strong shield of the church, and defy the arm of the law. The refuge for Wenlock is still known, and bears the name of "Lawless Cross." It is situated at the junction of the territorial boundaries of the Abbeys of Wenlock and Buildwas.

When the Danes crossed this district, Wenlock Abbey fell into disuse, but Lady Godiva, long after, induced her husband, Earl Leofric, to reinstate it. Once more it became tenantless, but the Normans raised a much more imposing edifice where the old ruins stood. This, too, in its turn fell, and now naught of it remains to tell the tale of its former greatness, but the ruins, grand and imposing in their decay.

The splendid scenery around Wenlock was well suited to the taste of the Saxon Ecclesiastics; they needed not castellated edifices to cause fear in the breasts of their adherents, but sought by the example of good works to win their love. They had been long established in the hearts of the people, but when the Normans came, saw, and conquered, they were forced to raise castles to insure their power over the vanquished, who hated them; nevertheless they built more beautiful Abbeys and church edifices than the Saxons, and Wenlock was one of them.

The Saxons built low, the Normans high, the Saxons plainly, the Normans decorative to a high degree. Wenlock is one of the greatest proofs of their architectural talents; their lancet and triple lancet windows, their mouldings, shafts and pillars, their grand clustering arches, with trefoil heads, their beautiful tracery, richly embossed doorways, double-headed griffins, their galleries with pointed arches, and groups of pilasters, their richly-groined ceilings, and above all their steeples and huge towers left the Saxons far behind, and won for them the admiration and support of the better classes of the conquered.

At Wenlock, as Mr. John Randall, of Madeley, says, in his excellent historical and topographical work "The Severn Valley," everything typical of the original arrangements of the edifice can be found; the dormitories, cloisters, ambulatories, lavatories, refectories, lodges, store-houses, courts, gardens, and fisheries, are all represented by the ruins; and, above all, the grand temple for

worship, and the poor boys' schools and scribes' offices can be distinctly traced. This and such-like buildings still praise the Normans; and one is led to regret that they were ever brought to ruin, whatever the cause was. Surely the evils which some say had grown up in them did not call for the destruction of the buildings, and we are bound to suspect, if not to believe, that Henry VIII. was led into his Vandal course by the promptings of covetousness and revenge, and not from any sincere desire to reform ecclesiastical abuses.

CHAPTER VIII.

Let gloomy hearts that never knew
One touch of laughing mirth,
Tear-loving eyes, unused to view
The beauties of the earth,

Proclaim this life a dreamy vale

The scene of dark despair,

My tongue shall tell another tale,
The world is very fair.

LANGFORD.

AFTER I gave up attending Shrewsbury market I drew large quantities of oats from thence for the use of the Queen Dowager's horses at Witley Court. This, it seems, raised the jealousy of the same person that was salesman to my employers when I first went to Bewdley; he who induced me to ride the pony to Kidderminster market, as narrated at page 34.

He left Bewdley and went to live at Shrewsbury when my employer's brother took to that business, and had established himself very easily, as he had attended that market before, and during my clerkship with the same firm at Bewdley.

My agency to my old employers enabled me at this time to sell to Mr. Nock, an extensive corn dealer, of Bridgenorth, wholesale quantities of Irish oats and Gloucestershire grown beans, which he, to some extent, sold to purchasers in the district between Bridgenorth and Shrewsbury. This interfered with the trade of the above-mentioned Bewdley salesman, and he wrote a letter to my principals, warning them as to the responsibility of Mr. Nock.

At this very moment there was a barge load of corn coming up the river Severn from them, which I had sold on commission to Mr. Nock. They very injudiciously stopped the barge on the way, and sent their principal clerk from Birmingham to my house,

with the letter they had received from Shrewsbury. I was very indignant, as Mr. Nock was a most respectable tradesman, whose credit had never been doubted, and I proposed to meet the clerk on the next Saturday at Bridgenorth to have the matter cleared up personally.

Having known the writer for so long a period, I was puzzled as to whether he was right or not in his apprehensions as to Mr. Nock's responsibility. The clerk from Birmingham called, when he went to Bridgenorth, upon Messrs. Pritchards, the bankers, upon whom Mr. Nock drew his cheques, and they told him enough to satisfy him that Mr. Nock's credit was not to be doubted. The barge was then ordered on, but Mr. Nock, on the refusal of my principals to give up the name of his maligner, entered an action against them, which was eventually settled by reference, for which they paid a certain sum for damages and all the costs.

Strange to say, although he knew I was aware that he was the writer of the calumnious letter against Mr. Nock, he wrote to him against me, to the same effect that he had written to my principals, as narrated above.

Mr. Nock received this letter on a Saturday morning, and as soon as I arrived he placed it before me. I was thunder-struck, and felt no hesitation then in telling him that this letter came from the same hand that had written the letter, with intent to injure him, in the previous case.

Upon this Mr. Nock proposed that he and I should go to Shrewsbury to see the writer and to punish him personally for his malignity. According to arrangement I drove my horse and gig on the next Saturday morning to Bridgenorth, and Mr. Nock drove me and his nephew in his double-bodied gig and pair to Shrewsbury. After putting up, we walked to our malicious friend's office. He was in the act of drawing a cheque for a farmer, but no sooner did we enter the office than he dropped his pen, and went out of it by another door, and we saw no more of him. We expected him to appear on the market, and were prepared to administer some well-deserved personal chastisement, if he came, but he never appeared.

Some years after I happened to be in Shrewsbury, and heard that he was not expected to live long. I therefore called to tell him that I wished him to know that I forgave him, but he sent down word that he could not see me.

It was the custom for the tradesmen who supplied the Queen Dowager's establishment at Witley Court, to dine there very frequently. This I of course availed myself of so often as I could, as the distance was only nine miles, and I felt desirous of mixing with the superior society of her numerous attendants. They were very agreeable people, and everything was free from any stiffness or self-complacency.

The nearest way to Witley was through Bewdley and Ribbesford, on the west side of the Severn; thence to Dunley and the Hundred-House Inn, where I generally called to see the landlord, Mr. Bunce, an oddity in his way.

The horses belonging to Her Majesty (some 32 in number) having arrived a day or two before the stipulated time, there was no corn ready for their use. An order was therefore sent up to the Hundred-House Inn, for a day and a night's supply, but he would not let them have more than two bushels of oats. A messenger was at once sent off to me, and I started a waggon load without delay. The morose landlord was never forgiven by the grooms and coachmen, and his Inn was very rarely visited by them. He grumbled often too, at Her Majesty hiring sets of post-horses from him occasionally (which she did for his benefit) saying that it was very strange she should want his horses when she had so many of her own! This and the exorbitant charges for refreshments supplied to the people (who came in large numbers to get a glimpse of the Queen) made him a perfect trouble on all hands, and had it not been that he was an old man and an old tenant, he would not have been allowed to remain.

The Queen Dowager, during her widowhood, gave a great impulse to the building and repairing of churches throughout the kingdom, by promoting and largely contributing to such works, and her steward told me that she made it a rule never to have