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152 Charles II. land than he swung completely round. All his political and religious views changed, and he declared that the great horn was Old Noll and the little horn was Dickon. By this means Nicholas Tyack secured his position, and remained mayor of Saltash. He had been high-handed in his proceed- ings before ; he became more high-handed under the Restoration. He wanted to apprentice his son in London ; so he took the youth to town, lived well whilst there, and on his return charged the expenses to the town.

Nicholas had a great advantage in living next door to the Town Hall, for he was able to break a way into it through the intervening wall. According to custom and rule, when a meeting of the Town Council was convened, the Town Hall bell had to be rung; but there was no specification as to the hour at which a meeting was to be held, nor was it laid down in black and white that the Hall door was to be unlocked for the occasion. Now when Nicholas Tyack desired to pass his accounts, or to transfer some bit of Corporation land to himself, or legitimatise any other little game to his advantage and the detriment of the public, he rang the bell at night, kept the Hall door locked, and admitted his adherents through his private door, held the meeting in the council-chamber, and passed his accounts and resolutions ''nem. con.'' But now both the Town Hall and Tyack's house have been swept away. The latter had a fine mullioned and many-light window. The house went first; then the Guildhall.

The story of the borough of Esh, Esc, or Saltash