly of the
French wine trade. The seal of the town bears a represen
tation of the murder of Becket, and places it under the
protection of S. Giles and S. Thomas a Becket.
A proverb says, ' He who drinks at S. Leonard's Well
(near Winchelsea), must always slake his thirst at its
waters.' 2
Plaice — 'Playz de Wynchelsee' — are taken abundantly
in the sea near here. Winchelsea is a very healthy spot,
though so near the ague-bringing marshes. The shepherds
of the plain call the ague ' Old Johnny ' and wear a charm
against it — a three-cornered piece of paper, suspended
round the neck, and inscribed —
1 See Quarterly Review, No. 223.
2 Notes and Queries, Ser. ii. vol. iv. p. 145.

58 SUSSEX
' Ague, I thee defy :
Three days shiver,
Three days shake,
Make me well for Jesu's sake.'
There are many charming walks in the high ground near
Winchelsea, and the artist will find it a most attractive rest
ing-place, and delight in the peculiar character of the place,
the unexpected bits of ruin cropping up here and there, the
strong relief of the foregrounds, the exquisite delicacy of
the distances, and the picturesqueness of twilight in such
unusual scenery.
' I strolled down to the sea-shore that hemmed the margin of the
marsh, and sat down upon the beach to listen to the wash of the water
upon the pebbles as the tide went out. It was one of those serene
evenings that are made for dreaming : the sea was calm, and melted
into the sky with a little haze upon the horizon ; streaks of varied
shades crossed it in lines, brown upon the shallows, palest green beyond,
blue where the waters deepened, and darker still when the shadow of
passing clouds fell upon its bosom. A fishing-boat, with brown sail
flapping idly, lay becalmed in the offing, and steamers crossed the dis
tance. The lighthouse at the end of the long faint pink line, that was
the far point that swept out into the ocean, seemed scarcely to be on
land at all, but a mere speck of white in a veil of haze at sea, and even
the shipping in the harbour, but two miles away, had a phantom look,
although the distant cliffs to my sight could not but be stable and
stately even in that languid atmosphere.' — Margaret Maliphant.
Camber Castle (it m.) is an example of purely military
architecture of Henry VIII. It was dismantled in 1642.
' The castle is remarkable as a specimen of purely military architec
ture of the reign of Henry VIII. There is something very striking in
seeing late details, perpendicular mouldings and gargoyles, four-centred
arches and the like, such as we are accustomed to in ecclesiastical and
domestic work, applied to a building where defence is even more the
primary object than in the old Norman fortress.'-^/. H. Parker.
2 m. east of Winchelsea is Rye, on the river Rother,
here of considerable width after its junction with the
streams Brede and Tillingham.
' Winchelsea is a town in a trance, a sunny dream of centuries ago ;
but Rye is a bit of the old world living pleasantly on, in ignorance of
the new.' — Coventry Patmore.

RYE 59
The old-fashioned houses rise quaintly on the side of a
little hill, and have more the aspect of a Norman than an
English town, perhaps because, like Winchelsea, it belonged
to the Abbey of Fecamp from the time of the Confessor to
Henry III. It became one of the Cinque Ports, but, with
its sister city, suffered every possible misfortune from war,
fire, pestilence, and devastation by the sea. Elizabeth,
however, named it ' Rye Royal,' from ' the noble entertain
ment she had, accompanied by the testimonies of love and
loyalty, duty and reverence, she received from the people,' 1
and the town was preserved from the decay which has
overwhelmed Winchelsea by becoming the point of depar
ture for troops bound for France under Elizabeth, and still
more by its being a favourite resort of industrious French
Huguenot refugees.
' Elizabeth entertained with all kind of courtesy such French people
as fled into England ; as also the Netherlanders, of whom a great
multitude had withdrawn themselves into England, as to sanctuary,
while the Duke of Alva breathed nothing but death and blood against
them, who, by the Queen's permission, seated themselves at Norwich,
Colchester, Sandwich, Maidstone, and (South) Hampton, to the great
benefit and commodity of the English, for they were the first that
brought into England the art of making those slight stuffs which they
call bazes and sazes, and other such like stuffs of linen and woollen
weaving.' — Camden's 'Elizabeth,' i. 119.
The harbour of Rye is still used, and boat-building still
goes on there.
' May never French land on this shore, to the Iosse of the English !
But if so sad an accident should happen, send then our Sussexians no
worse success than their ancestors of Rye and Winchelsey had, 1378,
in the reign of Richard the Second, when they embarked for Nor
mandy : for in the night they entered a town called Peter's Port, took
all such prisoners who were able to pay ransome, and safely returned
home without losse, and with much rich spoil ; and amongst the rest
they took out of the steeple the bells, and brought them into England,
bells which the French had taken formerly from these towns, and
which did afterwards ring the more merrily, restored to their proper
place, with addition of much wealth to pay for the cost of their
recovery.' — Fuller, 'The Worthies of England.' -»
1 See Jeake's ' Cinque Ports Charters,' p. 108.

60 SUSSEX
At the entrance of the town the street is crossed by the
much decayed but still stately Land Gate. Another gate —
Badding's Gate — was destroyed by the sea, and two more
gates have been wantonly pulled down in recent times.
The vast Church of S. Mary 1 has a Norman tower, and
remains of Norman arching in the transepts, otherwise it is
XIII. and XIV. c. On the north is the early English chapel
of S. Clare ; the south chapel is dedicated to S. Nicholas.
A local tradition says that the clock — one of the oldest still
working clocks in the county — on which fat cherubs strike
the hour, was given by Elizabeth. Near the altar is the
brass of Thomas Hamon, 1607, 'six times mayor of Rye.'
A monument commemorates Allen Grebell, who ' fell by
the hand of a sanguinary butcher, March 17, 1742,' being
mistaken for a Mr. Lamb, with whom the butcher had
quarrelled. A pillory is preserved here, but a more curious
relic, a cucking-stool for scolds —
' That stool, the dread of every scolding queen,' -
was destroyed as firewood in 1856.
Richard Fletcher, afterwards Bishop of Bristol, was
rector here in 1579, when his son, the famous dramatist,
was born at the rectory on the 20th of December.
In the churchyard, many tombstones bear the French
names of Protestant refugees. A long list exists of the
French and Flemish exiles who came to settle at Rye,
March 28, 1569, and includes five Protestant ministers.
There was another great influx of refugees after the mas
sacre of S. Bartholomew in 15 71, as many as six hundred
and forty-one persons arriving to settle at Rye alone within
three days after the massacre. On November 4, 1572,
eighty-five Protestant refugee households were enumerated ;
many who were strangers to each other, and in no way
related, uniting to live together. A conference of the
French churches was held at Rye in 1587, but after that
the number of emigrants settled in the town became
1 It is pretended that Rye has the largest parish church in England, but this is
far from being the case.
2 Gay, ' Pastorals.'

RYE

61

gradually less, though the French Church at Rye was repre
sented in the conferences till 1660. The last immigration
of foreigners to Rye was on the persecution of 1 680, after
which they were allowed to use the parish church, with
the consent of the principal inhabitants.
Some of the old names from the first immigration of
1560 long remained: — Hamon, altered to Hammond; Le
Telliers, to Taylors ; Dansyes, to Dansays ; also the Querins
and the Flemish Sivyers and Valloys. Of the third immi-

Rye.

gration were the Neves and Tournays, and Gebon, altered to
Gibbon. Ofthe fourth, in 1685, Saveroy, became Savery ;
Renow, Reynolds ; the Espinetts long existed ; the Lewnes
still exist ; Merinian was changed to Meryon. Many his
tories remain of their difficult escapes. Aaron Pain of
Dieppe, with his third son, Gabriel, made his escape to
Rye, and was followed by his wife Rachel, who got on
board a vessel disguised in sailor's clothes. Their youngest
child, David, a year old, had been conveyed by his mother
at night under the town gate of Dieppe, through the channel

62 SUSSEX
of a watercourse, and received on the other side by an
English sailor, who had agreed to take care of him, and
who brought him safely to Rye, the place being chosen as
the family refuge because the eldest daughter, Rachel, was
already there, having been sent thither by her parents to
learn English.1
A stone building near the churchyard, believed to have
been originally the chapel of an Augustinian convent, is
interesting as having been the first church used by the
French refugees at Rye.
At the point of the hill beyond the church is the Ypres
Tower, built by William de Ypres, Earl of Kent (who died
1 162), in the time of Stephen. There is a wide view from
the terrace close by.
' The beauty of these views is beyond all description, and has never
been expressed even in painting. What strikes me as being most
characteristic, and least noticed in these views, is the effect of sun
shine. The sun, said to shine with double lustre upon Rhodes, cer
tainly seems to do so here. On a bright day you look down from these
walls on something like a. hundred square miles without a shadow,
except, perhaps, from the dark down of Fairlight ; and the endless,
peaceful glory, organic and alive in every inch of it, is doubled in effect
by the continual presence of that other bright, but barren and restless,
plain of sea.' — Coventry Patmore.
The steep streets of Rye are paved with round flints.
On Conduit Hill is a desecrated chapel oi Augustine Friars.
In Mermaid Street is an old house, built in 1680 by
Samuel Jeake the antiquary, and afterwards inhabited by
his son Samuel, a writer on astronomy and rhetoric. A horo
scope carved on the building probably indicates the position
of the planets under which the foundation-stone was laid
' precisely at noon.' An old timber house, once the Mermaid
Inn, contains some quaint carvings. Opposite the George
Inn is Peacock's School, founded 1636, to which Thackeray
makes his ' Denis Duval ' go for education.
The fishing-nets used at Rye and fixed to stakes are
called ' kiddle ' or ' kettle-nets,' whence the expression,
' What a pretty kettle of fish.'
1 See Sussex Arch. Coll., 'Protestant Refugees in Sussex.'

PL A YDEN 63
Rye and its neighbouring marshes were notorious in the
nearly extinct ' smuggling days.'
' The Romney Marsh men, who attained the most notorious reputa
tion of those lawless days, were mostly natives of Sussex, and made
midnight journeys into their native county for the purpose of buying
up the flocks of the South Down farmers, and it is stated that these
" Owlers," or wool-smugglers, would in a few weeks shear and export
150,000 sheep. So late as 1531, the men of Sussex are supposed to
have smuggled upwards of 150,000 packs of wool by the year, and the
small landed proprietors whose estates bordered on the sea-coast were
too much influenced by a near but false prospect of gain. Large for
tunes were accumulated thus in East Sussex. Nor did the "free-trad
ing" cease until the war in 1793, existing during its later years contem
porary with another and still more disastrous system, namely, import
smuggling, Romney Marsh still leading the van, the captain ofthe band
being a man named Hunt, who became mixed up in the political dis
turbances of his time, the smuggling fraternity having none of them any
objection to turn a penny in conveying either letters or passengers when
the chance offered.' — Once a Week, Sept. 16, 1865.
J m. north of Rye is Playden. Here, near the north
door of the church (S. Michael), is a XV. c. monument,
¦ ornamented with a brewer's fork and mash-tub, and in
scribed, ' Hier ist begraben Cornelis Zoetmanns ; bidt
voer die ziele ' (pray for his soul).
The proverb —
' Sauket church, crooked steeple,
Drunken parson, wicked people,'
refers to Playden, known as Sauket or Salcot Street, from
the salted cod spread on its banks to dry.1
At 2 m. is Lden. Alexander Iden, Shakspeare's ' Gentle
man of Kent,' slew Jack Cade.
Beyond Rye, the railway enters Kent in the singular
district of Romney Marsh, formed by the meeting of the
sea-currents from the Atlantic and the North Sea, and
ending in the promontory of Dungeness, which consider
ably increases every year. Here the sojourner at Hastings
should visit Romney — 'bourg delaisse au milieu des
marais,' as Elisee Reclus calls it; and, above all, the
l See Notes and Queries, Ser. vi. vol. ix. p. 401.

64 SUSSEX
curious church of Brookland, with its unique timber tower
of rude Norwegian aspect, and its leaden tub font with
the symbols of the months impressed on its sides. The
scenery has a character all its own.
' The wane of the day had fallen into dusk, the brown had settled into
grey, and now that the gold of the sunset reflection had faded, the
marshland was very still and sweet ; the sheep were not even white
blots upon it, so entirely did the tender pall harmonise all degrees of
hue, so that the kine seemed no longer as living beings, but as mys
terious shapes bred of the very land itself. Even the old castle, so
grand and solid in the daytime, was now like some phantom thing in
the solitude — every curve and every circle defined more clearly than
in sunlight, yet the whole transparent in the transparent gloaming of
the air.
' The most solid thing in all this varied uniformity, this intangible
harmony, was a clump of trees in the near distance, that told a shade
blacker than anything else ; for the turrets of the distant town lay only
as a faint mass of purple upon the land, the little lights that twinkled in
it here and there alone betraying its nature ; long living lines of strange
clouds, that were neither violet nor grey nor white, lay along the blue
where sea and sky were one.' — Margaret Maliphant.

Ill
EASTBOURNE
HTILL after the middle ofthe XIX. c. Eastbourne consisted
¦*¦ of a row of old-fashioned houses — the Sea-Houses —
backed by open cornfields, intersected by elm-fringed lanes.
In different directions were three inland villages, South-
bourne, Meads, and Old Eastbourne; now all have been
united into one borough by the energy of its landowners —
the Duke of Devonshire and the Gilberts of Eastbourne
Place. The town of Eastbourne has now a sea-front more
than i£ m. in length, ending, in the direction of Beachy
Head, half a mile west of the Wish Tower, and closed at
the other end by the Redoubt, beyond which desolate stony
flats extend eastwards.
At Old Eastbourne is the Parish Church of S. Mary,
partly transition Norman, but chiefly perpendicular. Its
chancel contains a monument to Davies Gilbert, President
of the Royal Society; his real name was Giddy, but he
took that of Gilbert on his marriage. The Parsonage
Farm, close to the church, is said to have been a priory
of Black Friars. At the Lamb Lnn — one of the oldest inns
in Sussex — is a vaulted early English crypt in admirable
preservation. Compton Place (Duke of Devonshire) has beautiful
gardens. At Holywell, above the western shore, where
there are chalybeate springs, is All Saints Convalescent
Home, erected 1859.
The Martello Towers begin at Eastbourne, and fringe
the coast as far as Hastings. They were erected under
Pitt's administration, when a French invasion was expected,
65 E

66 SUSSEX
and now often give character and picturesqueness to an
otherwise dull scene.
The principal charm of Eastbourne is its vicinity to
Beachy Head — Beau-chef Head? — the south-eastern ex
tremity of the Sussex downs,
' Eastbourne owes much to Beachy Head, still the dread, though
not as once the grave, of mariners ; for a goodly lighthouse now burns
its nightly oil to the salvation of thousands, and a station of the mer
cantile telegraph communicates shipwrecks to Lloyd's ; and, though
dreadful, still the best of our hills, whose purest and keenest breezes
have revived so many languid frames, and strengthened so many a
tottering brain, and sent back many adyspeptic valetudinarian invigorated
for the duties of another year.' — Quarterly Rcviav, No. 223.
The cliff here rises to 575 feet. The heights are clothed
with soft short turf. The chalk cliffs are the refuge of thou
sands of puffins, guillemots, choughs, razorbills, and other
sea-birds. Peregrine falcons are also seen, and the rare
rock-dove — Columba liria — has been found here.
' I was much struck by the watchful jealousy with which the pere
grines seemed to guard the particular cliff — more than 500 feet from the
sea — on a lofty ledge of which their nest was situated, and which, indeed,
they evidently considered their own especial property ; with the excep
tion of a few jackdaws who bustled out of the crevices below, all the
other birds which had now assembled on this part of the coast for the
breeding season — it being about the middle of May — seemed to respect
the territory of their warlike neighbours. The adjoining precipice,
farther westward, was occupied by guillemots and razorbills, who had
deposited their eggs, the former on the naked ledge, the latter in the
crevices in the face of the cliff. Here the jackdaws appeared quite at
their ease, their loud, merry note being heard above every other sound,
as they flew in and out of the fissures in the white rock, or sate perched
on a pinnacle near the summit, and leisurely surveyed the busy crowd
below.' — A. E. Knox, 'Ornithological Rambles'
Wrecks used to be of frequent occurrence, but are now
very rare. In November 182 1, four shipwrecked sailors
clinging to the rocks were encouraged to hold on by the
sight of the samphire, which they knew must be above high-
water mark, till they were rescued. Mr. Jonathan Darby,

BEACHY HEAD 67
Vicar of East Dean from 1715 to 1728, was celebrated for
the number of shipwrecked persons he had personally
rescued, as well as for the staircase and cavern which he
made at his own expense, as a means of escape for those
shipwrecked beneath the cliffs.
' The cliff scenery of the chalk formation is striking in many parts of
the coast, but only becomes grand at Beachy Head. The needle-like
pinnacle standing a little distance apart, called the Charles Rock, is
the last of seven such fragments, whose memory survives in n. popular
weather-forecast — "When the Charleses 1 wear a cap, the clouds weep."
Samphire grows on the ledges of the Head just above the tidal limit.' —
Nineteenth Century, August 1884.
On a projecting promontory 1 m. west the Belle Toute
Lighthouse was erected in 1831. In the cliff is 'Parson
Darby's Hole,' till 1881 the only refuge for shipwrecked
crews. It was off Beachy Head that the naval action
took place on June 30, 1690, between the French under
the Comte de Tourville and the allied fleets of England
and Holland under Lord Torrington, an action in which
the allies were thoroughly defeated, the Dutch losing two
admirals, 500 men, and several ships — sunk to prevent
them from falling into the hands of the enemy, and the
English two ships and 400 men. The admirals on both
sides were blamed, ours for not fighting; the French for
not pursuing the victory.
1 1 m. farther west is Birling Gap, a cove, the entrance
to which was once defended by a gate and portcullis. It
was near this that the French privateer, Duguay Trouin,
with nine sail of the line and some smaller boats, took the
men-of-war Hampton Court and Grafton, and drove the
Royal Oak ashore.
' At irregular intervals on the Downs we meet with large flocks of
sheep, each under control of a single shepherd and his dog. Shallow
pools for their use have of late years been sunk in the deans, which,
besides serving their purpose, are favourite haunts of birds. The lover
1 The name is said to be corrupted from Churls, but more probably refers to
Charlston, a manor of West Dean.

68 SUSSEX
of aerial company may find it here to his heart's content, from the lark
mounting out of sight its topmost stair of song, and the windhover hawk
poising at mid-distance above his quarry, down to the whitethroat,
whose brief song of a few intertwisted sibilous notes seems to proceed
from a point close beside the listener, and the timid wheatear, beloved
of epicures, for whose behoof it is snared by T-shaped springs cut in
the turf, into which it flutters at the least noise, even at the shadow of
a passing cloud.1 Barring an occasional fox, hare, or rabbit, these are
the only living fellow-creatures that one may confidently reckon upon
meeting during a long day's ramble. Such relics of the past as lie
around, silent entrenchments and lonely barrows, do but enhance the
sense of absolute solitude, Depression of the spirit, however, is im
possible in an atmosphere so fresh and exhilarating, with a prospect so
wide and ever-shifting, now forward or behind, over curving uplands
and shelving valleys, now downward on one side over an endless suc
cession of fields and woods, villages clustered round their churches,
and scattered farmsteads ; on the other side, through gaps disclosing
glimpses of sea, bright or dark as sun or shadow falls on it, one moment
clear in the offing, at another flecked with white fishing-sails. How
deceptive are the distances from point to point upon these hills the
traveller will soon discover, and no "short cut," however tempting
towards the end of a journey, will seduce him a third time. But he
may buy experience too dearly if he lingers late upon the summit in
misty weather. Attempts to find a downward track during a fog are
well-nigh hopeless, not to say dangerous, as the chalk-pits, which are
numerous on the landward side, are usually unfenced.' — The Nine
teenth Century, August 1SS4.
' I never contemplate these mountains without thinking I perceive
something analogous to growth in their gentle swellings and smooth
fungus-like protuberances, their fluted sides, and regular hollows and
slopes, that convey at once the air of vegetative dilatation and expan
sion. Or was there ever a time when these immense masses of cal
careous matter were thrown into fermentation by some adventitious
moisture ; were raised and leavened into such shapes by some plastic
power, and so made to swell and heave their broad backs into the
sky so much above the less animated clay ofthe wild below?' — Gilbert
White. Beyond Birling Gap an excursion may be continued to
East Dean (1 m. north), where portions of the church are
Norman;2 to the Tudor house of Friston Place; and to
1 A Bourne wheatear may be added to Yarrell's list of ' The Six Good Things of
Sussex.' 2 A bell, inscribed to S. James, bears the legend — ' Me melior vere, non est cam
pana sub acre. '

JEVINGTON

69

the very curious and interesting village of West Dean (see
Ch. iv.), near Seaford. From Friston a road northwards
fringed with the white campion, known here as ' Grand
mother's nightcap,' may be taken to the hamlet oi Jevington,1
standing lonely in a hollow of the Downs. Here parts of
the church (S. Andrew) are Norman, indeed some say they
were Saxon, but their interest is ' restored ' away. This will
vary very pleasantly the return to Eastbourne by a pleasant

Wilmington Priory.

drive along the lower level of the Downs, through IVillin^-
don (where the church has the brass of Thomas Parker,
1558), and beneath Ration Park (not Wratton), which gave
a name to a family at a very early period.
In the same direction, following the road through Willing-
don, a delightful drive may be taken to (9 m.) Wilmington
(formerly Winelton), an attractive little village which nestles
1 Formerly written Gynynton.

70 SUSSEX
amongstj its old elms under the Downs, just where a
rude figure, ' the Long Man of Wilmington ' (some sa)1 1 80,
others say 240 feet high), may be seen scratched in the turf:
it has lately been renewed. The old-fashioned cottages
have brilliant gardens of flowers in summer, which line the
lane without any fence or division. At the top of a little
hill, a yew-tree, 20 feet in circumference, overshadows
the quaint little church (SS. Mary and Peter), which is
partly Norman, and, being unrestored, is still impressive
and interesting. The old Sussex name Ade is found often
repeated on its gravestones. On the west wall is carved a
figure. Close behind rise the picturesque remains of Wil
mington Priory, a Benedictine house colonised from the
Abbey of Grestein near Honfleur, in Normandy, to which it
was given by Robert de Mortagne, the first Norman lord of
the manor. Most of the ruins are now built into a farm
house ; the gateway is of the time of Henry VI. The
Priory seal has the figure of the Saviour seated under
a canopy, with the angel of the Annunciation on the
reverse. At a spot named the Well- Holes are the mon
astic ponds. Wilmington is about 3 ;;/. from Polegate and
2 m. from Berwick station, by which it may be visited
from Eastbourne by rail, and whence Michelham Priory
(see later) is also about 2 m. distant on the other side of
the line.
On the other side of Eastbourne, eastwards, Pevensey
Bay is fringed by a broad expanse of shingle, with scattered
green oases, the beginning of a wild district, across which
the peasants still walk with ' backsters,' flat pieces of wood
fastened to the soles of their boots to enable them to get
across the pebbles.
' On this wild health, the ring-dotterel, or stone-runner, as it is fre
quently termed, deposits three eggs, which can scarcely be distinguished
from the surrounding pebbles ; and many species of terns haunt it in
great numbers during the summer months. But amid this barren
waste, like an oasis in a desert, a cluster of green, furze-covered hil
locks suddenly appears, intersected with little fresh-water lakes, whose

PEVENSEY BAY 71
swampy banks, clothed with reeds and rushes, abound during certain
seasons with migratory birds of the grallatorial and natatorial divi
sions.' — A. F. Knox.
Where the road turns away from the beach on the way to
Pevensey is the farmhouse of Langley, which has a chapel
and other remains of an ancient grange of Lewes Priory.
[The road, which turns north from Langley to Hailsham,
passes the curious and interesting farm of Ottham Quarter.
An abbey of Premonstratensian canons was founded at
Otteham in the reign of Henry II. ; but the soil with which
they were endowed was ' so unprofitable that they were
starved out, and in 1203 they were removed by Eia de
Sankeville, the daughter of their founder, to Begeham
(Bayham), of which she was also patroness. The first
abbot of Ottham— Jordan — had been already translated
to be abbot of Bayham in 1200. Ottham, however,
was still kept up on a reduced scale as a shrine of S.
Laurence. Very little that is ancient remains except the
chapel of S. Laurence (now used as a stable), with ancient
sedilia and piscina. Hellingly Church belonged to the
canons of Ottham. The farm is now the property of Lord
Gage. A little farther the road passes (right) the picturesque
farm called Priests Hawse (Priest's House), formerly
the seat of the ancient family of Thatcher. Glynley is
a fine Elizabethan mansion of the Meeres, Fugges, and
Peacheys.] Through the village of West Ham, with its patched
church, spoiled by ' restoration,' we reach Pevensey (Peofn's
Island), with a station on the line to Hastings.
At the end of the street of West Ham we find the round
towers which flanked the western gateway of Anderida or
Andredcester, which derives its name from the vast forest
which the Britons called Coit Andred and the Saxons
Andred's Wald, and which Bede, writing in 731, describes
as all but inaccessible, and the resort of large herds of deer,
wolves, and wild bears. There is no evidence as to the

72 SUSSEX
date of the erection of the fortress, though it is usually said to
have been built under Julius Caesar, 55 B.C., who, by many,
is believed to have effected both his debarkations close by.1
Its walls, which enclose twelve acres, are still 12 feet thick
and from 20 to 25 feet high externally; but are filled up
within to 5 feet from their summits. They are built of flint
with strong mortar, strengthened by courses of red tiles.
At intervals there are towers, one of those on the north
side having evidently had additions after the Normans had
built a fortress within the Roman walls of the British fort.
About 490, Anderida was besieged by Aella the Saxon,
who totally destroyed all the British inhabitants.
' " Hoc anno, Aella et Cissa obsederunt Andredes-Ceaster, et inter-
fecerunt omnes qui id incoluerunt ; adeo ut ne unus Brito ibi superstes
fuerit" (Chron. Saxon, p. 15) ; an expression more dreadful in its sim
plicity than all the lamentations of (Gildas) the British Jeremiah.' —
Gibbon's 'Rome.'
On September 27, 1066, William the Conqueror set sail
from S. Valery in the Mora, followed by a fleet of 800
ships, and landed on the following day at Pevensey. The
Bayeux tapestry is inscribed — ' Hie Wilhelm Dux in magno
navigio mare transivit, et venit ad Pevensel ; ' and the
chronicles of Battle Abbey narrate — ' Dux ergo . . navi-
gationem aggressus, prospere tandem prope castrum Peve-
nesel dictum applicuit.' The Duke at once (before the
battle of Hastings) occupied the Roman-British fortress of
Anderida, which he bestowed upon his half-brother Robert
de Conteville, Earl of Mortain and Cornwall. Six months
after the battle of Hastings William embarked again at
Pevensey for Normandy.
Robert of Mortain built a Norman castle within the
ancient walls — the fortress whose ruins face us as we enter
the enclosure of Anderida from West Ham, or which first
meets those who approach from Hurstmonceaux or Hast
ings. In 1 104 the barony of Pevensey passed to Robert
de Aquila, in whose family it remained for about a hundred
1 See Thomas Lewin, 'Thei nvasion of Great Britain by Julius Ca;sar. '

PEVENSEY CASTLE

73

years, and from whom the name of 'the Honour of the
Eagle ' was given to it. Gilbert de Aquila, the last lord of
Pevensey of his race, had all his lands and honours forfeited
in 1235 because he went to Normandy without the king's
leave. Then, for a short time, Pevensey was held by the
Earls of Warenne. About 1269 it was granted to Prince
Edward, afterwards Edward I., and continued to belong to
the Crown till Edward III. settled it on John of Gaunt,
who made the Pelham of that day his constable. Yet by

'P ^ ¦>»,. ''-'*vte#;--j .-
'yA^&-

At Pevensey Castle.

1309 it is already spoken of as a ruin ; though it must have
been restored before 1399, when Lady Pelham gallantly
defended it against the combined armies of Richard II. , at
which time she wrote from Pevensey ' to her trew lorde ' the
earliest letter extant in the English language. Twenty years
later Queen Joanna, widow of Henry IV., was imprisoned
here for four years during the reign of her stepson.

1 The king's stepmother, Johanna, being accused by certain per
sons of an act of witchcraft which would have tended to the king's

74 SUSSEX
harm, was committed, all her attendants being removed, to the
custody of Sir John Pelham, who, having furnished her with nine
servants, placed her in Pevensey, there lo be kept under his control.'—
Walsingham. In the time of Elizabeth the castle was ordered to be
utterly rased, but the command was fortunately disregarded,
and the sale of the materials by the Parliamentary Com
missioners, for £40, in 1650, had no worse result.
The Castle of the Eagle, entered opposite Pevensey
Church, had a courtyard surrounded by five towers, of
which one was the keep. Traces of a chapel exist, and
a well, in which skulls of the wolves which overran the old
forest of Anderida have been found.
' Fallen pile ! I ask not what has been thy fate,
But when the weak winds, wafted from the main,
Through each lone arch, like spirits that complain,
Come hollow to my ear, I meditate
On this world's passing pageant, and the lot
Of those who once might proudly, in their prime,
Have stood with giant front, till, bowed by time
Or injury, their ancient boast forgot,
They might have sunk like thee ; though thus forlorn,
They lift their heads with venerable hairs
Bespent, majestic yet, and as in scorn
Of mortal vanities and short-lived cares ;
Even so dost thou, lifting thy forehead gray,
Smile at the tempest and Time's sweeping sway.'
— William Lisle Bowles.
The sea has retired since the Conquest, and the site
of the ancient harbour has long disappeared under the
mud washed down by the little river Ashburn and the
sand brought up by the tides. Though it is still a source
of dispute whether Julius Caesar landed at Pevensey or
Deal, the landing of William of Normandy at Pevensey, on
a site now covered by the marsh, is tolerably certain, though
some authorities have asserted that he landed at Bulver
hythe, or still nearer Hastings.
Pevensey is still nominally one of the minor Cinque
Ports, dependent upon Hastings, and it preserves its cor-

PEVENSEY 75
poration seal, with an invocation to S. Nicholas, in addition
to the usual Cinque Port emblems. The freemen of its
port were formerly called 'barons,' and their simplicity was
the subject of numerous jokes from Andrew Borde (1490?-
1549), a Carthusian friar, mentioned for the office of suf
fragan-bishop of Chichester in 152 1, who resided for a time
at Pevensey : his house there is still pointed out. The
original ' Merry- Andrew ' (who died a prisoner in the Fleet
in 1549) is believed to have intended to burlesque the pro
ceedings of 'the Laste Court' which then regulated the
affairs of the Pevensey Marshes. The proverb 'As wise
as the wise men of Gotham,' as applied to Borde's ' Merie
Tales of the Mad Men of Gotham,' is believed to refer to
Gotham, a manor partly in the parish of Hailsham, partly
in that of Pevensey.1
The Church of S. Nicholas (patron of the port) is XIII.
to XIV. c. It contains a good monument of the time of
James I. to one John Wheatley. In the village is a very
primitive Prison. On the east, amid the vast feeding-
grounds often locally known as ' brooks,' the Ashburn
' At Pevensey pours her soft and gentle flood.'
— Drayton, ' Polyolbion' xvii.
In the Marsh, 2J m. north-east of Pevensey, was the lost
town of Northeye, mentioned in old lists as one of the eight
dependent members of the Cinque Port of Hastings. Ruins
of a chapel, dedicated to S. James, were standing not long
ago, and the site of Northeye is still known as ' the Town
Field,' 'the Chapel Field,' &c. The deed of endowment
of the Chapel of S. James by William de Northeye, Kt.,
still exists amongst the episcopal archives at Chichester.
On the edge of Pevensey Marsh, towards Willingdon, the
names of five pieces of land commemorate the lost village
of Hydneye.2 The rare white stork, Ciconia alba, has been
seen and shot on the Level here.
1 Some, however, believe Borde to have referred to Gotham in Lincolnshire.
2 See Turner, 'The Lost Towns of Northeye and Hydneye.'

76

SUSSEX

' The great and fertile plain stretching along the Sussex coast from
the eastward of Beachy Head in the direction of Hastings, and inland
towards Wartling, Hurstmonceaux, and Hailsham, now studded with
great and fat beeves, was at some remote era covered by the sea, and
what are known as ' eyes,' or elevations above the surrounding level —
such as Chillcye, Northeye, Horse-eye, Richney, &c. — must have been
islands, forming a miniature archipelago. As all these are of Saxon
meaning, it may be presumed that, at the time of Saxon colonisation,
they were frequently or constantly insulated.' — M. A. Lower, 'Hist, of
Sussex.' Following the road across the marsh, we reach (3! »/.),
on a wooded height above the Level, the little village of

^^S^€^m

Hurstmonceaux.

Wartling, where the Pelham buckle appears on the south
chapel of the (restored) church.
2 ;//. farther (9 vi. from Eastbourne, 4J m. from Peven
sey Station) is the entrance to the deserted deer-park of
Hurstmonceaux, from its recent desolation and premature
decay one of the most picturesque places in England.
The name is due to the marriage of one of the lords
of Monceaux in Normandy, who came over with the
Conqueror, with the Saxon heiress of a family then settled
on the place. The names of Waleran and Ingelram de
Monceaux frequently appear in deeds of Plantagenet times.
Their manor-house here was visited by Henry III. and
Edward I. In the reign of Edward II. Maud de Monceaux

HURSTMONCEAUX

77

brought the estate of Hurstmonceaux by marriage to Sir
John de Fienes, the descendant of a Norman family
which had come over at the Conquest, and whose repre
sentatives had been Constables of Dover and Wardens of
the Cinque Ports till the reign of John. In 1440 Sir
Roger Fienes began to pull down the old manor-house
and to build the present castle, supposed to be one of
the oldest brick buildings in England, and certainly one

Hurstmonceaux Castle.

of the largest houses belonging to any subject in the king
dom. Richard Fienes (son of Sir Roger), who was chamber
lain to Elizabeth Woodville, married Joan, daughter and
heiress of Thomas, Lord Dacre, being in her right declared
Baron Dacre of the South, and was buried with his son
under the magnificent tomb in Hurstmonceaux Church.
It was his grandson Thomas, Lord Dacre, who received
Anne of Cleves on her arrival in England in 1540, but

78 SUSSEX
who, before he was four-and-twenty, ' being a right towardlie
gentleman,' was executed on Tower Hill, ostensibly for
having caused the death of John Busbrig from wounds
received in a fray at Hellingly, but more probably on
account of his ' great estate, which greedy courtiers gaped
after, causing them to hasten his destruction.' x
The two sons of Thomas Fienes, Lord Dacre, dying
without children, Hurstmonceaux and the title of ' Baroness
Dacre of the South ' passed to their sister Margaret, wife
of Sampson Lennard of Chevening,2 by whom Hurstmon
ceaux was greatly embellished. Their son Francis 3 was
one of the twelve peers who voted against the death of
Charles I. His son Thomas, Lord Dacre, married Lady
Anne Fitz Roy, natural daughter of Charles II. , and was
created Earl of Sussex. In 1708 George Naylor, of Lin
coln's Inn, bought the old Dacre property. By his wife
Grace, sister of Thomas Pelham, Duke of Newcastle, he
had an only daughter, Grace, who is said to have been
starved to death by her governess in the room with the
oriel window on the east side of Hurstmonceaux Castle.
Upon her death the property passed fo her cousin, Francis
Naylor, only son of her aunt Bethia, by the rich pluralist,
Francis Hare, who, with many other ecclesiastical dignities,
held in turn the deaneries of Worcester and St. Paul's,
and the bishoprics of St. Asaph and Chichester. On the
death of Francis Naylor without children, his half-brother,
Robert Hare, a Canon of Winchester, became the owner
of Hurstmonceaux. Late in his life his second wife,
Henrietta Henckel, jealous of the children of her prede
cessor, persuaded him to permit her to dismantle the
castle, and to build Hurstmonceaux Place, which she
fancied could be settled on her own children. The de
struction of the castle was accomplished, and its vast collec
tion of old furniture and pictures, which ' Mrs. Henckel
Hare ' despised as old-fashioned, were dispersed ; but, when
1 Camden, Eliz., 1594.
"- They are buried at Chevening under a most stalely tomb.
3 Also buried at Clicvenin'j, 1662. s

HURSTMONCEAUX

79

Robert Hare died, it was found that the destroyer had
built her new house upon entailed land.
Francis Hare Naylor, the eldest son of Robert by his
first marriage, had himself married the beautiful Georgiana,
daughter of Jonathan Shipley, Bishop of St. Asaph, and,
living with her in great poverty in Italy, had become the

Gateway, Hurstmonceaux Castlr\

father of four sons, Francis, Augustus, Julius, and Marcus.
He now succeeded to the estate of Hurstmonceaux, ruined
by his stepmother's extravagance, and for many years led a
much-tried and struggling life there, and wrote his Histories
of Germany and the Helvetic Republics at Hurstmonceaux
Place. Mrs. Hare Naylor, who was famous as a linguist, and

80 SUSSEX
insisted on her children conversing in Greek at the family
repasts, was as peculiar as she was beautiful. Daily, dressed
in white, she rode on a white ass to drink at a mineral spring
in the park : a tame white doe ran by her side. One day,
at the gate of the park near the church, the white doe was
killed by dogs. Then Mrs. Hare Naylor left Hurstmon
ceaux at once, and never could be persuaded to return
there. Thus, in 1807, Francis Hare Naylor sold the
estate, and it has since passed through several hands. The
living of Hurstmonceaux remained in the Hare family till
i85S- Coming over the brow of the hill from Wartling, on
reaching the relics of a huge storm-beaten beech-tree, the
immense ruins of the Castle — of red brick, turned silver-
grey by age — are seen in the hollow, whence, ' for conveni
ence of water to the moat, it sees nothing at all.' 1 The
moat has been dry since Elizabeth's time. Of the great
avenues which once approached the castle in every direc
tion, only a few trees remain — huge Spanish chestnuts,
stag-headed, their trunks gnarled and twisted by time. The
interior (almost a square, 200 ft. by 214 ft.) was perfect till
1778; the exterior remains still as it was built in the time
of Henry VI. , except that on the east side, by which we
approach from Eastbourne, some of the ancient mullions
were removed, and sash windows introduced by the Earl of
Sussex towards the end of the seventeenth century. On
the same side are the long pointed windows of the chapel,
and the round oriel of the 'Ladies' Bower.' In the centre
of the south front is the majestic gateway, flanked by
towers with projecting machicolated cornices of noble bold
ness, and surmounted by the alant or wolf-dog of Sir
Roger Fienes, holding in his paws a banner charged with
three lions rampant. On either side of the windows
above the gate are slits to receive the levers of the draw
bridge. The interior (admission 6d.) appears at first to be a
grassy expanse, broken by a few mouldering walls, but
1 Horace Walpole.

H URSTMONCEA UX 8 1
those who care to examine them may trace the four court
yards, the encircling galleries of the Green Court, the great
hall, chapel, kitchen, and other apartments of the ground
floor. Nothing remains to recall the 'Bethlem Gallery,'
and other long galleries on the upper floor, some of
them formerly hung with gilt-stamped leather. Beyond
the chapel are the walls of the rooms described by Horace
Walpole : —
' One side has been sashed, and a drawing and dining-room and
two or three rooms wainscoted by the Earl of Sussex, who married a
natural daughter of Charles II. Their arms with delightful carvings
by Gibbons, particularly two pheasants, hang over the chimneys. Over
the great drawing-room chimney is the coat-armour of the first
Lennard, Lord Dacre, with all his alliances. Mr. Chute was trans
ported, and called cousin with ten thousand quarterings. The chapel
is mean and small ; the Virgin and seven long, lean saints, ill done,
remain in the windows; there have been four more, which seem to
have been removed for light ; and we actually found S. Catherine
and another gentlewoman with a church in her hand, exiled into the
buttery.' On the west side of the castle, much overgrown with ivy,
is what is called 'the Drummer's Hall.' A hundred years
ago people believed that at certain times a giant three
yards high was seen striding along the battlements above
this, beating a drum. But the usual version given is that
which Addison, in his play of ' The Haunted House,' puts
into the mouth ofthe butler: ' Pho, Robin, I tell ye he never
appeared yet, but in the shape of the sound of a drum.' It
is said that a Lord Dacre, who was supposed to be dead,
long lived here in concealment, and beat a mysterious
drum to frighten away the suitors of his widow when they
appeared. A grassy road leads up from the castle to the Church of
All Saints {\ ml), which has a heavy early English tower
and low spire. The church has been added to at different
times, and was partially rebuilt with the castle. The inte
rior, ' restored ' at a very bad time, has all the injuries that
a tiled floor, varnished benches, and tawdry glass can inflict
F

S2

SUSSEX

upon it ; but the capitals of the pillars and the XIV. c. font
are redeeming features.
Near the altar fits proportions injured by a paltry modern
communion rail which hides its base) is the glorious tomb
of Thomas, Lord Dacre, and his son Thomas, erected in
1534. It rises, with its canopy, nearly the whole height of
the church, and is decorated with niches and tracery of the

Hurstmonceaux Chestnuts

utmost beauty, whilst the light shining through the open
canopy from the vestry (which has some of the glass from
the castle chapel) throws a picturesque effect of wonder
ful richness upon its union of Caen stone and Petworth
marble. Above the central of the three escutcheons on the
summit is the family crest — an eagle with an annulet in its
beak. Lord Dacre provided by his will that this his tomb

HURSTMONCEAUX

83

should be used as an Easter sepulchre. On the pediment
of the tomb two skulls, said to be those of the founder
and foundress of the church, lay till 1846, when Arch
deacon Hare insisted upon burying them with his own
hands. In front of the altar is the noble brass of Sir William
Fienes, 1405, with his effigy in complete armour and his
feet resting on a lion. The inscription sets forth a promise

Hurstmonceaux Church.

of sixscore days' pardon for all who shall say a ' Pater
noster ' and an ' Ave ' for the deceased.
' The proof of the age of this William Ffienles was taken at Worth
ing, December 6, 1378. Among the witnesses who remembered the
birth, one knew the day because it was written in the missal of the
parish church — an early form of "registration." Another, because in
that year — 1357 — Giles Parker struck an arrow through his leg in the
churchyard of Hurstmonceaux. Another, because the father of the said
William Ffienles, then Lord of Hurstmonceaux, came to his house and
wished to beat him.' — The Builder, Match 19, 1892.

84 SUSSEX
A monument on the north wall of the chancel commemo
rates Francis Hare Naylor, 1815, author ofthe 'History
of Germany,' of ' The History of the Helvetic Republics,'
and the novel ' Theodore, or the Enthusiast.' He died at
Tours, and is buried here beneath the altar.
The adjoining monument is that of his beautiful and
celebrated wife, Georgiana Hare Naylor, who died at Lau
sanne, April 6, 1806. A relief, by the Danish sculptor
Kessels, the favourite pupil of Thorwaldsen, represents her
deathbed, when she committed her little daughter to the
care of her eldest sister Anna Maria, Lady Jones. Both
these are commemorated with her on the same monument,
with her four sons — Francis, Augustus, Julius, and Marcus
Hare. A monument in the aisle commemorates Margaret
Beckett, the faithful nurse of the unhappy Grace Naylor,
whose 'untimely decease she daily and hourly lamented.'
Grace Naylor is herself buried in a vault beneath the
chauntry, now the vestry, outside the window of which is a
quaint stone to Richard Morris, 1749, who 'desired that
it might be remembered that he owed his bread to his
Grace the Duke of Newcastle,1 his great benefactor.'
In the churchyard, beneath and around its enormous
yew-tree, are the graves of Julius and Marcus Hare ; of the
first wife of Frederick Denison Maurice ; of Charlotte,
daughter of John Sterling, who was Julius Hare's curate
here ; and of Caroline Venables, with an epitaph by Pusey.
A little farther, beneath a Spina Christi, brought from the
Quirinal Garden at Rome, and thither from Calvary during
the Crusades, is the grave of Maria Hare, 1870, com
memorated in the 'Memorials of a Quiet Life.' Her
faithful maid, Mary Lea, ' through fifty-six years honoured,
devoted, and beloved in the Hare family,' rests by her
side. On the gravestones around may be read the names of
'Phillis Hoad,' ' Lina Deimling,' and others who were at
onetime familiar from Julius Hare's 'Parish Sermons.' He
1 Uncle of Grace Naylor.

HURSTMONCEA UX

85

delighted in the wide-spreading views from the churchyard,
and in the hill-set position of his church.
' Precious is the blessing which we enjoy, in having the Lord's house
set up on high, that all may see it, with its spire ever pointing to heaven,
to remind us, whenever it meets our eyes, how our hearts also ought
always to be pointing thither, with the same quiet, steadfast, unchanging,
immovable calmness. If the situation of our church is in many respects
inconvenient, at all events it has this advantage, that it stands upon a

Vestry, Hurstmonceaux Church.

hill, so as to be clearly seen afar off; and many a time, I think, when
the sky has been overcast with driving clouds, and everything else
looked gloomy, you must have observed a pure still light resting upon
it, betokening the light which, amid all the clouds and storms of the
world, rests on a heaven-pointing spirit.' — Hare's ' Parish Sermons.'
Close to the church stands a very magnificent XIV. c.
tithe-barn. Half a mile distant is Hurstmonceaux Place
(H. Curteis, Esq.), the house which Wyatt added for Mrs.

86 SUSSEX
Henckel Hare to an earlier manor by Inigo Jones. Baron,
then Chevalier, Bunsen, lived here in 1842-44. Mr. Wil-
berforce, who rented the Place in 18 10, wrote thence to
Lord Muncaster : —
' I am in a corner of Sussex, in an excellent house, and in a place
almost as pretty as the neighbourhood of the sea ever is. There is a
fine old castle here, built in Henry AT.'s time, but in complete preser
vation till about twenty years ago ; and though this is a very good
private gentleman's habitation, yet when one sets it against a complete
castle, one side of which was 200 feet long, and which was in the com
plete costume of the age in which it was reared, it dwindles into as
much insignificance as one of the armed knights of the Middle Ages,
fully accoutred, who should be suddenly transformed into the curtailed
dimensions of one of the box-lobby loungers of the opera, or even one
of the cropped and docked troopers of some of our modern regiments.'
— Life and Correspondence, vol. iii.
Opposite the gate of Hurstmonceaux Place is the house
which John Sterling occupied when he was Julius Hare's
curate in 1834.
' Sterling took orders . . . and fitted himself and family with a
reasonable house, in one of the leafy lanes in quiet Hurstmonceaux, on
the edge of Pevensey Level.' — Carlyle, ' Life of Sterling'
' He was continually devising some fresh scheme for improving the
condition of the parish. His aim was to awaken the minds of the
people, to arouse their conscience, to call forth their sense of moral
responsibility, to make them feel their own sinfulness, their need of
redemption, and thus lead them to a recognition of the Divine Love
by which that redemption is offered to us. In visiting them he was
diligent in all weathers, to the risk of his own health, which was
greatly impaired thereby ; and his gentleness and considerate care
for the sick won their affection ; so that, though his stay was very
short, his name is still cherished by many.'-^/. C, Hare, 'Life of
Sterling.' Farther down the lane, on the left, separated from the
road by a field, is Lime, on the site of an ancient monastic
establishment. It is often described in ' Memorials of a
Quiet Life,' but the house has been rebuilt, and its old
trees have disappeared.
A pleasant walk of 1 m. across fields leads hence to

HURSTMONCEAUX

87

Hurstmonceaux Rectory, which was the home of Julius
Charles Hare from 1831 to 1855, and in which the 'Vic
tory of Faith ' and ' Mission of the Comforter,' &c, were
written. . ' The rectory stood far removed from church, and castle, and village.
Of all the peculiarities of English life, none perhaps is so unique as
an English parsonage. But how peculiar even amongst English par
sonages was the rectory of Hurstmonceaux. The very first glance at

' im-Ai

Hurstmonceaux Rectory.

its entrance-hall revealed the character of its master. It was not merely
a house with a good library — the whole house was a library. The vast
nucleus which he brought wilh him from Cambridge grew year by year,
till not only study, and drawing-room, and dining-room, but passage,
and ante-chamber, and bedrooms were overrun by the ever-advancing
and crowded bookshelves. At the time of his death it had reached the
number of more than twelve thousand volumes. . . . The library was
like a magnificent tree which he had himself planted, of which he had
nurtured the growth, which spread its branches far and wide over his
dwelling, and in the shade of which he delighted, even if he was pre-

8S

SUSSEX

vented for a moment from gathering its fruits or pruning its luxuriant
foliage. ' In the few spaces which this tapestry of literature left unoccupied
were hung the noble pictures which he had brought with him from
Italy. To him they were more than mere works of art — they were
companions and guests ; and they were the more remarkable from
their contrast with the general plainness and simplicity of the home
and household, so unlike the usual accompaniments of luxury and

JS«t* ¦ \\VJJP

Old Beech Trees, Hurstmonceaux

grandeur in which we should usually seek and find works of such
costly beauty,
' In this home — now hard at work with his multitudinous volumes
around him at his student's desk, now wandering to and fro, book in
hand, between the various rooms, or up and down the long garden walk
overlooking the distant Level with its shifting lights and shades — he
went on year by year extending the range and superstructure of that
vast knowledge of which the solid basis had been laid in the classical
studies of his beloved university, or correcting with an elaborate
minuteness, which to bystanders was at times almost wearisome to

DACRE FARM 89
behold, the long succession of proofs which during the later years of
his life was scarcely ever out of his hands.' — A. P. Stanley, Quart.
Rev., cxciii.

Following the lane at the back of the rectory, we may
reach {i\ m.) the very fine old Jacobean house of Carter's
Corner, long the residence of the Bartons. The reputation
of old Sussex roads is recorded in the name of Foul Mile,
applied to a hamlet near Cowbeach, a little east of this,

The Dacre Farm, Hurstmonceaux.

Near Windmill Hill, almost on the edge of the desolate
deer-park of the castle, is the highly picturesque Dacre
Farm, a fine specimen of a XVI. c. farmhouse. There is
a tradition that two of the Lords Dacre are buried in its
garden. There is a cottage Manufactory of Trug Baskets at
Hurstmonceaux — a thing of Anglo-Saxon name {trog, a
boat), made of split wood, and peculiar to the place.

go

SUSSEX

[A line runs north from Eastbourne, passing through
Polegate Station to —
7 7ii. Hailsham Stat. This dreary little market-town
has a handsome perpendicular church (S. Mary). The
rope-factory, which is the industry of the place, has the
privilege of supplying the cords used in prisons for execu
tions. Hurstmonceaux (3-^ ///.) may be conveniently visited
from hence.

m

Gateway, Michelham Priory.

2 m. west — by the Dicker (or Dyker), formerly waste land
— on the little river Cuckmere,1 which serves as its moat, are
the very picturesque remains of Michelham Priory, a house
of Augustinian or Black Canons, founded (1229) in the
reign of Henry III. by Gilbert III. de Aquila — 'Lord of
the Eagle ' of Pevensey. A noble gateway forms the
1 'To the lover of the picturesque and the antiquary Michelham offers a treat
rarely to be met w ith in the south of England.' — 71/. .-J. Lci,',-r.

ARLINGTON

9i

approach over the Cuckmere, a rivulet which rises near
Heathfield and enters the sea at West Dene. In the Tudor
farmhouse are 'The Prior's Chamber' and a crypt used as
a dairy. An arched passage, called Isaac's Hole, is sup
posed to have been used as a prison. The priory mill
remains. The seal of the priory has the figure of the
Saviour seated under a canopy, with the angel of the An
nunciation on the reverse.

Horselunges.

The early decorated church of S. Pancras at Arlington
(a little south-west) occupies the site of very much earlier
buildings, of which many traces have been recently dis
covered. Fragments of pottery and an urn, found im
bedded in the sand beneath the nave, indicate Roman
work. The next remains are those of a Saxon church, to
which an early Norman chapel was added on the north,
containing four coffin slabs, two of them ornamented with

92 SUSSEX
crosses. This Saxon and Norman church was apparently
almost ruined by fire, and rebuilt under the transitional
period as the present church, some of the old walls being
engrafted in the later building, to which two perpendicular
windows and a Jacobean gable-finial have been added at
later dates. In the chancel is a 'leper window.'
' The whole church presents a. complete history from the earliest
time of Christianity in England.' — Sussex Arch. Coll.
9 m. Hellingly Stat. — There is a very picturesque old
house here at Horselunges — Hurst-longue, the entrance
into the wood. This was once part of Laughton Chase,
the hunting-ground of the Pelhams, where, at Pickhay-field,
Thomas Fienes, Lord Dacre of Hurstmonceaux, 'a young
nobleman of high spirit and promise, not more than four-
and-twenty years old,' accidentally wounded to death a
keeper of Sir N. Pelham in the reign of Henry VIIL, for
which he was executed at Tyburn, June 29, 1541, 'sore
lamented by many,' who believed that 'his great estate,
which greedy courtiers gaped after, caused them to hasten
his destruction.' 1
' There was executed at St. Thomas Waterings three gentlemen —
John Mantel, John Frowde, and George Roydon. They died for a
murther committed in Sussex in company of Thomas Fiennes, Lord
Dacre of the South, the truth whereof was this. The said Lord Dacre,
through the lewd persuasion of them, as hath been reported, meaning
to hunt in the park of Nicholas Pelham, Esq., of Laughton, in the same
county of Sussex, being accompanied with the said Mantel, Frowde,
and Roydon ; John Cheney and Thomas Isley, gentlemen ; Richard
Middleton and John Goldwell, yeomen, passed from this house of
Hurstmonceaux the last of April, in the night season, toward the same
park, where they intended to hunt ; and coming into a place called
Pikehay, in the parish of Hellingly, they, one John Busbrig, James Bus
brig. and Richard Sumner, were standing together ; and, as it fell out,
through quarrelling, there ensued a fray betwixt the said Lord Dacre
and his company on the one part, and the said John and James Busbrig
and Richard Sumner on the other, insomuch that the said John Busbrig
received such hurt that he died thereof the second of May next ensuing.
Whereupon, as well the said Lord Dacre as those that were with them,
1 Camden.

CHIDDINGLY 93
and divers others likewise that were appointed to go another way to
meet them at the said park, were indicted of niurther ; and the seven
and twentieth day of June the Lord Dacre himself was arraigned before
the Lord Audley of Walden, then Lord Chancellor, sitting that day as
High Steward of England, with other peers of the realm about him,
who then and there condemned the said Lord Dacre to die for that
trangression. ' — Hollinshed.
' The bearings of the case were very simple. Deer-stealing, like
cattle-stealing, was felony ; and where the commission of one crime
leads to another and a worse, the most lenient administration is neces
sarily severe. Had Lord Dacre been an ordinary offender, he would
have been disposed of summarily. Both he and his friends, however,
were general favourites. The Privy Council hesitated long before they
resolved on a prosecution, and at last it is likely they were assisted to
a resolution by the king. . . . Four out of the eight were pardoned.
For Lord Dacre there was to the last some uncertainty. He was
brought out to the scaffold, when an order arrived to stay the execu
tion, probably to give time for a last appeal to Henry. But it was
in vain. Five hours later the sheriff was again directed to do his
duty, and the full penalty was paid.' — Froude, 'History of England,'
iv. 121. John Milles, Protestant rector of Hellingly, was burnt
at Lewes in 1557. Near Hellingly Park is the A?nber Stone,
an ancient boundary mark.
' As amber is a word often found connected with Druidical remains,
this stone may have been held sacred by our Celtic ancestors.' — M. A.
lower. A Sussex proverb runs —
' Herrin/y, Chidd'n/j/, and Hoad/y,
Three lies, and all true.'
2 J m. north-west is Chiddingly, where the fine church
is chiefly early English, with a decorated tower and stone
spire, the only one in the county except Chichester and
Dallington. A rich monument with recumbent figures,
erected in 1612, commemorates Sir John Jefferay, Baron
of the Exchequer, and his wife ; in niches at the sides are
the figures of their daughter and her husband, Sir Edward
Montagu. Sir John Jefferay is represented as holding a
scroll. It was a tradition that he dropped down dead

94 SUSSEX
with that scroll in his hand 'as the divine judgment of
Heaven on a wicked judge in a wrong cause.' A slab
commemorates the founder of the Jefferay family in c.
15 1 3. Thomas Eades, the nonjuring vicar, 17 17, has
the inscription : —
' The body of Mr. Thomas Eades lies here,
A faithful shepherd that did not pow'r fear :
But kept old Truth, and would not let him go,
Nor turn out of the way for friend or foe.
He was suspended in the Dutchman's days,
Because he would not walk in their strange ways.
Daemona non armis sed morte subegit Iesus.'
Chiddingly Place, built by Sir John Jefferay, was the
family residence ; very little is left of it. Peakes, another
house of the Jefferays, is now a farm. Friths, in this
parish, has some remains of an old moated house of the
Chauntlers. Streame was the seat of the Frenches, who
were great ironmasters ; Stonehill of the Elphicks ; Bur-
chetts of the Willards ; Shirleys of the Shirleys ; and Hale
Green of the Torels and Calverleys : these are all now
farmhouses or cottages. Chiddingly has failed with the
iron trade.
The church of Fast Hoathly, a little north-west, has the
Pelham buckle on its tower. This was the early home of
Colonel Sir Thomas Lunsford, the Cavalier, who was ac
cused of cannibal propensities. Butler, in ' Hudibras,' 1
ironically couples him with the famous ' Bloody-bones ; '
and in a mock litany of the time we read —
' From Fielding and from Vavasour,
Both ill-affected men ;
From Lunsford eke deliver us,
That eateth up children.' -
Like Lord Dacre at an earlier date, Lunsford was tried
for killing deer in the park of Sir Thomas Pelham (June
27, 1632), and for a murderous assault upon its owner. In
1 Pt. iii. c. ii.
2 See Sussex Arch. Coll., i86r, 'Old Speech and Manners in Sussex.'

WARBLETON 95
1649 he 'sould all he had' and emigrated with his family
to Virginia, where he was buried at Williamsburgh.
In the wooded upland, a little farther north, is Waldron,
where the church (All Saints) was once of some interest as
possessing an east window with a kneeling figure in armour,
and the inscription ' Pray for the soul of John Pelham '
beneath it; but this has been 'restored' away.1
Possingworth was a manor which belonged to Battle
Abbey. At the dissolution it was granted to the Sidneys,
who sold it to Judith, Lady Pelham, in 1585. From the
Pelhams it passed to the merchant family of the Offleys,
of whom Sir Thomas Offley, Lord Mayor in the time of
Elizabeth, left half his estate to the poor, having lived
with such abstemiousness as to give rise to the rhyme —
' Offley three dishes had of daily roast —
An egg, an apple, and the third a toast.'
Tanners belonged at the time of his death to Sir Philip
Sidney, afterwards from 1603 to the Sackvilles, by whom it
was sold in 161 7 to the Fullers. The present house was
built soon afterwards by Samuel Fuller, of the great iron
master family.
12J m. Horeham Road Stat. — Horeham Manor, of the
time of James I., probably built by Thomas Dyke, is now a
farmhouse ; its terraces and bowling-green may be "traced.
There is a legend that the church, begun on a field at Hore
ham farm, still called 'the church field,' was removed by
supernatural agency.
A little east is Warbleton, where, in the vestry of the
church (S. Mary), is an iron-bound chest, and in the tower
a strong oak door with curious ironwork. This goes by
the name of ' Richard Woodman's door,' and is believed to
be the work of the Protestant ironfounder, R. Woodman,
burnt with nine other ' faithful servants of God put into one
fire' at Lewes, June 22, 1557. He was given up to justice
by Fairbanke, a recalcitrant rector of the place. In his
examination before Bonner he said, ' Let me go home, I
1 Before, however, the late restoration of the church.

96 SUSSEX
pray you, to my wife and children, to see them kept, and
other poore folke, that I would set aworke by the help of
God. I have set aworke a hundreth persons ere this, all
the year together.' A noble brass bears the figure of John
Prestwick, Prior of Battle, 1436. On his robes are in
scribed, ' Credo quod redemptor meus vivit.' The canopy
bears the crest of a pelican.
A desolate farmhouse, with fragments of a chapel built
into the stable, is all that remains of Warbleton Priory, a
house of Augustinians, moved from Hastings by Sir John
Pelham in the time of Henry IV. Blood on the floor of
one of the rooms remains from a murder committed there.
Two skulls are preserved in the house ; when any attempt
has been made to bury them, the most terrible noises have
been heard at night, and it is believed that all the cattle on
the farm have sickened. William Pelham, dying in 1503,
desired that masses might be said over his body in the
church at Laughton, and then that it should be taken to
Warbleton Priory and buried there in the church.
15 m. Heathfield Stat. Heathfield — pronounced 'Hefful'
by the natives — has a well-placed old church (All Saints)
and a wild park with fine views. Heathfield Tower was
built in honour of George Augustus Elliott, the hero of
Gibraltar, who lived at Heathfield Park and took his title
from if. Turner's ' Vale of Heathfield ' is perhaps the best
of all his Sussex pictures. A pillar at Cade Street bears the
inscription —
' Near this spot was slain the notorious rebel Jack Cade by Alex
ander Iden, Sheriff of Kent, A.D. 1450. His body was carried to
London and his head fixed upon London Bridge. This is the success
of all rebels, and this fortune chanceth ever to traitors.'
Jack Cade had concealed himself at the farm of Newick
in the parish of Heathfield. Tradition says that, gaining
confidence, he went to play at bowls at a public-house,
and whilst thus employed was discovered, and shot with
an arrow by Iden. The road which led from Heathfield
Common to Newick used to be called Lden's Way. The

DALLINGTON 97
rebellion of Jack Cade has been often described as a mere
revolt of uneducated men, but that it was not so is certain
from the Abbot of Battle, the Prior of Lewes, and many of
the principal families in East Sussex having taken part in
the movement. George Gilbert, the famous military Metho
dist preacher, had the head-quarters of his later life at
Heathfield, where he died in 1827, aged 87, and was buried
in his own chapel.
Cuckoo Fair, held on April 14 at Heathfield, is so called
because of the legend that the bird is first heard there, when
it is let out of an old woman's basket.
On the wooded hills, a few miles east, is Dallington.
The uninteresting modern church retains the old stone
spire bearing the buckle of the Pelhams. The saintly
George Wagner, well known as the founder of ' The Peni
tents' Home' at Brighton, lived as curate in the vicarge
here from 1842 to 1848. In his Memoir we read —
' Dallington occupies a commanding and beautiful situation. Look
ing southwards, the eye ranges over the lower ridges of the Weald,
and the deep wooded hollows which separate them ; Vvhile to the west
the view is bounded by the noble ranges of the Caburn and Ditch-
ling Beacon Downs, sweeping onwards to Beachy Head — their bold
swelling outlines beautifully contrasted with the soft dove-coloured
smoothness of their surface, occasionally broken by white gleaming
scars which reveal the nature of their formation. Beyond the Weald
again lies the broad expanse of Pevensey Level, sensitively responding
to the passing shadows of the clouds, and blackened here and there
by the swarms of animal life which people its rich pastures — always a
beautiful object at a distance and from a height, whether coloured with
a deeper and richer green than the neighbouring country, or pink (as
it often is in advanced summer) with the long and withered grasses
which ripen and die upon its surface. Above and beyond all, extends
the long narrow line of the sea, stretching from Beachy Head to the
heights of Hastings and Fairlight, sometimes intensely blue beneath
the calm sky bending overhead, or, in gloomy and unsettled weather,
responding variously to the endless variations of light, and cloud, and
atmosphere. 1 The Vicarage of Dallington commands this prospect. On the other
side, a line of lime-trees separates the garden from the churchyard.
The church is a plain but serviceable building, surmounted by a stone
spire (one of three only which the diocese contains) visible from many
G

98

SUSSEX

miles off. The village, or street (to use the local expression), straggles
northwards over the back of the ridge, till its last houses come in sight
of the forest heights of Brightling and Heathfield ; the former sur
mounted by a conspicuous Observatory ; the latter marked by the
monumental tower which still reminds the visitor of the hero of
Gibraltar. ' Most of the population, which is entirely agricultural, with none
above the rank of farmers, are collected in the village ; but there are
detached houses and cottages, scattered about for a distance of two miles
from the church — outlying portions to be reached by the deep sandy

rci

'MmAi

«au- rU.^UA _ "i^iO i limn t/ ' ill (fer-

Mayfield.

lanes which plunge down the sides of the ridge, and lead to some lone
farmhouse embosomed among oaken copses in the hollows ; or to some
solitary homestead, which marks a spot, perhaps, where the pasture
was first cleared by the brook-side, or where the rustic artisan had
erected his furnace in those bygone days, when the bog-iron of the
Weald was smelted in the charcoal-fires of the forest.'— J. N. Simp-
kinson.

i8f m. Mayfield Stat. Mayfield, ' the sweetest village in
Sussex,' as Coventry Patmore calls it, picturesquely crowns
a wooded ridge. Ascending from the station, and passing

MA YFIELD 99
on the left the XVI. c. stone house of Aylwins, we find
the village street adorned with several old half-timber
houses, of which one — The Middle House — bears the date
1 575-1 The Curfew is still rung at Mayfield at 8 p.m. from
Michaelmas to Lady Day. The perpendicular Church of S.
Dunstan stands on the site of a church which the sainted
archbishop built at ' Magaredda ' (where the archbishop had
a ' peculiar '), and of which it is recorded that when he saw
it did not stand properly east to west, the ' restless, reck
less, and inflexible ' Archdeacon Dunstan set it right with a
push of his shoulder. Some handsome carved pews have
escaped the 'restorer.' The pavement is partly formed of
iron memorial slabs. Iron slabs in the churchyard com
memorate the family of Sands from 1671 to 1708. During
the Marian persecution, four martyrs were burnt here in
the churchyard.
' Next followed four, which suffered at Mayfield, in Sussex, the 24th
day of September 1556, of whose names two we find recorded, and the
other two we yet know not, and therefore, according to our register,
hereunder they be specified, as we find them : John Hart, Thomas
Ravendale, a shoemaker and a carrier ; which said four, being at the
place where they should suffer, after they had made their prayers, and
were at the stake ready to abide the force of the fire, they constantly
and joyfully yielded their lives for the testimony of the glorious Gospel
of Jesus Christ.' — Foxe, 'Acts and Monuments,' viii.
'Grievous the persecution in this country under John Christopher-
son, the bishop thereof. Such his havock in burning poor protestants
in one year, that had he sate long in that see, and continued after that
rate, there needed no iron-mills to rarify the woods of this county,
which this Sonnet Junior would have done himself.' — Fuller.
Archbishop Islip appointed one 'John Wiclyve ' to be
vicar of Mayfield in 1365, appointing him afterwards to
the wardenship of Canterbury Hall, at Oxford, as one in
whose ' fidelity, circumspection, and industry ' he much
' confided, and whom he called to that office on account of
the honesty of his life, his laudable conversation, and know-
1 The best of the Mayfield houses are engraved in ' Antient Domestick Architec
ture,' by Francis T. Dollman and J. R. Jobbins.

ioo SUSSEX
ledge of letters.' l This Wiclyve was formerly supposed to
be identical with John Wicliffe the great Reformer, but it
is now certain that the vicar of Mayfield was one who
exchanged that preferment for Horsted Keynes,2 in the
same county, where he died in 1383 as rector of Horstead
Keynes and prebendary of Chichester.
Beyond the church stood the beautiful ruins of Mayfield
Palace, where the Archbishops of Canterbury are said to
have had a country residence from the time of S. Dunstan,
though no existing buildings date beyond the XIV. c. Arch
bishop Islip is said to have been punished by a fall from
his horse — followed by the paralysis of which he died at
Mayfield — for wasting more oak timber in the Dourdennes
(Weald of Sussex) for his new buildings than any of his pre
decessors.3 Archbishop Meopham and Archbishop Strat
ford also died in the palace at Mayfield. A council was
held here in 1332 to regulate the celebration of fast-days
and holidays. Cranmer exchanged Mayfield with the king
for other estates, and since then it has passed through many
hands, including Sir Thomas Gresham, who entertained
Elizabeth here on one of her progresses, and whose grass
hopper crest remains carved on the stone chimney-piece of
' Queen Elizabeth's Room,' now the convent guest-parlour.
The palace was -dismantled in 1 740, and continued a ruin
till 1863, when the Roman Catholic Duchess of Leeds
bought it and turnetLit into a Convent of the Society of the
Holy Child, the buildings being restored and altered for the
purpose. Strangers are only admitted by the nuns to visit a small portion of
. the building, and only on week-days between 3 and 4 p.m.
The Gatehouse has been restored, one of its flanking
towers being used as the priest's house, the other as a
school. The Great Hall (70 ft. by 40 ft), now the chapel,
was built by Archbishop Islip in 1350. At the recent
restoration nothing remained (or had existed for a hundred
1 Wood's Aniiq. Oxon., i. 484. 2 Reg. Sudbury, fol. 134a.
3 S. de Birchington.

MAYFIELD 101
and fifty years) of the original roof of the hall but its three
remarkably wide- spanned supporting arches, which gave
great picturesqueness to the ruin. Much of the original
tracery still remains in the windows. The niche which
contained the Archbishop's throne is now a Chapel of the
Sacred Heart. The throne itself, decorated with the same
diaper-work as his shrine in Canterbury Cathedral, is pre
served in the Antechapel, where are also shown the sword
of Sir Thomas Gresham, an ancient anvil attributed to
S. Dunstan, and a more modern tongs with which the
smith-archbishop is said to have pinched the devil's nose
when he molested him,1 as he was busy making a chalice.
As the devil was obliged to fly to bathe his nose in the
spring at Tunbridge Wells, it has remained chalybeate ever
since. Others say that he doctored himself at ' the Roaring
Spring,' a mile from Mayfield, 'which still roars once a year
in remembrance of it.'
' Saynt Dunstan, as the story goes,
Caught old Sathanas by ye nose :
He tugged soe hard and made hym roar,
That he was heard three miles and more.'
The hammer of S. Dunstan (mediaeval), formerly shown
here, has disappeared. St. Dunstan's 2 Well (walled round)
is pointed out.
The great stone staircase, 14 feet wide, which had a rail
from a Mayfield iron-foundry, was destroyed in the ' restora
tion.' A relic of the Mayfield iron-furnaces remains in the
name of The Forge, which belongs to one of the farms.
Thomas May, the poet, son of Sir Thomas May, was
born at Mayfield Place in 1595. He was a great favourite
with Charles I. and Henrietta Maria, and owed much to
them, but, says Clarendon, ' fell from his duty and all his
former friends, and prostituted himself to the vile office of
celebrating the infamous acts of those who were in rebellion
1 There is a similar legend at Glastonbury.
2 The feast of S. Dunstan is observed on May 19.

IQ2 SUSSEX
against the king.'1 His ' History of the Parliament of Eng
land ' is his most remarkable work, pronounced by Lord
Chatham to be ' honester and more instructive than Claren
don's history ; ' 2 by Bishop Warburton to be written with
'much judgment, penetration, manliness, spirit, and can
dour ; ' 3 and by Hallam to be ' a good model of genuine
English — terse, vigorous, and never slovenly.' 4 May died,
' a martyr to Bacchus,' as Andrew Marvell represents him,
in 1650, and was buried sumptuously in Westminster Abbey,
whence he was ejected at the Restoration.
At the foot of Mayfield hill is the fine old farmhouse
of Cranesdon, which was bought by Woolner the sculptor.
Between Mayfield and Framfield is the once interesting
but modernised farm of The Seven Chimnies.
2 1 \ m. Rotherfield. A picturesque village of thoroughly
Sussex character, named from the river Rother, which de
bouches at Rye. The church, chiefly early English, con
tains some monuments of the Nevills. It represents a
church which the Ealdorman Berhtwald, in 792, bestowed
upon the monks of S. Denis, and where he deposited
some relics which he brought back after a pilgrimage to
the great French Abbey. The lych gate is modern. George
Gilbert, the military Methodist preacher, was born at Rother
field in 1 741. 2 «s, east is the fine old manor-house of
Walshes. The neighbourhood, in the forest-land of Water-
down and Eridge, has much sylvan beauty. The women
of Rotherfield are said to be unusually tall, whence the
proverb, ' The women of Rotherfield have an extra pair
of ribs.' ' The most striking view of Eridge Forest is obtained upon its ex
treme edge, where the high-road from Tunbridge Wells to Rotherfield
divides it from Eridge Park. Two hills here enclose a narrow valley,
through which a brook runs, and looking from the bridge that spans it,
the dim woodland recesses upon one side, intricate with leaning trunks
and tangled boughs, rough with undergrowth and fallen leaves, con
trast with the clear vistas of the park on the other side — its trim drives,
1 Clarendon, Life, vol. i. 2 Letters to his nephew.
3 Letters to Hurd. 1 Lit. Hist, of Europe.

ROTHERFIELD 103
ordered beechen avenues, and broad spaces of greensward. The park
itself, too, which may be considered as once part of the forest, contains
some wildly beautiful scenery ; and it is here that the finest specimens
of silver birch are to be found.' — H. G. Hewlett, 'Nineteenth Century,'
August 1884.
24! m. Eridge. See Ch. i.
26| m. Groombridge. See Ch. i.
29I m. Tunbridge Wells.

IV
LEWES
T^ROM Haywards Heath, on the line from London to
-*- Brighton, a branch leads (in 13 m.) to Leices,1 the
capital of Sussex.
Defoe says, ' Lewes is in the most romantic situation I
ever saw;' and Gilbert White writes, 'The prospects and
rides round Lewes are most lovely.' The quaint, healthy
old town has a lower death-rate than any town in England
except two. ' Proud Lewes and poor Brighthelmstone ' is
a proverb of the days when letters were addressed, ' Bright
helmstone near Lewes.'2 The old houses straggle along
the terraces and ridge of a hill which is crowned by the
castle tower. At the foot of the hill flows the sluggish
Ouse, crossed by a bridge on the site of that where S.
Richard of Chichester ' had good luck in his fishing ' in
the thirteenth century, sending the fish he had caught as
a present to the Prior of S. Pancras. The rugged ruins
of the Priory still stand between the town and the wide-
spreading meadows, reaching to the sea on one side, and
girt in on the other by lofty downs — a plain which, on the
sudden rise of Newhaven as a port, it was once hoped to
change into 'one vast bason, wherein all the navies of
Europe might safely ride at anchor,' converting ancient
Lewes into 'the Liverpool ofthe south.'3
Ascending from the station by steep, narrow S. Mary's
Street, we reach the High Street, where, in the market-
1 The name is of Celtic origin.
2 See F. E. Sawyer in Notes and Queries, vi. q. 403.
3 See All the Year Round, November 1862.
104

LEWES 105
tower, hangs the great bell called 'Old Gabriel,'1 of the
time of Henry III.
It was opposite the Star Inn, lately closed, and now
occupied by public offices, which has a fine old oak stair
case brought from Slaugham Place, that six Protestants were
burnt 'at the sign of the Starre ' in 1556, and ten more,
including four women, in the following year, during the
episcopacy of Bishop Christopherson, of whom Fuller
quaintly observes that though ' carrying much of Christ in
his surname, he did bear nothing of Him in his nature.'
The vaulted cellar still remains in which the martyrs are
said to have been imprisoned.
Just below where the clock of S. Michael's Church pro
jects over the street,2 a turn leads to the C astle, and is
crossed by its fine Edwardian gateway, which retains its
portcullis grooves and the hinges of its gates : one of the
side towers is broken away. A round-headed arch is pos
sibly a remnant of the first castle erected here by William
de Warenne, Earl of Surrey, who had married Gundrada —
' Soror Gherbodi,' as Odericus Vitalis calls her — being one
of the two children of Matilda, wife of the Conqueror, by
her first husband, ' Gherbodus Flandrensis.' 3 The founda
tion charter ofthe Priory expressly states that its co-foundress,
Gundrada, was the queen's daughter, and in his second
charter William de Warenne uses the words 'pro salute
dominae meae Matildis reginae matris uxoris meae.' Within
the enclosure (entrance 6d.) are two mounds, one called
Brack Mount, the other bearing the remains of the keep,
1 ' Oh, happy Lewes, waking or asleep,
With faithful hands your time archangels keep !
6". Michaels voice the fleeting hour records,
And Gabriel loud repeats his brother's words ;
While humble Cliffeites, ruled by meaner power,
By Tom the Archbishop regulate their hour.'
— M. A. Lower, Epigram on the Lewes Clocks.
(.The parish church of Cliff e is dedicated to
S. Thomas a. Becket. )
2 The Lewes clocks of S. Michael's and Gabriel were formerly known as
Ananias and Sapphira, because they were never alike. See Notes and Queries, vi.
q. 202. 3 The son Gherbod held the great earldom of Chester under his stepfather.

io6

SUSSEX

which contains a small Archaeological Museum. There is
a delightful view from the summit.
We may descend into the level by the steep Keere Street,
down which, when staying at Brighton, George IV. success
fully drove his coach and four.

Castle Gate, Lewes.

The railway crosses the site of the chapter-house of S.
Pancras,1 where William de Warenne and Gundrada were
buried, with William, 2nd Earl de Warenne, who died 1135,
1 Many of the earliest English churches were dedicated to S. Pancras/patron
of children, martyred at fourteen under Diocletian, partly, it is supposed, because
the monastery of S. Andrew, which sent Augustine to England, was founded on
the paternal property of S. Pancras.

LEWES 107
and was laid at his father's feet, with many later Earls and
Countesses of Warenne. Gundrada died in childbirth, May
1085, and William in June 1088, having been created Earl
of Surrey by William Rufus the year before.1 The stone
coffins of Gundrada and her husband were found and
removed to the neighbouring Southover Church, where a
little chapel was erected to receive them in 1847. They
are of lead ornamented with lozenge-work, and bear the
names 'Gundrada,' 'Wilhelm.' From their small size (2
feet 1 1 by 2 feet 9) it is supposed that they were made to
receive the bones of the founders when they were exhumed
in some church rebuildings : the bones themselves have
been examined, and show that De Warenne was six feet
high, and Gundrada five feet seven. In the centre of the
chapel floor is — black and beautiful — the ancient grave
stone of Gundrada, ornamented like the coffins. After the
demolition of the priory it was taken away to make the tomb
of a Mr. Shirley at Isfield, but Sir William Burrell brought it
back to Southover in 1775. In reference to the belief that
those who swore falsely by S. Pancras 2 were possessed by
devils or fell down dead, the gravestone bears the broken
inscription : —
' Stirps Gundrada ducum,3 decus evi, nobile germen.
Intulit ecclesiis Anglorum balsama morum.
Martir . . ....
Martha fuit miseris, fuit ex pietate Maria.
Pars obiit Marthe ; superest pars magna Marie.
O pie Pancrati, testis pietatis et equi
Te facit heredem ; tu, clemens, suscipe matrem.
Sexta Kalendarum Junii, lux obvia, carnis
Fregit alabastrum. . .
Ina recess of the chapel is an effigy found in the priory,
supposed to represent John de Braose, Lord of Bramber,
1232. 1 Freeman is incorrect in making Gundrada survive William, and his earldom
the gift of the Conqueror.
2 S. Pancras was a boy of fourteen, beheaded under Diocletian. His church,
near the Porta S. Pancrazio at Rome, dates from 500. He was regarded as the
avenger of perjury through the Middle Ages.
3 Counts of Flanders, not of Normandy.

108 SUSSEX
Battered and shapeless walls are the only remains of
the Priory. It was the earliest Cluniac estabhshment in
England, the first prior, Lanzo, having come from Cluny
to a stone building in 1077. Its prior was the high cham
berlain of the order, and the priory itself was considered
one of 'the five chief daughters of Cluny.' Its magnificent
church was twenty-five feet longer than Chichester Cathe
dral. Here many Earls and Countesses of Warenne were
buried, their tombs including that before the high altar — ' in
pleno pavimento sub plana tumba ' — of John, seventh Earl,
who had married Alice, half-sister of Henry III., and who
was the most constant and resolute of his friends ; for whom
the king ordered public prayers to be offered on his death
in 1304, whilst the clergy promised a remission of 3000
days' purgatory to all who should pray for his soul. The
making of the railway opened the vault called the Lan
tern, used as a monastic prison. The mound intended
as a Via Crucis still exists. The last prior, Crowham,
who surrendered the priory in 1538, was made a canon of
Lincoln. The cruciform pigeon-house, for 3228 pigeons, was only
destroyed in the present century. From a charnel pit,
opened in making the railway, were removed thirteen wag
gon-loads of bones of the victims of the battle of Lewes,
and the effluvium, from those who perished in 1264, was
still most terrible. The capture in 1 3 7 7 of John de Cari-
loco, Prior of Lewes, on Rottingdean Hill, by the French,
gave rise to the proverb, ' Ware the Abbot of Battel, when
the Prior of Lewes is taken prisoner,' meaning when one
man falls into trouble, his neighbours had better beware.
William and Gundrada de Warenne had only two male
lineal descendants. In two generations (1148 and 1163)
heiresses brought their wealth to members of the royal
family, whose descendants long enjoyed it. In 1299,
Edward I., visiting the then Earl of Warenne at Lewes,
showed his sympathy for the loss of a son (in a tournament
many years before) by having mass celebrated in his pre
sence for the repose of his soul. In 1306, John, Earl of

LEWES

109

Warenne, being only eighteen, was married at Westminster
to Joanna, Countess of Bar, granddaughter of Edward I.
(daughter of his eldest daughter, Eleanor), a marriage which
turned out very miserably. In 1347 the title of Warenne
became secondary, being absorbed by the Fitz-Alans, Earls
of Arundel. After the priory was suppressed, one of the sons of
Thomas, Lord Cromwell, lived with his wife, who was a
sister of Jane Seymour, in its conventual buildings ; and

Lew

they afterwards belonged to Thomas Sackville, the poet Earl
of Dorset. In Southover there is a fine old house of Tudor
date. Another house is pointed out as having been in
habited by Anne of Cleves.
Of the existing churches of Lewes, S. Anne, at the top
of the hill, is transition Norman. It contains a monument
to Thomas Twyne, 16 13, author of 'The Garland of Godly
Flowers,' ' The Breviary of Brytane,' and other curious
books. There is a good Norman font against one of the
nave columns.1 5. Michael, in the High Street, contains
1 Depicted in Van Voorst's 'Ancient Fonts.'

no SUSSEX
brasses of John Braydforde, 1457, and a knight — Warren —
1400. The helmet of Nicholas Pelham, 1555, hangs above
his monument, which tells how —
' What time the French sought to have sackt Sea-foord,
This Pelham did repel 'em back aboord.'
A tablet commemorates Dr. (Gideon Algernon) Mantell,
the eminent geologist, ob. November 10, 1852, who was
born (1790) in the parish of S. John sub Castro, and
educated at a dame's school in Cliffe. He wrote several
books about Lewes and its neighbourhood, where he
opened a number of tumuli. S- John sub Castro, on the
site of a Roman camp, contains a tomb of Thomas Blunt,
barber, 161 1, who gave a silver-gilt cup to the town, in
scribed — ' Dona dedit, donisq. datis, datur ipse sepulchro :
Dona dedit ; dando celestia dona recepit ; '
and of Mr. John Chaloner, 1705, father of Bishop Chaloner
{ob. 1 781), the author of 'The Church History of England
from 1500 to 1687,' and a champion of Roman Catho
licism in England ; also, from an earlier church of S. John,
a (fourteenth century ?) monument to one Magnus, supposed
to have been a Danish prisoner taken in battle near the
town. On fifteen stones it bears the inscription —
1 Clauditur hie miles, Danorum regia proles ;
Mangnus1 nomen ei, mangnae nota progeniei :
Deponens Mangnum, se moribus induit agnum
Prepete pro vita, fit parvulus arnacorita.'
In All Saints' Church the interesting memorials of the
old Sussex family of Pellatt have recently been ' restored '
away. In the suburb of Cliffe is the Jireh Chapel, where the
garden-graveyard contains the tomb of the popular Calvinist
preacher, William Huntington, 1813. The 'S.S.' added to
his name has puzzled many. He explained it himself —
1 Magnus was evidently intended.

MOUNT CABURN III
' As I cannot get a D.D. for want of cash, neither can I get an M. A.
for want of learning, therefore I am compelled to fly for refuge to S.S.,
by which I mean sinner saved. '
The monument is inscribed —
' Here lies the coalheaver, beloved of his God, but abhorred of men.
The Omnipotent Judge, at the grand assize, shall ratify and confirm
this to the confusion of many thousands ; for England and its metropolis
shall know that there hath been a prophet among them. W. H. S.S.' 1
Beyond the suburb rises Cliffe Hill, whence there is a
good view of the town. There is a pleasant walk of 2 m.
from hence to the conical Mount Caburn (Caerbryn, the
fortified height), an outlying hill above Glynde, nearly 800
feet high, whence a wide panorama may be seen. It is
quarried for chalk, and covered with short turf. Here the
bee orchis — the ' freckled cowslip ' of Shakspeare — may be
found in the late spring. The steep paths, mere streaks of
white chalk in the down, are known as Bostals or Boarstals.
The circular growth of fungus known as ' hag-tracks ' are still
believed hereabouts to be the rings of fairies, or 'pharisees,'
as they are called. The scenery is pleasing, though tourists
will look in vain for the ' chain of majestic mountains ' de
scribed by Gilbert White, or even the ' grand ' views of
Murray's Handbook.
_ West of Lewes is South Mailing, where the church,
founded by John Evelyn in 1628, commemorates that of
the Benedictine Canons of old Mallyng, said to have been
founded by Ceadwalla, king of the West Saxons, who died
in 688. Some, however, think that it was built by Aldulf,
last of the South Saxon kings, who was slain in battle.
Some fragments of wall belonging to the college are built
into a farmhouse. Here the Archbishops of Canterbury
had a manor, to which the four knights who murdered
Becket rode forty miles on the following day from Salt-
wood Castle, to which they had first retreated.
1 An account of Huntington, by Robert Southey, will be found in a review of his
works by- the latter in the Quart. Rev., xxiv. 462-510. See also Lowndes' Brit.
Lib., 64 ; Macaulay's Crit. and Hist. Essays, ii. 524 ; Blackwood s Mag., xiv. 232.

112 SUSSEX
' On entering the house, they threw off their arms and trappings on
the large dining-table which stood in the hall, and after supper gathered
round the blazing hearth ; suddenly the table started back and threw
its burden on the ground. The attendants, roused by the crash, rushed
in with lights and replaced the arms. But soon a second still louder
crash was heard, and the various articles were thrown still farther off.
Soldiers and servants with torches searched in vain under the solid
table to find the cause of its convulsions, till one of the conscience-
stricken knights suggested that it was indignantly refusing to bear the
sacrilegious burden of their arms. So ran the popular story ; and, as
late as the fourteenth century, it was still shown in the same place — the
earliest and most memorable instance of a "rapping," "leaping," and
" turning table." ' 1 — A. P. Stanley, 'Hist. Memorials of Canterbury.'
At Coonibe (Sir G. Shiffner, Bart.) a curious ring (with
miniatures of Charles II. and Catherine of Braganza) is pre
served, given by Charles II. to Captain Nicholas Tattersal
(ancestor of the present owner), whose ship enabled the
king to escape to Fecamp after the battle of Worcester.
To the west of the town, beyond S. Anne's Church, was
the open ground called the Hides, recently enclosed. On
this side, beyond the present racecourse, towards Mount
Harry, which still commemorates in its name the popular
Henry III., the battle of Lewes was fought on May 14,
1264. It is not known by what route the Barons reached Sussex, but
when they had ascertained that the king was at Lewes, they pitched
their camp about nine miles from that town at the village of Fletching,
then surrounded by forest. On the night before the battle, while the
attendants of the king were holding high revelry in the Priory of St.
Pancras, the Earl of Leicester exhorted all his followers to repentance
and confession, and Cantilupe, Bishop of Worcester, gave absolution to
the army, kneeling on the turf, after which every soldier put a white
cross upon his breast, as well in token of his religious cause, as that his
side might recognise him in battle. Before sunrise on Wednesday,
May 14, the army of the Barons were marching upon Lewes, and reached
the crest of the hill above the town unopposed, their approach being so
little expected, that the sentinel placed to watch for them had either
deserted their posts, or were captured asleep. As soon as they came in
sight of the bell-tower of the Priory, Simon de Montfort again knelt on
1 Grandison, iv. I : ' Monstratur ibidem ipsa tabula in memoriam miraculi
conservata.'

THE BATTLE OF LEWES 113
the turf, and bidding all his soldiers follow his example, with their
arms outstretched in the form of a cross, cried — ' Grant us, O Lord,
our desire, with mighty victory, to the honour of thy name.' Then
he distributed his army, placing his own chariot, in which, on account
of his lameness, he had hitherto been carried, beneath his standard on
the summit of the hill, as if to indicate his presence there. But he
himself rode with the reserve force.
Meantime, King Henry unfurled his dragon standard, which be
tokened a resolution to give no quarter to the rebels, and came forth
against them, with Prince Edward commanding the right wing of his
army, and his brother, the King of the Romans, with his gallant son,
that on the left. Prince Edward then — ' thirsting after blood, as the
hart pants for cooling streams ' — fiercely began the battle, and forced
back his enemies by the fury of his first onset, continuing to pursue them
for four miles westwards, where multitudes fell slaughtered, and sixty
were drowned in attempting to ford the Ouse. By these movements,
through which one wing of each army was taken off the field, the car
and banner at the top of the hill became conspicuous, and tempted the
King of the Romans to an attack in which he was worsted at first.
Then, being joined by Prince Edward on his return from pursuing the
fugitives, he captured the car, but found it deserted by Montfort, who
was at that very time employing his whole strength in attacking the now
weakened royal centre where King Henry was stationed, knowing that
' by the seizure of the shepherd, the sheep would be dispersed.' ' Now,'
says the chronicler, ' flashed forth the lightning valour of the Barons,
fighting for their country with more breathless zeal.' They put the
King of the Romans to flight, took prisoners many of the greatest
royalist nobles and chieftains, and at length compelled the king him
self to fly for refuge to the Priory, which was defended by all possible
means. The King of the Romans, meantime, had been unable to escape
from the downs, where he had taken refuge in a windmill —
' The king of Alemaigne wende do full wel,
He saisede the mulne for a castel,'
and being surrounded there till evening, with jeers and cries of 'Come
out, you bad miller,' he was forced to give himself up, with his second
son Edmund, Prince Edward returning from his reckless triumph and
his bootless attack upon the car too late to give him any assistance.
' To while Sir Edward was about the chare to take,
The Kynge's side, alias, Simon did doun schake,
Unto the Kynge's partie Edward turned tite (speedily),
Then had the Erie the maistrie, the Kynge was discomfite.'
— Robert Brune.
H

H4 SUSSEX
The Prince then, on his return, found the field, where he expected
to be received with victorious acclamations, covered with the dead
and dying, and, as the banner of De Warenne was still flying on the
castle, by making a circuit of the town, he fled there for refuge. Vast
multitudes of fugitives were drowned in the river or suffocated in the
marshes from the weight of their armour ; others, reaching Pevensey,
escaped to France. 'Contrary to all expectation,' says the chronicler,
' the Barons had thus gained a wonderful victory, which they attributed
with gratitude to Him alone, by whose support they had passed through
the mortal dangers of the struggle.' The numbers of the slain, as given
by various authors, vary from 2700 to 20,000. l
' Many faire ladie lose hir lord that day,
And many gode bodie slayn at Leaus lay.
The nombre none wrote, for tell them might no man,
But He that alle wote, and alle thing ses and can.'
— Robert Brune.
The battle, which has left so great a trace on the history
and constitution of the country, is only commemorated at
Lewes in the name of Mount Harry, given to the highest
part of the Downs near the battlefield. The crest of the
hills is crowned by the Plantation known as Black Cap, and
a rude cross cut in the turf a little to the west is probably
a remnant of one which invited prayers for those slain on
that spot.
' Mount Harry is so distant from Lewes (nearly two miles) that it was
probably in the rear of Montfort's army, but it may, indeed, have been
where his car and standard were placed, or where the king had posted
his negligent watch over-night. The low mounds caused by the heaps
of bodies interrupting the smoothness of the turf, a decayed bone, or a
broken weapon, occasionally found, alone recall the memory of the
angry thousands once assembled there.' — W. H. Blaauw.
On the Downs, beyond Mount Harry, is Plumpton
Plain, whence the view was so much admired by John
Ray, the naturalist, when he visited Mr. Courthope at
Danny. ' Mr. Ray used to visit a family just at the foot of these hills, and
was so ravished with the prospect from Plumpton Plain near Lewes,
1 For these and many other details, see W. H. Blaauw, ' The Barons' War.

NEWHAVEN 115
that he mentions those scapes in his " Wisdom of God in the Works of
the Creation " with the utmost satisfaction, and thinks them equal to
anything he had seen in the finest parts of Europe.' — Gilbert White.

A railway line leads south to the sea, through the marshy
lands called Lewes Levels. On the higher ground at the foot
of the Downs are several villages. Southease (3 J ;//.), which
has a round tower to its church, was given to the abbots of
Winchester by King Edgar in 966. Piddinghoe1 (5 m.) has
a church partly XII. c, with another round tower. These
round towers of Sussex are built of rough flint, and their
form was probably adopted to evade the necessity for stone.
There is an inexplicable legend that ' Magpies are shoed at
Piddinghoe,' and in reference to the quantity of smuggled
spirits hidden here in pits and removed at night were the
proverbs — 'At Piddinghoe they dig for moonshine' — 'At
Piddinghoe they dig for smoke ' — ' At Piddinghoe they dig
for daylight,' all with the same intention. To the left, on
the east side of the Ouse, are the villages of Tarring Neville,
Heighton, and Denton, the last having a very small church,
of early English origin, dedicated to S. Leonard.
7 m. Newhaven Stat. An ugly, dirty little town and
smoky little port, with dangerous drinking water, and a long
pier at the mouth of the Ouse, whence steamers cross to
Dieppe in 4J hours. Here King Louis Philippe and Queen
Marie Amelie landed (as Mr. and Mrs. Smith), March 3,
after the Revolution of 1848.
' We have to announce the safe arrival of the ex-King and Queen of
the French at Newhaven yesterday.
' The ex-King and Queen have for some days been moving from
farmhouse to farmhouse in the neighbourhood of Treport. They were
nearly exhausted by fatigue, and on his arrival the King stated that a
night or two back he thought he must have given himself up.
' On Thursday Louis Philippe and the ex-Queen, and a male and
female attendant, who had during the week constituted the suite of
their royal master and mistress, embarked in a French fishing-boat from
near Treport, with the intention of attempting to cross the Channel.
1 The Ho (promontory) of the sons of Peada ?

116 SUSSEX
At sea the party was picked up by the Express, Southampton and
Havre steamboat, which immediately steamed for Newhaven, off which
harbour she arrived at seven o'clock in the morning.
' The King and Queen proceeded to the Bridge Hotel, where they
ordered beds, and intend to recover in some measure from the alarms
and fatigue of the week.
'The King, on landing, was habited in a green blouse, and blue
overcoat, borrowed from the captain of the Express. The King had
not so much baggage as he could carry in his pockets, in fact he had
not a change of clothing.' — Illustrated London News, March 4, 1848.
The church (of S. Michael) is partly XII. c, and
almost a copy of Yainville-sur-Seine. It has the unique
feature of the Norman apse of the chancel being joined
to the east side of the tower without any intermediate
chancel. On the tombstone of Thomas Tipper, 1785, a
local brewer, are the lines — by T. Clio Rickman, an
eminent politician of his day {ob. 1834) —
' Reader, with kind regret, this grave survey,
Nor heedless pass where Tipper's ashes lay.
Honest he was, ingenuous, blunt and kind,
And dared what few dare do, to speak his mind.
Philosophy and history well he knew,
Was versed in Physic, and in Surgery too,
The best old Stingo 1 he both brew'd and sold,
Nor did one knavish act to get his gold,
He played through life a varied comic part,
And knew immortal Hudibras by heart.
Reader, in honest truth, such was the man ;
Be better, wiser, laugh more if you can.'
There is a pleasant sea-view from the Castle Hill (150
feet), which is curious as to its geological formation, from
the mass of oyster and other shells beneath its turf.
Newhaven was formerly called Meeching.
' But now the Ouse, a nymph of very scornful grace,
So touchy waxt therewith, and was so squeamish grown,
That her old name she scorn'd should publickly be known.'
— Drayton, ' Polyolbion,' xvii.
1 'Newhaven tipper,' a kind of beer brewed with brackish water, which takes its
name from this Thomas Tipper.

BISHOPSTONE

[17

' The water-ousel is said to haunt the mouth of the Lewes river,
near Newhaven": and the Cornish chough builds, I know, all along the
chalky cliffs ofthe Sussex shore.'1 — Gilbert White.

8 m. Bishopstone Stat. The tiny village is in a fold
of the Downs about f m. from the station. In its
park-like pastures once stood Bishopstone House, the
occasional residence of Thomas Pelham, Duke of New-

Eadric's Porch, Bishopstone.

castle. Its transition Norman church has a tower in four
stages, slightly diminishing, with baluster windows. The
south porch is probably the oldest part of the church. Over
the door is a dial, bearing a cross and the name Eadric.
In the north wall is a stone slab, bearing the Lamb and the

1 But now the chough — Pyrrhocorax graculus — is considered to be nearly extinct
in the county. See W. Borrer, 'The Birds of Sussex.'

118 SUSSEX
doves drinking, as they are so often seen in early christian
sculptures at Rome. James Hurdis, the poet, a disciple
of Cowper, author of ' The Village Curate,' and Professor
of Poetry at Oxford, was Vicar of Bishopstone, 1791, and
lived close by at Norton.
9 7n. Seaford Stat.1 (Sea-fiord). The ugly, dreary little
town is becoming popular and prosperous through its
golf links, and has a mixture of down and sea air which
is very salubrious. The place had two parliamentary
representatives in 1300, and for centuries furnished its
quota of ships to the navy. Once also it had a harbour at
the original mouth of the Ouse, which was attacked by the
French in the time of Edward III., and again in 1545, when
'Pelham did repel 'em.' It was closed when the Ouse
deserted its mouth here and began to enter the sea at New
haven, and no vestige of a port now remains. This was
perhaps the Mercredesburn (Moer-cryd = Sea-ford) of Aella's
battle in 485. The remains ofthe British saint Lewinna —
the first christian lady in Sussex — martyred by the Saxons
c. 680, were preserved in S. Andrew's Church, and stolen
thence in 1058 by one Drogo (who has left a curious
account of the proceedings) for his monastery at Bergues S.
Winox, near Dunkerque. There they were revered till 1522,
when they were destroyed, with the exception of one rib.
The present transition-Norman church is dedicated to S.
Leonard, the Howard of early French history, and patron
of prisoners. The capital of the central column in its south
aisle has rude representations of the Baptism and Cruci
fixion of Christ. Over it is a carving of S. Michael and the
Dragon, found in the churchyard. In the outer wall are
a stone coffin and its cover. The garden of a house in
Church Street contains an early gothic crypt. In the face
of the cliff on the east is the natural and almost inacces
sible ledge, frequented by foxes, which is known as Puck
Church Parlour.
Seaford House was the residence of Sir John Leach,
Ford, from the Norse fiord, or bay.

SEAFORD 119
1760-1834, famous as a Master of the Rolls, more famous
for the feu d'esprit of Sir George Rose —
' Mr. Leach
Made a speech,
Angry, neat, and wrong ;
Mr. Hart,
On the other part,
Was right, and dull, and long.
Mr. Parker
Made the case darker,
Which was dark enough without ;
Mr. Cooke
Cited a book,
And the Chancellor said, I doubt.'

Corsica Hall has been haunted ever since Lord Napier's
son shot his tutor dead there in play. 'Are you from
Seaford?' is an inexplicable query addressed to a Sussex
person who leaves doors open.1
No one should visit Seaford without making an excursion
to the very picturesque and curious little village of West
Dean, 'the sheltered spot on the west' (3 ml), which,
however, lies to the east of Seaford, in the first folds of the
Eastbourne downs. When the straight dull road reaches a
valley, once a lake, with the many windings of the Cuckmere
just before it enters the sea, the pedestrian may shorten his
walk considerably by crossing straight over the hill in front
of him. The sudden apparition of the well-hidden village,
with its golden-lichened roofs, old dovecote, fine elm> trees,
most quaint gabled church, ancient tombstones, and fortified
rectory, is very striking.
The little church is transition Norman, with a curious
gabled frontal under the tower. It contains XVII. c. monu
ments of the Thomas family, and a canopied tomb, sup
posed to be that of Robert de Dene, formerly used as an
Easter sepulchre.
Joining the churchyard, is the XIV. c. Parsonage House,
1 See Notes and Queries, Ser. vi. vol. ix. p. 401.

120

SUSSEX

probably built by the monks of Wilmington. It is exceed
ingly rude and small, with narrow arched windows and a
high roof, and it rises directly from the rugged muddy way
of the village. It has a spiral stone staircase.
"At the lowest point of the broad valley lies West Dean. The
hamlet consists of very few houses, all so compactly grouped about the

Church of West Dean.

old church that it seems, on looking down upon the village, as if the
hand could cover them. The roofs are overgrown with lichen, yellow
on slate, red on tiles. In the farmyards are haystacks with yellow
conical coverings of thatch ; and around are close dense masses of chest
nut foliage, the green just touched with gold. The little group of
houses has mellowed with age ; their guarded peacefulness is soothing

WEST DEAN 121
to the eye and the spirit. Along the stretch of the hollow the land is
parcelled into meadows and tilth of varied hue. Here is a great patch
of warm grey soil, where horses are drawing the harrow ; yonder the
same work is being done by sleek black oxen. Where there is pasture,
its chalky-brown colour tells of the nature of the earth which produced
it. A vast oblong running right athwart the far side of the valley has
just been strewn with loam ; it is the darkest purple. The bright yellow
of the "kelk" spreads in several directions; and here and there rise
thin wreaths of white smoke, where a pile of uprooted couch-grass is
burning.' — George Gissing, ' Thyrza.'

«J»i<psl J.' ."1
u.'fc-iK.v .'-*v'

Parsonage House, West Dean.

The line from Lewes to Hastings passes, on the right,
a church amid tufted trees. It is that of Beddingham (the
home of the sons of Beda), one of the places mentioned in
King Alfred's will, where a monastery is believed to have
existed, and where the number of skeletons discovered
indicate a battlefield. A proverb says—
' When Beddingham Hill wears a cap,
Ripe and Chalvington get a drap. '
3 m. Glynde Stat. The village, at the foot of Mount
Caburn, has a Celtic name, from Glyn, a vale. The pretty

122 SUSSEX
little Grecian church was built by Trevor, Bishop of
Durham, in 1765. An obelisk in the churchyard has
an inscription by Mrs. Hemans to the two sons of Sir
D. Wedderburn, the eminent lawyer.
Glynde Place (Viscount Hampden) was built in 1567 by
William Morley, son of a successful ironfounder at Mayfield.
His grandson, Herbert Morley, was a distinguished Parlia
mentarian, but voted against the execution of the king.
The only son of this Herbert married the daughter of Sir
John Trevor, by Ruth, daughter of John Hampden. He
was allowed at the Restoration to purchase his pardon for
;£iooo, and died at Glynde in 1667. There are many
interesting portraits in Glynde Place, which has a grand old
drawing-room on the first floor.
2 m. south is Firle Place (Viscount Gage), with high roofs
like a French chateau of the XVIII. <?., nestling under the
Downs, entered by a gateway and surrounding a courtyard.
It is built of stone brought from Caen. The handsome hall
is decorated with armour. In the house are fine family
portraits by Sir J. Reynolds and others. Among its relics
are the table and chair constantly used by Napoleon I. at
St. Helena. The church, dedicated to S. Peter, contains
monuments of the Gage family.
Most of these old houses, nestling under the Downs for
shelter, look north. There was a notion that the south
wind brought sickness, and that the north and east winds
swept it away. Thus Tusser — •
' The south, as unkind, draweth sickness too near ;
The north, as a friend, maketh all again clear.'
— Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry.
Firle has been inhabited by the Gages since 1475.
There is a fine view from Firle Beacon.
' We know not a more tranquillising scene for the over-wrought brain
to rest upon than the prospect from the Downs on a fine summer's day
— the true Copley Fielding landscape ; here the many twinkling smiles
of ocean, always a feast to look upon ; there the slow-yoked oxen, with
their peaceful pace and low-bent necks, teaching us, in these fevered

ALFRISTON

123

days of steam and electricity, a very lesson of patience and humility ;
there the bleating flocks, browsing the sweet, short pasture, with their
minutest wants cared for, and their least wanderings restrained, by
that ever-watchful and sagacious guardian, the English sheep-dog.'
— Quarterly Review, No. 223.
8 tn. Berwick Stat. 2 m. north-east, on the Cuckmere,
are the interesting remains of Michelham Priory (see Ch.
iii.). An exposed, dusty road of 2 J miles leads south, where
the low spire of Alfrlston 1 (Aid or Old Friston) rises above
water-meadows and tufted trees, with softly-swelling downs
on either side, recalling many a picture by Copley Fielding

Alfriston.

or De Wint. At the entrance of the village is an ancient
stone cross, and it contains the Star Inn, a curious old
house, said to have been a hostelry for pilgrims to the shrine
of S. Richard of Chichester. Quaint little figures of S. Giles
and S. Julian (?) adorn brackets on either side of the door,
and beneath one of the windows is a representation of S.
George and the Dragon. A monster at the corner of the
house was probably the figure-head of a ship.
1 Domesday asserts that Alfric held Alfriceston before the Conquest.

124 SUSSEX
On a knoll in a field below the village, surrounded by
old elms, is the cruciform church of 5. Andrew, with a
low spire and a very wide chancel. Like most village
churches in Sussex, the interior of the ' cathedral of the
South Downs,' as it has been sometimes called, is ruined
by the gaudy tiles and varnished benches of a ' restoration,'
which here boasted that the seats were ' cut from the timber
of the south transept interior roof,' and for which a new
east window was made. Busts commemorate the rector
John Nutt, and his wife, 1653 ; and the canopy of an Easter
sepulchre (or founder's tomb) remains, with a square
Edwardian font. When a virgin died in this parish, a
wreath of white flowers used to be laid upon her coffin and
afterwards hung up in the church. A few years since, as
many as seventy 'virgins' garlands' hung in Alfriston
church at once. The foundations of the church are said
to have been originally laid in a field called Savyne Croft,
on the north of the village; but each night invisible
hands hurled the stones over the houses into the Tye,
where the church now stands. The form of the cross is
said to have been suggested by the position in which four
oxen were seen lying asleep on that spot.
' Alfriston, whose market-cross stands where Saxon ceorles sold
their surplus produce, and whose castle mound marks the site where
Alfred the Great assembled his thanes before beating the Danes at
Terrible Down. The inhabitants of Firle, Alciston, and Selmeston
are Saxon folk descended straight from King Alfred's rustics, without a
drop of mixed blood in their veins.' — Eraser's Mag., June 1874.
A curious building near the church, with a fine carved
oak roof, is said to have belonged to a Pre- Reformation
Clergy-House of the XIV. c. It is constructed of oak
framing, with the interstices filled in with wattle and daub.
The plan of the house was a central hall the whole height
of the building, with smaller rooms on each side for dormi
tories and offices.1
1 The house and its hall were engraved in The Builder, September 24, 1892.

ALFRISTON 125
An artist will find much to attract him in the timbered
cottages of the village, the old vicarage, and even in the
banks of the Cuckmere, though it is a mere streamlet.
' The country through which the Cuckmere flows has a melancholy
picturesqueness. It is a great reach of level meadows, very marshy,
with red-brown rushes growing in every ditch, and low trees in places,
their trunks wrapped in bright yellow lichen ; nor only their trunks,
but the very smallest of their twigs is so clad. All over the flats are
cows pasturing — black cows, contrasting with flocks of white sheep,
which are gathered together, bleating. The coarse grass is sun-scorched ;
the slope of the Downs on either side shows the customary chalky
green.' — George Gissing, ' Thyrza.'
A summer evening is the best time for visiting Alfriston.
' The only light that suits the tranquillity and tender pathos of the
region is that which fills the dimples of the Downs with inexpressibly
soft and dreamy expressions, and quickens the plain by revealing the
individuality of every blade of grass and plough-turned clod by its own
shadow.' — Coventry Patmore.
A circular hill at the western end of the parish is known
as the 'Five Lords' Burgh.' At the hamlet of Milton Street
so many Anglo-Saxon coins were discovered that the collec
tion became distinguished as 'the Alfriston find.'
A little west is Lullington, which has the smallest church
in Sussex. A little north-west, much nearer Berwick, lies Alciston,
the Aluricestone or Alaric's Town of Domesday Book.
Applied to Alciston is the proverb —
' When Firle Hill and Long Man has a cap,
We at A'ston gets a drap.' 1
A little west of Berwick Station is Selmeston, where the
church contains the altar-tomb of Dame Betris Braye,
daughter of Ralph Shirley of Wiston, 1532.
' When smuggling was carried on in these parts, the " free-traders "
had a rendezvous in the churchyard. An old altar-tomb served as their
1 F. E. Sawyer, Notes and Queries, 6th Ser. vol. ix. p. 341.

126 SUSSEX
temporary storehouse, By lifting the incumbent stone they could safely
deposit their goods, and it is said they never failed to leave a " tub "¦ or
two for the use of the parson.' — M. A. Lower.
A little north-west are the churches of Chalvington (S.
Bartholomew), where S. Thomas h Becket is represented
on a window ; and Rype, a good curvilinear building.
On the right of the railway the curious figure known
as ' the Long Man of Wilmington ' is now seen, cut in the
turf of the Downs. See p. 70.
ii;j m. Polegate Stat. Hence there are branch lines to
Eastbourne and Tunbridge Wells. (See Ch. iii.) Wilmington
(see Ch. iii.) is 2 J m. west.
15 m. Pevensey Stat. See Ch. ii.
2 if m. Bexhill Stat. See Ch. ii.
24J m. St. Leonards Stat. See Ch. ii.
26 \ m. Hastings Stat. See Ch. ii.

The old road from Lewes to Battle and Hastings passes
through South Mailing, and leaves on the left the little dis
used perpendicular church of Hamsey (the house by the
water), which contains a canopied altar-tomb of Tudor
date, generally known as the ' De Say Tomb,' from early
owners of the manor.
3 m. Ringi?ier, under the turfy slopes of Mount Caburn.
From Delver House, near the green, White of Selborne
dated several of his stilted letters, describing the Downs as
' a majestic chain of mountains,' eve. A neighbouring pine-
grove is mentioned in the 'Natural History of Selborne.'
The church (S. Mary) contains several monuments to
the Springett family, including that of 'the charitable
Springett ' —
' Redresse he did the wrongs of many a wio-ht,
Fatherlesse and widows by him possesse their rio-ht.'
The name of The Green Man Inn recalls Laughton
Chase. Broyle Park, once a deer forest of 2000 acres,

LA UGHTON

127

belonged to the Archbishops of Canterbury, afterwards to
the family of Springett.
To the right of the road to Laughton rise in the rich
plain the moated remains of Laughton Place, the old house
of the Pelhams, built by Sir William Pelham — ' prudent in
peace and valiant in war' — in the time of Henry VIII.
An inscription tells — 'L'an de grace 1534 fut cest mayson
faicte.' The initials of the founder frequently appear, W. P.,
with the badge of the buckle — assumed by the Pelhams after

1. "•^f--| 'i I1-- jm> ,'>, #>»' -1 v--i -'.-'- \

Laughton Place — The Tower.

the battle of Poitiers — in the decorations of the windows.
The terra-cotta ornaments of the great tower are very rare
in England. A little below the top is an enriched pro
jecting cornice, and the winding staircase, with a circular
column of brick, has five decorated windows, of which three
are blocked up. At the south corner of the moat is a
building chequered by diagonal lines of dark brick. The
ancient homestead, with its abundance of farm life, isolated
on an oasis in the marsh-land, will recall scenes in Holland.
Many generations of Pelhams lie beneath Laughton Church
The Duke of Newcastle was buried here November 18,

128 SUSSEX
1768, the Bishop of Norwich, in his rochet, reading the
service. The name of the Roebuck Inn recalls the ancient
chase of Laughton.
The title of Lord Pelham of Laughton is still borne by
the Earls of Chichester, though they deserted Laughton
Place in the time of Elizabeth for Halland, also in this
parish, and also reduced to the level of a mere farmhouse.
Evelyn lauded Halland amongst other ' sweet and delectable

At Laughton Place.

countrie seats.' It was the home of Thomas, Lord Pelham,
who married, as his second wife, Lady Grace Holies, sister
of John, Duke of Newcastle. Their five clever and beauti
ful daughters were brought up here, and their two sons, the
eldest of whom became (1715) Duke of Newcastle, and the
younger, Henry, Secretary at War, Paymaster of the Forces,
and (1744-54) Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Premier,
being succeeded in the latter office by his brother the

HALLAND

129

Duke. It was on hearing of Henry Pelham's death that
Garrick wrote — ' To hear no lawless passions call,
To serve the king, yet feel for all,
Such was thy glorious plan !
Wisdom with generous love took part,
Together work thy head and heart —
The minister and man.
Unite, ye kindred sons of earth,
Strangle bold faction in its birth,
Be Britain's weal your view !
For this great end let all combine,
Let virtue link each fair design,
And Pelham live in you.'
Turner's diary says —
' The ale was strong at Halland House, and it flowed as freely there
as it did in other old halls, in what are called the days of the " fine old
English gentleman." Many a bout we had of it. I may safely assert
that when we have met in the hall upon any occasion, political or
otherwise, not one of us has returned home thoroughly sober.' — Vol.
xi. p. 199.
The Duke of Newcastle's successor, Sir Thomas Pelham,
afterwards Earl of Chichester, deserted Halland for Stanmer.
The farmhouse of Chamber's Court belonged to the family
of De la Chambre.

A line runs north-east from Lewes to Tunbridge Wells
by- 2\ m. Barcombe Stat. Here there is good fishing on
the Ouse. In allusion to the simplicity of the natives, a
Sussex proverb says, ' When the people of Barcombe want
to make a cart, they make a waggon, and saw it in half.'
5 \ m. Isfield Stat.1 Isfield Place, now a farmhouse, was
the curious fortified house of the Shirleys, and bears their
arms and mottoes. Its outer wall remains, which had a
1 Formerly written Sifelle.

130 SUSSEX
tower at each angle. The church is restored, but still
interesting from its southern or Shirley Chapel, containing
the fine altar-tomb of Sir John Shirley, 1631, on which he
is represented with his two wives, their children kneeling
around. There are brasses of Edward Shirley, 1558, and
his wife, and Thomas Shirley, 157 1. In this church the
tomb of Gundrada, now at Lewes, was long kept. Little
Horsted (2 m. east) has a rebuilt Norman church. The
country upon which we now enter was covered with forests 1
till the last century.
' I left Tunbridge . . . and came to Lewes, through the deepest,
dirtiest, but many ways the richest and most profitable country of all
that part of England.
' The timber I saw here was prodigious, as well in quantity as in
bigness, and seemed in some places to be suflered to grow only because
it was so far off of any navigation that it was not worth cutting down
and carrying away ; in dry summers, indeed, a great deal is carried
away to Maidstone and other places on the Medway ; and sometimes
I have seen one tree on a. carriage, which they here call a tug, drawn
by two-and-twenty oxen, and even then this carried so little a way, and
then thrown down and left for other tugs to take up and carry on, that
sometimes it is two or three years before it gets to Chatham ; for if
once the rains come on, it stirs no more that year, and sometimes a
whole summer is not dry enough to make the roads passable. Here I
had a sight which, indeed, I never saw in any other part of England,
namely, that going to church at a country village, not very far from
Lewes, I saw an ancient lady, and a lady of very good quality, I assure
you, drawn to church in her coach with six oxen ; nor was it done in
frolic or humour, but mere necessity, the way being so stiff and deep
that no horses could go in it.' — 'A Tour through Great Britain, by a
Gentleman,' London, 1724.
8| m. Uckfield Stat. The village is a long street of
houses in pretty country. Opposite the King's Head Inn
is a stone room, probably once a prison. The old church
was pulled down in 1839.
1 of m. Buxted Stat. In an exceedingly pretty wooded
country. Going under the railway bridge and crossing a
1 ' The forest-ridge, composed of alternations of sandstone, sands, shales and
clays, with a deep valley on each side called the H'eald.' — Mantell, ' Wonders of
Geology. '

BUXTED 131
tributary of the Ouse, we find, at the entrance of Buxted
Park, the quaint square battlemented building called The
Hog House, with a hog and 158 1 carved over the door. It
was the residence of the Hogge or Huggett family, of whom
Ralf Hogge, in 1543, cast the first iron cannon made in
England : — ' Master Huggett and his man John,
They did cast the first cannon.'
Entering the park at the Hog House, we reach the
prettily situated Church (of S. Margaret), chiefly early Eng
lish, with a low shingled spire. Its chancel was probably
built by Sir Johan de Lewes, rector, 1292, who is com
memorated by a foliated cross. There are a good piscina,
remains of sedilia, and the brass of Britellus Avenel, rector,
1375. Christopher Savage and his son Robert were rectors
in the XV. c. ' Here lyeth graven under thys stoon
Xffore Savage both flesh and boon,'
is inscribed at the entrance of the chancel. Under the
cornice of the north porch is the figure of a woman with
a churn — tlje rebus of the Alchorne family, who built it.
South of the chancel is a mortuary chapel of the Earls of
Liverpool. The church has a curious oak muniment chest.
There are remains of an ancient hermitage in this parish,
carved out of the rock, at a spot known as The Vineyard.
Richard Woodman, the martyr, the great ironmaster of
Warbleton, is believed to have been a native of Buxted.
Huggetts Furnace, between Buxted and Mayfield, is
still pointed out, and the name is still common in the dis
trict. At Howbourne, in the parish of Buxted, the old
hammer-post, an iron trunk 9^- feet high, is preserved. We
are now in what was once the forest district of Sussex, but
the iron industry was fatal to the trees : —
' These forests, as I say, the daughters of the Weald
(That in their heavy breasts had long their grief conceal'd),
Foreseeing their decay, each hour so fast come on,
Under the axe's stroke fetch many a grievous groan,

132 SUSSEX
When as the anvil's weight and hammer's dreadful sound
Even rent the hollow woods and queachy ground,
So that the trembling nymphs, oppress'd with ghostl)T fear,
Ran maddening to the Downs with dishevell'd hair.
Jove's oak, the warlike ash, veined elm, the softer beech,
Short hazel, maple, plane, light ash, the bending wych,
What should the builder serve supplies the forger's turn,
When, under public good, base private gain takes hold,
And we, poor woful woods, to ruin lastly sold.'
— Drayton, ' Polyolbion.'
At Hendall, north of Buxted Church, is an old house
of the Pope family.
2 7ti. west of Buxted Station is Maresfiell, celebrated
for Wood's Nursery Gardens. The church is a small
decorated building. The names of ' The Forge ' and ' Old
Forge ' commemorate Maresfield ironworks.
15^ m. Crozvborough Stat. A little west is the site of
Crowborough Beacon, in what was formerly Ashdown Forest,
on a height of 804 feet, where beacon-fires formerly aroused
the Weald of Sussex in times of danger. There is a wide
view, the sea — twenty-five miles distant — being distinctly
visible. The drive hence, through wooded country, to
Withyham, is one of much beauty.
' Long ridges of ground covered with fern and heath, studded at
intervals with clumps of Scotch fir, alternate with narrow valleys, cul
tivated either as arable, meadow, and hop-garden, or threaded by
deep sandy lanes with rocky banks, overhung by twisted tree-roots.
Few and simple as are the elements of beauty in this landscape, the
repeated undulations, which involve a constant change of prospect,
secure it from monotony.' — Nineteenth Century, August 1884.
St. John's, Crowborough, is a little high-church settle
ment, with church, parsonage, almshouses, and daily ser
vice in a desolate country. Crowborough Warren was a
famous resort of smugglers.
' It is a strange thing to remember, when one is standing on the
cold desolate hills about Crowborough Beacon, or in the glens of Til-
gate Forest — now the very picture of quiet, and rest, and loneliness —
that this same Sussex was once the iron mart of England. Once, spotted

CROWBOROUGH 133
over these hills and through these forests, there were forges that roared
from morning till night, chimneys that sent up their smoke and their
poisonous vapour from one year's end to another ; cannon were cast,
and cannon-balls founded, where now there is no harsher voice than
the tap of the woodpecker or the jar of the goat-sucker. One can
scarcely realise those generations, and that trade, here ; one cannot
fancy the forests of St. Leonards and Ashdown, the Wolverhampton of
their age. But so it was ; and not the least remarkable thing in the
change is the absence of traditions about the life and customs of the
manufacturers so employed. The grandfathers of men now living were
actively engaged in the ironworks ; large fortunes, not a century ago,
were made by them, and yet, except in the names of places, and in
heaps of cinders, scarcely a trace remains that such things were.' —
M. A. Lower, ' Sussex Papers'
A little beyond Crowborough the railway line joins that
from Polegate to Groombridge and Tunbridge Wells. The
hamlet called Boar's Head Street recalls the arms of Anthony
Stapley the regicide, governor of Chichester (1651), who
bore 'Three Boars' Heads,' and owned land there.

A line runs north-west from Lewes to East Grinstead
by- (9 1/1.) Sheffield Park Stat.
Sheffield Place (Earl of Sheffield) is a modern gothic
house on the site of an ancient mansion, in a wild and
beautiful park, with old oaks, fern, and a fine sheet of water.
The house, a constant refuge for fugitives from France
during the great Revolution, contains a portrait by Sir
Joshua Reynolds of Gibbon the historian, who first visited
Sheffield Place in 1768, and who, when driven from
Lausanne by the Revolution, spent the last summer of his
life here as the guest of the first Lord Sheffield, occasion
ally acting as tutor to his daughters, afterwards Lady Maria
Stanley and Lady Louisa Clinton.
' In the year 1791, Lord Sheffield, accompanied by his family, visited
Gibbon at Lausanne, who promised to return soon to spend some time
with them in England. This formidable journey was deferred from
month to month, first by the ever-growing troubles in France, and
the war, which made travelling dangerous, and then by his great

134 SUSSEX
corpulence and those bodily infirmities which, having been too long
neglected, made it painful for him to move. At length, on receiving in
the month of April 1793, the news of Lady Sheffield's death, to whom
he was much attached, and whom he called his sister, he set out imme
diately to carry consolation to his friend. About six months after his
arrival in England, his complaint, which had originated more than
thirty years before, became so much worse that he was forced to undergo
an operation. This was several times repeated, and afforded some
relief, which encouraged a hope of convalescence, till the 16th of
January 1794, when he died without disquietude and without pain.' —
Guizot. In the neighbouring woods, Simon de Montfort en
camped with the army of the Barons before the battle of
Lewes, May 13, 1264.
The road, which crosses the Ouse and turns left on
leaving the station, skirts the paling of Sheffield Place, to
an open space with oaks, where there is an excellent old-
fashioned posting Inn. Hence, turning right, we reach
3 m. from the station (only 2 m. across the park, but leave
must be obtained to enter it), Fletching, a most attractive
specimen of an old-fashioned country village, its many-gabled
timber houses interspersed with pine-trees and ending in a
grey spire. The church (SS. Andrew and Mary) is a good
transition building with a fine Norman tower, but the
interior has been ' restored ' into dull commonplaceness.
The transepts show the bull's head of the Nevilles. In the
north aisle is the little brass of ' Petrus Denot,' a Fletching
tradesman of the XV. c. (who participated in the rebellion
of Jack Cade), on which brass gloves indicate that his trade
was that of a glover. On an altar-tomb in the south transept
is the fine brass of Sir Walter Dalyngrudge, 1395, and his
wife. An altar-tomb near this bears the effigy of Richard
Lache, 1596, who lived at the old Sheffield Place. His
widow, Charity, by her second marriage brought it to the
first Earl of Nottingham. It was let to J. Wilson, a famous
Sussex ironfounder, who died in 1670, and was buried in
great state from Sheffield Place with a torchlight proces
sion. The end wall of the north transept is strangely
screened off from the rest of the church so that it is only

HORSTED KEYNES 135
possible from a narrow passage, to see the monuments of
the Sheffield family by which it is covered, with that of
Gibbon in the centre, bearing an epitaph by Dr. Parr. The
historian rests in the vaults beneath, near his friend and
benefactor, by whom his remains were brought from Lon
don, where he died.
A Sussex proverb says —
' The people of Fletching
Live by snapping and ketching. ' '
i3f- m. Horsted Keynes Stat. A pleasant walk through
deep wooded lanes (turning right above the station) leads
to (i;J m.) Horsted Keynes. The picturesque early Eng
lish church of S. Giles stands upon a bosky knoll in a
lovely situation, with a tall slender spire. At the outer
angle of the south transept and chancel is a modern tomb,
with a foliated cross, over the grave of the saintly Arch
bishop Leighton. The epitaph tells how 'in an age of
religious strife he adorned the doctrine of God his Saviour
by a holy life, and by the meek and loving spirit which
breathes throughout his writings.' Against the adjoining
wall is an older monument, inscribed, ' Depositum Roberti
Leightouni Archiepiscopi Glaguensis apud Scotas, qui objit
xxv. die Juny. Anno Dmnj 1684, aetatis suae 74.' Close
by is the slab tomb, engraved with a coat of arms, of Sir
Ellis Leighton (1680), younger brother of the Archbishop.
In the interior of the church (keys at the second cottage),
which is restored out of interest, is the monument of the
Archbishop's sister, Mrs. Sapphira Lightmaker — 'a devout
woman and a mother in Israel, widow indeed, notwith
standing solicitations to a second marriage.' Many other
members of the Archbishop's family are commemorated on
the same tomb. Opposite is a curious miniature monu
ment, containing a tiny cross-legged effigy in armour of a
Knight-Templar of the time of Edward I.
From the north of the church a lane (1 ///.) leads
through hazel woods and by a large pool to Broadhurst, a
1 See Notes and Queries, Ser. vi. vol. ix. p. 243.

1 36

SUSSEX

fine old manor of the Lewknors and Michelburnes, now a
farmhouse, standing most picturesquly in a wild spot amid
groups of old oaks. Here, after resigning his archbishopric,
Leighton passed the last ten years of his life with his sister,
Mrs. Sapphira Lightmaker, and her son, Master Edward
Lightmaker,' spending most of his income in works of

Horsted Keynes.

charity. Some of the large old rooms of the house are of
his time. Amid these oak-crowned hillocks and thick
nut-copses, ' the little bishop,' as he is frequently called, for
he was very small of stature, loved to dwell upon the
marvellous works of the Almighty, especially on the glories
1 The executors of bis will, executed at Broadhurst.

BKUADHURST

137

of the firmament and the stars, saying that ' we miss the
chief benefit they are meant to render us, if we use them
not to light us up to heaven.' ' It was a long hand,' he
would exclaim, ' and a strong hand too, that stretched out
this stately canopy above us, and to Him whose work it is
we may ascribe most excellent majesty.' A short time
before his death he wrote —

42A^A

c Sj

sffiZZ?*®**

zc^AZXlJM

Broadhurst.

' I find daily more and more reason without me, and within me yet
much more, to pant and long to be gone. I am grown exceedingly
uneasy in writing and speaking, yea, almost in thinking, when I reflect
how cloudy our clearest thoughts are ; but, I think again, what other
can we do till the day break and the shadows flee away, as one that
lieth awake in the night must be thinking ; and one thought that will
likely oftenest return, when by all other thoughts he finds little relief,
is, when will it be day ? '

Archbishop Leighton died (1684) at the Bell Inn

138 SUSSEX
Warwick Lane in the City of London — peacefully in his
sleep — thereby fulfilling his often-expressed desire that he
might not trouble his friends in his death.
' He used often to say that, if he were to choose a place to die in,
it should be an inn ; it looking like a pilgrim's going home, to whom
this world was ali as an inn, and who was weary of the noise and con
fusion in it. He added that the officious tenderness and care of friends
was an entanglement to a dying man ; and that the unconcerned attend
ance of those that could be procured in such a place would give less
disturbance ; and he obtained what he desired, for he died at the Bell
Inn, in Warwick Lane.' — Burnet's ' Own Times.'
After describing what had been the main subject of the
Archbishop's thoughts for thirty years, Bishop Burnet
says —
' I was formed to them by a bishop, that had the greatest elevation
of soul, the largest compass of knowledge, the most mortified and most
heavenly disposition, that I ever yet saw in mortal ; that had the
greatest parts, as well as virtues, with the perfectest humility, that I
ever saw in man ; and had a sublime strain in preaching, with so grave
a gesture, and such a majesty, both of thought, of language, and of pro
nunciation, that I never once saw a wandering eye when he preached ;
and I have seen whole assemblies often melt in tears before him ; and
of whom I can say with great truth, that in a free and frequent conver
sation with him for above two-and-twenty years, I never knew him say
an idle word that had not a direct tendency to edification ; and I never
once saw him in any other temper but that which I wished to be in, in
the last moments of my life.'
The name of the hamlet Danehill is a memorial of the
Danish occupation.
i6\ m. West Hoathly Stat. The village, some distance
to the west, has a good church, partly early English, with
some iron slabs to members of the Infield family. At
Rockhurst, i\ m. west, is a large mass of sandstone rock,
poised upon a smaller one, known as ' Great upon Little.'
The wood in which it is situated is called Andreds IFood,
which has made some antiquaries regard it as an altar to
a British deity — Andrast ; though the name of Anderida
(from the negative prefix an, and tred a dwelling) may have
simply meant an uninhabited district.

GRAVETYE 139
Gravetye, in this parish, is a remarkable though small
XVI. c. house, with mullioned windows and a terraced
garden. Its hall has a richly ornamented stucco ceiling.
The house was built by Richard Infield, who died in 1624,
having married Catherine Culpeper of Wakehurst. Their
daughter, Agnes, took the property to Richard Falconer ;
their initials F. C. are over the porch. The Infields carried
on great ironworks here. Gravetye has recently belonged
to Mr. W. Robinson, author of the well-known work on
' The English Flower Garden.'
18 \ m. Kingscote Stat.
2o| 7n. East Grinstead. See Ch. i.

BRIGHTON
BRIGHTON is only 5o|- miles from London. Its
population (185,402 in 1891) is more than a fourth
of that of the county. But the place was unknown till the
middle ofthe XVIII. c. Then the village of Brighthelmstone
— said to be so called as the ' tun ' or residence of Bright-
helm, a bishop of Selsey — became frequented for bathing.
Though described in 1 5 1 5 by Hall as ' a poore village in
Sussex called Bright Helmston,' it is now distinguished
as the ' Queen of Watering Places ; ' for at the end of the
XVIII. c. the place was brought into fashion by the Prince
of Wales, afterwards George IV,, who began his fantastic
palace of the Pavilion in 17S4.
' It is the fashion to run down George IV. ; but what myriads ot
Londoners ought to thank him for inventing Brighton ! One of the
best physicians our city has ever known is kind, cheerful, merry Doctor
Brighton. Hail, thou purveyor of shrimps, and honest prescriber of
South Down mutton : no fly so pleasant as Brighton flies : nor any
cliff so pleasant to ride on : no shops so beautiful to look at as the
Brighton gimcrack shops, and the fruit shops, and the markets.' —
Thackeray, ' 'J'he Neivcomes.'
' Brighton does not offer any special advantages to bathers, either
by the attractions of its shore, or by the mildness of its climate, or the
beauty of the surrounding country : its fortune lies in its being situated
in the meridian of London, at the point of the south coast nearest to
the capital and the most accessible by railway. In reality, one must
regard Brighton as a suburb of London, whence the name of London-on-
Sea, as applied to it. The favour of Londoners has, since the beginning
of the nineteenth century, made it a populous town ; and now, without
any other means of subsistence than its fishery and its visitors, it has
more than a hundred thousand inhabitants, a hundred and fifty thousand
140

BRIGHTON 141
at the height of its season, and it has become the equal of a number
of industrial and commercial towns of the first class. Thousands of
merchants, whose counting-houses are in the city of London, have fixed
their residence at Brighton, and almost daily perform two journeys
between the Thames and the sea.' — Elisee Rectus.
It is its bracing air, dryness,1 and sunshine which attract
visitors to Brighton, and which cause many London trades
men to make their residence there, and to traverse the space
between London and Brighton twice daily.
' Long shalt thou laugh thy enemies to scorn,
Proud as Phoenicia, Queen of Watering Places ;
Boys yet unbreach'd and virgins yet unborn
On thy bleak downs shall tan their blooming faces.'
But ' London-on-Sea,' three miles in length, is absolutely
devoid of beauty. Next to its healthy climate, its chief
boast is its fine sea carriage-drive and promenade, over
three miles in length. It is also said to possess the finest
Aquarium in the world. The Museum contains a quantity
of valuable ancient pottery, and a perfect collection of the
fossils found in the chalk. 5. Nicholas, dating from the
time of Henry VII., was the old church of Brighthelmstone
village,2 but was almost rebuilt in 1853 ; it still contains a
font from a much more ancient church. In the churchyard
are monuments to Captain Tattersell — 'through whose
prudence, valour, and loyalty Charles II. was faithfully pre
served and conveyed to France, 1651'8 — and to Phoebe
Hessell, who fought as a private in the 5th Infantry, was
wounded at Fontenoy, and died at the age of 108. The
great Duke of Wellington was a pupil of Mr. Mitchell,
vicar of Brighton, and Mr. Wagner, afterwards vicar, was
also his tutor.
There is a legend that Charles II. spent the night at the
1 A proverb (referring to the Isle of Wight, 45 miles distant) says—
' When the Island's seen above the line,
Brighthelmstone loses weather fine.'
- ' Saint Nicholas keepes the mariners from daunger and diseas,
That beaten are with boystrous waves and tost in dreadfull seas.'
— The Popish Kingdom.
3 See Shoreham.

1 42 SUSSEX
King's Head in West Street, before embarking at Shoreham.
' His black-wigged majesty,' says Mrs. Thrale, ' has from
the time of the Restoration been its sign.'
The Pavilion is a foolish Chinese palace, nominally due
to designs of Nash. Its conglomeration of minarets made
Sydney Smith say, ' The dome of St. Paul's has come down
to Brighton and pupped.' 1 A house was originally built
here by Louis Weltje, cook to the Prince of Wales, but was
purchased by the Prince, who had been attracted by the
pure air of Brighton, and determined, when visiting his uncle
the Duke of Cumberland, who was the first of the Royal
Family to frequent the place, to make it his summer resi
dence. The Prince Regent spent nearly a million on his
ridiculous plaything-palace, which was finished in 1787.
' Shut up — no, not the King, but the Pavilion,
Or else 'twill cost us all another million.'
— Byron, ' Don Juan,' xiv.
The Royal Stables have been converted into the fine
concert-room called The Dome : the Riding-School is a
Corn-Exchange. The house where Mrs. Fitzherbert lived still overlooks
the Steyne, which takes its name from the rock — stane —
where Brighthelmstone fishermen used to dry their nets.
The eastern part of Brighton is known as Kemp Toivn,
from Thomas Reed Kemp, who built it 1821-35. Here
the esplanade may be amusing for a time : there is nothing
but the sea and the people to look at, but the elastic air
is enjoyable. The Chain Pier. 1134 feet long, was built in
1822. There is another pier to the west.
Brighton fishermen are called 'Jaspers.' They were
formerly called 'Juggs.' Cooper, in his ' Glossary,' gives :
' Jug, a nickname given to the men of Brighton. In the
parish of Kingston there is "Jugg's Road," on Kingston
Hill, so named because the Brighton fish-dealers, on ap
proaching Lewes, were first caught sight of on that spot.' 2
William Wilberforce also said, ' It looks very much as if St. Paul's had come
down to the sea and left a litter of cupolas.' — Life, iv. 277.
- See Notes and Queries, Ser. vi. vol. ix. p. 342,

POYNINGS 143
The Downs at the back of Brighton are excessively
dreary. Mrs. Piozzi reports that Dr. Johnson declared that
a man would soon be so overcome by their dismalness that
he would hang himself, if he could find a tree strong enough
to bear the rope, but that he would not be able to find it.
A railway line of 5^ m. has been constructed to the
Devil's Dyke. This is a natural fosse, 300 ft. deep, by
which tradition says that the devil intended to let the sea
in by night upon the churches of the Weald, but was pre
vented by an old woman looking out of her cottage window
with her candle in a sieve, which put him to flight, as he
mistook it for the rising sun. On the crest of the hill is a
British Ca7iip, known as Poor Man's Wall (the devil was
the ' Poor Man '), now much cockneyfied, and of tea-garden
celebrity. The Devil's Dyke hotel and its surroundings are
a popular resort. The Downs near this have their legend
of a ' Spectral Horseman ; ' but the district for the most
part is consecrated to the devil. Where the Dyke opens
out to the low land is the Devil's Punch-bowl. Two
mounds here are known as The Devil's Grave and the
Devils Wife's Grave; and on the hill, till recently, the
Devil's Hoof-Prints were pointed out in the turf. Two miles
S.W. is the height known as Thunders (Thor's) Barrow.
Below the dyke lies Poynings, with an unusually well-
proportioned cruciform church (Holy Trinity). It is built
of chalk and rubble, cased with flints. Four admirable
arches support the tower. The north transept is known as
Montague Chapel. Over the chancel window and the porch
are the arms of Poynings. Some old encaustic tiles bear
the arms of Richard, King of the Romans, brother of Henry
III. The plan of this interesting church is almost identical
with that of Alfriston.
In the neighbouring village of Pyecombe, shepherds'
crooks, of a kind indispensable to every rightly-equipped
shepherd, were made — Pyecombe hooks.
Edburton, a little west of Poynings, has a lead font of
1 1 80, and a pulpit and altar-rails said to have been pre
sented by Archbishop Laud.

144

SUSSEX

There is a pleasant drive over the Downs from Brighton
to Newhaven (9 711., see Ch. iv.). It passes a little south
of (4 ml) Ovingdean (celebrated in Ainsworth's novel of
'Ovingdean Grange,' now a stuccoed villa), where Charles
II. is said to have rested at the manor-house before embark
ing at Shoreham. Rottingdean (4 »/., omnibus to Brighton
twice daily) is a pleasant little bathing-place, with an early
English church of S. Margaret, which belonged to a priory
rich enough to attract an attack of the French in the time of

;jlfl&;

m^--

Poynings.

Richard II., when the Prior of Lewes was taken prisoner.1
Bulwer Lytton and Cardinal Manning were at Dr. Hooker's
school here. Burne Jones resided here, and has given two
beautiful windows to S. Margaret's Church.
' In a house at Rottingdean all kinds of strange noises were heard
night after night, when suddenly they ceased. Soon afterwards one of
1 From this time (1377) is supposed to date the proverb, ' Ware the Abbot of Battle
when the Prior of Lewes is taken prisoner.'

STANMER PARK 145
a gang of smugglers confessed to their having made a secret passage
from the beach close by the house, and that, wishing to induce the
occupiers to abandon it, they had rolled at dead of night tub after tub of
spirits up the passage, and so had caused it to be reported that the place
was haunted.' — Airs. Lathom, ' West Sussex Superstitions.'
At Balsdean, 2 711., is an ancient decorated thatched
chapel, now used as a barn.

A line of 8 m. leads east from Brighton to Lewes (see
Ch. iv.), passing —
4 m. Falmer Stat.
Stanmer Park (Earl of Chichester) was bought by
Thomas Pelham of Halland, who built the house in 1724.
It contains a very interesting collection of portraits of John,
ist Duke of Marlborough (Kneller) ; his son ; his four
daughters ; and several of his grandchildren ; inherited
through the marriage of Thomas Pelham, Duke of New
castle, with Henrietta, eldest daughter of Henrietta, Coun
tess of Godolphin, who was the eldest daughter of the
great Duke. The portrait of Elizabeth Steward, mother
of Oliver Cromwell, in widow's weeds ; Cromwell's Bible,
in four volumes, with his own marginal notes ; a medallion
of the Protector, and impression of his great seal; and a
picture and miniature of his daughter, Lady Fauconberg,
came through the marriage of Thomas Pelham, ist Earl
of Chichester, with Ann, only daughter and heiress of
Frederick Frankland of Muntham, and great-grand-daughter
of Frances Russell, daughter of the Protector. Of this
Thomas, ist Earl, and his wife Ann Frankland, are portraits
by Sir Joshua Reynolds, from whose hand there are also
many other fine portraits at Stanmer.
Holli7igsbury Hill, the site of a British fort, may be
visited from hence.

[The main line from Brighton to London passes
through —
i\ 711. Preston Park, now a suburb of Brighton. The
early English (restored) church of 5. Peter has some faint
K

146 SUSSEX
remains of rude frescoes. One represents the murder of
Thomas a Becket by the four knights, and the monk Grim
vainly trying to protect him. In another, S. Michael is
weighing the souls of the departed, and the Devil is trying
to force the scales upward.1
Francis Cheynell, the Parliamentarian and opponent of
Chillingworth, having forfeited his living near Banbury by
non-residence, retired to a cottage here, though he de
nounced Sussex as a county in which religion was neither
preached nor practised. He died in 1665, and is buried in
the nave of the church, extolled by Bishop Hoadly as being
'as pious, honest, and charitable as his bigotry would
permit.' In the churchyard is the grave of the Rev. James
Douglas ( 1 753-1819), the antiquary and artist, author of
the Nenia Britannica.
7 771. Hassock (formerly Hassock's Gate) Stat. Hassock
is an open common with trees on it.
1 m. right is Keymer Church, partly Norman. Ditch-
ling Church (of S. Margaret), ij m. east, is transition
Norman and early English of XIII. c. The shingled spire
is supported by four gothic arches. The chalk pillars are
admirably worked. Near it is a fine old timber house, once
the Priest's Flouse.
Ote Hall on Oatsha/l (General Godman), is an interesting
Elizabethan house of timber, on the site of an old manor
inhabited by the family of De Otehall in the reign of
Edward III. From this family it passed to the Michel
burnes, and then to the Godmans, of whom Thomas God-
man built the present house in 1600. The house was
afterwards long inhabited by the Shirleys, of whom General
Shirley, who became Commander-in-chief of the forces in
North America, never left home without six horses to his
carriage. Selina, Countess of Huntingdon, also lived here
for some years, and her chaplain, the Rev. W. Romaine
officiated in the hall, which was used as a chapel. The
Godman family have now repurchased the property.
The ascent called The Bostall leads to the highest point
1 See A rchaeologia, vol. xxiii.

DANNY 147
in the country, Ditchling Beacon — 858 feet — where there are
remains of a Roman camp.
2 7ii. left (omnibus) is Hurstpierpoint, where the modern
church of 1845 is by Barry. Belonging to the old church
is an effigy of a Knight-Templar in chain-armour, and
also of a knight in plate-armour of the time of Edward
III., supposed to be Sir Simon de Pierpoint. In the east
window of the south chapel are medallions from Bishop
Butler's suburban house of Hampstead Place. Between
Hurstpierpoint and Twineham is Hickstead, a curious old
manor of the Stapleys. .SI John's College is a large middle-
class school, founded 1848 : the chapel is of 1865. Under
the Downs, to the south of the village, is the fine old
Elizabethan brick house of Danny (Dane-eye), the old seat
of the Campion family. It was built in 1595 by George
Goring of Ovingdean, afterwards in the household of
Henry, Prince of Wales. He was knighted by James I.
in 1608. In 1629 he was created Lord Goring of Hurst
pierpoint, and in 1645 Earl of Norwich. The extravagance
of his son George forced him to sell his estate to Peter
Courthope of Cranbrook in 1652. In the reign of Charles
II. the manor and advowson came into the possession of
Sir John Shaw of Eltham, and at the end of the last century
Sir T. Gregory Shaw sold that property to W. J. Campion,
descended from the Norman family of Champaigne, who
obtained Danny by marrying a Courthope.
From the house of Danny a path winds up Wolstonbury
Hill, which bears traces of a circular camp, undeniably
Roman. Two plantations are known as Campion's Eye-
brou's. In the parish is Daneworth.
3J m. west of Hassocks is Albourne Place, the residence
of the Juxon family. There is a tradition that Archbishop
Juxon escaped from the Parliamentarian soldiers here in
the disguise of a bricklayer. The church (of S. Bartholomew)
was rebuilt in 1853.
9 m. Burgess Hill Stat.
9§ 711. Keymer Junction. On the right is Wivelsfield,
with an early English church. A little south-east is West-

148 SUSSEX
ineston, where the church of .S. Martin has mural paintings
of the XII. c. representing the Delivery of the Keys
to S. Peter, the Adoration of the Magi, Scourging of
Christ, &c.
[A line leads south-east (9 in.) to Lewes by —
31 m. Plumpton Stat. Plumpton Place (8 m. from
Lewes, " m. south ofthe station) is an old moated mansion.
The estate is mentioned in the will of King Alfred, and was
part of the dower of Anne of Cleves. Afterwards it belonged
to the Mascalls, of whom Leonard Mascall, author of many
agricultural and botanical works, — ' country gentleman's
books' — in the time of Henry VIIL, first introduced carp
{eyprinus) into England, cultivating them in the moat here.
He is also reported to have brought the golden pippin into
Sussex. According to the old proverb —
' Turkeys, carp, hops, pickerel, and beer,
Came into England all in one year.'
The house is much spoilt and desecrated.
A mile and a half south-west is Street or Streat Place
(General Fitz Hugh), a fine old house of the time of James
L, which belonged to the Dobells from 1632 to 1734. The
room which was once the library has rich decorations. A
curious hiding-place was concealed behind the hall chimney,
and there is a legend that during the civil wars a fugitive
Royalist rode into this, and disappeared with his horse for
ever. The early English church has tablets of Sussex iron
in its pavement. There is a monument to Mrs. Martha
Cogger — 'a pattern of piety and politeness.']
1 3 ///. Hayward' s J Heath Stat. Here, till recently, was
a wild heath with fine groups of fir trees. The land has
been cut up and sold in small portions by the Sergisons,
and is now a colony of cockney villas, and the roads both
to Lindfield and Cuckfield are lined with lamps.
ii- m. north-east (omnibus) is Lindfield, a pretty and
ancient village, with a wide rambling street. The bracket
1 From the hayward, or cattle-keeper ofthe manor.

LINDFIELD 149
supporting the sign of the Tiger Inn is a good specimen of
Sussex ironwork. The Church of S. Margaret, which stands
at the upper end of the street, with a quaint shingled spire,
was formerly worth visiting-. It contained a very curious
effigy of 1520 on three incised tiles, and on the wall was a
XV. c. fresco of S. Michael, but a restorer has plastered
over the fresco, and destroyed the old monuments and
glass : all the interest of the place is gone, except that the
west porch still retains a parvise, now used as a ringing
chamber. The east window is of exactly the same design
as the east window of Etchingham, except that the latter has
an additional order of mouldings. Behind the church is
Old Court (C. E. Kempe, Esq., the well-known artist of
stained glass), a very picturesque, half-timbered house, with
a lovely garden.
1 m. from Lindfield is Paxhill (William Sturdy, Esq.),
of 1595, the old Elizabethan house of the Board family,
which belonged first to the Wilsons. It stands on a
height, fronting west. The library chimney-piece is sculp
tured with a hunting-scene. The house is much spoilt by
modern additions.
East Miscalls (1 J m., which also belongs to Mr. Sturdy)
was the seat of the Mascalls in the XIV. and XV. c. Then
it was sold to the Middletons, and afterwards to the
Newtons (1560), from whom it passed to the Noyes family.
The beautiful old timber-house dates from 1580: it is
(1894) in a terrible state of dilapidation, uninhabited, and
scarcely safe to enter.
Kenwards was the old house of the Challoners.
Two miles left of Hayward's Heath (omnibus eight times
a day, 6d.) lies Cuckfield, in a beautiful wooded country.
The Church of Holy Trinity has been restored, but has
two good timber porches, one of them black and white.
It contains many monuments of the Burrells, and that of
Charles Sergison, 1732, eminent as a Commissioner of the
Royal Navy under William III. and Anne. There is a
beautiful view from the churchyard. In the hollow below
is Cuckfield Place, the XVI. c. house of the Sergisons,

150 SUSSEX
which was Elizabethan in its architecture till 1848, but
has since been added to. It is the ' Rookwood ' of Harrison
Ainsworth. One of the trees in the lime avenue is supposed
to foretell the death of an owner, by a branch falling across
his path. The house itself is haunted by a 'Blue Lady.'
The Gate House, at the foot of the avenue, is a quaint
turreted edifice of the time of James I. The Sergisons used
to be buried at midnight by torchlight, the procession
issuing from the gate-house as the clock struck twelve.
Through the valley below the house runs the little river
Adur, which abounds in trout.
[A branch of 13 m. leads east from Hayward's Heath
to Horsted Keynes, see Ch. iv. (on the line from London
(Victoria) by East Grinstead to Lewes). It passes —
Ardlngly Stat. The church {i\ m. north) has an oak
porch and screen. It contains the effigies of a knight and
a lady, probably Wakehursts, also the brasses of Richard
and Nicholas Culpeper of Wakehurst : that of their parents-
in-law, Richard and Elizabeth Wakehurst, 1454, on a tomb :
and that of Elizabeth, 1634, daughter of Sir William Cul
peper and his wife, Jane Pellatt. The Middle-class School
of S. Saviour is in connection with Shoreham and Lancing.
The river Ouse, which flows by Lewes to Newhaven, has
its source near this.1
Wakehurst Place (1 m. north) was built by Sir Edward
Culpeper in 1590. The two daughters of Richard Wake
hurst, who died in 1454, and is buried in the church,
having married the brothers Richard and Nicholas Cul
peper, brought the property to the family of ' the ubiquitous
Culpepers,' of whom John Philipot, Somerset Herald, writ
ing in 1657, says: 'I have noted at one time there were
twelve knights and baronets alive of this house too-ether.'
The manor-house, restored by Caroline, Marchioness of
Downshire, is a fine old stone building of three stories.
Both its long wings have been shortened of their orio-inal
design by three-fifths. The hall, though only one story
1 The sources of the Ouse, Adur, Arun, and a feeder of the Mole, are within a
few miles of each other.

SLAUGHAM 151
high, is very handsome, with a rich stucco ceiling and
frieze, and a heavy chimney-piece bearing an escutcheon of
the Culpepers with twelve quarterings. A richly-ornamented
door opens on the staircase.
3 771. north-east is West Hoathly. For this and Grave
tye, see Ch. iv.]
i6f m. Balcombe Stat.1 2 in. south-east is Ardingly,
see above. Balcombe Place is on the estate of Neylands,
where a fine old mansion of the Culpepers was recently
destroyed. The place was originally Neylond, and pro
duced Thomas Neylond, Prior of Lewes, in 1459, whose
magnificent brass is at Cowfold.
3 m. west is Slaugham. The south chancel of the
Church of St. Mary was built by the once famous family of
Covert in 16 13. Here, removed from an earlier part of the
church, is a very curious monument of 1579, also belong
ing to the family, though only marked by initials, which
has kneeling statues of a man and his wife with their seven
sons and eight daughters. There are brasses of John
Covert, 1503 ; Jane Covert, Lady Fetyplace, with her open
Bible, 1 58 1 ; and Richard Covert and his three wives,
1547. Richard Covert is represented standing in his
coffin, looking at the figure of the Saviour rising from the
sepulchre. The last two brasses are in picturesque old
canopied tombs. Mural paintings of the Flagellation,
Crucifixion, and Last Supper were found here under the
whitewash. In the hollow below the churchyard (entrance
at the farmhouse) are the exceedingly picturesque fragments
of the magnificent Slaugham Place, the old house of the
Coverts, a very rich, powerful, and numerous family in the
reigns of Elizabeth and James I., but now extinct. They
had a park here of 1200 acres. An artist will delight in the
ruins, small as they are, the most striking feature being
the beautiful triple entrance of three rich renaissance arches,
with fluted pilasters, coats of arms, &c, now standing in an
orchard. 1 Illustrating the simplicity of the natives, a Sussex proverb says, ' The people of
Balcombe put dung round their church spire to make it grow as high as Cuckfield spire, '

152 SUSSEX
' The Coverts were among the greatest landed proprietors in the south
of England, and tradition says that they might travel over their own
manors from Southwark to the English Channel.' — M. A. Lower, 'Hist.
of Sussex.' The principal source of the Adur is at Slaugham.
2 m. distant is Lower Seeding, with a tall modern church
yard cross ' to the unrecorded dead.' At Leonardslee (Sir
Edmund G. Loder, Bt.) kangaroos have been acclimatised
and breed in the woods, and beavers have a lodge. There
is a famous Alpine garden here.
' The scenery of St. Leonard's forest, uniformly picturesque, becomes
specially beautiful at Leonard's Lee. It includes a natural ravine,
which drains the high ground on either side, and was utilised by the
iron-masters, when they reigned supreme in this region, for the purpose
of obtaining water-power to drive their smelting-mills. By skilful treat
ment, these "hammer" or "furnace" ponds have been enlarged into
a series of four lakes ; the " pond bays " that divided them, and in which
the masonry was fixed for the wheels and sluices, now forming cause
ways or bridges. A grove of larch stands at the head of the ravine, and
a portion of the sandy slopes is covered with heather and fern, from
which rise silver birches, mingled with Scotch firs, and in places a wild
apple-tree, whose distorted lichen-coated trunk serves as a foil to the
grace and dignity of its associates. The woods which surmount and
fringe the slopes are mainly of beech, single examples of which attain
great size ; while the underwoods, which spread down to the borders of
the lakes, include Spanish chestnuts and other saplings. No one who
has viewed this scene on a brilliant day in autumn will readily forget it.'
— H. G. Hewlett, ATine/cenlh Century, August 1884.
Three Bridges Station.
1 J in. east is Worth, where the church (keys close by),
prettily situated on a wooded knoll, approached by an ancient
timber lych-gate, is now a mere rebuilding under Salvin of
what was till recently one of the most curious and remark
able early Norman or Anglo-Saxon buildings in England,
and which, with the exception of the church at Bradford-
011- Avon, probably affords the only perfect specimen of an
Anglo-Saxon ground-plan. The portions least interfered
with externally are the apse and the south transept, which
have a basement of large stones, a string-course of stone

WORTH

153

half way up the building, and numerous flat shallow but
tresses. Three ancient windows remain, two on the north
and one on the south of the nave; but two of them are
partial restorations. They have two lights, divided by a
heavy balustre, in the place of the later mullion. The
simple round arch, supported by rude pillars, at the entrance

Anglo-Saxon Arches, Worth.

of the chancel, is curious. The font is ancient. But all
that vulgar tiles, revolting glass, and coarse woodwork can
do to spoil a church, has been liberally bestowed. Near
the timber porch is the very laudatory gravestone of John
Alcock, with a curious epitaph, and close by that of his wife,
whom he starved, inscribed, ' My knees are faint through
fasting, my flesh is dried up for want of fatness.'

'54 SUSSEX
Crabbet Park is a modern Georgian house, built from
the admirable design of its mistress, Lady Anne Blunt, the
African traveller and grand-daughter of the poet Byron.
The place has become celebrated for its breed of Arab
horses and their sales. The owner of the house, Mr.
Wilfrid Blunt, has insisted on a wild piece of land, covered
with rubbish heaps and brushwood — ' the African desert ' —
being left in front of the house door, in curious contrast to
the well-kept lawn and pleached alleys a little farther off.
Worth Park (Mrs. Montefiore) is a large modern house
of brick and stone, very sumptuously furnished.
Interesting fossil plants are often found in the sandstone
of this district. Beautiful views may be obtained from the
high ground of Worth Forest and Tilgate Forest.
[A line runs east to Tunbridge Wells, by East Grinstead,
Forest Row, and Withyham. See Ch. i. Passing at 2 in.
Rowfant, where Rowfant Place, a very fine old Jacobean
house, was the residence of Frederick Locker the poet.1 In
the Natural History Museum at South Kensington, much
attention is attracted to a natural curiosity from Rowfant.
' In 1888, a pair of the Great Titmouse (Partis major) began to
build their nest in the post-box which stood in the road at Rowfant,
and into which letters, &c, were posted and taken out by the door
daily. One of the birds was killed by a boy, and the nest was not
finished. 'In 18S9, a pair completed the nest, laid seven eggs and began to
sit ; but one day, when an unusual number of post-cards were dropped
into, and nearly filled, the box, the birds deserted the nest, which was
afterwards removed with the nest.
' In 1890, a pair built a new nest and laid seven eggs and reared
a brood of five young, although the letters posted were often found
lying on the back of the sitting bird, which never left the nest when
the door of the box was opened to take out the letters.
'The birds went in and out by the slit for the letters.' — Museum
Notice. [A line runs S.W. to Horsham by i\ in. Crawler, on
the outskirts of Tilgate Forest, from which several old trees
1 Afterwards Locker- Lampson, oo. 1895

HORSHAM 155
adorn the village. The (restored) church of S. John Bap
tist bears on its oak roof the inscription —
' Man yn wele bewar ; for warldly good maketh man blynde,
Bewar for what comyth behinde.'
Mark Lemon, for twenty-nine years the editor of Punch,
died here, at Vine Cottage, May 23, 1870. A proverb says
— ' It always rains on Crawley Fair day.'
' At Crawley, sand and sandstone appear, and the road is composed
of grit and stone, containing fluviatile shells, bones and plants.' — Man-
tell, ' Wonders of Geology.'
i|- m. left is ffield, where the church of S. Margaret
contains tombs of a knight and lady, supposed to be Sir
John de Ifield and his wife, 131 7. The knight's effigy, a
very noble one, offers a splendid example of the armour
of the time of Edward II. The pews of this church came
from S. Margaret's at Westminster.
5 m. Faygate Stat.
9 m. Horsham Stat, a very picturesque little country
town, said to derive its name from the Saxon Horsa. It
is quiet, except when enlivened by its market, which has
much local celebrity. The meeting of the streets is called,
like that of Oxford, Carfax. The Causeway is an avenue
of trees, lined by quaint bow-windowed houses, with broad
pavements in front of them, and leading to the old church
(of S. Mary), which is a handsome medley of many styles
upon an early English foundation, with a spire which is tall
for Sussex. The interior has undergone the mutilation of
a wholesale restoration, and its monuments are mostly torn
from the sites for which they were intended, and meaning-
lessly crowded under the tower. Those allowed to remain
in their places include, on the north side of the altar, a
graceful canopied tomb of Sussex marble to Thomas, Lord
Hoo, 1455, long Chancellor in France, and an important
soldier and statesman under Henry VI. Opposite, on the
south of the altar, is an altar-tomb with an effigy of a knight
in armour to Thomas, Lord Braose, 1396, whose family

'56 SUSSEX
long owned the place, and from whom the lordship de
scended to the Dukes of Norfolk. Near this is the tomb
of Elizabeth Delves, 1654, aged 25, with a beautiful recum
bent marble statue by Francis Fanelli, evidently a portrait
and full of character. There are two brasses, one represent
ing a man and woman. The other, of a priest, though head
less and footless, is still important from its costume — the
splendid chasuble, and the rich stole, crossed upon the
breast and passing beneath the girdle of the alb : it is
beautifully engraved by Waller. Near the north porch
is the Trinity Chantry, founded by Sir John Caryll in the
time of Henry VIII. Over a vestry of the time of Edward
IV. is a strong-room, with grated windows and its old
bolts and bars.
The Grammar School was founded by Richard Collier,
1532, but the school has recently been moved from the
picturesque old building near the church to another site.
Hugh James Rose, one of the leaders of the Tractarian
movement, was Vicar of Horsham from 182 1 to 1830.
' The truth concerning Hugh James Rose, in a word, is this, — that
whatsoever things are pure, are lovely, are of good report, — whether in
Providence, in Nature, in Literature, or in Art,— he loved these things
with all his soul. His intense appreciation of the natural scenery — in
particular the Down scenery of his native county, of which he would
discourse with a kind of rapture, — amounted in him to a passion.' —
Biirgon. Near the church is the old manor-house of Hewells.
which belonged to Rusper Priory, and was the residence of
the Treadcrofts for a hundred and fifty years.
At Chesworth {\ m. S.E.) was the ancient residence
of the De Braoses, now a farm, retaining traces of its moat
and chapel. At Denne Park (a little south) is a very noble
lime-avenue. The fine old Elizabethan house of Hill's
Place was destroyed in 1819.
On the east is St. Leonard's Forest (9000 acres), which
takes its name from a chapel of the saint. It belonged to
the great family of De Braose and the Dukes of Norfolk
who succeeded them, but reverting to the Crown, has for

ST. LEONARD'S FOREST 157
more than two hundred years been held by several owners.
The principal avenue was called Alike Mill's Race, from a
runner for a wager who fell dead there in the moment of
victory ; but this has been recently cut down, with many
other of the finest trees. Many picturesque legends linger
around the forest. Dr. Andrew Borde, writing in the
XVI. c., says ofthe nightingale, 'The bird wyl syng round
about the forest, but never within the precinct of the forest.'
This is because nightingales once disturbed the devotions
of a forest hermit, who cursed them.
' Adders never stynge
Nor nightingales synge, '
is an old distich. If a man rides through the charmed pre
cincts at night, a headless figure is apt to vault up behind
him and accompany him to the limit of the forest ! this
figure is 'Squire Paulett' St. Leonard himself fought in
the recesses of the wood with a mighty dragon, and, though
the saint was victorious in the end, the combat was terrible.
Wherever the blood of St. Leonard, drawn by the monster,
dropped upon the earth, masses of lilies of the valley sprung
up, and are still to be seen in proof of the authenticity of
the story. As late as 16 14 an account of 'a strange mon
strous serpent ' haunting St. Leonard's Forest, was published
by one John Trundle.
'There is always left in his track or path a glutinous and shine
matter (as by a small similitude we may perceive in a snail's) which is
very corrupt and offensive to the senses. The serpent is reputed to be
9 feete, or rather more, in length, and shaped almost in the forme of an
axeltree of a cart, a quantitie of thicknesse in the middest, and some
what smaller at both ends. The former part, which he shootes forth as
a necke, is supposed to be an elle long, with a white ring, as it were,
of scales about it. There are likewise on either side of him discovered
two greate bunches as big as a, large foote-ball, and, as some think,
will in time grow to wings ; but God, I hope, will so defend the poor
people in the neighbourhood but he shall be destroyed before he grow
to fledge.' 5 m. north-east is Rusper, where a Benedictine priory
of S. Mary Magdalene was founded by one of the De

158 SUSSEX
Braose family. It is now a picturesque farmhouse In
1840 an enamelled chalice and gold crucifix were found
in coffins desecrated here, An external staircase in Friday
Street, Rusper, deserves notice.
In the church are the brasses of John de Kyggesfolde,
a civilian, and his wife Agneys, 1375, whose demi-effigies
afford valuable examples of costume of that period.1 The
legend, which is in Norman-French, runs, 'John de Kyg
gesfolde et Agneys sa feme gisount icy, Dieu de lo almes eit
mrcy.' Another brass commemorates Thomas and Mary
Challoner, 1532. The ancient farm called Normans is said
to have been inhabited by the family of Mutton from the
time of the Conquest, and a chest is preserved which the
farmer's ancestor is said to have brought from Normandy at
that time.
2 in. north, in the parish of Warnham, which has a
station on the line from Horsham to Dorking, is Field
Place, where Percy Bysshe Shelley was born, August 4,
1792, and which was his home till after his expulsion from
Oxford. The room in which he was born is marked by a
tablet as 'the shrine of his dawning speech and thought.'
' Queen Mab ' was written at Field Place.
On IVarnham Pond Shelley first began to float paper
boats, a pastime which always continued to please him so
much that, having no other paper, he is remembered to
have sent a ^5 note away, twisted into a paper boat, upon
the Serpentine. Warnham Church (restored) is early English. It con
tains the fine Elizabethan tomb of Sir John Caryl, 1613.
' The speech of the Sussex peasant is distinguished by a broad
yawning pronunciation of the open vowels, which makes it difficult to
understand, and hardly to be represented in print. Some idea of it
may be obtained by trying to follow the rhyme-sequence in the follow
ing doggrel triplet, which figures on an alehouse sign : —
' I, John Charman,
Will beat half on 'em
With any long-legged man in Warnham.'
— The Nineteenth Century, August 1S84.
1 See Boutell's ' Monumental Brasses.'

SHOREHAM 159
3 m. south-west is liclii7igfield, in a richly-wooded country.
The old church of S. Nicholas has a low timber spire. To
the Aylesbury Dairy Farm here, plans were made for the re
moval of Christ's Hospital, founded in 1553 by Edward VI.
2 ///. south-east, at Nuthurst, the church of S. Andrew
has some remains of ancient glass, and a brass of Thomas
Frenshe, rector, i486. Near Nuthurst Lodge is the spring
called The Wren's Well, in the thick wood, with some
double- moated remains of a castle — Sedgwick Castle —
which belonged to the ancient family of De Selvage, then
to that of De Braose. One source of the Adur is here.]
2 ;/;. beyond Three Bridges Station the railway line
to London enters Surrey.

A line runs north-west from Brighton and Horsham and
Guildford by —
3 171. Portslade Stat. The village, 1 m. north, has an
early English church, S. Nicholas, with an ancient fresco of
the Last Judgment. i-|- in. north is Hangleton, with an old
Tudor manor-house, Hangleton Place. Near this stood the
recently destroyed old house of Benfield, with a porch
sculptured with shields. The Church of Aldrington, a
little south, has been rebuilt, after being ruined for 300
years. A hermitage was established here, on the north of
the churchyard, for one Thomas Bolle, in 1402 ; now the
place is a suburb of Brighton. Six dreary miles of exposed
and dusty road, along which William IV. took his daily
drive, lead from Brighton to —
6 m. Shoreham Stat. New Shoreham, at the mouth of
the Adur — the I'ortus Adurni of the Romans — is the place
where John landed after the death of Richard I., and where
Charles II. embarked after the battle of Worcester (October
15, 165 1), landing at Fecamp. The church here and the
neighbouring church of Old Shoreham are probably both due
to the De Braoses, Lords of Shoreham. New Shoreham
was founded by William De Braose, probably in atonement
for his cruelties in Wales, where he beguiled Sitfylt of

i6o

SUSSEX

Dimswald and many other powerful persons to a feast in
his castle at Abergavenny, and murdered them ; and then,
going to Sitfylt's house, slew his only surviving son in the
presence of his mother, and set fire to his mansion. After
wards, falling under suspicion of infidelity to John, he
escaped to France, where he died in 12 12, but his wife
Matilda and her children, who had fled to Ireland, were
taken, brought back to Windsor, and never heard of
more.

&.-IL

New Shoreham Church.

.SIS'. Mary and Nicholas, ATew Shoreham (usually open),
is the glorious fragment of a cruciform church, consisting
of choir, transepts, and one pier of the nave. The arches
under the tower are Norman, in the choir transition. In
the north transept is an exquisite foliated early English
arch. The capitals of the columns are beautiful and de
serving of study.1 A Norman arcade runs round the choir
1 Many of them are engraved in a work on the church by Edmund Sharpe.

OLD SHOREHAM 161
under the early English windows, surmounted by a triforium
and clerestory. The fine Norman font under the tower is
coeval with the foundation. There is a brass of a merchant
and his wife of the time of Edward IV. The church is
comparatively free from the abominations which accompany
an English 'restoration.' When perfect, Shoreham, never
conventual, was in the first rank of English parish churches.
The elections of members of Parliament used to be held in
the north transept of the church.
The disproportionately handsome Suspension Bridge
dates from 1833, when it was built by a Duke of Norfolk.
A straight road running from the station and a turn
to the left lead, m\m., to Old Shoreham, with a smaller
cruciform Norman church of S. Nicholas (keys at the
school), of much interest, recalling, with its stumpy Nor
man tower, many village churches in Picardy. The west
end of the nave is supposed to be earlier than the rest
of the church, and to have been the whole of the original
building. There are few windows, but there has been an
unusual number of doors : the nave alone has three blocked
entrances. There is, or was, an oak chancel-screen. The
east window is of the same design, as regards tracery, as
that of Etchingham, except that there is an additional order
of mouldings at the latter. The tower is supported by four
massive Norman arches. At the ends of the transepts are
very peculiar oblong windows, with zigzag mouldings on
the outside. Parts of the church were restored almost from
ruin in the middle of the present century, but the good
Jacobean pulpit has been discarded for a trashy modern
one. There are monuments of the families of Blaker,
Monk, and Bridger in the church and churchyard.
Beyond an old timber bridge over the Adur, Lancing
College rises on the hillside.
' And Adur coming down to Shoreham softly said,
The Downs did very ill, poor woods so to debase.'
— Drayton, ' Polyolbion,' xvii.
10 m. Bramber Stat, (from Brymmburgh — fortified hill).
L

1 62

SUSSEX

Bramber has only a population of 173, but in 1832 it
returned two members to Parliament. It was once an
important place, and the site of a fortress of the Saxon
kings, built to guard the hollow — 4 m. long, i| wide —
by which the Adur reaches the sea at Shoreham. Close to
the station, on the hill (with a locked churchyard), is the
Church of S. Nicholas, the ivy-mantled nave and tower of
which belonged to a small cruciform Norman building.
Behind are the remains of the Castle, which, inhabited by

A

Bramber.

Earl Guerd in the time of the Confessor, was built by the
English, but granted at the Conquest to the Norman,
William de Braose, who added a keep, with walls nine feet
thick. In 1644 Captain Temple held Bramber Castle for
the king, and was besieged there, and when the Parliamen
tarians took it, they blew it up. Only a fragment of a tower
on a mound now remains from the ruins of the castle which
was a large parallelogram, moated on the south and north
west.

STEYNING 163
Very few villages have the attractive charm of Bramber.
The cottage roofs, sometimes tiled, sometimes stone, are
gilded with lichen, their little gardens are bright with
flowers in summer; and the hill behind, crowned by the
jagged ruins of the castle, is covered with elm-wood. A
little Museum — ' Potter's ' — of stuffed land and sea birds,
and of other animals in various ludicrous attitudes, is quite
worth visiting, and is an enchantment to the children of the
neighbourhood. There are no remains of Sele Abbey, founded 1075, and
destroyed to build the rectory. S. Mary's House is a good
timber building. Beyond the Adur (turning left at 'Ye
Olde King's Head ') is Seeding Church, which belonged to
a priory. ' Westward of the Adur all the sheep have horns, smooth white
faces, and white legs. As soon as you pass that river, and mount
Beeding Hill, all the flocks at once become hornless, or, as they call
them, poll-sheep, and have, moreover, black faces with a white tuft of
wool on their foreheads, and speckled and spotted legs ; so that you
would think the flocks of Laban were pasturing on one side of the
stream, and the variegated breed of Jacob were cantoned on the other.
If you talk with the shepherds on the subject, they tell you that the case
has been so from time immemorial, and smile at your complacency if
you ask them whether the situation of these breeds might not be re
versed.' — Gilbert White, ' Natural History of Selborne.'
10^ in. Steyning Stat. A church was founded at Stey-
ning — Stane Street — by S. Cuthman, a West Country shep
herd, who miraculously guarded his father's sheep by making
a circle round them, which nothing could break through.
His mother had long been paralysed and confined to a couch
on wheels, upon which, on his father's death, he wheeled her
' eastwards.' The cord by which he drew the couch broke,
and he replaced it by elder-twigs. Haymakers, who watched
him from their fields by the wayside, mocked at him, and
were ever after punished by storms which spoilt their hay.
The couch finally broke down at Steyning, where Cuthman
erected a hut for himself and his mother. He also built a
timber church, working at it with his own hands, but wear-

1 64 SUSSEX
ing gloves {cheirothecas) whilst he worked, and hanging
them up outside the church whilst he was at prayers. In
this church he was buried, and the pilgrimage to Cuthman's
grave caused a town to spring up round it.
Ethelwolf, father of Alfred, dying at Bramber Castle, is
reported by Asser, Alfred's secretary, to have been buried
at Steyning in 853, 1 but was afterwards moved to Win
chester. The Confessor gave Steyning to Fecamp in Nor
mandy, and William I. confirmed the grant. At the
suppression of alien priories (1 Ed. IV., 1461) Steyning
was transferred to Sion.
Cuthman's church — the supposed burial-place of a king
and a saint — stood on the site of the existing church of
S. Andrew, built by Fecamp Benedictines in the time of
Henry I. The piers of the tower and arches of the aisles
are early Norman, the rest of the building is of 1150. The
nave has a beautiful series of enriched pier-arches of the
latter period. The tower is XVI. c. The vicarage dining-
room has a handsome oak screen, dated 1522, which pro
bably came from the church.
The gabled house near the church, called the Brother
hood Hail, was given by William Holland, Alderman of
Chichester, for a grammar-school, which he founded here in
1614. There is a tradition that as often as the field at Steyning
known as 'the Penfold field' (a meadow which S. Cuth
man crossed when wheeling his mother) is mown, rain
follows immediately after.2
2 in. N.W. is Wiston (anciently Wistoneston), beautifully
situated near the foot of Chanctonbury Ring (814 feet),
crowned by remains of a British-Roman camp. The fine
old Elizabethan house of Wiston was altered by Blore when
he was full of the work at Crewe Hall, and he changed
most of the windows to be like those of the house in
Cheshire. A fine relief, built into the outer wall of the
house on the garden side, probably stood formerly over the
1 Florence of Worcester and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle say he was buried at
Worcester. 2 See Sussex Daily News, Sept. 18, 1883.

WISTON 165
chimney-piece of the hall, which has a good timber roof of
the time of Charles I., but has had stucco ornaments added
to the walls in the last century. A gallery has admirable
French panelling. In the library is a good full-length por
trait of Sir John Fagg, who purchased Wiston from the
Shirleys, and from whom the present family are descended
in the female line. A fine portrait of Cromwell on the
stairs belonged to Cardinal Mazarin.
Close to the house is the church of S. Michael, ruined
by an ignorant 'restoration.' In the east window are the
arms of Braose and Warenne, and of Braose and Howard
(before the augmentation of Flodden Field). The font has
an early basin of Sussex marble. The south chapel con
tains the once deeply interesting and important, but now
fragmentary, monuments of the Shirleys.
At the Conquest, Wiston was granted to one Ralph, who
took the name of Wistoneston. His descendant, in the
seventh degree, married Adam de Bavent in the time of
Henry III. Eleanor de Bavent brought Wiston by mar
riage (1349) to William de Braose or Brewys, a younger
son of the great family at Bramber. His grandson, Sir John
de Braose, 14.26, has a very important brass here. The
stone is powdered over with brass scrolls, thirty in number,
bearing the words 'Jesu mercy.' The six shields bear the
arms of Braose, the monkish-Latin inscription is (or was) —
' Es testis, Christe, quod non jacet lapis iste
Corpus ut ornetur, sed spiritus ut memoretur.'
The whole is a noble example of a knight in plate-armour of
the time of Henry V. Every peculiarity of the panoply of
plate-armour in its highest perfection is exhibited in the most
characteristic manner. The small appendages to the taces
indeed, but these alone, are unusual.1 The spurs are of great
length. The tomb of a child under a graceful canopy, on
the left of the chapel, is supposed to be that of the only son
of Sir John de Braose, who died before him. The manor
1 See Boutell's 'Monumental Brasses.' The brass is engraved in Dalla way's
' Sussex.'

1 66 SUSSEX
then passed by the marriage of his sister Beatrix de Braose
to Sir Hugh Shirley. The gravestone of this first of the
Shirleys of Wiston, from which the brasses are torn away,
was long used as the cover of a well, but is now restored to
the pavement of the chapel. Sir Hugh Shirley, who was
Grand Falconer of Ireland, was one of the four knights in
royal armour who fell by the hand of the Earl of Douglas
at Shrewsbury, July 20, 1403.
' Hold up thy head, vile Scot, or thou art like
Never to hold it up again ; the spirits
Of Shirley, Stafford, Blunt, are in my arms.'
— K. Hen. IV., Pt. i. Act v. Sc. 4.
His son, Ralph, who fought at Agincourt, and diede. 1443,
was married three times. From his first marriage with
Margaret Staunton, sprang the elder line of Shirley of
Eatington and Shirley, Earl Ferrers ; by his second marriage
with Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John Blount, he was the
father of Ralph Shirley, who succeeded him at Wiston.
This Ralph, dying c. 1509, left two sons, of whom the
younger, Thomas, founded the family of the Shirleys of
West Grinstead. The elder, Sir Richard (1540), had a very
striking and important canopied tomb her-e, which has been
wantonly destroyed. The relief which was at the back of
the tomb is preserved, on which Richard Shirley is repre
sented between his two wives, Alma Shelley of Michel-
grove, and Elizabeth Guldeford. The monument is of
peculiar importance, as the figure of the knight, who died
in the time of Henry VIIL, is one ofthe first examples of
a standing figure on a tomb. William, son of Sir Richard
Shirley (d. 155 1), was likewise buried at Wiston under an
altar-tomb, now destroyed, which also covered the remains of
Richard Elrington C1569), the second husband of his widow.
His son Thomas, who was only nine years old at the time
of his father's death, was knighted by Elizabeth at Rye in
1 5 73- He rebuilt the house at Wiston, and, being a staunch
Protestant, he was here appointed by Elizabeth as jailor to
Anne, wife of Philip, Earl of Arundel, who had embraced

WISTON 167
the Roman Catholic faith. Sir Thomas Shirley was after
wards Treasurer to James I. His fine monument was de
stroyed in the ' restoration ' of the church ; but his figure and
that of his wife, which formerly stood under a semicircular
arch, are to be found in the recess of a neighbouring window.
By Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Kempe of Ollantighe in
Kent, he was the father of three sons, the famous Shirley
brothers, whose romantic story was considered so remark
able even in their own day that a drama was composed
on it by John Day, William Rowley, and George Wilkins,
1607, and acted during their lifetime. The second of these
brothers, Sir Anthony, went to Persia (1598) on a mission
to induce the Shah to join the Christians against the Turks,
and was made a Mirza or prince, being the first instance of
a Christian upon whom any Oriental title was conferred. He
was appointed ambassador for Abbas Shah to the courts
of Europe, and died, after many adventures, in 1630. His
younger brother, Sir Robert, had accompanied him to Persia,
where he married Teresia, daughter of a Circassian prince
named Ismael Khan. Being sent back to Europe as ambas
sador, he arrived at Rome in Persian dress, with a crucifix
in his turban. On a second visit to Rome, in 1662, he was
painted, with his wife, by Vandyke.1 Returning to Wiston
(in 161 1 ), he was honourably received by James I.; but
ultimately went back to Persia, where he died in 1628,
and was buried at Kazvin. Teresia died in a convent
at Rome. The eldest of the three brothers, Sir Thomas, tried to
keep up the family fortunes by investing his money in ships as
privateers against the Spaniards ; but he was taken prisoner
by the Turks, and only liberated on the interference of
James I. He was afterwards imprisoned in the Tower for
interfering in the Levant trade. At length, utterly ruined,
he was compelled to sell Wiston, and died of a broken
heart. A distich says —
' Shirley of Preston
Died for loss of Weston.'
1 This portrait is now at Petworth.

1 68 SUSSEX
Wiston was bought by Sir John Fagg, whose descendant,
Elizabeth Fagg, brought it to the family of Goring in 1743.
Wiston has always had a deer-park.
The periwinkle grows wild in this neighbourhood — ' the
fresh Pervincke rich of hewe ' of Chaucer.
The proverb —
' Old Mother Goring's got her cap on,
We shall soon have wet ' —
refers to Chanctonbury.
A little west of Wiston is Washington (Wasa-inga-tun,
the settlement of the sons of Wasa). The church, rebuilt
(except the tower) in 1866, contains a XVI. c. tomb to
John Byne. The gravestone of Charles Goring, 182 1, in
the churchyard is inscribed —
' Ab orienti redux incorruptus,
Optimatibus improbisque invisus,
Divitiarum honorumque spretus,
Populi salutis et potentiae vindex. '
The church of Sullington, a little farther west, con
tains an effigy of a knight of the time of Henry III., said
to be that of Sir William de Covert, and a stone coffin
of 1230. 14 m. Henfield Stat. Henfield is a picturesque Sussex
village, where the Bishops of Chichester had a moated manor.
A monument in the church (S. Peter, of which the interest
is restored away) commemorates Thomas Bysshopp, who
died in 1552. Henry Bysshopp, the Royalist, was concealed
from the Parliamentarians in a hole in the old house at
Henfield. His picture, with the dog which shared his
hiding-place and did not betray him by barking, is in the
gallery at Parham. A brass, with effigies of a woman and
child, commemorates Mrs. Ann Kenwellmersh, ' a vertuous
and woorthy matron of pietie,' 1633, ar)d her grandson,
Meneleb Raynsford, who died at the age of nine in 1627.
Beneath is inscribed —

WEST GRINSTEAD 169
'Great Jove hath lost his Ganymede, I know,
Which made him seek another here below —
And finding none — not one — like unto this,
Hath ta'en him hence into eternal bliss.
Cease, then, for thy dear Meneleb to weep ;
God's darling was too good for thee to keep :
But rather joy in this great favour given,
A child on earth is made a saint in heaven.'
The learned Catholic, Thomas Stapleton, exiled under
Elizabeth — when he became a professor at Douai, and
afterwards master of a college at Louvain — was born at
Henfield. New Timber Place (2 in. S.E.) is an Elizabethan house,
preserving its ancient moat and bridges.
Partridge Green Stat. 2 m. east is Shermanbury , a
little west of which is a picturesque Edwardian gateway of
Ewhurst, the old moated manor of the Peverels.
18J m. West Grinstead Stat. The church of S. George,
of picturesque outline, has a low shingled spire and a good
decorated timber porch. The walls were apparently of
peculiar herring-bone work, of which one portion is exposed.
The interior, which has been really restored, not mutilated
and destroyed, under Warren, is full of interest. The font
is a very fine one. The church has two naves. The altar
at the end of that on the north is detached in order to show
a curious ambry immediately behind it. The stained glass
is by Kempe. In the cradle-roof above the altar a panel is
made to open, to show the lever by which a canopy was
suspended over the host. On the N. wall hangs a copy of
a perished fresco of S. Christopher. The walls were once
covered with frescoes, which were disapproved of, and the
bills still exist for painting texts of Scripture over them ' in
the best style.'
The ancient oak seats bear the names of the different
farms to which they belong, and one aisle is set apart for
men, and another for women. The screen is a restoration,
but part of the ancient screen was found in the tower
gutter. In what was formerly the Burrell Chantry is an altar-tomb

170 SUSSEX
bearing the brass of Philippa (1375), daughter of David de
Strabolgy, Earl of Athol, and wife, first of Sir Ralph Percy,
and afterwards of Sir John Halsham {ob. 1385).1 Another
brass on an attendant altar-tomb is that of Sir Hugh
Halsham (1441) and his wife Jocosa, 1421. In both the
beautiful effigies of the Ladies Halsham, the simple
arrangement of kirtle, tunic, or cote-hardi ' alone apparent
beneath a mantle' is seen.2 Both the ladies wear the
plaited wimple so arranged as to impart to its upper outline
a heart-like contour. Both brasses have elegant canopies.
Between the finials of the memorial of Sir Hugh and his
wife were three banners of arms, of which only the central
one remains, charged with, first and fourth, argent, a chevron
engrailed, between three leopards' heads, gules, for Halsham ;
and second and third, paly of six, or and sable, for Strabolgy,
Earl of Athol. Though the monument of Philippa, Lady
Halsham, bears the date of her death, both plates were
evidently engraved at the same time, after the death of Sir
Hugh, 1 44 1.
An ancient stone coffin is preserved near the Strabolgy
tomb. A great monument by Rysbrack commemorates
William Powlett, 1748. The sarcophagus of Sir William
Burrell, the archaeologist, 1796, is by Flaxman.
The fine old Elizabethan Rectory contains a great deal
of fine old carved oak furniture, which is an heirloom to
rectors of West Grinstead. A local tradition says that it
was carved by Cromwell's soldiers when they were quartered
here. The old house of Clothalls, now a farm, belonged
to the ancient family of that name for four hundred years.
West Grinstead House is a modern Gothic building by
Nash. In the park formerly stood an old manor of the
staunch Royalist family of the Caryls, often visited by
Pope — ' This verse to Caryl, muse, is due.' — Rape of the Lock.
Under 'Pope's Oak,' which stands alone in the park,
1 Engraved in Dallaway's ' Sussex.'
a See Boutell's ' Monumental Brasses.'

KNEPP CASTLE 171
the poet is supposed to have written ' The Rape of the Lock.'
The Caryls, having been Roman Catholics, have left a
Roman Catholic colony at West Grinstead, where the priest
has opened industrial schools of great utility, managed by
Sisters of Charity.
1 m. W. was Knepp Castle, formerly one of the six great
fortresses of Sussex, now only a fragment of a tower on a
little mound. It gave name to a family ; Paganus de la
Knappe is mentioned as a benefactor of Beeding Priory.
Knepp was seized in forfeiture from William de Braose
by King John, and became a favourite hunting-lodge with
him (many letters which he wrote from Knepp being extant).
He restored it to the Braose family in the person of Giles,
Bishop of Hereford, 12 15. The bishop died immediately
after, and in June 12 16, John ordered the castle to be
destroyed and burnt, a sentence which was never carried
out, owing to the king's own death in October. In 1546-72
Knepp was four times forfeited to the Crown by attainders
in the Howard family.
\ 111. north, in a park which has a lake of 80 acres, is
the modern gothic castle of Knepp (Sir Raymond Burrell,
Bart.), which contains — after Petworth — the best collection
of pictures in the country, including —
Holbein.— Hit Henry Guldeford, Controller of the Household to
Henry VIII.
Lady Guldeford, daughter of Sir Thomas Wotton.
These two pictures are replicas from those at Windsor.
Thomas Cromwell, Earl of Essex — a very fine specimen of
the master. Anne of Cleves, of fine and sensible countenance.
Lord Chancellor Rich.
Sir A. More. — Jane, wife of Ninian Burrell of Holmstead Place,
Cuckfield. Frances Roberts, wife of W. Hooper, then of Sir Nicholas
Crisp.
Porbus. — The Duke and Duchess of Brunswick-Grubenhagen.
Van Somer. — Prince Henry with a goldfinch.
William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke.
Vandyke. — Henrietta Maria, in white satin — full length.
Lely— Charles II.— full length, seated, in the robes ofthe Garter.

172 SUSSEX
The house contains the valuable topographical library
collected by Sir William Burrell. A great curiosity is the
Diary (1680-1720) of Timothy Burrell of Cuckfield, with
his comically illustrated accounts, in which ' cakes for my
little girl,' a newpigstye or broom, &c, are equally depicted.
A pot of beer indicates the entries of wages paid to John
the coachman, constantly drunk ; a dagger through a window
the window tax, which infuriated him. Charities are entered
under 'The Lord's Rent.' The daughter of this Timothy
Burrell married Lord Trevor (his unkind treatment by
whom he mentions in Greek), and her daughter the third
Duke of Marlborough.
' Amongst Sussex antiquaries the palm must undoubtedly be
awarded to Sir William Burrell. As we turn over those fifteen folio
volumes of MSS. which he bequeathed to the British Museum, we
actually seem to have before us all the indentures, pedigrees, and
manorial records which the county could ever have possessed.' —
Quarterly Rev. , No. 223.
3^ m. W. of the station is Shipley Church (S. Mary),
recently well restored under Pearson. It is an interesting
building with several fine Norman arches, and was granted to
the Knights-Templars in the XII. c. by Philip de Harcourt,
the friend of Henry IL, who was Dean of Lincoln, Arch
deacon of Evreux, and afterwards Bishop of Bayeux. Against
the south wall of the chancel is the sumptuous alabaster tomb
of Sir Thomas Caryl of Bentons, 1616, who is represented
with his wife and four children. The two last lines of the
epitaph are a puzzle, the nominatives and verbs being
placed together. The inscription runs —
' Aske not who lyes entombed, that crime
Argues you livid not in his time ;
His virtues answer, and to Fate,
Outliving him, express their hate
For stealing 'way the life of one
Who (but for fashion) needs no stone
To seek his praise ; his worst did dye,
His best part outlives memorie.
Then view, reade, trace, his tombe, praise, deedes,
Which teares, joy, love, strains, causeth, breeds.'

COW FOLD 173
• There is a fine old timber south porch, and at the end
of the churchyard a very picturesque ancient timber build
ing, serving as a mortuary chapel, said to have been once
the north porch. It used to be said that an echo in Shipley
Church repeated at night the twenty-two syllables —
' Os homini sublime dedit coelumq 'tueri
Jussit et erectos.' 1
Belonging to this church, but preserved in the vicarage,
is a curious and beautiful miniature Reliquary (seven inches
long and six high), enamelled and gilt at the sides and ends,
being contemporary with the cession of the church to the
Templars. One of the pieces at the top was found and
supplied by a person who accidentally saw the reliquary
at an exhibition at Horsham.
2 in. N. of West Grinstead (omnibus from station) is
the church of Cowfold (S. Peter), containing the immense
and magnificent brass of Thomas Nelond, Prior of Lewes,
1433- ' This large and noble effigy furnishes the finest example of an ecclesi
astic wearing a surplice, corresponding in most respects in form with the
similar vestment still retained as a ministering habit by ourselves. The
expression of the head in this brass is peculiarly solemn and dignified,
and is engraven with admirable effect. . . . The canopy is of the most
elaborate beauty known to exist amongst brasses of English workman
ship. ... A symbolical shield indicates the doctrine of the Blessed
Trinity. ' — Boutell's ' Monumental Brasses'
Mr. W. Borrer (author of ' The Birds of Sussex ') has a
very fine collection at Cowfold, illustrative of the ornitho
logy of the county, including the very rare Glossy Ibis,
found at Piddinghoe; a Crane from near Newhaven, and
a Ger Falcon from Rye.
In the parish of Cowfold is the modern monastery of S.
Hugh, Parkminster (1886), with a large church. All the
thirty-six silent fathers have little houses of their own. The
monastery was built upon the general expulsion of religious
orders from France, and in the fear that the famous monas-
1 Harris's ' Lex Terh.' verb Echo.

174 SUSSEX
tery of the Grande Chartreuse would be confiscated, its
most precious relics were brought here, including a piece of
the True Cross given by S. Louis, a bone of S. Peter, and
a ATeronica napkin, in splendid monstrances. The white-
robed monks of Parkminster are a great feature of this
country-side. They never eat meat, and observe rules of
silence. Parknowle is a handsome modern house, containing
good pictures.
2i| ;//. Southwater Stat.
i\ m. west is New Building (Wilfred Blunt, Esq.), an
interesting small Jacobean manor-house, with a fine old
staircase, and a priest's hiding-hole. The hall, paved with
Sussex marble and panelled with old oak, has a Sussex iron
fire-back of 1650. An artist will delight in the old garden
at the back, with its miniature paved walks and ancient
sundial. The copse-fringed lanes which are a characteristic of
this part of Sussex are called Rues.
26 m. Horsham. See p. 155.

A line runs W. from Brighton to Chichester and Ports
mouth by —
6 m. Shoreham Stat. See p. 159.
6\ m. Lancing Stat.1 This is a very quiet sea-bathing
place. On the hillside to the north is 5. Nicholas's College,
the first of the schools founded by Canon Woodward in
1848, and intended to imbue the sons of gentlemen with
a devotion to the Church of England.
9 in. Worthing Stat. Worthing rose, with Brighton, from
a fishing village to a considerable town in the time of the
Prince Regent. It is a very ugly, uninteresting place, with
a relaxing climate ; but pleasant excursions may be made
from it. Worthing wheatears — ' the English ortolan ' — are
a well-known dainty, and are taken in great numbers on the
1 The name is said to be derived from Wencheling, one of the sons of Aella, founder
of the South Saxon kingdom.

BROADWATER 175
Downs in rude traps excavated in the turf. They are so
abundant that one man sometimes takes a hundred in a day.
1 m. N. is the fine cruciform transition-Norman church
of Broadwater (S.-Mary), with a low semi-Norman tower,
from which the stupidity of an ignorant restorer has removed
the circular stair-turret, which till recently gave a diversified
termination to its outline. In the chancel is the brass of
John Mapilton, rector, and chancellor to Katherine of
France, 1420, a fine example of a copSd ecclesiastic; and
a renaissance tomb to Thomas, Lord De la Warr, 1525,
Knight of the Garter under Henry VIIL, whose family
lived hard by at Offington. On the south of the chancel is
a stone bench ; in the south transept the tomb of Sir
Thomas West, 9th Baron De la Warr, 1554. An admirable
foliated cross in brass bears on the arms ' Sanguis Xti salva
me. Passio Xti conforta me.' At its foot is placed an
inscription to John Corby, rector, 141 5 ; but the cross was
probably really a memorial to Richard Toomer, rector,
1432-1445.1 Here, in 1734, died John Bunnet, aged 109,
who had six wives, three of whom he married and buried
after he was 100.
Offington, a little west, was a residence of the Earls De
la Warr. 1 m. farther, prettily situated amongst elm trees, is the
church of Sompting, with a very remarkable tower of Rhenish
character, with a gable on each face, and a quadrangular
wooden spire. The gables are divided by rounded shafts,
and the lower part of the tower is encircled by flat bands of
stone. The lower portion of the tower and part of the
chancel claim to be Saxon, and perhaps are of the time
of Edward the Confessor. In the south transept are rude
sculptures — a kneeling bishop, and the Saviour with a book,
surrounded by emblems of the Evangelists. The church
was early granted to the Knights-Templars.
'A very curious church, which deserves to be studied with great
attention. ' — Rickman.See Cartwright's ' Topography of the Rape of Bramber.

176

SUSSEX

The farm known as Sompting Abbots was the property
of the Abbey of Fecamp. The house belonging to it, above
the church, was used for a short time as a residence by
Queen Caroline before she went to Italy.
2 m. along the Downs, above Sompting, is Cissbury
(Cissa's beorg), a camp of sixty acres enclosed by a single

Sompting Church.

trench from, eight to twelve feet deep — 'like nothing so
much as a huge sponge-cake; as if it had tumbled by
accident among those quiet grazing grounds, treeless and
shrubless.'1 3 m. N.E. of Cissbury is Chanctonbury (814
feet). See p. 164. 1 Quarterly Rev., No. 223.

TARRING 177
Somewhat in the same direction, 9 in. N.E. of Worthing,
is Warminghurst, in a lofty situation, with a wide view.
The modernised church has a fine brass of Edward Shelley
(with his wife, Joan Iden, seven sons, and three daughters),
1554, Controller ofthe Household to Henry VIIL, Edward
VI. , and Mary. A little N.W. is Thakeham, with a (restored)
early English church (S. Mary). William Penn lived for
some time at Thakeham, and worshipped in the Quaker's
Meeting House, near Coolham village, which still exists, and
which he is said to have built.
The lands of Apsley at Thakeham gave a name to the
family which produced Sir Allan Apsley, Lieutenant of the
Tower, father of Lucy Hutchinson. The proverb, ' Thake
ham,- the last place God made,' refers to the out-of-the-
world position of the village.
5!- m. west of Thakeham is West Chittington, where
some frescoes have been found . in the chancel, partly
Norman. The old stocks remain by the churchyard.
At Findon, 4 in. on the road from Worthing to Horsham,
is a good early English church (of S. John Baptist). The
roof deserves notice. In the church are two stone seats,
with a door between them.
io\ in. West Worthing Stat. This is the frightful suburb
of a dreary place.
i\ in north of the station is Tarring. The church (S.
Andrew) has a tall spire. The tower window was erected
to Robert Southey by his eldest daughter, Mrs. Warter,
wife of the rector. The place has been a ' peculiar ' of the
Archbishops of Canterbury from the time of Athelstan. The
National School is a fine fragment of the Archbishop 's Palace,
which was early English, altered in perpendicular times.
The small but famous Tarring Fig Orchard (on the
right of the village street, entrance 2d.), is said to have
been planted by Richard de la Wych, the sainted Bishop
of Chichester, who 'grafted fruit-trees at Tarring with his
own hand.' Others ascribe the garden to Becket, and a
fig-tree is shown as planted by him. The original figs were
probably brought from Fecamp to Sompting, and thence

178 SUSSEX
here: the later figs were planted in 1745- ll ls curl0US
that at the ripening of the figs large flights of beccafici1 like
those of the Roman Campagna, come to Sompting and
Tarring, and nowhere else.
Parsonage Row, Tarring, dates from the time of Henry
VI. A path leads north from the churchyard to {i\ ml)
Salvington, where, in a muddy lane on the left, at Laaes, is
the very humble cottage where the learned John Selden was
born, Dec. 16, 1584, his father being a Wandering fiddler,
who used to go about to play at village fairs.
' His learning did not live in a lane, but traced all the latitude of
arts and languages, as appears by the many and various works he hath
written, which people affect as they stand affected either by their fancy
or function. Lay gentlemen prefer his " Titles of Honour ; " lawyers
his "Mare Clausum;" antiquaries his "Spicilegium ad Edmearum;"
clergymen like best his book "De Diis Syris," and worst his "History
of Tythes." '—Fuller.
The distich over the inner lintel of the cottage door —
' Gratus, honeste, mihi, non claudar, inito sedebis,
Fur abeas, non sum facta soluta tibi,' 2
is said to have been composed and carved by Selden when
he was ten years old. The parish register says — ' 1584.
John, the son of John Selden the minstrell, was baptized
the xx. day of December.' 8 Hence, by lanes, we may reach
Highdown Hill, with a camp (300 ft. by 180) enclosing
'the Miller's Tomb,' with verses composed by the eccentric
John Oliver, who had a mill here, and erected his tomb
thirty years before his death. He died 1793, and was
carried to his grave by a procession of maidens in white,
followed by all the surrounding country-side.
1 Some consider them only the smallest kind of chiffchafF or willow-wren.
2 Which has been translated by Johnson —
' Walk in and welcome ; honest friend, repose •
Thief, get thee hence, to thee I'll not unclose.'
3 His epitaph, at the Temple Church, says—' Natus est decimo sexto Decembris.
MDJ.XXXIV., Salvintoniae, qui siculus est Terring, Occidentalis in Sussexiae mari-
timis, parentibus honestis, Joanne Seldeno Thomae Alio 2. quinis secundo anno
mdxli nato, et Margareta filia et haerede unica Thomae Bakeri de Rushington ex
equestri Bakerorum in Cantio familia ; filius e cunis superstitum unicus aetatis fere
lxx annorum.' '

CLAPHAM 179
' Mr. Warter, the vicar of West Tarring, has testified to the pre
valence among the peasantry thereabouts of such superstitions as the
following : — Pills made of spiders' webs are prescribed by unqualified
practitioners as a remedy for ague. Warts are charmed away by pro
nouncing a magic formula. Evil spirits are exorcised. It is believed
that to cure a child afflicted with hernia, you must pass it through a
split sapling ash nine times before sunrise on the 20th of March, and,
in the event of the tree's closing up, the patient will be healed ; but
should the tree dwindle, so will the life. Horse-shoes are nailed over
doors to avert witches. On the occurrence of death in a household the
bees belonging to it are "waked" to prevent the same fate befalling
them. " Funeral biscuits " are baked especially for those who visit the
house on the day of interment.' 1 — Nineteenth Cent., August 1884.
12-1 ;;/. Goring Stat, is the nearest (ij ml) to High-
down Hill. The Church of S. Mary is partly Norman. A
brass commemorates John Cooke and his wife Emma Lys.
Castle Goring is a modern gothic house. At Ferring, a
little west, the manor-house belongs to an ancient building
where S. Richard de la Wych, Bishop of Chichester, is said
to have miraculously fed 3000 persons with bread intended
for 90. z\ m. N.W. of Goring Station is Clapham, with a transi
tion-Norman church, containing the very fine brass of John
Shelley and his wife Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of
John de.Michelgrove, 1526. The lady bears the arms of
Shelley on one side of her dress, and of Michelgrove on the
other. Mr. Shelley bears a tabard with his arms, sable, a
fesse engrailed, or, between three welk shells, argent, for
Shelley, being an instance of the class of arms called
allusive? Michelgrove belonged to the family of that name,
and afterwards to the Shelleys. It was bought, in 1845,
by the Duke of Norfolk, who pulled down the magnifi
cent gothic house. A heronry existed in Angmering Park,
which joins Michelgrove, but the trees were all cut down
to be used in the building of New Shoreham Suspension
Bridge, after which the birds migrated in a body to Parham.
Henry V. was entertained at Michelgrove by Judge Shelley.
1 See ' The Seaboard and the Down,' vol. ii.
2 This remarkable brass is engraved in Dallaway's ' Sussex.'

i8o

SUSSEX

1 5 -J- 7ii. Angmering Stat. § in. is the village of West
Angmering, where the Church of S. Margaret has a chancel
arch of c. 1200, and a tower built by the nuns of Sion, and
which bears their arms with the date ' Anno Dom. Milesimo
Quingesimo Septimo.' A brass commemorates Eden Baker,
1598. Nothing but two small blocks of masonry in a field
called the Lykening remains of the Church of S. Peter at
East Angmering. The name of Angmare (Domesday)
comes from the mere round which the village was built,
and which existed till the nineteenth century. Remains
exist still of another pool, called Menmare, now bisected
by the railway.
At New Place, near this (now converted into cottages),
were born, on three successive Sundays, the three sons of
Sir Edward Palmer, all afterwards knighted by Henry VIII.
There is probably no other instance of a full fortnight inter
vening between the first and third child produced at the
same birth.
' This is that which is commonly called superfoetation (usual in
other creatures, but rare in women), the cause whereof we leave to the
disquisition of physicians.
' The truth hereof needs no other attestation than the general and
uncontrolled tradition of their no less worshipful than numerous pos
terity in Sussex and Kent, amongst whom I instance Sir Roger Palmer,
aged 80 years, lately deceased, a cofferer to our late king, averring to
me the faith hereof on his reputation.' — Fuller.
The baby-clothes of the three little Palmers are pre
served in the house of their descendant, Lady Acland Hood,
at S. Audries in Somersetshire.
A little N. is Poling, with a decoy for wild-fowl, on a
stream running into the Arun. The XV. c. church contains
a brass to Walter Davys, vicar. A chapel which belonged
to a Commandery of Knights of S. John is turned into a
dwelling-house. The neighbouring church of Lyminster
(Leven minster), S. Mary Magdalen, is transition-Norman,
with a Norman font.
18 m. Ford Junction Stat. For the rest of the line to
Chichester see Ch. vi.

VI
CHICHESTER
/^HICHESTER is one of the oldest cities in England,
^ being the ancient Regnum, situated at the junction
of the Roman Stane Street, which led to London, with
another Roman road from Anderida (Pevensey) to Portus
Magnus (Porchester). It was the royal residence of Cogi-
dubnus, viceroy of the Emperor Claudius, who, originally
a British chief called Cogi, received the second part of his
name from the Romans. The Saxon Aella, coming in three
ships with his three sons Cymen, Wencheling, and Cissa,
landed in 477 at Cymenes-Ore (now Keynor, in the parish
of Sidlesham, 7 m. S.), driving back the Britons into the
forest of Anderida, and pushing his conquests year by year
till the British rulers united and fought them at Mercredes-
burne in 485, with a doubtful victory. Cissa, succeeding
Aella, who died in 514, gave Regnum his own name —
Cissan-ceaster. The Conqueror bestowed the place upon
Roger de Montgomeri, Earl of Alencon, who built a castle
on the north-east of the town, of which not a vestige is left.
Chichester was formerly walled like Chester and York, but
only a fragment of the walls remains. They were, however,
strong enough to hold out for ten days against the Parlia
mentarians under Waller, who took the town in 1643, after
which his soldiers smashed the cathedral organ, battered its
tombs and statues to pieces, and destroyed two of the town
churches, S. Pancras and S. Bartholomew.
The worthies of Chichester include Archbishop (Thomas)
Bradwardine, 1290? — 1349 — 'Doctor Profundus;' Arch
bishop William Juxon, who accompanied Charles I. to the

1 82 SUSSEX
scaffold, born here August 24, 1582 ; the poet Collins, De
cember 25, 1721; the poet Hayley, 9th November 1745 ;
'the three Smiths of Chichester,' George (ob. 1776) and
John (ob. 1764), the landscape painters, and William
Smith, the portrait painter (ob. 1767), being three sons
of a Chichester baker, who was also a Baptist minister.
When the See was moved hither in 1075 from Selsey
(where it had been established in the VII. a), the site where
the cathedral church of S. Peter now stands was occupied
by a monastery, whose church at first served for the
bishopric. A new cathedral was begun by Radulphus,
third Bishop of Chichester, finished in 1108, and burnt
only six years after. The same bishop began at once to
rebuild it, and had nearly finished it at his death in 1123,
and much of his time still remains. The lower part of the
tower may even perhaps belong to the earlier, or monastic,
church ; but the three central aisles of the nave to the top
of the triforium are of the second church. A second fire
in 1 186 greatly injured the building and destroyed the roof,
after which Bishop Seffrid II. (1 180-1204) added the clere
story, the Purbeck marble shafts of the pillars, and admir
able early English western porch.1 The two outer aisles
were probably added under Bishop De la Wych (1245-52).
The Lady Chapel was built by Bishop Gilbert de St. Leo-
fard (1288-1305), the campanile by Bishop John Langton
(1305-36). Many later additions were made by Bishop
Sherborne (1507-36). Fuller says that while 'Bishop
Seffrid bestowed the cloth and making on the church,
Bishop Sherborne gave the trimming and best lace thereto,
in the reign of Henry VII.'
In i860 a foolish restoration removed the beautiful stone
rood screen, known as the Arundel shrine, which supported
the organ gallery at the end of the nave, and it was then
discovered that the piers supporting the central tower had
been much weakened and cut away, and repairs were be°nn.
On February 21, 1861, when the workmen employed on
1 There is no foundation for the proverb mentioned by Fuller, ' The Master Work
man built Sarisbury (Salisbury) and his Man the church of Chichester.'

CHICHESTER 183
them were at their dinner, the tower and spire fell. Their
rebuilding was at once begun, and they were completed in
1866. An old proverb says —
' If Chichester Church steeple fall,
In England there's no king at all, '
and it fell in the reign of Victoria. The rebuilding is
admirably done, and already harmonises in colour with the
rest of the building. But it is not an exact reproduction.
The spire is shorter, and the tower rather higher than the
old one ; yet most will allow that Scott has here — for
once — almost done well.
On the north is a large massive detached bell-tower of
the XV. c, with turrets at the angles. There was formerly
a tower of the same kind at Salisbury. The breadth and
low proportions of this tower emphasise the gracefulness of
the central spire. An attempt has recently been made to
recase its enormously thick walls, though they are in perfect
repair, but this atrocity has been successfully prevented.
One of the most picturesque points in the exterior of
Chichester Cathedral is the little north-west entrance — a
double arch and centre column supporting a tympanum
with a trefoil niche — admirable as an artistic ' subject.'
Chichester, the broadest English cathedral except York,
is the only one which has five aisles, though many parish
churches have them, and many Continental cathedrals :
Antwerp has seven. Each outer aisle once contained two
chantries, and portions of their dividing screens and rere-
doses are still to be seen. The intersecting pillars and
arches give much picturesqueness to the interior, which
retains its old pavement, and has hitherto — except in its
tombs — not been much mutilated by Deans wishing to go
down to posterity as ' restorers.' A wholesale restoration —
entirely uncalled for — has been recently threatened, but all
lovers of antiquity trust that such a fell purpose may con
tinue to be successfully combated.
Examining the church, architects will observe the
peculiar squareness of the abaci of the columns. Turning

18 r SUSSEX
to the right from the west door, we find the first bay of the
right aisle used as a baptistery. Between the pillars of the
aisle is the tomb of Bishop Arundel, recently brought back
to its original position : the skeleton of the bishop is inside,
resting on the floor of the church. Over the south porch
was the ancient Consistory Court, reached by a spiral stair
case from the nave. On the north of the South Transept
is a tomb supposed to be that of Bishop Richard de la Wych
— S. Richard of Chichester (1245-53, canonised 1261) —
to which his relics were translated in 1276 in the presence
of Edward I. and Eleanor of Castile, and which became a
famous object of pilgrimage. When the fall of the spire
became imminent in 1861, the figure was saved the night
before the catastrophe, but the canopy of the tomb was
smashed to atoms. Unfortunately a charlatan sculptor
named Richardson — the same who was allowed to ruin the
effigies of the knights at the Temple — persuaded Dean
Chandler to allow him to 'restore' this and other monu
ments in the cathedral, which he did by paring them down
to a uniform dulness, and utterly destroying their character,
likeness, and historic value. Close by is the brass of Dean
Burgon, 1888. Above the tomb, on the screen of the choir,
are pictures executed for Bishop Sherborne by Theodore
Bernardi, representing the gift of the Monastery of Selsey
to S. Wilfred by Ceadwalla, and the confirmation of this
grant to the cathedral, as made by Henry VIII. to Bishop
Sherborne. Against the opposite (south) wall is an unknown
Tudor monument, with the tomb of Bishop John Langton,
1337 — a very fine example of an early decorated monu
ment — on one side of it, and that of the banker, John
Smith, 1832, on the other. The fine window above was
given by Bishop Langton (1305-38): its execrable glass,
executed in Lorraine, was at Metz during the siege, and un
fortunately not destroyed there. The old sacristy, which
opens from the transept on the west, is now used as a choir
school : it has early English vaulting, with beautifully
sculptured corbels. An oak muniment chest, eight feet
long, is said to be of Saxon date, and to have been brought

CHICHESTER 185
from Selsey. Against the west wall of the transept is the
wooden reliquary of S. Richard, sacked by Goring. In an
eastern chapel, used as a robing-room, hangs the quaint
wooden monument of Henry, son of Bishop King, 1660.
Entering the South Aisle ofthe Choir, we find two curious
pieces of Norman sculpture — the Raising of Lazarus and
the Meeting of Christ with Martha and Mary — brought
from the old Cathedral of Selsey, now in the sea. Between
these, showing strong renaissance feeling, is the monument
of Bishop Sherborne (1507-36), erected by the bishop in
his lifetime, and recently restored by New College, Oxford.
In the beautiful Sacristy, formerly of two chambers, are
interesting remains of Norman work. Against the choir-
screen is the tasteless tomb of Dean Hook, 1875.
Behind the modern reredos (which has recently super
seded a fine panelled screen of the time of Henry VII.) are,
on the south, the simple altar-tomb of Bishop Edward Storey,
1478-1503, who built the beautiful market-cross, and, on
the north, the tomb of Bishop George Day, 1556. The
almost unique clustered, yet insulated, columns of Purbeck
marble here are of the greatest beauty. The Chapel of S.
Mary Magdalen, at the end of the south aisle, has been
recently restored (by his widow) to the memory of Canon
Cross. The present Dean (1895) nas made an effort to have
the whole of this part of the cathedral repaved, which would
totally destroy its interest and beauty, but the cathedral has
fortunately found valiant protectors.
The Lady- Chapel was built by Bishop Gilbert de S.
Leofard (1288-1305), described by Matthew of West
minster as ' a father of orphans and consoler of widows, a
pious and humble visitor at the beds and in the cottages of
the poor, a friend of the needy far more than of the rich.'
The chapel is still beautiful, in spite of an abominable
tiled floor. If°is used as a chapel for the college. The
old altar-slab remains. On the left (beneath the tomb of
Thomas Bickley, 1596) is the simple coped tomb of Bishop
Ralph — ' Radulphus Epi ' — 1243, the builder ofthe Norman

¦86 SUSSEX
cathedral. A canopy on the south shelters two simple
tombs, supposed to be those of Bishops Seffrid (1146) and
Hilary (11 73). The chapel has been used as a burial-place
for the Lennox family since the first Duke of Richmond
was brought here from Westminster in 1720. The ceiling
of the ante-chapel was painted by Bernardi for Bishop
Sherborne. In the North Choir-Aisle is the tomb of Bishop Otter,
1840, with a bust by Towne. Here is the beautiful canopied
tomb of Bishop Moleynes, 1445-49, counsellor of Henry
VL, 'faithful among the faithless,' afterwards murdered
at Portsmouth. Another canopied tomb is ascribed to
Bishop Rickingdale (1429). On the north-west opens the
Chapter Library, of which the chief treasure is Cranmer's
copy of the Service Book of Hermann, Archbishop of
Cologne, with his MS. notes. The grant by Oslac to Selsey
in 780 is preserved. A copy of S. Augustine is XII. c.
A number of patens and chalices, and an XI. c. cross, with
rings of XII. and XIII. c, come from desecrated tombs of
early bishops : a chalice and paten were found in the coffin
of Bishop Langton. Here are remains of the paintings of
Bernardi, which were destroyed by the fall of the tower.
The North Transept was long used as the parish church
of S. Peter. On the north wall are the pictures by Bernardi
of the English kings till the end of the Tudors ; those after
wards (till George II.) were smashed by the fall of the tower.
Against the west wall are three tombs of bishops. That in
the centre commemorates Bishop Henry King, 1641-69,
the Royalist poet-bishop, who presided over Chichester
during its siege by Waller; after which his property was
sequestered, and he was deprived of his See till the Restora
tion. Waller describes him as ' a proud prelate as all the
rest are, and a most pragmatical malignant against the
Parliament, as all his cater-capt companions are.'1 On
one side is Bishop Grove, 1695, and on the other Bishop
Carlton, 1705. Against the eastern wall is a monument by
Gibson to Mrs. Huskisson.
1 Vicars, 'Jehovah Jireh,' and his 'England's Worthies.'

CHICHESTER 187
At the entrance of the northernmost aisle of the Nave,
in what was once the chantry of S. John Baptist, is the
beautiful decorated tomb of a nameless lady — supposed to
be Maud, Countess of Arundel — which fortunately escaped
destruction by the impostor Richardson. Utterly ruined
by him is the tomb — probably brought here from the Grey
Friars Church — of Richard Fitz- Alan, 14th Earl of Arun
del (beheaded for high treason, 1397), and his Countess.
Richard II. caused the Earl's tomb to be opened in order
to prove that his head had not miraculously grown to his
body again, as was asserted.1 Against the adjoining pillar is
Flaxman's monument to William Collins the poet (1721-56),
who was born and died at Chichester, where he used to
haunt the cathedral in his fits of frenzy, and is buried in St.
Andrew's Church. He is represented bending over a Bible.
'I have but one book,' he said to Dr. Johnson, 'but that
is the best.' At his feet are ' The Passions ; ' his epitaph
is by Hayley and Sargent. There are several other feeble
monuments by Flaxman in this aisle, and at its west end
a statue, by Carew, to W. Huskisson, 1830, killed at the
opening of the Manchester and Liverpool Railway.
The very narrow Choir was formerly divided from the
nave by the beautiful rood screen of Bishop Arundel
(1458-78), containing two shrines within a graceful and
richly-vaulted arcade of early perpendicular work, behind the
eastern wall of which were staircases giving access to the
rood, and in later times to the organ. The misereres and
canopies are of the time of Edward III., the rest of the
stalls having been given by Bishop Sherborne (1508-36),
and the throne by Bishop Mawson (1740-54). The organ,
by Harris, is of 1678.
At the entrance of the nave from the south transept is a
door leading through an early English porch to the irregular
three-sided Cloisters — perpendicular, with a simple arched
wooden roof. In the south cloister a relief, with a shield
bearing the arms of Henry VII. and two figures kneeling
before the Virgin, marks the entrance to the rooms of the
1 See Hollinshed.

106 SUSSEX
king's chaplains, appointed to serve the chantry founded by
Henry V. for his own soul, with those of his father and
mother and of Nicholas Mortimer. Beyond this is the
monument of William Chillingworth, 1602-44, the contro
versialist, described by Tillotson ' as the glory of his age and
nation,' who having become a Roman Catholic, was re-con
verted to Protestantism by his godfather, Archbishop Laud,
after which he published his ' Religion of Protestants a Safe
Way to Salvation. ' Being taken prisoner at Arundel by the
Parliamentarians when ill, he died soon afterwards in the
Bishop's palace here. At his funeral, Cheynell flung his
famous book into his grave that ' it might rot with its author
and see corruption ; ' but it has done just the contrary.
' Ifyou would have your son reason well, let him read Chillingworth.'
— Locke ' On Education. '
' His book is still esteemed the most solid defence of the Reforma-»
tion.' — Gibbon.
' Those who desire to know the doctrines of the Church must read
Chillingworth's admirable book.' — Mosheim.
There 'the school jargon of the subtle Jesuit is incomparably ex
posed, and the long dispute between the'two Churches, for the first
time, placed upon its proper immoveable ground, the Bible alone.' —
Warburton. Over the south-east angle of the cloisters is the XIV. c.
Chapel of S. Faith, now a dwelling-house. At the south
western angle is the episcopal palace.
Canon Lane Gate, in South Street, built by Bishop Sher
borne and bearing his arms, forms the picturesque approach
to the ecclesiastical colony under the shadow of the cathe
dral. Inside, on the right, is the Vicar's Close; on the
left the old house called the Chauntry, which contains much
of the carving from Halnaker. Beyond it, the Deanery was
built in 1725 by Dean Sherlock, afterwards Bishop of Lon
don, in the place of an old house which abutted on the
city wall. A paved passage on the right — 'St. Richard's
Walk '—gives an attractive view of the cathedral. A stately
Edwardian Gateway is a fitting approach to 'the Bishop's
Palace, a fine old house, with an early English chapel of

CHICHESTER 189
Henry III. The intersecting ribs of its vaulting rest upon
very beautiful corbels. The dining-room, where the Prior
of Sele was tried by the bishop — 'in aula sua infra pala-
tium Cicestrens' — was remodelled by Bishop Sherborne,

Chichester Cathedral from the Palace Garden.

and has a fine timber ceiling, painted in compartments
by Bernardi. The windows have beautiful panelled stone
decoration. The garden — the most beautiful bishop's garden
in England except that of Wells — which follows the town
bastion, was planted by a bishop in the last century with

19° SUSSEX
rare evergreens, which have now attained a size and beauty
seldom seen in England. Its grand tree privets are glorious
when they flower. A charming view of the cathedral may
be obtained from hence. A colossal head, probably of
S. Christopher, was found in the churchyard at Bosham.
In South Street is Vicar's College, where the hall, now a
schoolroom, retains its ancient lavatory and reader's pulpit.
Chichester Cross, an exquisitely beautiful octagonal struc
ture, at the junction of four streets, is the work of Bishop
Storey, c. 1500. The figures which filled its niches were
destroyed by the Puritans under Waller. The clock, 'an
hourly memento of her goodwill to the city,' was given by
Dame Elizabeth Farringdon, 1724.
The most interesting building, after the cathedral, is 5.
Mary's Hospital, which stands a little east of North Street.
It was founded, as a convent, by a Dean of Chichester in
the XII. c, and suppressed c. 1229, when its revenues were
appropriated to the maintenance of ' thirteen decayed per
sons ' and a warden. Its great late early English hall is
divided by partitions into little dwellings of two rooms
each.1 In the Church of £. Olave, on the east side of North
Street, some remains of Roman building materials have
been found, which has led to the belief that this is probably
the earliest place of Christian worship in Chichester.
The Guildhall, near the end of North Street, was once
the chapel of the Grey Friars monastery, where the Arundel
monument, now in the cathedral, was probably first erected.
In its garden is a circular mound, which was probably used
as a Calvary.
Under the Church of 61. Andrew is a Roman tesselated
pavement. There is a monument here to John Cawley,
1 62 1, father of William Cawley the regicide, who died at
Vevay, 1660, and is buried there in S. Martin's Church.
The now almost forgotten poet William Collins, 1756, is
buried in the church.
1 Plans, sections, and details are given in Dollman's ' Antient Domestick Archi
tecture.'

SELSEY

191

' Of all our minor poets, Collins is probably the one who has shown
most of the higher qualities of poetry. He heats and melts objects, in
the fervour of his genius, as in a furnace.' — Hazlitt.
' Silently and imperceptibly the Odes of Collins have risen by their
own buoyancy ; and their power is felt by every reader who has any
poetic feeling. ' — Southey.
The group of streets called the Pallant takes its name
from the Palatinate, the Archbishop's peculiar.
The last of the city gates was pulled down in 1773, but
there are remains of the city walls on the north, especially
well seen above some public gardens. Beyond the walls
is the Otter Memorial, built 1850, a training college for
schoolmasters, founded by Bishop Otter. 1 in. north, in
the direction of Goodwood, is the embankment called the
Broyle, from bruillum, a coppice.
The antiquarian will not fail to make an excursion from
Chichester to 9 m. Selsey — the Seal's Island — a place of
great ecclesiastical interest, for it was on this wild coast that
S. Wilfrid of York was shipwrecked when returning from
the Continent with his clergy. A pagan priest urged on the
native heathen to put the refugees to death, but he was
struck dead by a stone from a sling, and the wind changing,
the Christian vessel got to sea and reached Sandwich in
safety. But his savage reception roused Wilfrid's missionary
sympathies, and returning to the inhospitable shores of
Selsey a few years later, c. 680, he was endowed with the
promontory by Edilwalch, king of the South Saxons, who
had already embraced Christianity.
' The bishop, therefore, with the king^'s consent, or rather to his
great satisfaction, baptized the principal generals and soldiers of that
country ; and the priests, Eappa, and Padda, and Burghelm, and Eadda,
either then or afterwards, baptized the rest of the people. The queen,
whose name was Ebba, had been christened in her own island, the
province of the Viccii. She was the daughter of Eanfrid, the brother of
Eanber, who were both Christians, as were their people ; but all the
province of the South Saxons were strangers to the name and faith of
God. There was among them a certain monk of the Scottish nation 2
whose name was Dieul, who had a very small monastery at the place
named Bosanham, encompassed with the sea and woods, and in it five
1 Really Irish.

!92 SUSSEX
or six brothers, who served our Lord in poverty and humility ; but
none of the natives cared either to follow their course of life, or hear
their preaching. But Bishop Wilfrid, by preaching to them, not only
delivered them from the misery of perpetual damnation, but also from
an inexpressible calamity of temporal death, for no rain had fallen in
that province in three years before his arrival, whereupon a dreadful
famine ensued, which entirely destroyed the people. In short, it is
reported that very often, forty or fifty men being spent with want, would
go together to some precipice, or to the sea-shore, and there, hand-in-
hand, perish by a fall, or be swallowed up by the waves. But on the
very day on which the nation received the baptism of faith, there fell a
soft but plentiful rain ; the earth revived again, and the verdure being
restored to the fields, the season was pleasant and fruitful. Thus the
former superstition being rejected and idolatry exploded, the hearts
and flesh of all rejoiced in the living God, and became convinced that
He who is the true God had, through His heavenly grace, enriched
them with wealth, bolh temporal and spiritual. For the bishop, when
he came into the province, and found so great miser)' from famine,
taught them to get their food by fishing ; for their sea and rivers
abounded in fish, but the people had no skill to take them except eels
alone. The bishop's men having gathered eel-nets everywhere, cast
them into the sea, and by the blessing of God took three hundred fishes,
of several sorts, which, being divided into three parts, they gave a
hundred to the poor, a hundred to those of whom they had the nets,
and kept a hundred for their own use. By this benefit the bishop
gained the affections of them all, and they began the more readily at
his preaching to hope for heavenly goods, seeing that by his help they
had received those which are temporal. At this time, King Edilwalch
gave to the most reverend prelate, Wilfrid, land of eighty-seven families,
to maintain his company who were in banishment, which place is called
Selesea, that is, the island of the Sea-Calf. That place is encompassed
by the sea on all sides, except the west, where is an entrance about the
cast of a sling in width ; which sort of place is by the Latins called a
peninsula, by the Greeks a chersonesus. Bishop Wilfrid, having this
place given him, founded therein a monastery, which his successors
possess to this day, and established a regular course of life, chiefly of
the brethren he had brought with him ; for he bolh in word and action
perfonned the duty of a bishop in those parts during the space of five
years, until the death of King Eegfrid. And forasmuch as the aforesaid
king, together with the said place, gave him all the goods that were
therein, with the lands and men, he instructed them in the faith of
Christ, and baptized them all. Among whom were two hundred and
fifty men and women slaves, all of whom he, by baptism, not only
rescued from the servitude of the devil, but gave them their bodily
liberty also, and exempted them from the yoke of human servitude '—
Bede, ' Ecclesiastical History.'

SELSEY

193

Selsey continued to be the Episcopal See till the
Conquest, when it was moved to Chichester under Bishop
Stigand. No trace, however, remains of either cathedral or
monastery, for all the holy sites are now under the waves
two miles out at sea : in the time of Camden they were
still uncovered at low water. The anchorage along the
south-east coast of the promontory, which is still called the
Park, was full of deer in the time of Henry VIIL, when
Bishop Rede excommunicated its poachers, ' dampnacionis
filii, spiritu diabolico seducti.'
' In this isle remaineth onely the dead carkasse, as it were, of that
anciente little citie, wherin those bishops sat.' — Camden.
Day by day the land here is still continually carried
away, and the small proprietors lie in their beds, and know
that the storm which they hear is bearing their acres and
their subsistence out to sea, no one attempting to save
them. It is a dreary, ugly road which leads across the Manhood
(Manwode, Main-Wood) from Chichester to Selsey. It
passes close to the church of Sldlesham (S. Mary), on a
manor which was given by Ceadwalla to Wilfrid, as a
tributary to Selsey, and which belonged to the Bishops of
Chichester till the reign of Elizabeth. The church (S.
Mary) contains a curious carved muniment chest, and a
monument with effigies of Rebecca Taylor, 1631.
Selsey on Sea is a most dreary, treeless little place, with
a very fine air, which causes its scattered lodging-houses
to be frequented in summer. In fine weather the Isle of
Wight is visible on the west. The materials of the modern
church were brought from a site two miles off, and belonged
to the nave of the former church, which Bishop Rede built
(1369-85) and dedicated to S. Peter, like the ancient cathe
dral : it contains the old font.
Two miles away, now very near the eastern shore of the
promontory, the chancel of the old church still stands in a
graveyard, full of weather-beaten tombs yellow with lichen,
and surrounded by ivy-mantled walls. The spot has a
N

•94 SUSSEX
melancholy beauty of its own, with a view on one side over
the sea, and on the other to Chichester Cathedral. Close by
are some unexplored mounds — probably British — covered
with turf. In the chapel are foliated crosses, and a dilapi
dated canopied tomb to John Lewes and Agatha Gorges, his
Wlfe> IS37. recalling that of West Hampnett. Behind the
kneeling figures, their patron saints, George and Agatha,
appear in relief. In the churchyard is an epitaph by Hayley
to two young men who were drowned whilst going to the
assistance of a shipwrecked vessel.
Surrounded, in spring, by fields of daffodils, and backed
by an ancient oak copse, stands the Rectory, once a priory,
with a quaint conglomeration of external architecture, and
rooms dating from the XIV. c.
There is very little interest in the other very numerous
villages of the Selsey peninsula. In Bracklesham Bay,
3 in. W. of Selsey, a great number of fossils may be found
in the marl. West Wittering Church, probably built in the
XIII. c. by S. Richard (de la Wych) of Chichester, contains
three oak stalls and a canopied tomb — with reliefs of the
Annunciation and Resurrection — to William Ernley, 1545,
one of a family which took its name from another of the
Selsey villages. A coffin lid, supposed to be that of a ' Boy
Bishop,' has been found here. Near this is Cakeham, where
the bishops of Chichester had a country palace, and where
a tall brick hexagonal tower, built in the beginning of the
XVI. c. by Bishop Sherborne, is still in existence.
On the other, the eastern, side of the peninsula, in
Pagham Harbour, between Selsey Church and Pagham,
was the curiosity known as the Hushing Well where in a
space of 130 feet by 30, a rush of air seemed to burst
through the water from some underground cavity as the
tide came in; but the well has been destroyed by the
drainage of the harbour, 'formerly a perfect paradise for
the ornithologist, which has now, unfortunately for him,
entirely disappeared.'1
The early English Church of Pagham is dedicated to
1 W. Borrer, ' The Birds of Sussex. '

BOSHAM 195
S. Thomas a. Becket, for the manor here belonged to the
See of Canterbury, and the archbishops had a palace here,
of which there are no remains.
The depredations of the Sussex wreckers on these shores
in former days gave rise to the lines of Congreve —
' Sussex men that dwell upon the shore
Look out when storms arise and billows roar ;
Devoutly praying with uplifted hands
That some well-laden ship may strike the sands,
To whose rich cargo they may make pretence.'

The railway from Chichester to Portsmouth passes —
3 m. Bosham Stat. Bosham (Bosan-hamm, Boso's
Meadow) is situated on a historic creek. Harold, whose
lands extended from Havant to Chichester, had a manor
here. The first scene in the Bayeux tapestry represents
'Harold and his knights riding towards Bosham,' and from
hence he set out to Normandy. The tapestry depicts his
embarkation — how Harold stripped off his lower garments
and waded to the ships, with his hawk upon his fist, whilst
his companions, in similar manner, carried their hounds
high and dry.
The name of Bosham was already in existence in the
time of Bede, who tells how S. Wilfrid, in 678, found the
Irish Dicul settled in a little monastery at Bosenham,
' sylvis et mari circumdatum.' On the site of this monas
tery, William Warelwast, Bishop of Exeter, founded a
college for a dean and five prebendaries, c. n 20, in the
place of a similar foundation of his at Plympton in Devon
shire, which he had dissolved on account of the dissolute
lives of its inmates. Herbert de Bosham, Becket's secre
tary, who wrote the 'Book of Becket's Martyrdom,' was
probably a canon of this college. The chancel of the
church served as a chapel for the college.
Sussex has many advantages, but its greatest admirers
will not claim that its population is endowed with good

196 SUSSEX
looks. The people of Bosham, however, are remarkably
handsome. It has a well-to-do fishing population of evident
foreign extraction, who stand aloof from their neighbours,
seldom marry out of the place, and keep their good looks
to themselves. Bosham is a peculiar and attractive spot. A long creek,
with its fishing-boats and salt atmosphere, winds up to where
its thatched cottages are hidden in the old elm-trees around
the ancient church of Holy Trinity, which occupies the site
of the far older sanctuary where Harold sought the divine
blessing upon his journey to Normandy. The tower and its
chancel arch are of that description of Norman which some
archaeologists insist upon calling Saxon. Though much
altered and modernised, the tower might even possibly claim
such antiquity. It has no external door. On one side it
has two square-edged string-courses, and under the spire is
a corbel-table. On the inside its more distinctive features
are seen in a triangular-headed window above the arch
leading to the nave, with the long and short work seen at
Jarrow and Monkwearmouth, and a small square slit beside
it. If it were not spoilt by a tiled floor, the interior would
be the most picturesque in Sussex. The eastern end of the
south aisle is raised to a lofty platform, for the sake qf a
little groined early English crypt, reached by steps near a
canopied tomb. The noble arcaded font is also raised upon
steep steps against a round column, with contrast of shadow
and colour which will enchant an artist. The rugged
material of the walls has been everywhere exposed.
The present chancel is early English. Under a canopied
arch in its north wall is the beautiful tomb of a child, re
ported to be that of a daughter of Canute, who died here
while visiting Earl Godwin in his castle : the figure is pro
bably of the time of Edward I. A stone coffin containing
the remains of a child was desecrated by the archaeologists
in 1865. Not far from the church, where a piece of ground was
surrounded by a moat, is the probable site of the castle of
Earl Godwin and Harold.

BOSHAM 197
' Herbert de Bosham was born at Bosham (which Earl Godwin craftily
kissed out of the Archbishop of Canterbury) ; and, being a good scholar,
he was a maniibus (I mean to twite, not lo fight for him) unto Thomas
Becket. He was present at his murder-martyring ; and had the discre
tion to make no resistance, lest he had been sent the same way with his
master. However, amongst many other books, he wrote the story of
his master's death. Going over into Italy, he was, by Pope Alexander
the third, made archbishop of Beneventum ; and, in the month of Dec.
1 178, created cardinal.' — Fuller.
The collegiate buildings of Bosham have been recently
destroyed ; only one perpendicular doorway is left.
The echo of Bosham bells from the woods of Itchenor is
supposed to be the answer sent by the ancient bells beneath
the waves, which sunk, by their weight, the ships of the Danes
who were carrying them off, before they left the harbour.
1 m. south-west is Chidham Church, which is early Eng
lish. A farmhouse, partly XV. c, at Appledram, a little south
east, is said to belong to a castle begun by one William
Renan in the time of Edward II. ; but as he could not
obtain a license to crenellate, he sold the rest of his building
materials to Bishop Langton, who used them for the bell-
tower of the cathedral. The remains are those of a massive
square, with square-headed windows, and a tower at one
angle. 7 in. Emsworth Stat. This is the nearest point to
Thorney Island, which occupies the centre of Chichester
harbour. The church ('restored') is Norman and early
English, and has a carved oak screen and Norman font.
Here the little stream of the Ems forms the boundary
between Sussex and Hampshire. A deep place in the
river is called ' Gunter's Pool,' and a local proverb says,
' When the wind sits in Gunter's Pool there will be rain.'
3 111. north is Radon, where the (restored) early English
church contains a curious monument of the Gounter family,
who long resided at Old Racton House, now destroyed. A
canopied altar-tomb commemorates Hugh Gounter and his
wife, and an alabaster monument Sir George Gounter and his
wife Ursula. Radon Tower was built by the third Lord
Halifax, 1770, and is used as a beacon. Lordlngton, near

198 SUSSEX
Racton, was built by Sir Richard Pole at the end of the
XV. c, and rebuilt in the XVII. c. Sir Richard Pole
married Margaret, daughter of George of Clarence, a niece
of Edward IV., afterwards Countess of Salisbury, and was
the father of Cardinal Pole. The present house, which
retains much of the original building, especially a fine oak
staircase decorated with quaint figures of animals, is said
to be still haunted by the Countess of Salisbury, with a
bloody gash round her neck.
Stanstead Park, which was built c. 1687 by the Earl of
Scarborough, and which entertained George IL, contains
some fine carvings by Gibbons and tapestry made at Arras
for the Duke of Marlborough. In 1805 it was sold to
Lewis Way, Esq., who much enlarged the house and added
a private chapel, in which Samuel Wilberforce preached his
first sermon. Stanstead Forest (1666 acres), divided by
three great avenues, has much beauty. 3 m. north of
Stanstead is Up Park, formerly a seat of the Earls of
Tankerville. The house, built in a very lofty situation
at the end of the XVII. c, contains a great many objects
of interest, including one of the finest collections of Sevres
china in the world. It is not shown.
' The broken ground and park, straggling in unrestrained com
munion with down and heather far beyond the palings which confine
its deer, give a chace-like appearance to the scenery.' — Quarterly Rev.,
No. 223.
At Harting (ij in. north), Cardinal Pole was rector.
Ford, Lord Grey, is buried in the church. Alexander Pope
often visited John Caryll here at the now destroyed Lady-
holt House. Regarding Tarberry (Tor-barrow) Hill, in
this parish, there is a legend that the devil, projecting
the scalding spoon from his punch bowl at Hinde Head
in Surrey, threw it over to Sussex, where it alighted here
bottom upwards.1 ' Who knows what Tarberry would bear,
Must plough it with a golden share,'
is a proverb. 1 See H. D. Gordon, ' Parish of Harting.'

WEST HAMPNETT 199
An excursion should be made to the north-west of Chi
chester to (4 ml) Kingly Bottom, a most picturesque hollow
under Bow Hill (so called from its form), containing a dark
grove of magnificent yew-trees of immense age. The name
of the valley is said to be derived from a conflict between
the natives and the invading Danes c. 900, in which several
chieftains ('kings ') were killed, and were buried under the
four large mounds to the north of the hollow. The excur
sion may be continued by the sinuosities of Bow Hill to
Up Park. See above.

Leaving Chichester on the north-east by the road which
follows the Roman Stane Street, we pass West Hainpnett
Place, a vast and noble old mansion of the Steeles (now
the Union), built by Richard Sackville, uncle of Thomas,
first Lord Buckhurst. The church {i\ ml) of S. Mary or
S. Peter, West Hampnett (formerly Hamptonette 1), has its
tower over the end of the south aisle. The south wall of
the chancel shows herring-bone work of Roman tiles, evi
dently brought from seme Roman building, and very rude
early arches. This wall is probably Saxon. The rest of
the church is ruined by restoration. The interesting and
important Saxon chancel arch, ' wholly constructed of the
flat building-tile,' has been ' restored ' away altogether, and
the interior of the church has now no interest except from
the graceful canopied tomb of Sir Richard Sackville and
his wife Elizabeth, on which they are represented kneeling
with their two children at the sides of a Pieta, a very curious
relief. In the churchyard is the tomb of Bishop Gilbert,
1870. Boxgrove (2 ml), formerly Bosgrave, had a famous
priory, founded in the time of Henry I. (1 1 1 7) by Robert de
Haia (of Halnaker), who owned the lordship, dedicated to
S. Mary and S. Blaise,2 and placed under the Benedictine
Abbey of Coutances as a cell for three monks. Roger St.
1 3 Edward III.
2 Bishop of Sebaste in Armenia, and martyred under Licinius, 316.

200 SUSSEX
John, who married the daughter of Robert de Haia, added
three more monks, and his sons increased their number to
fifteen. When the alien priories were suppressed, Boxgrove
was made indigena. Thomas West, Lord De la 'A arr,
pleaded hard with Cromwell for its existence at the Disso
lution, saying that ' his aunsystorys and his wiffy's mother '
rested there, and that he had ' made therein a power chapell
to be buried yn ; ' but, though Commissioner Layton re
ported ' the prior is a gret husbonde and kepith gret hospi-
talitie : ejus monachi omnes sunt ejusdem farinae,' it was
not spared. The revenue of Boxgrove was ^3000 at the
Dissolution ; of this nothing was given back to the church.
In 1535 Boxgrove was granted to Thomas, Lord De la Warr,
who had married the daughter of Sir John Bonville, the
heiress of Halnaker, and who, dying at Offington in 1557,
is buried at Broadwater. It afterwards belonged to the
Morleys, whose heiress married the tenth Earl of Derby.
In 1765 it was purchased, with Halnaker, by the third
Duke of Richmond.
The Church of SS. Mary and Blaise was that of the
Priory. Only the Norman tower and the early English
choir and transept remain ; the nave is in ruins. The
most picturesque view — especially in winter — is that from
the rectory garden. Three most beautiful Norman arches
remain from the entrance to the Chapter House. On the
north are the ivy-mantled ruins of the (decorated) Prior's
Lodging or Refectory, unroofed and mutilated by a Duke
of Richmond. The very curious dovecot (mentioned in
the Survey under Elizabeth as capable of containing 200
measures, of corn), which stood in the rectory garden, was
' restored ' away a few years ago.
The interior of the priory church is exceedingly striking,
and the beauty of the marble columns in the choir, clustered
in the French style, is seldom exceeded, though they seem
to have been copied from those at Chichester. The tran
septs have interesting galleries, with ornamented oak fronts.
These were intended for the lay dependants of the priory,
and were spared by Scott, who had done less mischief here

BOXGROVE 201
than is usual in a ' restoration,' though the old pavement is
destroyed, and some of the monuments are moved from
their rightful sites. A frescoed ceiling is XVI. c. At the ends
of the aisles are traces of the altars of S. Catherine and S.
Blaise. The choir is divided into four bays, each having a
cross vault with ribs, the diagonal being enriched with tooth
ornament. The arches of the clerestory are supported by
slender Purbeck pillars, and between the lights of the triple
lancet east window are Purbeck shafts. Two arches on the

Ruins of the Chapter House, Boxgrove.

south of the choir were thrown together in the XVI. c. to
contain the very beautiful renaissance ' De la Warr Shrine '
of 1532, inscribed — 'Of yr charite pray for ye souls of
Thomas La Warre and Elysabeth hys wyf The shrine is
covered with armorial bearings, including the chape — a
badge given to Sir Thomas West when (with Sir Thomas
Pelham) he took King John of France prisoner at Poitiers.
Two tombs on the north of the chancel are attributed to
Philippa, Countess of Arundel and Pembroke, 1428, and
her second husband, Adam de Poynings, who desired to

202 SUSSEX
be buried here, to the north of her tomb. In the south
transept are two handsome tombs of Sussex marble. It is
believed that two daughters of Queen Adeliza of Louvain
and her second husband, William de Albini, Earl of Arundel,
were buried there.1 Monuments commemorate Sir William
Morley of Halnaker, 1701, and his daughter Mary, wife of
James Stanley, 10th Earl of Derby, 1752. The inscription
on the gravestone of ' Mary Countess of Derby, our Bene
factress,' refers to her foundation of the Boxgrove alms
houses. The ruined park of Halnaker, formerly Helnache {\ m.
north), is of great beauty, and has remains of grand chestnut
avenues. Delightfully situated on the edge of a declivity
are stately remains of the once famous and beautiful house
of Halnaker, built in the time of Henry VIII. by Sir
Thomas West, second Lord De la Warr. Edward VI. was
here in 1552, and wrote of ' Halvenaker, a pretty house
beside Chichester.' The gateway remains (which had oct
angular towers on each side), and much of the walls of the
buildings which surrounded a courtyard, and the east end
of the chapel with its triplet window. The rooms on the
right of the court were ' my lord's side,' those on the left
' my lady's side.' The doors of the hall were inscribed —
' Les biens venus ' and ' Come in and dringe.' Much of
the interior fittings is preserved at ' the Chauntry ' in Chi
chester. The old walled garden is now an orchard. Be
hind it is a grand weather-beaten cypress worthy of Verona,
and two noble ilexes are on a hill above the glen — ' the
Spider Ride.'
Opposite Halnaker is an entrance to Goodwood Park
(Duke of Richmond), always open to the public. Its name
was anciently Godinwood, probably from the Saxon God
win, father of Harold. The estate was bought from the
Comptons by the first Duke of Richmond in 1720. The
house, which is quite without beauty, was designed by
Chambers and finished by Wyatt. It is shown in the
1 The Queen herself was buried at the Abbey of Affligen, near Alost, founded
by her father and uncle.

GOODWOOD 203
absence of the family, and contains some fine portraits by
Vandyke, Lely, Kneller, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Romney,
and Lawrence. The famous Vandyke of Charles I., Hen
rietta Maria, and the princes Charles and James, is a replica
of pictures at Windsor and Chatsworth. In the Billiard
Room is the most remarkable picture in the house, brought
from the old chateau ofthe Stuarts at Aubigny near Bourges,
and known as ' The Cenotaph of Lord Darnley,' inscribed
' Tragica et lamentabilis internecio serenissimi Henrici
Scotorum regis.' There is a picture at Windsor which is
almost a replica of this.
'Near the house is a grotto and an underground passage made from
it called the Catacombs. There are walks through woods, in which are
gothick and other buildings. But the place is most famous for a great
variety of forest trees and shrubs ; they have thirty different kinds of
oaks, and four hundred different American trees and shrubs, which
compose one wilderness.' — Travels of Dr. Richard Pococke, 1754.
The park has beautiful views, but is more remarkable
for its noble cedars of Lebanon, more than a hundred and
fifty in number. In a summer-house is the Neptune and
Minerva Slab, found in digging the foundations of the
Chichester Council Chamber in 17 13. It is inscribed —
the letters in italics being conjectural restorations —
Neptuni et Minervae templum
pro salute domus divinae.
ex auctoritate Tib. Claud.
Cagidubni r. leg. aug. in Brit.
Collegium fabror. et qui in eo
a sacris sunt d. s. d. donante aream
Pudenle Pudentini fil.1
The slab commemorates a temple which the tribal chief
Cogidubnus, imperial legate under Claudius, erected in his
capital of Regnum to Neptune and Minerva as patrons of a
1 ' The Temple of Neptune and Minerva, erected for the health and preservation
of the Imperial family by the authority of the Emperor Tiberius Claudius and of
Cogidubnus, the great king ofthe Britons. The Company of Artificers, with others,
who were ambitious of the honour of supplying materials, defrayed the expense.
Pudens, the son of Pudentius, gave the ground.'

204 SUSSEX
collegium fabrorum, supposed to have been a guild of ship-
carpenters belonging to the port. Many are inclined to
connect this Pudens with the Pudens of the New Testa
ment. ' Eubulus greeteth thee, and Pudens, and Linus, and Claudia, and
all the brethren.' — 2 Tim. iv. 21.
They believe Claudia to have been the daughter of Cogi
dubnus, king of the Regni. Martial's Epig. iv. 13 is ad
dressed to Rufus on the marriage of one Pudens with
Claudia, a foreigner (peregrina) ; and this Pudens is a cen
turion (Martial, i. 32) who is expected to return to Rome
to receive the honour of equestrian rank (vi. 58).
A Pheasantry has been formed from an old chalk-pit.
There is a fine view from Cairney's Seat, named from an
old servant of the family.
The Race Course, 1 m. from the house, is famous for the
Goodwood Races, established 1802, and held at the end of
July — a far more aristocratic gathering than those at Epsom
or Ascot. 'This splendid course, taking jaded London out of itself in the
weaiy dog-days, has acquired a pre-eminence for which the racing
world is entirely indebted to the enterprise of the late Duke of Rich
mond. The hill is singularly adapted for the purpose. Situate 700
feet above the sea level, and possessing an unbroken landscape in every
direction, it catches each perfumed breeze that is wafted from land or
sea. Here, when all Nature elsewhere languishes, the boundless ex
panse of turf and sea-board brings momentary freedom and elasticity to
the most careworn. It is unlike Epsom, it is unlike Ascot ; you feel
you are in a nobleman's domains, and if not his invited guest, at least
a permitted trespasser. On the South — the prevailing quarter from
which the vegetable world of Sussex turns instinctively — affording
shelter enough for all comers, either from the partial thunder-shower
or regular downpour, runs a tall dark grove of firs. On the western
extremity of the course rises the stately Grand Stand, not the conspi
cuous building which travellers who look to the well-known hill from
the carriages of the South-Coast Railway take it for, but concealed
under covert of the grove ; whilst the singular conical hill known as
the Rook's Trundall (a corruption, probably, of Roundall and St.
Roche), loop-shaped and double-trenched, proudly flanks the whole.
The course is a, horse-shoe, like Epsom, so that the spectators may

EARTH AM 205
command a view of all the running, but so bold a ravine divides its
extremities that no cross-country cavalcade can be present here, as
there, at both the starting and the winning posts.' — Quarterly Rev.,
No. 223.
The proverb, 'The last race-horse brings snow at his
tail,' refers to the belief that frost may be expected any
time after 'the Sussex fortnight,' which ends with the first
week in August.
A current local tradition says that Aaron's golden calf
is buried in Rook's Hill1 where there is a large earthwork
known as ' the Trundle.' It has an outer and inner vallum,
and a deep fosse. It is evidently of Celtic origin, though
afterwards used by the Romans. Other ancient earthworks
lie half a mile to the south.
To the right of the highroad, 6 ;//. from Chichester and 2
m. beyond Boxgrove, lies Eartham, where the poet William
Hayley lived in Eartham House (Sir Peniston Milbanke),
which was built by his father, and where he wrote his
' Triumphs of Temper,' which had a great though short-lived
popularity. Here Flaxman, his intimate friend, passed a
fortnight with him — ' such a fortnight,' he wrote, ' as many
thousands of our fellow- creatures go out of the world without
enjoying.' ' Everything about that man is good except his poelry.' — Southey,
Letter to S. T. Coleridge.
' He lived in the days when polish held the place of vigour, and
harmony that of feeling, and poetry is judged as a song is now — by the
sweetness of its music. ' — Allan Cunningham, ' Biog. and Crit. Hist, of
Literature' ' He must always hold a place in the history of English literature.'
— Quarterly Rev., xxxi.
The church, which has a Norman chancel arch, was the
burial-place of Hayley's father, and contains his epitaph on
his remarkable and gifted mother ; it has also an admirable
monument by his master, Flaxman, to Thomas Alphonso
Hayley, the promising and brilliant natural son of the poet,
upon whose lingering illness some of his father's most
touching verses were written. After his death, William
1 See Brewer's ' Diet, of Phrase and Fable,' sub ' Golden Calf.'

206 SUSSEX
Hayley could not endure to remain at Eartham,1 and sold
his paternal inheritance to the Rt. Hon. W. Huskisson,
killed at the opening of the Liverpool Railway. Huskis
son was buried in the Liverpool cemetery, but there is a
monument to him in the north side of the church here, as
well as in Chichester Cathedral.
1} in. S.E. of Eartham is Slindon Park, built by Sir
Garrett Kempe in the time of Elizabeth, on the site of an
old manor of the Archbishops of Canterbury, in which the
great archbishop Stephen Langton died, July 1228.
At 10 in. the road — the Stane Street — reaches Up Wal
tham, where the early English church has a circular apse,
and then ascends Sutton Hill, whence there is a wide view
of rich country, and reaches (12 in. from Chichester, 6
from Petworth) Bignor. The churchyard has fine yew-
trees. At Bignor Park lived Nicholas Turner. One of
his daughters was Charlotte Smith (ob. 1806), authoress of
'The Old Manor House,' 'Emmeline,' and many other
novels and poems.
' Some of her novels will last, and her sonnets with them, each
perhaps aided by the other. There is nothing great in her, but she is
natural and touching.' — Leigh Hunt, ' Men, Women, and Books'
Her sister, Mrs. Dorset, was the authoress of ' The Peacock
at Home,' and other poems, 1809.
Bignor is the station upon the Roman Stane Street, ' ad
decimam ' (from Regnum) of the Itineraries, and here, in
'the Berry field,' in a very pretty situation, are the remains
of a Roman villa.
'This villa, which so many thousands have since crowded to visit,
had lain undiscovered, though only a foot or two below the surface of
the soil, till 181S, when one Farmer Tupper, ploughing with his yoke
of oxen his own little freehold, came upon the richest tessellated pave
ment in England.' — Quarterly Rev., No. 223.
The remains surround a court, and are of considerable
size, and, since their discovery, have been carefully preserved.
1 A most interesting article on the ' Life and Writings of Hayley ' will be found
in the Quarterly Rezdew, xxxi.

LAVANT 207
Those who have travelled much in Italy will not think much
of the tessellated pavements to be seen here, but they are
still amongst the finest which have been found in England.
One of the best represents the Rape of Ganymede, another
the Four Seasons — Winter, holding a bare twig, especially
fine — another a comic scene, in which Cupids are repre
sented as Gladiators. There are considerable remains of a
bath-room, and another room has an open fireplace.
' Enough remains to attest the judgment and taste as well as the
opulence of the owner. The high ground, chosen for the site of the
villa, lay open to the south-west, having a group of hills and valleys
more picturesquely "folded" perhaps, than at any other point in the
South Downs. Here, upon an area of four acres, he planned his house
upon a grand scale. Traces of similar but smaller villas have been
found at Hurstpierpoint, Angmering, and elsewhere.' — The Nineteenth
Century, August 1884.
Bury Hill, to the east of Bignor, has a large tumulus
on its summit.

A line leads N. from Chichester to Midhurst and
Pulborough by —
3J m. Lavant Stat. The station is at Mid-Lavant.
East Lavant is a little east. They take their name from
the Lavant rivulet.
' The land springs which we call lavants, break out much on the
Downs of Sussex, Hampshire, and Wiltshire. The country people say
"When the lavants rise, corn will be dear."' — Gilbert White, 'Nat.
Hist, of Selborne.'
' Clear Lavant, that doth keep the Southamptonian side,
(Dividing it well from the Sussexian lands,
That Selsey doth survey, and Solent's troubled sands).
—Drayton, ' Polyolbion,' xvii.
In l\lid-Lavant Church (S. Nicholas) is a tomb with an
effigy, erected during the lifetime of Dame Mary May, 1681.
East Lavant Church has a brass of Thomas Cawse, and a
Sussex marble slab inscribed — ' Priez ci passez par ici pour
l'alme Luci de Mildebi.'
The road from Lavant, \ m. before reaching Singleton,

208 SUSSEX
passes through West Dean, where the church (S. Andrew)
contains a fine early XVII. c. monument to members ofthe
Lewknor family — an uncle, son, and nephew.
7 m. Singleton Stat. 2 in. east is East Dean, where
probably stood the royal villa of Dene, at which Asser first
saw Alfred.
' Usque ad regionem dexteralium Saxonum, quae Saxonice Suth-
seaxum appellatur, perveni, ibique ilium in villa regia, quae dicitur
Dene, primitus vidi.' — De Rebus gestis Aclfredi Magni.
Charlton, a hamlet of Singleton, was the centre of the
famous hunting-ground of Charlton Forest, first brought
into notice by the Duke of Monmouth. It had a banquet
ing room called Fox-Hall. In the church of Singleton is
a monument to the last huntsman of the Charlton pack,
inscribed —
' Here Johnson lies : what hunter can deny
Old honest Tom the tribute of a sigh ?
Deaf is that ear that caught the opening sound,
Dumb is that tongue which cheered the hills around.
Unpleasing truth 1 Death hunts us from our birth,
In view, and men, like foxes, take to earth.'
10 in. Cocking Stat. Here was a cell belonging to Sees
in Normandy, and afterwards to the college at Arundel.
The church of Hey shott (1 in. east) is dedicated to S. Giles.
1 A curious phenomenon is observable in this neighbourhood. From
the leafy recesses of the layers of beech on the escarpments of the
Downs, there rises in unsettled weather a mist which rolls among the
trees like the smoke out of a chimmey. This exhalation is called
" Foxes-brewings," whatever that may mean, and if it tends westward
towards Cocking, rain follows speedily. Hence the local proverb : — •
" When Foxes-brewings go to Cocking,
Foxes-brewings come back dropping.'" — M. A. Lower.
3 in. west, over Heyshott Downs, is the village of Wool
Lavington. Lavington House, built by T. Sargent, the

LA V INGTON 209
friend of Hayley, will always have an interest as having been
the residence of Samuel Wilberforce, Bishop of Oxford,
and afterwards of Winchester. On June 11, 1828, he was
married here to Miss Emily Sargent, the heiress of Lav
ington,1 by Mr. C. Simeon, and in the churchyard his wife
was buried, February 1841. ' Oh, how in Lavington church
yard do I enter into " the harvest in the end ofthe world," '
wrote Wilberforce to Miss L. Noel in April 1841. Hither
he rode for the last time, May 31, 1873, and he wrote in his
Journal — ' Mind resting somewhat on God, and blessing
Him for power of enjoying the beauties of His world around
me.' He died by a fall from his horse near Dorking, July
19, 1873.
' More even at Lavington than at Cuddesdon was he fond of sally
ing out for his evening walk, with a few congenial spirits round him,
before whom he could speak freely. But it was on the charms of the
pleasant landscape which surrounded his Sussex home that he chiefly
expatiated on such occasions, leaning rather heavily on some trusty
arm, while he tapped with his stick the bole of every favourite tree
which came in his way, and had something to tell of its history and
surpassing merits. Every farmhouse, every peep at the distant land
scape, every turn in the road, suggested some pleasant remark or playful
anecdote. He had a word for every man, woman, and child he met, —
for he knew them all. The very cattle were greeted as old acquaint
ances ; and how he did delight in discussing the flora of the neighbour
hood, the geological formations, every aspect of the natural history of
the place.' — Burgon.
The church (of S. Peter) has a special interest from the
ministrations of Samuel Wilberforce.
' His sermons in this church were amongst his very best. He used
to pour out his heart there as if it were a relief to him to talk out
what had passed within him. The memories of that church and of the
house near it, of the graves that clustered round it, and of the voices that
had spoken in it, seemed to bring out all the man that was in him, and
to possess him with a stronger sense than ever of the loving dealings of
God with the soul.'— if. G. Wilberforce.
There is a brass to the Bishop in the church, and his
1 An old proverb says, ' No heir to the Lavingtons ever succeeded his own
father.' See Rev. T. Mozley, ' Reminiscences,' p. 132. 0

210 SUSSEX
pastoral staff, as Bishop of Oxford, is fixed to the wall near
the altar. In the churchyard is a cross to ' Samuel Wilber
force, twenty-eight years a Bishop in the Church of God.'
' It had been the Bishop's constant desire, ever since he laid his
wife to rest in Lavington churchyard, that when his time came he
might rest there beside her. At Cuddesdon, at Lavington, and in
London, there hung in his bedroom a picture of Lavington churchyard,
"that I may ever see," he used to say, "my own resting-place."' —
Life. ' Verily, as the years roll out, this spot will attract many a pilgrim
foot : but the church, no less than the world, is prone to forget its
greatest benefactors, and few will care to remember, when a few
decades of years shall have run their course, how largely our Church of
England is indebted lo him who sleeps below. None but those who
knew him will have the faintest conception what an exquisite orator,
what a persuasive preacher, what a faithful bishop, — in every private
relation of life what a truly delightful person, — is commemorated bythe
stone which marks the grave of Samuel Wilberforce.' — Burgon.
' No church could stand in a more beautiful spot. The trees, the
fields, the beautiful hills, the exquisite landscape in the distance, all
complete a picture which will long dwell in the memory of even the
most heedless of travellers.' — Louis J. Jennings, 'Rambles Among the
Hills.' An observatory was built by Bishop Wilberforce on the
hill above the house.
From Duncton Beacon there is a fine view.
12^ in. Midhurst, a. pleasant old town above the Rother.
At the Grammar-School — ' Schola Grammaticalis ' — founded
by Gilbert Hannam in 1672, Sir Charles Lyell and Richard
Cobden were educated. Attached to the perpendicular
church (of S. Denis) is the Montacute Chantry, but the tomb
of Lord Montacute, which it contained, has been removed
to Easebourne. Francis, 3rd Viscount Montague, who suf
fered so much for Charles I., was buried here.
A lovely walk above the river -bank leads from the
station to the picturesque and beautiful ruined house of
Cowdray. The property belonged to the Bohuns till the
time of Henry VIL, when Sir David Owen, natural son of
Owen Tudor, and uncle of the king, married their heiress,
Mary. Sir David sold the property to Sir W. Fitzwilliam,

COWDRAY 211
treasurer of the king's household, created Earl of South
ampton, whose mother married, as her second husband,
Sir Anthony Browne, Grand Standard-Bearer of England.
Their son was another Sir Anthony, the friend of Henry
VIIL, and to him his maternal half-brother, the Earl of
Southampton, dying childless in 1543, left Cowdray. Llis
son was created Viscount Montague in 1554 by Philip and

Cowdray.

Mary, and from him seven viscounts descended in succes
sion. Edward VI. was here August 22, 1549, and wrote
to his friend Barnabe Fitzpatricke (who, as a boy, was
appointed to undergo any whippings the royal pupil de
served) : 'At Cowdray, a goodly house of Sir Anthony
Browne's, we were marvellously, nay, rather excessively
blanketted.' Lord Montague stood very high in the favour
of Queen Elizabeth.

212 SUSSEX
' The first that showed his bands to the Queen was that noble,
virtuous, honourable man, the Viscount Montague, who now came,
though he was very sickly and in age, with a full resolution to live and
die in defence of the Queen and of his country against all invaders,
whether it were pope, king, or potentate whatsoever ; and, in that
ground, he would hazard his life, his children, his land, and goods.
And to show his mind agreeably thereto, he came personally himself
before the Queen, with his band of horsemen, being almost two hundred ;
the same being led by his own sons ; and with them a young child, very
comely, seated on horseback, being the heir of his house, that is, the
eldest son to his son and heir ; a matter much noted of many, whom I
heard to commend the same, to see a grandfather, father, and son at
one time on horseback afore a queen for her service.' — Letter of the
Spanish Ambassador Mendoza, September 1588.
Elizabeth spent a week at Cowdray in 1591, where her
Sunday breakfast was provided with three oxen and a hun
dred and forty geese.1 She killed several deer in the park
with her crossbow. In the same year Lord Montague died.
' Baker's Chronicles ' say : ' Though he were a great Roman
Catholic, yet the queen, finding him faithful, always loved
him, and in his sickness went to visit him.'
The later history of the house is very tragical. On the
2 4th September 1793, during the absence of its owner, the 8th
Viscount, flames were seen issuing from a carpenter's work
room at the top of the north-west angle of the house, where
workmen had left a pan of charcoal burning, and they soon
gained such a hold that the whole interior of the house
was gutted by fire, and scarcely anything it contained was
rescued. The ' Roll of Battle Abbey ' is believed to have
perished in the flames. Only a month later, before he had
heard of his misfortune, the young owner of Cowdray,
George Samuel, Viscount Montague, aged 22, being at
Schaffhausen, determined to shoot the falls in a small boat,
with his friend, Mr. Sedley Burdett. His valet, declaring
that the respect of a servant ought in such a case to give
way to the duty of a man, attempted to restrain his master
by force, but in vain. The young men passed the first fall
in safety, made for the second, and were never seen again.
The property of Cowdray then passed to Lord Montague's
1 See ' The Orders and Rules of Sir Anthony Browne.'

COWDRAY 213
sister, Elizabeth Margaret, married to Mr. Stephen Poyntz.
Their two sons were drowned before their eyes at Bognor.
Thus was fulfilled to the uttermost ' the curse of Cowdray,'
pronounced by one of the last monks of Battle against Sir
Anthony Browne, when he took forcible possession of Battle
Abbey, that ' by fire and water his line should come to an
end, and perish out ofthe land.'
The property, devolving upon the three daughters of
Stephen Poyntz, was sold to the Earl of Egmont in 1843.
Over the ruined entrance of Cowdray are seen the arms
of Sir Anthony Browne, and on the roof of the hall are the
anchor and trefoil and the W. S. of the Earl of Southampton.
In the great dining-room were very curious frescoes, repre
senting events in English history, probably executed by
Theodore Bernardi for Sir Anthony Browne. The Buck
Hall was surrounded by carved stags, of which fragments
remain. ' Sir,' said Dr. Johnson, when he came hither
from Brighton, ' I should like to stay here four-and-twenty
hours. We see here how our ancestors lived.' The foun
tain, which once stood in the centre of the court, is now at
Woolbeding. The highroad runs, without hedge or paling, through
the park, where is a beautiful chestnut avenue nearly a
mile long. Near the South-Coast Railway Station are
four avenues of ancient yews, called the Close Walks,
forming a quadrangle in which Elizabeth is said to have
dined at a long table, and to have shot three or four deer
as they were driven by. 1 m. from the ruins is Cowdray
Lodge (Earl of Egmont), built by its owner.
Just outside the park gate, in the direction of Woolbeding,
stands Easebourne Church, dedicated to S. Mary. It was
attached to a little Benedictine priory built by John de
Bohun in the time of Henry III. The south aisle was the
nuns' chapel. In the chancel, which was the burial-place
of the Bohuns, is the oaken effigy of Sir David Owen, 1 542,
who married their heiress. Here also is the tomb, brought
hither from Midhurst Church, with the kneeling figure of
Sir Anthony Browne, Lord Montague, the friend of Queen

214 SUSSEX
Elizabeth, with the recumbent effigies of his two wives, Jane
and Magdalen.
Lodsworth Church, on the N.E. of the park, was once
very interesting from the curious open-timbered gallery on
its south side, but this has been ruthlessly ' restored ' away,
together with the old yew-tree of the churchyard, in the
place of which paltry coniferae have been planted. At
West Lavington, on the south of Cowdray Park, is the
church built for Archdeacon (afterwards Cardinal) Manning
in 1850, only a few months before his secession to the
Church of Rome. Here he preached his last sermon as
an English clergyman. Long afterwards he wrote of the
love he felt for the earlier 'little church under a green hill
side, where the morning and evening prayers and the music
of the English Bible for seventeen years became a part of
my soul.' 1 In the churchyard Richard Cobden, the ' Apostle
of Free Trade' (who died in London, April 2, 1865), is
buried beside his father William, in whose old farmhouse
in the neighbouring hamlet of Heyshott he was born. When
agricultural depression obliged the farm to be sold, he began
life as a commercial traveller, but lived to repurchase , his
native place in 1845, and built Dunford House, which was
afterwards his home.
[The branch line from Midhurst to Petersfield passes —
3 in. Elstead Stat. 3 in. south, on the top of the
Downs at Treyford, are the barrows known as ' The Devil's
Jumps.'
2 m. north, on the road from Midhurst to Petersfield,
is Trotton, where the church of S. George was built, with
the neighbouring bridge over the Rother, in 1400, by
Thomas, ' Baron Camois of Broadwater,' a hero of Agin
court, who lived here at Camois Court. The monuments in
this remote church are of the utmost importance. In the
chancel is the brass of Margarete, daughter and heiress of
Richard Foliott, and first wife of Sir John de Camoys, 13 10,
1 'England and Chiistendom,' p. 124.

TROTTON 215
being one of the earliest known brasses in memory of a lady,
and the only brass, except that of Sir John de Northwode, at
Minster in the Isle of Sheppey, which can with any certainty
be attributed to a French artist. On this brass, of exquisite
finish, the engraver has placed his initial N. at the base of
the canopy nearest the effigy of the lady. After the death
of this Margarete, Sir John Camoys married another Mar
garet, daughter and heiress of Sir John de Gatesden. This
lady was granted, with her property, by a formal deed, to
William Paynel, whom she married after Sir J. Camoys'
decease !
' In this brass, the wimple, that strange covering for the throat,
chin, and the sides of the face, is very distinctly shown ; and it is
adjusted, after a fashion prevalent in the earlier part of the Edwardian
era, in such a manner as to impart a triangular outline to the features.
A single curl of hair appears on either side of the forehead, which is
encircled by a narrow enriched fillet ; and upon the head, and falling
gracefully upon the shoulders, is a coverchef. The remainder of the
costume, with the exception of its heraldic decorations, is of the simplest
character, but is expressed with great vigour and effectiveness. A
super-tunic envelops the whole person ; it has no waist-cincture, and
its sleeves are loose, and terminate somewhat below the elbow, thus
displaying of the kirtle worn beneath no more than the tight sleeves,
buttoned closely to the wrists ; the clasped and uplifted hands are bare.
Originally nine smaller shields were attached to the front of the tunic,1
a singular specimen of costume, for this is the only sepulchral brass
known to have presented this peculiar species of ornament. These
have now been abstracted, and that at a very recent period. A fine
pedimental canopy, with slender side-shafts and pinnacles, eight shields
of arms, the border fillets with the letters of the legend wliich they
enclosed, and a profusion of small stars and other ornaments with
whicii it was once semee, have in like manner, but at a more distant
period, been abstracted from the marble slab. The border legend
originally was as follows, written in Longobardic capitals : " Margarete
de Camoys gise ici. Dieu de sa aime eut merci : Amen." The legend
commences without an initial cross.' — BoutelPs ' Monumental Brasses.'
On an altar-tomb, with an immense slab of Purbeck
marble, is the brass of Thomas, Lord Camoys — 'strenuus
miles de gartero ' — the second founder of the church,
1 The surcoat of William de Valence, 1296, at Westminster, was originally
decorated in this way.

2i6 SUSSEX
1410, and his wife Elizabeth, 1419, daughter of Edward
Mortimer, and widow of Henry Percy (Harry Hotspur),
being the ' Gentle Kate ' of Shakspeare (see ' Henry IV.').
Their son Richard stands at his mother's knee. The effigy
of the knight — who commanded the left wing of the English
army at Agincourt, and for his valiant deeds was made a
Knight of the Garter — gives a rare example of the collar of
SS. and the Garter appearing on the same figure. The
lady is dressed in the ' sideless cote-hardi ' of the time,
with a flowing robe and an elaborate reticulated head-dress.
The shields of arms are Camoys and Mortimer.1
The poet Thomas Otway was born (March 3, 165 1) in
this parish, being son of the Rev. Humphrey Otway, curate
of Trotton, and afterwards Rector of Woolbeding. Collins
alludes to him in his ' Ode to Pity ' —
' But wherefore need I wander wide
To old Ilissus' distant side,
Deserted stream and mute !
Wild Arun, too, has heard thy strains,
And Echo 'midst my native plains
Been soothed by Pity's lute.'
His best works are his plays of ' The Orphan ' and
' Venice Preserved.' He is reported to have died choked
by the first mouthful of a roll which he had bought with
a guinea given him by a gentleman when he was starving,
and which he attacked too greedily.
In an 'Ode to the River Arun,' Charlotte Smith
writes — ' On thy wild banks, by frequent torrents worn,
No glittering fanes, nor marble domes appear ;
Yet shall the mournful muse thy course adorn
And still to her thy rustic waves be dear !
For with the infant Otway lingering here,
Of early woes she bade her votary dream,
While thy low murmurs sooth'd his pensive ear,
And still the poet consecrates the stream;
1 The brass is engraved in Dallaway.

WOOLBEDING 217
Beneath the oak and beech that fringe thy side,
The first-born violets of the year shall spring ;
And in thy hazels, bending o'er thy tide,
The earliest nightingale delight to sing :
While kindred spirits, pitying, shall relate
Thy Otway's sorrows, and lament his fate.'
1 m. distant, approached by deep lanes, is the very
quaint little church of Chlthurst, on the Rother. A rude
flat arch between the nave and chancel is attributed to
Saxon date. Close to the church is a picturesque cottage,
built from the remains of a small priory, some of whose
monks have tombs in the churchyard.
5 m. Rogate. Beyond the village, to the left of the
Petersfield road, and just on the boundary of Sussex and
Hampshire, are the remains of Dureford Abbey, a house of
Premonstratensian Canons, founded 1169 by Henry Hoese
(Hosatus-Hussey). The tomb of a monk marked with a
raised cross, and fragments of arches, are built into the walls
of the old-fashioned moated garden of the farmhouse ; but
very little is left. Near II aben Bridge, over the Rother, are the
moated remains of a castle, probably of the Camoys family.
9 m. Petersfield (in Hampshire).]
[The road from Midhurst to Haselmere passes \ in. to
the right of Woolbeding, a fine old XVII. c. house with
high overhanging roofs and dormer windows, like a French
chateau. Its delightful old gardens enclose the church of
All Hallows, which has some stained glass from Mottisfont
Priory. The fountain which stood in the court of Cow
dray is preserved here. An enormous tulip-tree should be
noticed. A beautiful avenue of old Scotch firs leads to
the house on the Petersfield side.
Crossing a ridge of hills, the road, at 5 in., reaches
Fernhurst, in a delightful situation. In the oak-woods of
Verdley, to the east of the village, are remains of an old
castle, destroyed for road-making in the middle of the XIX.
c. It is a lonely and romantic place — 'known only to
those that hunt the marten cat,' says Camden.

218 SUSSEX
3 /;/. N.W., on the edge of a hill, with a wide view over
Sussex and Surrey, is the church of Liiichmere, with very
peculiar scalloped and vandyked decoration to its windows.
The village green, with its fine old oaks, is very attractive.
At the foot of Linchmere Hill are the curious re
mains of Shulbrede Priory, now a farmhouse. It was
founded in the XIII. c. by Sir Ralph de Anderne for five
Augustinian canons, and suppressed by the Bishop of Chi
chester, ' not without an eye to his own advantage,' ten
years before Cromwell's visitation. A great upper hall,
called 'the Prior's Chamber,' is adorned with rude paint
ings. In the picture of the Nativity, the animals have
labels expressing voices. The cock crows — ' Christus natus
est.' The duck quacks — 'Quando, quando?' The raven
croaks — ' In hac nocte.' The cow lows — ' Ubi, ubi ? ' The
sheep bleats — 'Bethlem, Bethlem.'1]
\b\ in. Selham Stat. Tllllngton, a little north, has a
modern church built by the Earl of Egremont, containing a
brass of William Spencer and his wife, 1593, and a monu
ment to William Cox, precentor of Chichester in the time
of Charles L, and his wife, buried here 'in the hope of
a more perfect union hereafter.' ' Hie, spe melioris con
sortia recondi voluit.' A family with the Saxon name of
Aylings have held land at Tillington for three hundred years.
17^ m. Petworth."1 The station is if in. from the town.
An omnibus waits for every train.
The quiet old-fashioned town surrounds a market-house
(with a bust of '"William the Deliverer'), built by George
O'Brien, Earl of Egremont. The residence of the Percies
here was not supposed to be beneficial to the place. Leland
says it grew more prosperous after ' the yerles of Northum
berland used little to ly there ; ' but afterwards (in the time of
Henry VIII.) was ' right well encreasid,' a cloth manufactory
having been established in the town. The large church,
1 Similar paintings remain at Cleeve Abbey, near Dunster, in Somersetshire.
2 In Saxon times Peteorde, then Pedewrda (Ricli. I.), Peitewurth Qohn) Put-
worth (Ed. I.), Pettewoorth (Hen. VII.).

PETWORTH 219
with a feeble modern spire,1 is dedicated to Our Lady of
Pity. The north chantry, dedicated to S. Thomas of Can
terbury, was the burial-place of the Percies, to whom Lord
Egremont, in his eightieth year, erected a monument by
Carew — 'mortuis moriturus.' Here rests the unfortunate
9th Earl Henry, who was long imprisoned in the Tower
upon accusation of being concerned in the Gunpowder
Plot, and, though nothing was proved against him, only
released by the Star Chamber on payment of a fine of
,£30,000. His wife was sister of Elizabeth's Earl of Essex.
With him lies his son Algernon (tenth Earl) and his grand
son Josceline (nth Earl), in whom the male line became
extinct. Lady Lucy Percy, Countess of Carlisle, daughter
of the 9th Earl, also lies here with her father. Josceline
of Louvain, brother of Queen Adeliza, widow of Henry I.,
and husband of Lady Agnes Percy, is said to have been
buried here. A monument by Bailey commemorates Lord
Egremont, 1840. Against the north wall is a monument
of one of the Dawtrey family in 1527. A little below
the church are some XVIII. c. almshouses — the Somerset
Hospital, founded by Charles, Duke of Somerset. Thomp
son's Hospital, in North Street, was founded by Thomas
Thompson of Barnard's Inn in 1624. Near the church is a
fine old house of the Dawtrey family. Amongst the many
eminent rectors of Petworth have been Richard Montague,
afterwards Bishop of Chichester and Norwich, 1623 ; Brian
Duppa, afterwards Bishop of Chichester, Salisbury, and Win
chester, 1638 ; Henry King, afterwards Bishop of Chichester,
1 64 1 ; Francis Cheynell, the disputatious Puritan, who was
the persecutor of Chillingworth, 1643 ; John Price, the chap
lain of General Monk, who was in his confidence as to the
Restoration, 1669; Euseby Cleaver, afterwards Bishop of
Cork, of Leighlin and Ferns, and Archbishop of Dublin,
1783 ; and Charles Dunster, author of many literary works,
1789. 1 Replacing a crooked leaden spire taken down in 1800, which, gave rise to the
distich — ' Proud Petworth : poor people,
High Churchj crooked steeple.'

220 SUSSEX
Petworth Park, bequeathed by Henry I. to his second
wife, Queen Adeliza (• Alice la Belle '), was given by her to
her brother Josceline of Louvain. He married Agnes, heiress
of the Northumbrian Percies, ' for birth and valour equal to
any subjects in Christendome.' 1 She covenanted before her
marriage that her husband should either take the arms of
Percy and omit his own, or continue his own arms and take
the surname of Percy to him and his posterity for ever. He
chose the latter alternative, noticed in lines under her pic
ture in the pedigree at Sion House —
' Lord Percy's heir I was, whose noble name
By me survives unto his lasting fame ;
Brabant's duke's son I wed, who for my sake
Retains his arms, and Percy's name doth take.'
Petworth became henceforward the principal residence of the
house of Percy (so that there is a much finer collection of their
portraits here than at Alnwick) till Lady Elizabeth Percy,
the great heiress of the family, married (1682) as her third
husband (though only fifteen) Charles Seymour, ' the proud
Duke of Somerset,' who lived here with almost regal state
and pretension. Her son Algernon, the seventh Duke of
Somerset, dying without male issue, Sir Hugh Smithson,
who had married his only daughter Elizabeth, succeeded
to the Northumbrian estates ; but Petworth came to the
son of her second daughter, Lady Catherine Seymour, who
had married Sir William Wyndham, Bart, described by
Pope as — ' Wyndham, just to freedom and the throne,
The master of our passions and his own.'
Their son, Sir Charles Wyndham, then owner of Petworth,
became Earl of Egremont, whence the Egremont portraits
here. His son, George Wyndham, third Earl of Egremont,
who lived to eighty-five, added enormously to the Pet
worth collections. These, with all their glorious portraits
of Percys and Seymours, he left to his adopted son, the
1 Fuller.

PETWORTH 221
father of the present owner. The barony of Leconfield
was created for him in 1859.
The old castle of the Percies stood even nearer the town
than the present 'magnificent palace of a subject,' but was
almost entirely pulled down by the Duke of Somerset when
the existing house was built. Fuller says : ' It was most
famous for a stately stable, the best of any subject in Chris
tendom, affording standing in state for threescore horses,
with all necessary accommodations.' Both Edward I. and
Edward II. visited Petworth, and Edward VI. spent some
days here; Charles III., the Austrian claimant of the
Spanish throne, was also here on his way to visit Queen
Anne at Windsor.
From the town, nothing indicates the immediate pre
sence of a great house ; but at a door in the street close
to the church, visitors should apply to visit Petworth House
(Lord Leconfield), which was built by Charles, Duke of
Somerset, at the end of the XVII. c. Magnificently unin
teresting in itself, it contains the most important private
collection of pictures in the kingdom (above six hundred in
number), and one of the finest collections of family portraits
in the world. The statues, purchased through Gavin Hamil
ton for the third Earl of Egremont, are of no great merit.
The house is shown with great liberality on Tuesdays
and Thursdays (no fees being intended) at n, 12, 2, and 3.
Visitors are admitted in parties as the clock strikes, after
which a very rapid walk through the rooms occupies exactly
an hour. There is no time or possibility of examining or
enjoying any special picture, but, with the crowds — chiefly
uninterested and uneducated — who have to be herded along,
no other system is possible. No casual visitor can carry
away more than a confused jumble of beautiful impressions.
The collection of the works by Vandyke is magnificent,
and that of Sir Joshua Reynolds is the largest in existence.
To notice only a few of the most important points of interest :
Tapestry Hall:
Decorated with frescoes of Louis Laguerre.

222 SUSSEX
Grand Staircase :
On which Elizabeth, Duchess of Somerset, is represented in a tri
umphal car, surrounded by her daughters. She was the great
heiress of the house of Percy, married at fourteen to Henry
Cavendish, Earl of Ogle, son of the Duke of Newcastle, who
died in a few months : then to Thomas Thynne of Longleat,
murdered at the foot of the Haymarket, Feb. 12, 1681-82 :
then to Charles Seymour, 6th Duke of Somerset. She died
1722, at the- age of fifty-five, having had thirteen children by
her third marriage.
The Beauty Room :
Containing portraits of Queen Anne and of Sarah Jennings, Duchess
of Marlborough, by Kneller. The rest of the portraits are by Dahl.
The White and Gold Room :
Vandyke. *Lady Ann Carr, Countess of Bedford, daughter of
James I.'s friend, and mother of the famous William Lord
Russell who was beheaded. Other portraits of this lady
by Vandyke are at Woburn, Althorp, and in the Louvre.
*Lady Dorothy Sidney, Countess of Sunderland, the ' Sac-
charissa' of Waller and Mrs. Ady. Another portrait by
Vandyke is at Althorp.
' Perhaps the best known of all the portraits of Dorothy
Sidney is that at Petworth, her uncle Northumberland's
home. The face is full of character and good sense. We
see the skin of roses and lilies of which Waller sings, the
radiant eyes that woke again the old pain when he saw
them upon the painter's canvas, and the sweet expression
which after all was perhaps the chief charm of her face.' —
Mrs. Ady, ' Saccharissa. '
*Lady Elizabeth Cecil, Countess of Devonshire.
*Lady Dorothy Percy, Countess of Leicester, mother of Al
gernon Sydney and ' Saccharissa ' — at the age of 27.
The Old Library :
Zucchero. Sir Nicholas Bacon.
Porbus. Old Lady.
Murillo. His own portrait.
The Red Library :
Gainsborough. Lady Egremont.
Sir J. Reynolds. Lady Craven.

PETWORTH 223
Sir f. Reynolds. Mrs. Musters.
Sir Antonio More. Sir Henry Sidney and Lady Mary Dudley, his
wife, 1553 — the father and mother of Sir Philip Sidney.
Vandyke. Portraits of Sir Robert Shirley and his wife Teresia.
Over fireplace : Vandyke. Lady Catherine Cecil.
The Marble Hall:
Titian. Cardinal de Medici as a young man — a very noble por
trait.
Bronzino. A Boy.
Hogarth. Peg Woffington.
Square Drawing-Room :
I'andyke. Prince William of Orange, father of William III., as a
child.
* Vandyke. Algernon Percy, with his wife, Lady Anne Cecil, and
their little daughter.
Holbein. Queen Katherine Parr.
*Claude. A landscape, with Laban and his daughters — a magnifi
cent picture.
Titian. Catarina Cornaro, Queen of Cyprus (?).
* Vandyke. Henry Percy, 9th Earl, confined for sixteen years in
the Tower — one of the masterpieces of the master.
* Vandyke. Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford. There are six
(almost) replicas of this picture in England.
Sir loshua Reynolds. The Marquis of Granby.
Vandyke. Henry, ioth Earl of Newport, and his son.
Vandyke. Mrs. Porter, Lady of the Bedchamber to Henrietta
Maria.
Lely. Lady Elizabeth Cecil, who married first Sir William Ilatton,
and secondly Sir Edward Coke.
The Carved Room, with magnificent carvings by Grinling
Gibbons :
' The most superb monument of Gibbons' skill is a large
apartment at Petworth, enriched from the ceiling, between the
pictures, with festoons of flowers and dead game, all in the
highest state of perfection and preservation. One vase sur
passes all the others in beauty of execution and elegance of
design, being covered with a bas-relief of the purest taste,
worthy indeed of the Grecian age of cameos. Selden, one of
his disciples — for what right hand could have executed such
plenty of laborious productions — lost his life in saving this
carving when the house was on fire.' — Walpole.

224 SUSSEX
Jervas, after Vandyke. Henrietta Maria and Sir Jeffrey Hudson
the dwarf.
Sir J. Reynolds. Kitty Fisher.
*Holbein. Henry VIII. — painted 1540.
Sir J. Reynolds. Reflection.
Vandyke. Charles I. on horseback.
The Oak Room :
Albert Diirer. The Coming of the Magi.
Turner. The Thames at Eton.
Sir J. Reynolds. Lady Taylor — in a white dress.
North Gallery :
Turner. JessiGa, on a gold ground.
Do. The Thames at Windsor.
Do. The Thames at Weybridge.
Lawrence. Pope Pius VII.
Romney. Lady Hamilton — of whom there are three different
representations.
Gainsborough. Several exquisite Landscapes.
Opie. Musidora.
Turner. A Sea Piece.
There is a splendid collection of china in the house ;
also of old embroideries, including some worked by Lady
Jane Grey. Amongst other relics preserved here is the
sword used by Hotspur at the battle of Shrewsbury. In
the Old Library is a famous illuminated MS. of Chaucer.
The outside of Petworth, which is built of freestone, has
no architectural beauty. Walpole says : ' We were charmed
with the magnificence of the park, which is Percy to the
backbone.' In recent times the park has recovered from
the ironworks which once devastated it, and of which a
relic remains in the string of hammer ponds in the Stag
Park. Mr. R. C. Leslie describes how he saw Turner
fishing in the park at sunset, where ' Chantrey, the sculptor,
had been trolling for jack' the day before, and how the
great painter nearly lost his line, which was saved by his
father (C. R. Leslie, R.A.), who summoned a boat to the
rescue.

PETWORTH

225

' When we returned, and while waiting for the boat, Turner became
quite chatty, rigging me a little ship, cut out of a chip, sticking masts
into it, and making her sails from a leaf or two torn from a small
sketch-book, in which I recollect seeing a memorandum in colour that
he had made of the sky and sunset. The ship was hardly ready for sea
before the man and boat came lumbering up to the bank, and Turner
was busy directing and helping him to recover the line, and, if possible,
the fish. This, however, escaped in the confusion. When the line
was got in, my father gave the man a couple of shillings for bringing
the boat ; while Turner, remarking that it was no use fishing any more
after the water had been so much disturbed, reeled up his other lines,
and, slipping a finger through the pike's gills, walked off with us
toward Petworth House. Walking behind, admiring the great fish,
I noticed, as Turner carried it, how the tail dragged on the grass, while
his own coat-tails were but a little farther from the ground ; also that
a roll of sketches, whicji I picked up, fell from a pocket in one of these
coat-tails, and Turner, after letting my father have a peep at them,
tied the bundle up tightly with a bit of the sacred line. I think he had
taken some twine off this bundle of sketches when making his stone
rocket apparatus, and that this led to the roll working out of his
pocket. My father knew little about fishing or fishing-tackle, and
asked Turner, as a matter of curiosity, what the line he, had nearly
lost was worth. Turner answered that it was an expensive one, worth
quite half-a-crown.' — ' Delecta.'
The Sussex marble called Petworth marble is seldom
found at the place itself, but in the adjoining parishes of
Kirdford, Northchapel, Wisborough Green, and Billings-
hurst. 'It occurs in layers that vary from a few inches to a foot or more in
thickness, and are separated from each other by seams of clay, or of a
friable limestone. This limestone is of various shades of bluish grey,
mottled with green and ochraceous yellow, and is composed of the
remains of fresh-water univalves, formed by a calcareous cement into
a beautiful compact marble. It bears a high polish, and is elegantly
marked by the sections of the shells which it contains, their constituent
substance presenting a striking contrast to the dark ground of the
marble. In other varieties the substance of the shells is black, and
their sections appear on the surface in the form of numerous lines
and spiral figures. Occasionally a few bivalves, eyclas, occur, and the
remains of the minute crustaceous coverings of the Cypris faba very
constantly.' — Mantell, ' Geology of the South of England.'
Architects especially commend the chimneys of Moor
P

226 SUSSEX
Farm, ' with two lofty shafts, having angle pilasters of an
elegant design.' 1
The church of Lurgashall (S. Laurence), a little N.W.
of Petworth Park, has an external timber cloister on the
south of the nave.
A little south of Petworth Station is Burton Church,
which contains a painted rood-loft, and the curious brass
of Elizabeth Goring, 1558, wearing over her dress a tabard
upon which the arms of Goring, Pelham, Covert, and several
other families are quartered.
' Burton Park is memorable for possessing a few patriarchal oaks of
vast girth, worthy of the reputation which Sussex bore when she was
reckoned among the chief quarries of the nation for the supply of its
"wooden walls.'" — Nineteenth Century, August 1884.
23 m. Pulborough. See later.

The line from Chichester to London passes —
2 m. Drayton Stat. This is the nearest station to
Pagham (see p. 194), and to Goodwood (see p. 202).
6 in. Barnham Junction. A branch of 3 \ m. leads south
to Bognor, a quiet watering-place at a point where a long
reef of rocks juts out from the shore. It was founded in
1 785 by Sir Richard Hotham, a Southwark tradesman, who
wished to have called it Hothampton.
1 m. east is Felpham, where the church of Our Lady
contains a monument to William Hayley, the poet, who
retired to ' a marine hermitage ' at Felpham in his later
years, finding Eartham too expensive. Outliving his popu
larity, he preserved his happy disposition, neither soured
nor dispirited by failure. ' If I have lost my popularity,'
he said, ' it is the more incumbent upon me to show my
friends that the cheerfulness of my spirit is built on a much
nobler foundation than the precarious breath of popular
applause.' Here he wrote his last lines to the swallows
collecting on his turret before their departure —
1 See The Builder, August 7, r886.

FELPHAM 22?
' Ve gentle birds that perch aloof,
And smooth your pinions on my roof,
Preparing for departure hence
Ere winter's angry threats commence ;
Like you, my soul would smooth her plume
For longer flights beyond the tomb.
May God, by whom is seen and heard
Departing man and wandering bird,
In mercy mark us for His own,
And guide us to the land unknown.'
William Hayley died here, in his seventy-fifth year,
November 12, 1820. The poet's epitaph is by Mrs. Opie.
Hayley wrote the epitaph of William Steel, a blacksmith, in
the churchyard —
' My sledge and hammer lie reclin'd ;
My bellows, too, have lost their wind ;
My fire's extinct, my forge decay'd,
And in the dust my vice is laid ;
My coal is spent, my iron gone,
The nails are driven, my work is done.'
Cyril Jackson, the famous Dean of Christ Church and
tutor to George IV., died in the manor-house, 1819, and is
buried here. William Blake lived for some time in a pretty
cottage (which still exists) at Felpham, under the patronage
of Hayley, and many of his strange ' Visions' were conceived
there. 7 m. Yapton Stat. The village of Yapton is believed
to take its name from Eappa, a follower of S. Wilfrid.
The church has a curious black granite font and a Norman
tower. 9 m. Ford Junction. A branch of 3 in. runs S.E. to
Littlehampton, a small watering-place at the mouth of the
Arun, where the Empress Matilda landed in 1139. A little
to the west is the early English cruciform church of Climping,
said to have been founded by John de Climping, Bishop of
Chichester, in 1253. Contemporary with the foundation is
the very curious old church chest. At Atherliigton, in this
parish, aire remains of a very interesting old moated house.

228 SUSSEX
The churches of Preston and Rustington, a little to the east,
have some Norman details. The osprey — here called the
mullet-hawk — frequents the estuary of the Arun for the
sake of the mullet. The richness of the soil in this district
and near Bognor, which often grows forty bushels of wheat
to the acre, causes it to be regarded as 'the garden of
Sussex.' For the line from Ford Junction to Brighton, see Ch. v.
Long before reaching it, the noble outline of Arundel
Castle is seen crowning the wooded hill above the river —
'Arun, which doth name the beauteous Arundel.'
— Drayton, ' Polyolbion:
1 1 m. Arundel Stat. The sights of Arundel — the church,
Roman Catholic church, and keep — can be seen on Mon
days and Fridays. The castle is not shown, and the Fitz-
alan chapel (the object of chief interest) can only be seen
on having procured a special order beforehand by writing
to the Duke's agent.
Arundel is mentioned in the will of Alfred the Great
and in Domesday Book. Local tradition connects its name
with Hirondelle, the charger of Bevis of Hampton, giant-
warder of the castle, whose sword ' Mongley ' is shown in
the armoury. At the Conquest, the earldom was granted
to Roger de Montgomeri, who commanded the Breton
allies at Hastings. His two sons, Hugh and Robert, held
it till 1118, when it was granted to the Albini. The last
Earl, Hugh de Albini, died childless in 1243, when the
earldom passed to John Fitzalan, through his marriage with
Isabel, eldest sister of Earl Hugh. The Fitzalans then took
the arms of the Albini, with their estates and titles. They
held the property till Richard Fitzalan's daughter and heiress
married John Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, and their daughter
Margaret brought Arundel bymarriage to Sir Robert Howard,
whose son John (in 14S3) was created Earl Marshal and
Duke of Norfolk. The present owner — Hereditary Earl
Marshal of England and first of English peers — is the 15th
Duke of Norfolk. A proverb says —

ARUNDEL 229
" Since William rose and Harold fell
There have been Earls of Arundel,
And Earls old Arundel shall have
While rivers flow and forests wave.' '
' Arundel Castle is of great esteem, the rather because a local earl-
dome is cemented in the walls thereof — Fuller.
' What house has been so connected with our political and religious
annals as that of Howard ? The premiers in the roll-call of our nobility
have been also among the most persecuted and ill-fated. Not to dwell
on the high-spirited Isabelle, Countess Dowager of Arundel, and widow
of Hugh, last earl of the Albini family, who upbraided Henry III. to
his face with " vexing the Church, oppressing the barons, and denying all
his true-born subjects their right ; " or Richard, Earl of Arundel, who
was executed for conspiring to seize Richard II. — we must think with
indignation of the sufferings inflicted by Elizabeth on Philip, Earl of
Arundel, son of the "great" Duke of Norfolk, beheaded by Elizabeth
in 1572 for his dealings with Mary Queen of Scots. In the biography
of Earl Philip, which, with that of Ann Dacres his wife, has been well
edited by the 14th Duke, we find that he was caressed by Elizabeth
in early life, and steeped in the pleasures and vices of her court by
her encouragement, to the neglect of his constant young wife, whose
virtues, as soon as they reclaimed him to his duty to her, rendered him
hated and suspected by the Queen, so that she made him the subject
of vindictive and incessant persecution, till death released him at the
age of thirty-eight. To another Howard, Thomas, son of Earl Philip,
the country is indebted for those treasures of the East, the Arundel
Marbles.' — Quarterly Review, No. 223.
The little town of Arundel rises from the Arun in one
steep street, which is dominated by the castle. A feeble
modern gate forms the entrance of the latter ; then a road
winds between lawn and trees to a second and picturesque
early English gateway with a Norman arch and a drawbridge.
On the left is the keep.
The castle was besieged in 1102 by Henry II , to whom it
was surrendered by Robert de Belesme, son of Roger, the
first Norman Earl. In 1139 Stephen besieged the Empress
Maude, when she was staying in the castle with her step
mother, the queen-dowager Adeliza, widow of Henry I. and
wife of William de Albini. In December 1643, the Parlia
mentary troops under Sir W. Waller besieged the castle for
1 See Illustrated Times, Feb. 23, 1856, p. 131.

230 SUSSEX
seventeen days, and it was taken on January 6, 1644, with
1000 prisoners. Cannon had played upon the castle from
the church, and it continued a ruin till 1720, when it was
partially restored under the eighth Duke. The tenth Duke
also restored it according to his own fancy, producing a
most miserable sham-gothic deformity. The present Duke
has pulled this down, but the existing building, erected
under Buckler — ' fastueux palais moderne,' as Elisee Reclus
calls it— is not much better, and its ill-lighted rooms and
passages have all the gloom and discomfort of a medieval
castle without their grandeur. Neither within nor without
does the house which has produced fifteen dukes and
thirty-seven earls possess one salient or admirable feature,
except in its gateway. The Library, a remnant of the
former building, is a pleasant bastard-gothic room, with
delightful recesses for readers in the thickness of the wall.
The later rooms — billiard-room, anteroom, drawing-room —
attain the climax of discomfort as well as of ugliness. The
pictures have mostly names of great masters to which they
have no claim. There are, however, authentic portraits by
IV. Street of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, beheaded 1547 ;
by Holbein of his son Thomas, the fourth Duke of Norfolk,
beheaded 1572; and by Vandyke of Thomas Howard, Earl
of Arundel, who collected 'the Arundel Marbles,' now at
Oxford, the friend of Selden, the patron of Hollar, and the
man whom Rubens hailed in a letter as ' the Evangelist of
the world of art' But the finest portrait belonging to the
Duke is a noble Holbein, which he has generously lent to the
National Gallery, and which represents Christina, daughter of
Christian IV. of Denmark, and widow of Francesco Sforza,
Duke of Milan, a noble picture painted for Henry VIIL,
that he might decide whether he would like to propose
for her.
The Keep is a late Xorman tower. Over its entrance is
the window of S. Martin's Oratory. There is a curious sub
terranean storeroom. In one of the prisons is inscribed,
' I pray to God if hit please him, please delyvere us all out
of distress.' The keep was at one time remarkable for a

ARUNDEL 231
colony of owls, introduced (a present from America) by
Charles, eleventh Duke, who died 181 5, but extinct before
1870. Their ducal owners amused themselves by giving
them the names of those they were supposed to resemble.
Great was the amusement at the castle breakfast-table when
a servant announced, ' Please, your Grace, Lord Thurlow's
laid an egg.' This famous bird died in 1859, supposed to
be a hundred years old.1
Entered through the castle grounds is the Fitzalan
Chapel, containing the five famous Arundel tombs. It is
still the constructional chancel of the cruciform parish
church, but from being collegiate, not parochial, passed at
the Dissolution, with the estates of the college, and later
priory, to its present possessors. In the present century
an ineffectual lawsuit attempted its recovery to the parish.
The chapel was originally that of a college of Holy Trinity,
founded for a master and twelve canons in 1380 by Richard
Fitzalan, who was beheaded on Tower Hill in 1397, and it
was attached to what was then a priory church. The earliest
of the tombs, in the centre of the chapel, bears the effigy of
Thomas, Earl of Arundel, 1415, and his wife Beatrix, a
natural daughter of King John of Portugal. It is encircled
by forty shields, one covered with quarterings. The lady
wears the mitred or horned head-dress, a strange fashion
long in favour, in spite of both lay and ecclesiastical censure.
At the feet of the Earl is a horse ; at the feet ofthe Countess
two lapdogs. This was the Fitzalan despoiled by Richard
II. and restored by Henry IV.
Beneath the most eastern arch of the partition from
the Lady Chapel is the cenotaph tomb of John Fitzalan,
seventeenth Earl, 1435, who is buried in the monastery of
Grey Friars at Beauvais, where he died of a wound received
in besieging the castle of Gerberoi. The figure upon the
tomb is in plate- armour with a collar of SS. ; beneath is a
skeleton. South of the altar is the tomb of William, nineteenth
Earl, 1488. This ' puissante, noble, and virtuous earle ' was
1 See West Sussex Gazette.

232 SUSSEX
the patron of Caxton. The dress of his Countess, Joan,
is very interesting.
' The tomb, placed within a chantry of richest architecture, consists
of two stages in the same taste and of like material, Sussex marble ; at
the west end, on the lower stage, sufficient space is left for the altar,
when the service was performed for the souls of the deceased. The
figures, which lie loose upon the tombs, are carved in a softer stone,
and possess considerable merit ; the draperies being executed in the
angular style of Albert Diirer. The Earl is represented in his robes of
creation, with a coronet upon his head. The head-dress of his Countess
is remarkable for its splendid decorations and the singular manner in
which the coronet is introduced upon it ; beneath her surcoat appears a
rich robe wrought with gold ; the cuffs are long and turned back from
the hands, which are broken ; round her neck is a splendid necklace.' —
C. A. Stothard, ' Monumental Effigies'
Opposite, on the north, is the tomb of Earl Thomas,
1524, and Earl William, 1543, son and grandson of the
nineteenth Earl. This tomb has a rich canopy. Above
Earl William's chantry (on the south) is a tablet to Henry,
Earl of Arundel, the last of the Fitzalans, ' qui pie et suaviter
in Domino obdormivit, 1579.'
In the centre of the Lady Chapel is the tomb of John
Fitzalan, sixteenth Earl, 1421. Its brasses have been ab
stracted. The original stone altar, with its crosses, remains.
There are brasses of a knight and lady, 1418, and ofthe first
Master of the College, Ewan Eartham, 1432. Edward
Henry, Cardinal Howard, great-nephew of the twelfth Duke
of Norfolk, was buried in the Fitzalan chapel in Septem
ber 1892.
The parish church of S. Nicholas was united to a priory
established by the first Norman Earl, Roger de Montgomeri,
and attached to S. Martin of Seex. In the north aisle of
the church are frescoes of the Seven Deadly Sins and Seven
Works of Mercy. An ancient stone pulpit which encircles
a pillar is now used as a pew.
On one side of the churchyard are considerable remains
of the Fitzalan College. Its buildings had the right of
sanctuary, and a severe penance was passed by Bishop
Rede of Chichester on a constable who seized an escaped

ARUNDEL 233
prisoner when he was holding the sanctuary ring on the
college door.
The huge modern Roman Catholic Church of S. Philip
Neri occupies the summit of the hill up which the town
stretches. It is a very dull though magnificent decorated
building, from designs of Hansom of Clifton, and has cost
,£100,000. The detached tower is intended to be 275 feet
high. But, in spite of the enormous sums spent upon it,
the church is a dreary edifice, without character, power,
picturesqueness, or imagination.
At the bottom of the town are remains of the Maison
Dieu, built in 1380 by Earl Richard, the founder of the
College. It provided for twenty poor men. Its buildings
were destroyed by Waller's troopers.
Most beautiful are the views in Arundel Park, of the
winding declivity of hill, the castle at the most salient point,
and the delicate distances of plain and sea. A tower is
called Hioi-ne's Tower from its architect. Turner's cele
brated view is taken from the brow of the hill, north of
Copyhold. The waters of the Arun are famous here for their grey
mullet — 'Arundel mullet' A spot dear to artists is the
water-mill called Swanbourne.
' It is situated beneath the castle, 'on the east side, at the head of
the stream by which the ancient 'Swanbourne Lake' discharges itself
into the river, and most probably occupies the site of the original build
ing mentioned in Domesday. Perhaps, of all the beautiful spots in the
neighbourhood of Arundel, none comprises more real beauty than this.
The valley in front, shaded by the willows and ash which adorn the
little islands of the lake, and winding its way in the distance amongst
the hills ; the castle projecting boldly from the eminence on the left ; the
steep acclivities on each hand, clothed to their summit with luxuriant
forest-trees, pr exposing at intervals the wild and rugged surface of the
rock ; these, with the stillness of the place, unbroken save by the voice
of the coot or the plash of the moorhen returning to her haunt, pre
sent a scene in whose presence the lapse of centuries will be easily for
gotten, and the mind, hastening back to the age of the Confessor, will
muse on the lake and stream as they existed then, and fancy itself
beside the mill which was at work eight hundred years ago.' — Tierney,
' History ofthe Castle and Town of Arundel.'

±34

SUSSEX

At the foot of Causeway Hill, on the right of the road
from Arundel to Worthing, now converted into cottages,
are the small remains of the priory of Pyrham or De
Calceto, founded by Queen Adeliza (then married to Wil
liam de Albini, lord of Arundel) for Augustine canons,
and called De Calceto, from a wooden causeway over the

Entrance to Amberlcy Castle.

valley of the Arun, which they were bound to keep in
repair. ii m. below Arundel, at Tortington, a small priory was
founded by Avice Corbet, daughter of one of the De
Albini, in the reign of Richard I. Nothing remains but a
barn, which was part of the refectory. The contemporary
church, S. Mary Magdalene, has two admirable Norman

AMBERLEY 235
arches with rich ornaments, and a peculiar Norman
font. To the right of the line is Burpham, with an old church
and remains of an ancient entrenchment. To the left is
South Stoke, with a Norman church.
1 4! ///. Amberley Stat, close to North Stoke, one ofthe
two places (the other was Warntiigcamp, 2 ;//. distant),
where one of the ancient British canoes used on the Arun
has been discovered.
Beyond the village are the massive ruins of Amberley
Castle, built by Rede, Bishop of Chichester, in the time of
Richard II. They stand on a low cliff, overlooking the
marsh called Wild Brook, through which runs the Arun,
abounding in ' Amberley trout,' celebrated by Izaak Walton
and others, and which Fuller calls ' one of the four good
things of Sussex.' 1 The bishops had a residence here from
the Conquest, but it was not castellated till 1379, of which
time are the present walls and gateway. The present
dwelling-house is due to Bishop Sherbourne, 1508. Here,
in 'the Queen's Room,' were formerly paintings by Ber
nardi, like those executed for the bishop in the palace and
cathedral of Chichester ¦; but they have now been removed
to Parham. The castle was plundered by Waller's troops
in 1643. 1 In allusion to the former muddy and marshy state of the parish, it
was a common jest against the people of Amberley that they were web-
fooled.2 The difference between Amberley in its winter and summer
dress is expressed in the local saying, which makes the winter reply
to " Where do you belong?" — "Amberley, God help us!"s and the
summer — " Amberley, where would you live ? " ' — M. A. Lower.
1 The Arundel mullet, tbe Chichester lobster, the Shclsey (Selsey) cockle, and
the Amerley (Amberley) trout.
2 Another proverb speaks of them as ' web-footed and yellow-bellied.'
3 The place is.spoken of as ' Amberley-God knows,' and people often say they are
going to ' God knows.' A proverb runs —
' Amberley — God knows,
All among the rooks and crows,
Where the good potato grows.
— See F. F, Sawyer, Notes and Queries
Ser. vi. vol. ix. p. 341.

236 SUSSEX
But- ' The last of the grand morasses on Western Sussex, the Amberley
Wild Brook, is converted into so-called smiling meadows, re-echoing
with the lowing of cattle instead of the hollow boom of the bittern and
the croak ofthe heron.' — W. Borrer, ' The Birds of Sussex.'
Amberley Church (S. Michael) is partly Norman, partly
early English. It contains a brass to John Wantle, 1424,
with a surcoated figure. The pulpit has an hour-glass stand.
In the south aisle is a fine decorated door of Edwardian
date. 2\ in. west is the stately Elizabethan house of Parham
(Lord Zouche of Haryngworth), which was built by Sir
Thomas Palmer, and passed, in 1591, to the family of
Bisshopp, now represented by Lord Zouche. Very valu
able collections were made here by the late Robert Curzon,
fourteenth Baron Zouche, author of 'The Monasteries of
the Levant ; ' but the most precious of the books and of the
Arabic and Irish MSS. have been removed for safety to the
British Museum.
The great hall is hung with armour, which in part was
procured from the now carefully preserved collection at S.
Irene in Constantinople, left by the Christian knights, who
defended the town against Mahomet II. in 1452. The
collection contains ' more specimens of defensive armour
anterior to the year 1450 than in all the other collections of
Europe put together,' 1 with the exception of that at Athens,
and that which still remains at Constantinople. In this
hall Queen Elizabeth dined on her way from Cowdray to
Sutton Place. There are two contemporary portraits of her
in the house, one of them attributed to Zucchero, to whom
a fine picture of the famous Earl of Leicester is also ascribed.
A portrait of Mary Curzon, Countess of Dorset, governess
to the children of Charles I., the first woman in England
to whom a public funeral was accorded, is by 1'andyke.
There is an interesting portrait of a Paget who was impli
cated in the Babington conspiracy to murder Elizabeth, but
1 Sussex Arch. Coll., xxv.

PARHAM 237
who made his escape under the name of Mope. Amongst
the pictures in the drawing-room are Lady Frederick Camp
bell by Gainsborough, and Lady Wilmot Horton (whose
daughter married the fourteenth Baron Zouche) by Phillips.
The autograph lines addressed to the latter by Byron, and
beginning ' She walks in beauty like the night ' are preserved
in the house.
A gallery 158 feet long, which runs the whole length
of the house on the upper floor, had an elaborate ceiling,
destroyed 1832. It is lined with portraits of Bisshopps and
their connections, including Henry Bisshopp, buried at
Henfield, a staunch Royalist, who was concealed there
from the Parliamentarians. He is represented with the dog
which shared his hiding-place, and on the silence of which
his fate depended. From this gallery at the top of the
house, fulfilling the Roman Catholic idea that it must have
nothing over it, opens the chapel, containing a curious
wooden Jacobean font, with figures of Adam and Eve
beneath it — as on the marble font at S. James's, Piccadilly
— sold away from the church of S. Peter at Oxford by the
Rev. E. Denison. Under one of the windows of the
gallery are hidden steps, leading to ' the priest's hiding
hole.' There is a ghost at Parham, often heard, but never
seen within the memory of man.
The Park, full of ferny depths and glorious old oaks,
stretches away on one side towards the soft recesses of the
Downs. Very near the house is the little church of S. Peter,
which has a curious leaden font of 1351, and beyond it
the hill breaks suddenly into a declivity with a beautiful
view over the plain. At the end of ' West Plain ' is ' Betsy's
Oak,' said to be so called from Queen Elizabeth, but more
probably ' Bates's Oak,' from Bates a keeper. Parham con
tinued an utterly primitive place till 1830. There were
no roads, and postilions lost their way in the park. Two
of the keepers fought, and one of them killed the other just
before the house windows. The murderer was hanged at
Horsham, and his mother bought his body — not to bury it
— but to exhibit it at sixpence a head. To this desolate

238 SUSSEX
place smugglers, having murdered an exciseman who inter
fered with their calling, dragged his body and threw it into
one of the great ponds in the park.
The Heronry in the park, one of the thirty in England,
is due to birds brought in the time of Elizabeth by Lord
Leicester's steward from Coity Castle in Wales to Pens-
hurst There they stayed 200 years, and then migrated to
Angmering Park close to Michelgrove, near Arundel, whence,
when the trees in which they built were cut down, they
came to Parham.1
' The palm of beauty must be awarded to the park of Parham, in
virtue both of its position and the majestic dimensions of ite limber.
Lying at the foot of the South Downs, its spacious levels melt insensibly
into their gracious upland curves, and share in the ample largesse of
sunshine and shadow which the heavens pour down upon them. The
whole park is richly treeful, and its oaks are singularly fine ; but atten
tion is chiefly arrested by its lofty pines.' — H. G. Hewlett, ' Nineteenth
Century' August 1884.
2 m. east is Storrington, the native place of Maple the
furniture dealer, and Sayers the prize-fighter. The church
(S. Mary) has tombs by Westmacott to Sir Henry Bradford,
181 6, and Major Falconer, 1827. An incised slab com
memorates Henry Wilsha, 1591, chaplain to the then Earl
of Arundel. West of Amberley Station is Houghton Church (S.
Nicholas), containing a brass to Thomas Cheyne, i486.
Left of the line is Hardham, with an early English
church. In this parish, above the Arun, stood Heryngham
Priory, a small house of Black Canons founded by the
Norman family of Dawtrey. Its site is now occupied by a
farmhouse, in which a chimney-piece bears the arms of the
last prior, William Picklowe. A chapel of the time of
Edward I. remains.
19^ in. Pulborough Stat. Beautifully situated on a hill
above the station is the church (of Our Lady of Assumption),
approached by an interesting timber lych-gate of the XIV. c.
1 For a description of this heronry see Knox's ' Ornithological Rambles in
Sussex.'

PULBOROUGH 239
Portions of the building are early English. A fine brass
represents Thomas Hardyng, Canon of Chichester and
Rector of Pulborough, 1423. Other brasses are of Edmond
Mille and his wife, 1452, and their son Edmund, 1478.
This family of Mille had a mausoleum here, now destroyed.
The approach to the church, with its fine old tower, lych-
gate, steps, and the old houses near it, is a favourite subject
with artists.
West of the church is an artificial mound which sup
ported a Roman ' castellum.' Many Roman relics have
been found near this. A little below the church are the
remains of Old Place, a manor of the Apsleys, now a farm
house, at the back of which are very beautiful carved timber
fragments of Edwardian date. New Place, a farmhouse on
the right of the line to Horsham, is even more picturesque.
It has a fine old hall, now a kitchen.
Pulborough is a good point from which to visit the
Roman villa at Bignor. See p. 206.
For the line from Pulborough to Chichester by Petworth
and Midhurst see p. 207.
To the west of the station, near the meeting-place of the
Arun and Rother, is Stopham Church (The Blessed Virgin),
partly Norman, and containing a fine stained window painted
and signed by Roelandt between XIV. and XV. c, and a
number of brasses — a complete family history in brass — of
the Barttelot family, who have held property here from the
time of the Conquest, and who were hereditary seneschals
of the Earls of Arundel from the XIV. c. to the time of
Charles I. The most ancient brasses are — John Bartelott
and his wife Joanna (daughter of William de Stopeham),
1428: John Bartelott and his wife Joan Lewknor, 1453:
Richard Bartelott, 1489 : John Bartelott, 1493- The
Bartelotts have resided at Stopham since 1420. Of two
interesting farmhouses, the Manor House is of c. Charles I.,
and retains its ancient fireback in a huge fireplace, and a
great deal of oak panelling. Lee Farm is a beautiful old
house of earlier date, and has several panelled rooms. The
panelling of the immense gallery in the roof has been

240 SUSSEX
removed to Petworth House. Stopham Bridge, over the
Arun, said to be XV. c, is very picturesque : it has nine
arches, divided by pointed buttresses on the N. and square
on the S., to resist the force of the incoming tide.
24J m. Billingshurst Stat. This place, like the London
Billingsgate, commemorates the Saxon tribe of Billing.
The church is partly Norman. It contains a brass to
Thomas and Elizabeth Bartlett, 1489. In the church of
IVisborough Green, a little to the east, some ancient frescoes
have been discovered.
3 1 1- m. Horsham Stat. For Horsham and the line from
thence to Three Bridges, see Ch. v.

INDEX

Adur, source ofthe, 152, 159;
¦ estuary of the, 159, 162.
Alboume Place, 147.
Alciston, 125.
Aldrington, 159.
Alfriston, 123.
Inn : The Star.
Amberley, 235.
Anderida, 71.
Andreds Wood, 138.
Angmering, 180.
Appledram, 197.
Apsley, 177.
Ardingly, 150.
Arlington, 91.
Arun, source ofthe, 150 ; estuary
ofthe, 228 ; odes to, 216.
Arundel, 228.
Inns : Norfolk Arms, Bridge.
Ashburnham, 41.
Ashdown Forest, 9.
Asten, the, 41.
Atherington, 227. B.
Balcombe, 151.
Baldslow, 24.
Balsdean, 145.
Barcombe, 129.
Barnham Junction, 226.
Batemans, 16.
Battle, 28.
Inns : George, Railway.

Bayham, 4.
Beachy Head, 65.
Beauport, 25.
Beddingham, 121.
Beeding, 163.
Beeding, Lower, 152.
Belle Toute, 67.
Benfield, 159.
Berwick, 123.
Bexhill, 27, 126.
Hotel : Sackville.
Bignor, 206.
Billinghurst, 240.
Birling Gap, 67.
Bishopstone, 117.
Boar's Head Street, 133.
Boarzell, 14.
Bodiam Castle, 45 ; stations for,
15. 17-
Bognor, 226.
Hotels: Royal Pier, Royal
Norfolk, Victoria Park,

Bolebrook, 8, 9,
Boreham Street, 43.
Bosham, 195.
Bow Hill, 199.
Boxgrove, 199.
Bracklesham, 194.
Bramber, 161.
Inn : Castle — good.
Brambletye, 9.
Brede, 46.
Brickwall, 49.
Brightling, 17.
24i Q

242

INDEX

Brighton, 140.
Hotels : Grand, Metropole,
Bedford, Norfolk, Old
Ship, York, Royal Albion,
Queens, and many others.
Cabs : is. 6d. the first mile,
6d. for every part of a mile
afterwards ; 2s. 6d. the
first hour, Is. 3d. every
hour afterwards.
Broadhurst, 135.
Broadwater, 175.
Broomham, 50.
Broyle Park, 126.
Buckhurst, 7.
Bugzell, 17.
Bulverhythe, 27.
Burchetts, 94.
Burgess Hill, 147.
Burpham, 235.
Burton, 226.
Burwash, 15.
Bury Hill, 207.
Buxted, 130.
Inns : Buxted Hotel, White
Hart.

Chithurst, 217.
Christ's Hospital, 159.
Cissbury Camp, 176.
Clapham, 179.
Cliff End, 50.
Cliffe, III.
Climping, 227.
Clothalls, 170.
Cocking, 208.
Coombe, 112.
Cowdray, 210.
Cowfold, 173.
Inn : Red Lion.
Crabbet Park, 154.
Cranesdon, 102.
Crawley, 154.
Inn : The George.
Cripps's Corner, 44.
Crooked Aunts, the, 43.
Crowborough, 132.
Crowhurst, 26 ; Park, 26.
Cuckfield, 149.
Inns : King's Head, Talbot,
— both good, and much
frequented in summer.
Cuckmere, the, 90, 119, 125.

C.
Caburn, Mount, in, 121.
Cade Street, 96.
Cakeham Tower, 194.
Camber Castle, 58.
Carter's Corner, 89.
Catsfield, 27.
Causeway Hill, 234.
Chalvington, 126.
Chanctonbury Hill, 164.
Charlton, 208.
Charlton Forest, 208.
Chesworth, 156.
Chichester, 181.
Hotels: Dolphin, best ; An
chor, Globe.
Chiddingly, 93.
Chidham, 197.

D.
Dallington, 97.
Danehill, 138.
Danny, 147.
Dean, East, near Chichester, 208.
Dean, East, near Seaford, 68.
Dean, West, near Chichester, 208.
Dean, West, near Seaford, 69,
119.
De Calceto, Priory of, 234.
Denne Park, 156.
Denton, 115.
Devil's Dyke, the, 143.
Hubbard's Dyke Hotel.
Devil's Jumps, the, 214.
Dicker, the, 90.
Ditchling, Ditchling Beacon, 146.
Dixter, 50.

INDEX

Drayton, 226.
Duncton Beacon, 2 1 0.
Dunford House, 214.
Dureford Abbey, 217.

Friston Place, 68.
Friths, 94.

243

Eartham, 205.
Easebourne, 213.
Eastbourne, 65.
Hotels: Cavendish, Grand,
Queen's, Albion, Anchor,
Burlington, Marine, Sus
sex.
East Grinstead, 10.
Inns : Dorset Arms, Queen's,
East Hoathly, 94.
East Lavant, 207.
East Mascalls, 149.
Ecclesbourne Glen, 23.
Edburton, 143.
Elstead, 214.
Emsworth, 197.
Eridge, 4.
Etchingham, 14.
Ewhurst, 169.

Fairlight, 23.
Falmer, 145.
Faygate, 155.
Felpham, 226.
Fernhurst, 217.
Ferring, 179.
Field Place, 158.
Findon, 177.
Firle, 122.
Firle Beacon, 122, 125.
Fletching, 134.
Ford Junction, 180.
Forest Row, 9.
Inn : Brambletye Castle-
clean and good.
Foul Mile, 89.
Frant, 4; Station, n.

Glynde, 121.
Glynley, 71.
Goodwood, 202.
Goring, 179.
Gravetye, 139.
Great upon Little, 138.
Great Sowden's Wood, 48.
Grinstead, East, 10.
Inns : Dorset Arms, Crown.
Grinstead, West, 169.
Groaning Bridge, 48.
Groombridge, 5.
Guestling, 50.
Gunter's Pool, 197.
H.
Haben Bridge, 217.
Hailsham, 90.
Inns: George, Ciown.
Hale Green, 94.
Halland, 128.
Halnaker, 202.
Hampnett, West, 199.
Hamsey, 126.
Hangleton, 159.
Hardham, 238.
Hartfield, 9.
Harting, 198.
Hassock, 146.
Hastings, 19.
Hotels : Queen's, Palace,
Marine, Albany, Albien,
Castle.
Hastings, Battle of, 31.
Hayward's Heath, 148.
Inns : Station, Liverpool,
Sergison Arms — all indif
ferent, a better inn at
Cuckfield.
Heathfield, 96.

244

INDEX

I leighton, 115.
Hellingly, 92.
Henfield, 168.
Inn : George, While Hart.
Hendall, 132.
Heryngham Priory, 238.
Hewells, 156.
Heyshott, 208.
Heyshott Downs, 208.
Hickstead, 147.
Highlands Asylum, 14.
High Rocks, the, 3.
Highdown Hill, 178.
Hoathly, East, 94.
Hoathly, West, 138.
Hollingsbury Castle, 145.
Hollington in the Wood, 24.
Holmeshurst, 16.
Holmhurst, 24.
Hooe, 28.
Horeham, 95.
Horselunges, 92.
Horsham, 155, 240.
Inns : King's Head, Black
Horse, Anchor.
Horsted Keynes, 135.
Horsted, Little, 130.
Houghton Church, 238.
Howbourne, 131.
Huggett's Furnace, 131.
Hurstmonceaux, 43, 76.
Inn : Woolpack, at Gardner
Street.
Hurstpierpoint, 147.

I.

ICKLESHAM, 51.
Iden, 63.
Ifield, 155.
Isfield, 129.
Itchingfield, 159. J-
Jevington, 69.

K.
Kenwards, 149.
Keymer, 146 ; Junction, 147.
Keynor, 181.
Kidbrooke, 10.
Kingly Bottom, 199.
Kingscote, 139.
Knepp Castle, 171.

Lacies, 178.
Lamberhurst, II.
Inn : Chequers.
Lancaster Great Park, 9.
Lancing, 174.
Laughton, 127.
Laughton Place, 127.
Lavant, 207.
Lavant, Mid, 207.
Lavington, West, 214.
Lavington, Wool, 208.
Leonards, St. See St. Leonards.
Leonardslee, 152.
Lewes, 104.
Hotel : White Hart, a good
old-fashioned hotel in the
High Street.
Lewes, Battle of, 112.
Linchmere, 218.
Lindfield, 148.
Inns : Tiger, Red Lion, —
very humble.
Littlehampton, 227.
Hotels : Beach, Norfolk,
Terminus.
Little Horsted, 130.
Lodsworth, 214.
Lordington, 197.
Lurgashall, 226.
Lullington, 125.
Lyminster, 180. M.
Malling, South, in.
Manhood, the, 193,

INDEX

245

Maresfield, 132.
Martello Towers, the, 65.
Mayfield, 98.
Inns : Royal Oak, Railway.
Meads, 71.
Medway, source of the, 10.
Michelgrove, 179.
Michelham Priory, 90 ; stations
for, 70, 123.
Midhurst, 210.
Inn : Angel — tolerably
good.
Mid Lavant, 207.
Mike Mill's Race, 157.
Miller's Tomb, the, 178.
Milton Street, 125.
Mount Caburn, in.
Mountfield, 17.
Mount Harry, 114.
N.
New Building, 174.
Newhaven, 115.
Hotels : Bridge ; London
and Paris, near the
Station.
New Place, near Angmering,
180.
New Place, near Pulborough,
239-
New Timber Place, 169.
Ninfield, 43.
Normanhurst, 41.
Normans, 158.
Northiam, 48.
North Stoke, 235.
Norton, 118.
Nuthurst, 159. O.
Offington, 175.
Old Place, 239.
Old Roar, 24.
Ore, 24.
Ole Hall, 146.

Ottham Quarter, 71.
Ouse, the river, 104, 115, 118;
source of the, 150.
Ovingdean, 144. P.
Pagham, 194.
Parham, 236.
Parkminster, 174.
Parknowle, 174.
Parson Darby's Hole, 67.
Partridge Green, 169,
Pashley, 14.
Paxhill, 149.
Peakes, 94.
Penhurst, 43.
Pett, 50.
Petworth, 218.
Inns : Swan, Half Moon.
Pevensey, 70, 126.
Inn : Royal Oak — dear.
Piddinghoe, 115.
Playden, 63.
Plumpton Place, 148.
Plumpton Plain, 1 14.
Polegate Junction, 126.
Inn : Green Man.
Poling, 180.
Portslade, 159.
Possingworth, 95.
Poynings, 143.
Preston, near Brighton, 145.
Preston, near Littlehampton,
228.
Priest's Hawse, 71.
Puck Church Parlour, 118.
Pulborough, 238.
Pyecombe, 143.
Pyrham, Priory of, 234.
R.
Racton, 197.
Rampyndens, 16.
Ratton, 69.
Regnum, 181.

246

INDEX

Ringmer, 126.
Inn : The Green Man.
Roar, Old, 24.
Robertsbridge, 16.
Inn : The George.
Rockhurst, 138.
Rogate, 217.
Romney Marsh, 63.
Rook's Hill, 205.
Rother, the river, 58, 102.
Rotherfield, 102.
Rottingdean, 144.
Inn : White Horse.
Rowfant, 154.
Rusper, 157.
Rustington, 228.
Rusthall, 3.
Rye, 58.
Inn : The George.
Rype, 126.

St. Leonards, 19.
Hotels : Victoria, Grand,
Eversfield, Alexandra,
Saxon.
St. Leonard's Forest, 156.
Salehurst, 16.
Salvington, 178.
Scotney Castle, 11.
Seacox Heath, 15.
Seaford, 118.
Flotel : Seaford Bay.
Sedgwick Castle, 159.
Sedlescombe, 44.
Sele Abbey, 163.
Selham, 218.
Selmeston, 125.
Selsey, 191.
Sheffield Place, 133.
Shermanbury, 169.
Shipley, 172.
Shirleys, 94.
Shoreham, New, 159.
Inns : Royal George, Surrey
Arms.

Shoreham, Old, 161.
Shulbrede Priory, 218.
Sidlesham, 193.
Sidley Green, 43.
Silver Hill, 17.
Slaugham, 151.
Slindon Park, 206.
Sompting, 175.
Southease, 115.
South Mailing, in.
Southover, 107.
South Stoke, 235.
Southwater, 174.
Sowden's (Great) Wood, 48.
Standard Hill, 43.
Stane Street, the, 186, 206.
Stanmer Park, 145.
Stanstead Forest, 198.
Stanstead Park, 19S.
Steyning, 163.
Inn : White Horse.
Stoke, North, 235,
Stoke, South, 235.
Stonehill, 94.
Stopham, 239.
Storrington, 238.
Streame, 94.
Streat Place. 148.
Sullington, 168.
Swanbourne, 233, T.
Tanners, 95.
Tarberry Hill, 198.
Tarring, 177.
Tarring Neville, 115.
Tell'em Lane, 25.
Thakeham, 177.
Thorney Island, 197.
Three Bridges Junction, 152.
Ticehurst, 14.
Inn: Bell.
Tilgate Foresl, 154.
Tillingham, the river, 58.
Tillington, 218.

INDEX

247

Tortington, 234.
Trey ford, 214.
Trotton, 214.
Tufton Place, 50.
Tunbridge Wells, I.
Hotels : Calverley (Culver-
den — the wood-pigeon
wood), Kentish, Mount
Ephraim.
Post-Office : The Pantiles.
U.
Uckfield, 130.
Inn : King's Head.
Udimore, 48.
Up Park, 19S.
Up Waltham, 206, V.
Verdley Castle, 217.
W.
Wadhurst, II.
Wakehurst Place, 150.
Waldron, 95.
Warbleton, 95.
Warminghurst, 177.
Warnham, 158.
Warningcamp, 235.
Wartling, 76.
Washington, 168.
Weald, the, 130.
West Dean, 119.

Westfield, 46.
West Chittington, 177.
West Grinstead, 169.
West Ham, 71.
West Hampnett, 199.
West Lavington, 214.
Westmeston, 147.
West Wittering, 194.
West Worthing, 177.
Wild Brook, 235.
Willingdon, 69.
Wilmington, 69.
Winchelsea, 51.
Inn : The New — clean and
commendable.
Windmill Hill, 89.
Wiston, 164.
Withyham, 7.
Wivelsfield, 147.
Wolstonbury Hill, 147.
Woolbeding, 217.
Wool Lavington, 208.
Worth, 152.
Worth Forest, 154.
Worth Park, 154.
Worthing, 174.
Hotels : Marine,
Sea.
Houses, Steyne.

Yapton, 227.

Royal,

THE END.

Printed ly Ballantvne, Hanson & Co.
Edinburgh and London

WORKS BY AUGUSTUS J. C. HARE

LIFE AND LETTERS OF FRANCES, BARONESS
BUNSEN. Third Edition. With Portraits. 2 vols., crown

MEMORIALS OF A QUIET LIFE. 3 vols., crown 8vo.
Vols. I. and II. , 21s. (Nineteenth Edition); Vol. III., with
numerous Photographs, los. 6d.
' ' One of those books which it is impossible to read without pleasure. It
conveys a sense of repose not unlike that which everybody must have felt
out of service time in quiet little village churches. Its editor will receive
the hearty thanks of every cultivated reader for these profoundly interesting
'Memorials' of two brothers, whose names and labours their universities
and Church have alike reason to cherish with affection and remember with
pride, who have smoothed the path of faith to so many troubled wayfarers,
strengthening the weary and confirming the weak." — Standard.
DAYS NEAR ROME. With more than 100 Illustrations
by the Author. Third Edition. 2 vols., crown 8vo, 12s. 6d.
WALKS IN ROME. Thirteenth Edition, revised. With
Map. 2 vols., fcap. 8vo, cloth limp, 10s.
" The best handbook of the city and environs of Rome ever published.
. . . Cannot be too much commended." — Pall Mall Gazette.
"This book is sure to be very useful. It is thoroughly practical, and is
the best guide that has yet been offered." — Daily News.
" Mr. Hare's book fills a real void, and gives to the tourist all the latest
discoveries and the fullest information bearing on that most inexhaustible
of subjects, the city of Rome. ... It is much fuller than ' Murray,' and
anyone who chooses may know how Rome really looks in sun or shade." —
Spectator. WALKS IN LONDON. Sixth Edition, revised. With
additional Illustrations. 2 vols., fcap. 8vo, cloth limp, 12^.
" One of the really valuable as well as pleasant companions to the peri
patetic philosopher's rambling studies of the town." — Daily Telegraph.
WANDERINGS IN SPAIN. With 17 full-page Illus
trations. Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo, Js. 6d.
"Here is the ideal book of travel in Spain; the book which exactly
anticipates the requirements of everybody who is fortunate enough to be
going to that enchanted land ; the book which ably consoles those who are
not so happy by supplying the imagination from the daintiest and most
delicious of its stories." — Spectator.
GEORGE ALLEN, 156, CHASING CROSS ROAD, LONDON R

2 WORKS BY AUGUSTUS J. C. HARE
CITIES OF SOUTHERN ITALY AND SICILY.
With Illustrations. Crown 8vo, 10s. 6d.
"Mr. Hare's name will be a sufficient passport for the popularity of his
work. His books on the Cities of Italy are fast becoming as indispen
sable to the traveller in that part of the country as the guide-books of
Murray or of Baedeker. . . . His book is one which I should advise all
future travellers in Southern Italy and Sicily to find room for in their port
manteaus." — Academy.
CITIES OF NORTHERN ITALY. Second Edition.
With Illustrations. 2 vols., crown 8vo, 12s. 6d.
"We can imagine no better way of spending a wet day in Florence or
Venice than in reading all that Mr. Hare has to say and quote about the
history, arts, and famous people of those cities. These volumes come
under the class of volumes not to borrow, but to buy." — Mor?iing Post.
CITIES OF CENTRAL ITALY. Second Edition. With
Illustrations. 2 vols., crown 8vo, \2s. dd.
SKETCHES IN HOLLAND AND SCANDINAVIA.
Crown 8vo, with Illustrations, y. 6d.
' ' This little work is the best companion a visitor to these countries can
have, while those who stay at home can also read it with pleasure and
profit. "—Glasgow Herald.
STUDIES IN RUSSIA. Crown 8vo, with numerous
Illustrations, 10s. 6d.
"Mr. Hare's book may be recommended as at once entertaining and
¦instructive." — Athencsum.
"A delightful and instructive guide to the places visited. It is, in fact,
a sort of glorified guide-book, with all the charm of a pleasant and culti
vated literary companion." — Scotsman.
FLORENCE. Third Edition. Fcap. 8vo, Illustrated,
cloth limp, y.
VENICE. Third Edition. Fcap. 8vo, cloth limp, 3^.
With Illustrations.
"The plan of these little volumes is excellent. . . . Anything more
perfectly fulfilling the idea of a guide-book we have never seen." — Scottish
Review. GEORGE ALLEN, 156, CHARING CROSS ROAD, LONDON

WORKS BY AUGUSTUS J. C. HARE

PARIS. With Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth, iaj\ ; or
in 2 vols., cloth limp, \os. 6d.
DAYS NEAR PARIS. With Illustrations. Crown 8vo,
cloth, ios. ; or in 2 vols., cloth limp, ioj-. 6d.
NORTH-EASTERN FRANCE. Crown 8vo, cloth,
los. 6d. With Map and 86 Woodcuts. 532 pages.
Picardy — Abbeville and Amiens — Paris and its Environs — Arras and
the Manufacturing Towns of the North — Champagne — Nancy and the
Vosges, &c.
SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE. Crown 8vo, cloth,
ios. 6d. With Map and 176 Woodcuts. 600 pages.
The different lines to the South — Burgundy — Auvergne — The Cantal
—Provence — The Alpes Dauphinaises and Alpes Maritimes, &c.
SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE. Crown Svo, cloth,
ios. 6d. With Map and 232 Woodcuts. 664 pages.
The Loire — The Gironde and Landes — Creuse — Correze — The
Limousin — Gascony and Languedoc — The Cevennes and the Pyre
nees, &c.
NORTH-WESTERN FRANCE. Crown 8vo, cloth,
ios. 6d. With Map and about 80 Woodcuts. About 450 pages.
"Mr. Hare's volumes, with their charming illustrations, are a reminder
of how much we miss by neglecting provincial France." — Times.
" The appreciative traveller in France will find no more pleasant, inex
haustible, and discriminating guide than Mr. Hare. . . . All three volumes
are most liberally supplied with drawings, all of them beautifully executed,
and some of them genuine masterpieces." — Echo.
"Every one who has used one of Mr. Hare's books will welcome the
appearance of his new work upon France. . . . The books are the most
satisfactory guide-books for a traveller of culture who wishes improvement
as well as entertainment from a tour. ... It is not necessary to go to the
places described' before the volumes become useful. While part of the
work describes the district round Paris, the rest practically opens up a new
country for English visitors to provincial France." — Scotsman.
SUSSEX. Second Edition. With Map and about 50
Woodcuts. Crown 8vo, 6s.
GEORGE ALLEN, rs6, CHARING CROSS ROAD, LONDON

4 WORKS BY AUGUSTUS J. C. HARE
THE STORY OF TWO NOBLE LIVES. Charlotte,
Countess Canning, and Louisa, Marchioness of Water-
ford. In 3 vols., of about 450 pages each. Crown 8vo,
£1, us. dd. Illustrated with n engraved Portraits and 21 Plates
in Photogravure from Lady Waterford's Drawings, 8 full-page and
24 smaller Woodcuts from Sketches by the Author.
There is a Special Large Paper Edition, with India Proofs of
the Plates. Crown 4to, .£3, 3s. net.
The Embassy at Paris in the time, of Louis XVIII. and Louis
Philippe — Life of Lord and Lady Waterford in Ireland — The Famine
and Rebellion, &c. — The Story of the Indian Mutiny as told in Lady
Canning's Letters and Journals, &c. — Lady Waterford's Art Work
— Recollections of her Conversations — Visits from and to the Royal
Family, &c.
THE GURNEYS OF EARLHAM : Being Memoirs and
Letters ofthe Eleven Children of John and Catherine Gurney
of Earlham, 1775-1875, and the Story of their Religious Life
under many Different Forms. Illustrated with 33 Photogravure
Plates and about 20 Woodcuts. In 2 vols., crown 8vo, 25s.
712 pages.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES: Being Memorial
Sketches of Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, Dean of Westminster ;
Henry Alford, Dean of Canterbury ; Mrs. Duncan Stewart ;
and Paray le Monial. Illustrated with 8 Photogravure Portraits
and 20 Woodcuts. I vol., crown 8vo, iar. 6d.

BY THE LATE AUGUSTUS WILLIAM HARE
RECTOR OF ALTON, BARNES
THE ALTON SERMONS. Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo,
,s. 6d.
SERMONS ON THE LORD'S PRAYER. Crown 8vo,
IS. 6d.
GEORGE ALLEN, 156, CHARING CROSS ROAD, LONDON