co. Monmouth, widow) and John Pinfold and Martha, his wife, settled the hundred and manors to such uses as the three should jointly appoint. And in default thereof as to one moiety, to Elizabeth Hoskins in fee simple; and as to the other moiety, to John Pinfold for life, with remainder to Martha Pinfold in fee simple. And by another indenture dated 28 February, 1756, they jointly appointed one moiety to Elizabeth Hoskins in fee simple; and the other moiety to such uses as Martha Pinfold, either alone or with John Pinfold, should by deed or will appoint. And in default to John Piufold for life, with remainder to Martha Pinfold in fee simple.

Martha Pinfold by will dated 31 March, 1756, appointed her moiety to her husband John Pinfold for life, with remainder to her sister Elizabeth Hoskins for life, and to her nephew Edward Hoskins in fee simple.

John Pinfold survived his wife and Edward Hoskins, and at his death the moiety passed by virtue of her will to Edward Hoskins's heir-at-law hereafter mentioned. Elizabeth Hoskins by will dated 18 December, 1760, devised her moiety to her son Edward Hoskins in fee simple. Edward Hoskins died intestate, and without issue, leaving Lewis Hoskins, his only surviving brother and heir-at-law, who thereupon succeeded to one moiety of the hundred and manors, and to the other moiety thereof on the death of John Pinfold. Lewis Hoskins by will dated 24 April, 1783, devised Peers Court to his wife Elizabeth Hoskins for life, if she should reside there; but if she should prefer to live elsewhere, then he gave her an annuity of £30. And subject thereto, and to legacies to his son John Hoskins and his daughters, Elizabeth, Martha, Lois, and Ann, he devised the hundred of Langley and Swineshead, his manors of Alveston, Rockhampton, Stinchcombe, and Frampton Cotterell, and all his real estate in the counties of Gloucester and Monmouth, or elsewhere, to his son Edward Hoskins in fee simple.

By two deeds poll dated 1 October, 1788, George Hunt and Martha, his wife, and Jasper Maidment and Eleanor, his wife, released the hundred and manors from their annuities, being satisfied with the security of Peers Court therefor. Edward Hoskins sold the hundred and manors to Samuel Peach Peach, of Tockington, Esq., and conveyed them to him by deed dated 20 December, 1788. The price paid was £855. In this deed Edward Hoskins is described as of Tetbury, Gent, eldest son and heir-at-law and devisee of Lewis Hoskins, late of Peers Court, Esq., who was only surviving brother of Edward Hoskins, late of the Pantee, in Newchurch, CO. Monmouth, Gent. He was probably an attorney practising at Tetbury, for one of the witnesses on the back of the conveyance describes himself as clerk to Messrs. Bowdler and Hoskins. His mother, brother, and sisters joined in the conveyance to release their annuity and legacies; viz.:

Elizabeth Hoskins, widow, John Hoskins, Esq., Elizabeth Hoskins, Martha Hoskins, Lois Hoskins, and Ann Hoskins, spinsters, all of the town and borough of Monmouth, children and legatees named in the will of Lewis Hoskins. It also states that Mrs. Hoskins had given up Peers Court, and become entitled to the annuity.

Samuel Peach Peach died 26 February, 1845, having by will dated 16 February, 1844 (proved 14 October, 1845) devised the hundred and manors to his daughter Ellin Sybilla Cleaver for life, with remainder to her eldest son James Peach Cleaver for life; to his sons successively in tail; to his daughters as tenants in common in tail; to her second son Charles Pierrepont Cleaver for life; to his sons and daughters in like manner, with other remainders. The Cleavers assumed the name of Peach pursuant to a direction in this will.

James Peach Peach died a bachelor and intestate on the 20th of January, 1867, and Mrs. Ellin S. Peach died on the 28th of December, 1867, and was succeeded by her second son, the Rev. Charles Pierrepont Peach. His eldest son, James Legard Peach, having attained his majority, disentailed the hundred and manors by deed dated 11 April, 1883. The Rev. J. L. Peach sold the manor of Rockhampton to John Cullimore, of Chester, for £26, and conveyed it to him by deed dated 6 October, 1888. The only lands (besides the waste lands) sold with the manor were two small inclosures, all the other property having been sold off.

Chester.

JOHN CULLIMORE. 1955.-CRANFORD AND THE BERKELEYS. As many of the great Gloucestershire family of Berkeley lie buried at Cranford, Middlesex, where they have long had a seat, a few notes of inscriptions in the church of St. Dunstan will interest the reader. Externally the church, though its surroundings are pretty, is by no means attractive, and possesses few features of architectural interest. The nave is of eighteenth century work, and while the flint-built tower and the chancel are evidently much older, probably mediæval, they have nothing striking to notice. The interior, however, compensates for the poverty of the external appearance, and though it is but a small building, its fine coved roof, and the decorative way in which its unpretending character has been treated, give a charm which is wanting in many a more stately structure.

The church is placed some distance from the village, close to Cranford House, right away from the main road, and as its only approach is by the drive up to the mansion it is probable that but few are acquainted with the existence of this quaint spot.

There are several monuments in the church, and of those relating to the Berkeleys we now give some particulars from notes made five or six years ago.

In the chancel, within the communion rails, is an altar tomb, upon which is the shrouded recumbent figure of a lady sculptured in white marble. There is this inscription :

VOL. IV.

YY

Here lyeth the bodye of the most vertuous and patient lady Elizabeth, Lady Berkeley, widdowe, daughter and sole heir of George Carey, Lord | Hunsdon, soune and heir of Henry Carey, Lord Hunsdon, sonne and heir of William Carey and of the Lady Mary, his wife, second daughter and coheir of Thomas Bullen, Earle of Ormond and Wilshire, | father also of Queen Anne Bullen, wife of King Henry the Eighth, mother of Queen Elizabeth, late Queen of England, which Lady Berkeley, after her pious pilgrimage of 59 years, surrendered her soul into the hands of her Redeemer | the 23th [sic] day of April, Anno Domini 1635.

On the same side of the chancel is a mural tablet bearing the following inscription :—

Here lyeth the body of George, Baron of Berkeley, Mowbray, Seagrave, and Bruce, and Knight of ye Bath, who departed this life ye 10th day of August, | A.D. 1658. He married Elizabeth, second daughter and coheir of Sir Michael Stanhope, of Sudbury, in ye County of Suffolke, Kt, by whom he had issue, Charles, Elizabeth, and George. Charles, drowned in his passage to Fraunce, | January 27, 1641; | Elizabeth, married to Edward Coke, Esq., grand-child and heir to Sir Edward Coke, Knight, f sometime Lord Chief Justice of both Benches; she died November 9th, A.D. 1661, and lieth buried at Heigham in Norfolke; and George, Lord Berkeley, now living. This deceased lord, besides ye nobility of his birth, and ye experience he acquired by forraign trauailes, was very eminent for ye great candour and ingenuity of his disposition, his singular bounty and affability towards his inferiours, and his readiness (had it bin in his power) to have obliged all mankind.

This nobleman was that George Berkeley "the traveller," to whom John Smyth, of Nibley, the famous historian of the family, dedicated his Lives of the Berkeleys.

Adjoining the last mentioned tablet there is another, with this inscription:

Here lyeth the body of George, Earl of Berkeley, Viscount Dursley, Baron | of Berkeley, Mowbray, Seagrave, and Bruce, | who had the honour to be a Privy Counsellor to King Charles the Second and to King James; eminent for his affability, | charity, and generosity. He married Elizabeth, one of the coheiresses of John Massingberd, Esquire, of the family of the Massingberds in Lincolnshire. He departed this life | 14 Octo., 1698, ætat. 71, in hopes of a blessed resurrection, for the merciful shall obtain mercy.

On the south side of the nave are two small plain tablets. The first is in memory of Craven Fitzhardinge Berkeley, M.P. for Cheltenham, seventh and youngest son of Frederick Augustus, fifth Earl of Berkeley, who died at Carlsbad, 27 June, 1855, aged 50, and was interred in the Protestant burial-ground at Frankfort

sur-Maine. The second contains a long inscription in memory of the late Lord Fitzhardinge, Maurice Frederick Fitzhardinge. Berkeley, G.C.B., who was born 3 January, 1788, and died at Berkeley Castle, 17 October, 1867. This nobleman was second son of the above Frederick Augustus, Earl of Berkeley, who died in 1810. His title, owing to the decision of the House of Lords, was for several years in abeyance. His two elder sons, who successively came into possession of the family estates in Gloucestershire and Middlesex, were raised to the peerage. The late Lord Fitzhardinge was an admiral in the royal navy, and sat as member for Gloucester in five parliaments, besides contesting that city unsuccessfully on three other occasions. He was also a lord of the admiralty in 1852. His eldest son is the present Lord Fitzhardinge, of Berkeley Castle.

On the north wall of the nave there is a monument, with a Latin inscription and a likeness of the deceased in white marble, to the memory of William Smythe, Esq., who married Elizabeth, eldest daughter of George, Earl of Berkeley, and died 21 December, 1720, ætat. 80. She died about the year 1681. From the coat of arms we may assume that this William Smythe was a relative of John Smyth, of Nibley, already mentioned.

There is also a tomb in the churchyard recording the death of Francis Henry Fitzhardinge, fourth son of Frederick Augustus, Earl of Berkeley, who was 33 years member for Bristol. 10 March, 1870, aged 75.

He died

W. P. W. PHILLIMORE.

1956.-TRACKING A CHURCH ROBBERY BY MAGIC.-In the first volume of the new series of the Antiquary (1890), pp. 4-6, there is an article under the above heading by Mr. W. J. Hardy, F.S. A.; and as one of the parties concerned was a Gloucestershire man of former days, we shall lay the case before our readers. This can best be done in Mr. Hardy's words :-

The fact that on a September day, some time during the reign of Henry VIII., the parish church of Holbeach [Lincolnshire] was despoiled of a considerable amount of its money and jewels, introduces us to a curious instance of the widespread belief existing at the time in the practical utility of magic.

"To the king ower sovereign lord," complained and informed his true and faithful subject John Patriche, that "about the 6th of September last" Holbeach Church, in Lincolnshire, was "robbyd and spoyled" of money and jewels to the supposed value of above 300 marks. The loss was a serious one, occasioning a very general consternation, and the leading men in the parish took what was then evidently the customary course on such occasions. "To thentente," says Patriche, "to have knowlege of the namys of the theffez, and to know where the seyd money and goods was bycom," several of the parishioners resorted to one Edmund Nasche, dwellyng at Cicestre towene." There is no doubt about the reading of

the word "Cicestre," so that Nasche's qualifications and repute as a sorcerer must have been out of the common, or the good people of Holbeach would hardly have taken a journey into Gloucestershire to consult him. By trade he was also a "wheeler," though no doubt he reaped more profit by practising "the craft of inchantement and wichecraft." But Holbeach town could in its midst boast of a gentleman who practised the black arts, for, continues Patriche, the townspeople took with them "a certain John Lamkyn of Holbeach," who practised inchantment and witchcraft, with the additional accomplishment of " sorcery." Later on he tells the king that both these individuals dubbed themselves "sothesayers," skilled in the knowledge of "nigramansi."

On reaching Cirencester, the party seem to have had a conference, and "for a certeyn rewarde to them" (i.e., Nasche and Lamkyn) "promysed," they undertook to give the parishioners knowledge of the names of the thieves, and whither the money and goods had been conveyed. If we may read the words "then and there" literally, the promise of reward must have acted upon the magical powers of Nasche and Lamkyn with a rapidity which would surely have aroused suspicion in the sceptical mind, for, says John Patriche, "then and there the same inchantours namyd your sayd subjecte to be one of the theves." Considering that Patriche had shown the utmost anxiety to discover the perpetrators of the crime, the declaration must have come as a little surprise; but who could dispute the word of a sorcerer? The party took their way back to Lincolnshire in due course, and on return made known the revelation; in consequence of which the parishioners of Holbeach "agen all lawez of God and of your hightness, gevyng faithe and credenz" to the "inchantours," have now of late "published and reported untrewly in the seid parisshe of Holbeach, and in dyverse others places withine the schere of Lincolne, that your seyd subject shuld be one of the thevez, and of those that shuld be the robberez of the seyd churche."

The story was therefore evidently pretty generally believed. Patriche brings forward his social respectability as a proof of his innocence. He has, he says, in his possession, and to his "oune use, londys and tenementez to the clere yerely valwe of xl markes, and goodes convenient to his degree, and more than many other there have." Before the time in question he was always reputed "of good name, fame, honeste credenz and conversation in the seyd countye," but now, owing to the report, he is "browght into infamy, slander, and owte of credenz," so that "such as afore this tyme haue been conversant with hym, withdraw his company, and such as afore this have been his frendes, have hym now in mistrust withowt cause, and withdraw their frendshippe and favour from hym to hys utter undoying in this worlde for ever. And to the perillus comforte and ensampull of other such enchantours, and which is to the encrese of the mysbeleve of your highness' subjects