inanition, how peculiar must then have been the fiate of the human body, and confequently the practice of medicine in monafteries, when men born in times, and bred in habits, which almoft exempted them from the evil, thall I fay the privilege of weak conftitutions, were often fwept away in the midst of their days by fuch inflammatory diforders! or, if they furvived to a later period, were knocked down at a ftroke by apoplexies, the fuperadded lazinefs and plenty of a convent muft have been doubly pernicious. But another and a difgafting circumftance in the habits of monks muft have expofed them to putrid and cutaneous diforders; I mean, a total inattention to cleanlinefs, for which they had to blame the abfurdity of their rule, for they had uo fheets to beds, or fhirts to their backs; they flept in their ordinary dreffes of woollen; and they never availed themfelves of a practice, from which they do not appear to have been prohibited, and which alone rendered the fane habits tolerable in the antients, namely, a conftant ufe of warm baths, which would have removed all impurities from the fkin; fome of which produce a firange mixture of feelings, to be repelled from the converfation of a man of learning and eloquence by ftench and vermin." (p. 102.)

Chap. IV. of this Book treats of the vicarage.

Book III. chap. I. of the origin, progrefs, and ramifications of property, from the Saxon to the prefent umes, à judicious and interefting difquifition; and a comparative view of antient and modern population and improvement. "From a people occupied like the Saxons in rearing and devouring the progrefs [produce] of their own hands, pofterity had little to expect; and, accordingly, the fubject of this history cannot boast one Saxon charter, one remnant of Saxon architecture, properly fo called; and, independently of general hiftory, we have no remaining evidence but that of language, that fuch a race of men ever exited among us. I do not even recollect, that a Saxon penny or a Northumbrian ftica has ever been turned up within the parith. The Normans were a more. abftemious and politic people; their lawyers, with more chicane, had infinitely more knowledge of the principles of jurifprudence; their ecclefiaftics, though more devoted to the court of Rome, had a greater thare of piety and learning; their princes alone, haughty, unjuft, and cruel, gave a conquered people reafon to look back with regret on the mild though unfkilful fway of their native monarchy. As feribes and architects in particular, they were men to whom this district was greatly indebted; for our oldeft cattle, our oldeft remaining churches, our most valuable records, are all early Norman." (p.186.)

Such was the fate of property and manners when the houfe of Lacy_became poffeffed of Blackburnfhire. But, before we go on to that part of the fubject, it may be proper to confider the effects which this great revolution produced on the fiate of property in it. The fimplicity and independence of Saxon tenures was completely deftroyed; a tract of country which had been parcelled out among 28 lords now became fubject to one, and all the intriCacies of feodal dependence, and all the rigours of feodal exaction, wardfhips, reliefs, efcheats, &c. were introduced at once. Yet, perhaps, the rights thus acquired were feldom exer cifed in their utmoft extent; the Saxon lords, though reduced to a fiate of galling dependence, do not appear in general to have been actually firipped of their fees; and we have one infiance in which the old poffeilor of a monor

before

before the Conqueft alienates after that event in his own name. What a man in fuch circumstances is permitted to transfer he has previoufly been allowed to retain. But thefe remaining rights, for the deftruction of which many trains were laid, gradually merged in the fuperior fee, where, perhaps the greater part of them till remains; but others were fucceffively re-granted in military fervice or frank almoigne. Subordinate freehold properties were allo cantoned out in focage; tenures in villenage, which had commenced immediately after the Conqueft, were extended and encouraged; and thus, by fucceflive fteps, the origin or all landed property within the hundred, fome later copyholds alone excepted, is to be traced to voluntary concellions of the Lacies, or their fucceffors of the houfe of Lancaster." (137) Chap. V. contains a lift of the lords of the honour of Clitheroe, the Lacies, of whom Henry, the laft, defpairing of male fluc, furrendered all his lands to the king, who re-granted them to him for life, and, after his decease, to Thomas earl of Lancaster, and Alice, his wife, who was a Lacy, and the heirs of their bodies; failing of which, they were to retain over to Edmund, the king's brother, and to his heirs, for ever. On the attainder of Thomas earl of Lancaster, the honour of Clitheroe and hundred of Blackburn were feized into the king's hands, and remained in the crown till the beginning of Edward the Third's reign, when they were granted for term of life to Queen Ifabella; but previous to her death the attainder of Earl Thomas had been reverfed, on the plea that he had not been tried by his peers; fo that, immediately on that event, Henty duke of Lancasier fucceeded to the honour and hundred by virtue of the entail on Edmund, the king's brother, and his heirs. (p. 146.) Charles II. granted it to General Monk and his heirs. His fon's widow, Lady Elizabeth Cavendish, re-married Ralph duke of Montague, who, by a former wife, had John duke of Montague; who had two daughters; Ifabel, married to Edward Earl Beaulicu, and Mary, to George Earl of Cardigan, afterwards Duke of Montagne, who had a fon Henry, Duke of Buccleugh. "By what aft or acts the honour of Cli theroe has patied from one family to

another through a female connected in blood with neither, after having applied in vain for information where it might have been expected, I am not afhamed to plead ignorance. It is poffible it may have been devifed in fee by the fecond duke of Albemarle to his dutchefs; and, as fhe is known to have left eftates to her flep-fon, John, Duke of Montague, the honour of Clitheroe may have been among the number. But this is merely conjecture. Other inftances, though of leis magnitude, may occur in the progress of this work, in which, after travelling with cafe and certainty through four or five centuries, our lights have failed at that precife point where private evidences, ceafing to be confidered as the playthings of Antiquarian curiofity, are guarded by the referve of family delicacy, or by the jealouty of legal importance." (p. 150.)

We have next an account of the cafile of Clitheroe with its chapel and honour, with its forefts and other demefnes, interfperfed with much interefting and able difcuffion on forefts, game, trees, the witches of Pendle in the 16th century. "Of the fyftem of witchcraft" here, obferves Nir. W. "the real defect is not in theory, but in evidence. A poffibility that the bodies of men fhould fometimes be given up to infernal agency, is no more to be denied than that their fouls should be expofed to infernal illusions; that such appearances fhould be exhibited in one age and withdrawn in another is equally the cafe with miracles; that they fhould not extend to all countries is common to them and to revelation itfelf; but all the modern inftances of fuppofed witchcraft, which I have read of, are difcredited either by the apparent fraud or folly of the witneffes. Were I to behold with mine own eves fuch circumfiances as have often been related, or were they to be related to me by a philofophical obferver of perfect integrity, upon the evidence of his fenfes, I know not upon what principles I could refufe my affent to the conclufion, that they were really the effects of diabolical power. That thefe opinions may not be accused of leaning too much to the doctrines of exploded fuperitition, I will take leave to refer my readers to the following fentiment of a great and enlightened modern Divine: That, for any thing we know, he (the devil) way (fill) operate in the way of pofiffion,

I-do not fee on what certain grounds any an can deny. Bp. Hurd's Sermons, vol. III. p. 239."

Webiter, who wrote against witchcraft, is buried in Clitheroe church, with a calculation of his nativity on his monument. (p. 272.) Such is on the tomb of Burton in Chriftchurch, Oxford; fuch on the gardener's houfe at Laurifion for Sir Alexander Napier his celeftial theme, probably calculated by his brother John, inventor of the Logarithms. Wood's Cramond, p. 41. Browfholme, in Bowland foreft, is a large houfe of red ftone, with a good library, a large mifcellaneous collection of antient coins, and a valuable atiemblage of MSS. relating principally to the antiquities of the neighbourhood, and to which this Hiftorian is much indebted. The most valuable relick preferved there is the original feal of the Commonwealth for the approbation of minifters. It is of very mafly filver, and inferibed, "The feale for the approbation of public preachers." In the centre are two palm-branches, and within them an open book with thefe words, The Word of God. The workmanfhip is good; but I could fcarcely venture to afcribe it to Simon. (pp. 208, 209.)

Book IV. of this judicious Hiftory contains a topographical furvey of the prefent parish of Whalley, by townihips, ditiributed into three portions; the vale of Calder, the tract between Pendle aud Ribble, and that between the Calder and the Hyndeburne. Whalley came by intail, 1667, to Sir Ralph Afheton, of Middleton, bart. who died 1717, leaving a daughter Mary, married to Sir Afheton Curzon, bart. who died 1775. Their eldest son, Nathaniel, is now Lord Scarfdale, their younger fon, Afheton, now Lord Curzon. His fon, Penn Aheton, died 1797, having married Sophia-Charlotte, eldest daughter of Earl Howe, now Baronefs Howe, whofe eldeti fon, George-Auguftus Curzon, born 1788, is the prefent owner. This rich domain has been retained by the two opulent families of Braddyll and Afheton for a longer period than their monkith predeceffors; and, with the flourishing houfe of Rufiell, which was elevated above the fortune of ordinary gentry only by the abbey domains of Thorney, Waohuru, and Tavistock, may serve as a confutation of the fyften of Sir H. Spelman and his fuperGANT. MAG, January, 1802,

ftitious followers in the laft century. (p. 225.) It appears that a Saxon thief was beheaded in one of the townships; this punishment being probably introduced by the Norman lord; and the right of fuch mode belonging to the earls of Chefter, was probably imported hither by the Halton branch of the Lacies in their fucceeding to the fee of Clitheroe. (p. 243.)

The prefent application of the chapel at Read hall furnishes our author with fome pertinent obfervations on the little ufe of private chapels and chaplains, compared with the attendance of the whole family at public worship in the church. (p. 248.)

"Near the fummit of Hapton park, and where it declines to the South, are the remains of a large pool, through which, tradition reports that the deer were drawn by their keepers in a manner ftill practifed in the park at Lyme. It is impoflible not to be firuck with a mixture of antient fimplicity and baronial fplendour in this once-favoured refidence of the family [of Townley]; where, from the windows of their caftellated mansion high and bleak, with no eyes for landfcape and little feeling of cold, they could furvey with undiminished pleasure vaft herds of deer, fheep, and cattle, grazing in a park of 10 miles in circumference; where, like the old courtier, who never hunted but within his own grounds, they could enjoy the pleafure of the chace without any interruption or intrufion; and whence they derived inexhauftible fupplies of that plain hofpitality which never confumed a great eftate. Modern eyes, however, will not wonder at the final defertion of Haplon for Townley.” (p. 264.)

In Clitheroe church were two alabafter figures of a knight and lady, which, upon the ground which the monument covered being wanted to make a pew, were barbarously interred beneath the floor, and are now inacceffible to the draughtfman." (p. 269.) Mr. Nichols, in his Leicefterfhire, has recorded a fimilar fate which overtook a bon compagnon, the Lord Ros [fee our vol. LXII. p. 115]: and fince at Kidderm.inter, vol. LXII. P. 688.

A fingular infiance of the deftruction of a crofs in a church-yard, "by a drunken rabble hired or the purpose a few years ago, occurs at Burnley. (p. 302.5 The bal and its infeription remains, removed for fafety to Townley.

On