welfare was much neglected, those who had the inclination to attend Divine service having to travel a distance of six miles to the church at North Hyde. Services were first introduced in a barn at West Drayton, and it was in that humble sanctuary that the Archbishop first administered the rite of confirmation to the hitherto poor, neglected children. Thorney Broad, about three-quarters of a mile south of the railway station, is a favourite spot for trout-fishing. Indeed, the disciples of Izaak Walton find much to occupy their attention during the fishing season, in the rivers and streams hereabouts. Trout have been turned into the Colne, but not yet with great success. A race-course was established at West Drayton about the year 1865, in a large river-side meadow, on the south of the railway. The periodical gatherings which take place there were a great nuisance to the neighbourhod, the sports being among the most frequented of those suburban races which are patronised by the lowest classes of sporting "roughs." Near the station is a small cluster of houses, with the "Railway Inn." This spot is known as Yiewsley-the lee or meadow adorned with yews, which form so marked a feature in the villages of West Middlesex; but it is a hamlet actually belonging to the parish of Hillingdon. St. Matthew's Church, in this district, was built from the designs of Sir Gilbert Scott in 1869. The first stone of the new schools at Yiewsley was laid by Bishop Claughton in August, 1871. The schools will hold about 300 children. From the hamlet of Yiewsley we turn our steps once more eastward, following, for the most part, the courses of the Grand Junction Canal and the Great Western Railway, and leaving Cowley, Uxbridge, and Hillingdon, away on our left, to be dealt with on our return journey. After our long perambulations through the flat and level districts which are called the Valley of the Thames, but which scarcely form a valley-for the lack of hills, at all events on the Middlesex side-it is pleasant to find ourselves once more on a slight “upland," at the ancient village of Hayes, crowned with its historic church. It stands about a mile to the north of the Great Western Railway, which has a small station near the meeting of the parishes of Hayes and Harlington, and named after the former. The district all round the railway station in every direction is covered with brickfields, which sadly mar its appearance; but these are rather decreasing in number, the supply of clay being not inexhaustible. The Grand Junction Canal-which conveys goods, and once conveyed passengers also, below Uxbridge and London —runs here almost parallel with the railway; and the cottages are all inhabited by an industrial population, who find their occupation in either brick-making or barge-driving. In 1871 the number of inhabited houses in the parish amounted to 524, with a population of 2,654 souls. This latter number was gradually increased during the ten following years, for, according to the census returns for 1882, Hayes numbered a population of 2,891. The village of Hayes is very extensive, and, unlike its neighbours, it has a history. It is bounded on the south by Heston, Harlington, and Cranford, and on the west by Hillingdon; and northwards it extends to Northolt and Ickenham, while eastwards it originally stretched as far as Hanwell, for Southall and Norwood were once portions of it. The fact is that Hayes was, in AngloSaxon times, a country residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who held the manor and the rectory of Hayes. Consequently, though most of the parochial duties were discharged by a vicar, who held the "cure of souls," the rector of Hayes was always a great Church dignitary, whose ecclesiastical rank invested the place with an honour and a sanctity peculiar to itself. It is very remarkable that whilst in some counties nearly every name mentioned in "Doomsday Book" has disappeared, in Middlesex the names of well-nigh every parish and hundred remain almost unchanged, after the lapse of eight centuries. Thus, in that ancient record this place figures as Hesa-probably then pronounced as Haisa—in the Hundred of Osulvestane, or Ossulston.* After a description of the king's land, the book tells us that "Archbishop Lanfranc holds Hesa for forty-nine hides; there is land for forty ploughs. To the demesne pertain twelve hides; and there are two ploughs there. Among the freemen and the villanes there are twenty-six ploughs, and there could be twelve more." Lysons tells us that the name is probably derived from the Saxon word " Haeg," a hedge (in French "Haye"), which comes very near to its present appellation. From Hesa it became Hease, Heyse, Hays, Heesse, Hesse, and Hese, at different times. The old road from London to Oxford passes though the whole length of the parish, nearly bisecting it. In the days of the Tudors the western part of the parish was an open heath, adjoining that of Hillingdon; and it would seem, It is now in the Hundred of Elthorne, Hayes.] AN ARCHIEPISCOPALIAN MANOR. 209 from the map of John Norden (about 1625), that Pope Urban, as the sign of his metropolitan juristhe road ran in a somewhat different direction, diction. It is pleasant to think that so sweet and turning to the north, along what is now called pious a character as Anselm must have walked Mellow Lane, the fine old trees of which point along the roads and trod the fields about Hayes. backwards to the distant past, and look like the As a writer, a philosopher, and a leader of men, he features of an ancient highway; and this is con- was one of the foremost characters of his own age, firmed by local tradition. The course of the road and is regarded by all parties as one of the was doubtless altered as enclosures were gradually brightest ornaments of the English Church. made. The manor and parish of Hayes apparently have differed greatly in extent at different times. In the Saxon era it is said to have comprised thirty-two hides, or about 3,840 acres. In "Doomsday," the hides in the hands of Lanfranc are given as fiftynine, which would give about 7,080 acres, if we reckon 120 acres to the hide. According to the Ordnance Survey of the year 1865, the exact acreage is 5,772, of which nearly 1,520 acres are arable, nearly 1,250 pasture-land, while 300 are occupied as brick-fields, woods, osier-beds, orchards, &c., &c. (This includes the "precinct" of Norwood.) "Little care, however," writes Mr. Mills, in an unpublished "History of Hayes," "has been taken of the boundaries of the parish. The custom of 'beating the bounds' has not been performed for a great number of years, and few boundary stones or other marks exist, and such as are in existence have been mostly defaced." The fact is, that a divided rule never answers. The rector left the vicar, and the vicar left the rector, to see to this duty on "Rogation Days," and between the two, that useful ceremony was neglected. The earliest mention of Hayes is in A.D. 830, when a priest-Warherdus, or Walherdus-bequeathed the manor of Hayes, which he styles his own patrimony, to the church of Canterbury. And if it be true that manors were so called from manere, it is probable that he lived here, and exercised the "cure of souls" as well as the rights of a "squire" over his tenants. The next owner of the manor who is mentioned by name is Stigand, the last Saxon archbishop, who crowned King Harold. Lanfranc we have already mentioned. He died in 1089, and was succeeded, after a four years' interval, by the saintly Anselm, who was not only the owner of the manor, but occasionally resident here, as well as at Harrow and Mortlake. One Whitsuntide, we are told, the king summoned Anselm to his neighbourhood at Windsor. On this occasion he stayed at Hayes, where he was visited by nearly all his suffragan bishops, who in vain persuaded him to make up his quarrel with William. In the long run the worthy ecclesiastics prevailed, and here or at Windsor the king handed to him the pall which had been sent from Rome by The early history and patronage of this church. and of the manor are coincident down to the reign of Henry VIII. Hayes was a "Peculiar" of Canterbury-that is, although situate in Middlesex, which is in the diocese of London, it was directly under the spiritual control of the Archbishop of Canterbury-like Harrow-on-the-Hill. This arrangement lasted into the present century; but through the abolition of all such "peculiar" jurisdictions by Act of Parliament, it is now subject to the see of London, and the present rector attends the visitations of the Bishop of London and the Archdeacon of Middlesex. To mention the several owners of this manor and rectory from Anselm to the Reformation would be to give a list of the Archbishops of Canterbury. But amongst them should be mentioned the names of Thomas à Becket, Langton, Islip, Langham, Simon de Sudbury, Fitz-Alan, Morton, and Warham, all of whom must have been occasional visitors at least at the Rectory House, which still has something quite palatial about it. Archbishop Cranmer is said to have presented in 1543 the manor, with the advowsons of both the rectory and the vicarage, to Henry VIII., in exchange for other preferments. Five years later we find the king bestowing them on Sir Edward North, afterwards Lord North, one of the greatest possessors of Church lands. In the year 1613 Lord North sold both the manor and the advowsons, which have passed into the hands of several private families in succession—as Millet, Franklyn, Jenyns, Cooke, Ayscough, Blencowe, and Villiers, many of whom lie buried in the church. The manor now belongs to Sir Charles Mills, of Hillingdon; and the rector's family hold the consolidated advowson of both rectory and vicarage. The There were formerly several handsome mansions in this parish, and a few still remain, but none are worthy of individual description, or to which literary and other recollections are attached. aspect of the village, in spite of brick-fields, railways, and canals, is still rural and peaceful. Mr. Mills writes, in his "History of Hayes" :—“ In a perambulation of the village for the purpose of discovering and describing antiquities, I was charmed to find within twelve miles of the bustle, din, and smoke of London the real country, with its wide, rich pastures and waving corn, its trees, hedgerows, wild flowers, and gardens; and, to complete the picture, I should have been happy to have added, interspersed with timber-built houses with overhanging storeys, gables, and dormers; but truth compels me to admit that such is no longer the case. Here and there may still be seen the thatched one-storey cottage, with low bulged walls and other details, which would delight the painter and the poet. Some chimney-stacks at Yeading, family, and now by Mr. Thomas Salt, of Weeping Cross, Staffordshire. "Yealding" is really Saxon for "Eald," or old, and "ing," a meadow; the property belonged five centuries ago to the Bishops of Lichfield and Coventry, who had a charter of free-warren within its limits. A little more than a century ago the Court Rolls of the manor mention that John Turner, a copyholder, was permitted to plant a grove of elm-trees across "the waste of Yealding Green;" the trees that Mr. Turner planted can still be identified, but the "waste" FONT IN WEST DRAYTON CHURCH. built with thin and the "green" they were to adorn are both gone. kiln burnt So true are Goldsmith's lines affording the large chimneycorners of a former age, a gable next the churchyard, and some cottages near Botwell Cross, are all the objects that can claim the attention of the antiquary, and these only in a very moderate degree." Within the parish there would appear to have been several manors: not only those of Norwood and Southall, now erected into separate and distinct parochial districts, but also those of Yealding, or Yeading, Botwell, and Hayes-with-Park-Hall. The last two, however, have long disappeared as manors proper, though they exist as hamlets; Yeading remains it was owned by the Petit Lysons tells us, in his "History of Middlesex," that the principal hamlets in Hayes are Botwell, Yeading, Hayes End, and Wood End; to these he might have added Cotman's Town, all of which still retain their ancient names. Botwell and Yeading are distinct places, and form the centres of two localities devoted to brick-making. Cotman's Town is the cluster of houses to the east of the church, beyond which lies a district called Cold Harbour. Wood End Green lies between the west end of the church and Hillingdon. The parish church is dedicated to St. Mary the Virgin, to whom Mr. Mills thinks that it was dedicated by Anselm himself. If so, however, nothing of that structure remains, except a stone in the north face of the tower, some ten feet square, and carved with triangles arranged in the form of crosses. The font is a fine specimen of the transitional was a smaller and plainer church here in the old Saxon times, one which was probably constructed of wood, as at Staines and elsewhere. The chancel, which is of the Early English style, was probably erec ted about the year 1220. The nave HAYES. The is mostly of the Decorated, or Edwardian period; | Oxford, and other well-known instances. and the north and south side aisles followed as chancel deflects considerably to the north-east. It necessity arose. At the east end of each aisle was a chantry chapel, with an altar, and a separate true east point had not been chosen by the builders is thought by some persons that in such cases the endowment for a chantry priest. These chapels of the earlier portion, whether nave or chancel, and were marked off by screens, parts of which still that the builders of the latter portion intended to correct their blunder; while another theory has been maintained which attaches to it a symbolical meaning—namely, that it was intended to represent the Saviour on the cross, whose sacred head inclined at a slight angle to the right or the left. It is more probable that it was an ingenious device of the architect to give an appearance of greater length to the interior. The walls of the church are mostly of flint and chalk, the latter probably imported from the Buckinghamshire or Hertfordshire hills; the facing, for the most part, is of rough-hammered flint. The walls are solid and substantial, and have worked into them several fragments of wrought stone, portions of an earlier structure. The external buttresses are simple; those at the angles of the chancel have niches for the statues of saints-probably the patron saints of the church. The windows are of various dates, ranging from 1220 down to 1600, examples of almost every style being shown-and their details are well worth study. The great east window is of Elizabethan date and workmanship, and has recently been filled with painted glass, commemorating an event in the life of a son of the present rector. The north and south doorways are under Pointed arches, the latter having in front of it a handsome wooden porch. At the west end is a fine specimen of Perpendicular architecture, the door and window being under one main arch, a sill-window separating the door from the three-light window above. The tower is of three storeys, but looks bare and unadorned, being devoid of buttresses. It contains a peal of six bells. Magi," given by the lord of the manor, Mr. Jenyns, in 1726; but it now stands on the ground near the vestry, at the east end of the south aisle. On the wall of the north aisle, near the door, is a roughly-executed life-sized fresco of St. Christopher, representing that saint as carrying on his shoulder the Divine Child as he strides through the water. Below can be seen the crab, the eel, the flat-fish, and a mermaid with her comb in her hand. Above is a figure fishing. Such an ornament is frequent on the walls of churches in Norfolk and Suffolk, but very rare in Middlesex. The pulpit, of deal, was made to stride across the entrance to the chancel, with a desk on either side for the curate and parish clerk, thus blocking up the view of the east end altogether Happily this monstrosity-the production of some tasteless churchwarden or lord of the manor—is a thing of the past, and a decent, and even handsome, pulpit has been set up elsewhere in its stead. In the church is a parish muniment chest of curious structure, more than three centuries old; it is of oak, and the top is made out of one solid block of timber. It is bound with iron, and has very substantial bands, hinges, and locks. At the entrance of the churchyard is an old and picturesque lych gate, in a very fair state of preservation. Sir In the chancel is a fine monument to Sir E. Fenner, a judge of the King's Bench, who died in 1611; and there is another Jacobean monument, the inscription on which has been long stolen. Edward Fenner's monument is of alabaster and choice marbles, and represents the worthy judge in a recumbent position. In the north aisle is a The nave has a lofty pitch, and a plain waggon- Purbeck marble slab, with brass, commemorating headed roof, divided into compartments, and lit by Walter Grene, who died in the fifteenth century, but some very late and ugly-shaped dormer windows. the exact date is lost. At the east end of the south The carved crosses at the intersections of the aisle is an altar-tomb to Thomas Higate, part of panels are curious, and the seamless coat, the nails, the brass on which has disappeared. Here, cut in the spear-head, and the wounded hands and feet, brass, in the attitude of prayer, may be seen the and the other emblems of the Passion, appear on worthy squire and his dame, with their nine chilnearly all of them. Mixed with them are fleur-de- dren, with inscriptions in Latin and English verse— lys and Tudor roses, marking the late period of its neither very good. Of the remaining monuments construction. Fine roofs of oak, and of a more little need be said, except that they seem to imply artistic style, cover the chancel and side aisles. In that the dead are uniformly virtuous, and to suggest, the chancel are an ancient aumbry, a piscina in a therefore, that we must look among the living for very perfect state, and sedilia—all of elegant pro- the vicious and wicked. The inscription over one portions. In the flooring are some good old of the rectors of the parish, the Rev. Mr. Samuel encaustic tiles. The walls, previous to the recent Spence, 1730, should not be omitted here, as sugrestoration of the church, were covered with hatch-gestive of the happy via media between Romanism ments, and several flags, coats of armour, and and Dissent, of which we have heard so much :helmets hung on them; but these were all decayed, and, as too often is the case, disappeared on that occasion. Over the communion-table there formerly hung a painting of the "Adoration of the "Just underneath there lays (lies) a priest interred, |