Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 21, 1910.djvu/42

 28 of the Ealdormanship, and before that no doubt of the Mercian kings. It continued to belong to the Abbey till the Dissolution, when it passed to the Paget family, ancestors of the present Marquis of Anglesey, who is still Lord of the Manor of Abbot's Bromley itself.

My nephew, Mr. S. A. H. Burne, following the lead of his father's sister as dutifully as if he had been a native of the Banks' Islands, determined to go further into the history of the place, and what I have now to tell you is the result of his investigations.

The Chartulary of Burton Abbey contains a document drawn up circa 1125, in the reign of Henry I,, from which it appears that the rents of the manor of Abbot's Bromley were then farmed by five men,—Aisulf the Priest, Godwin, Bristoald, Leuric, and Orm,—but the wood the Abbot kept in his own hands. He also received three shillings rent from Edric the Forester. The "wood" referred to is evidently the township of Bromley Hurst, and the "five men" must be the predecessors of the "4 or 5 of the cheif of the Town, whom they call'd Reeves," of Plot's account. I need not remind you that the Reeve was the ancient elected headman and representative of the township, as the Sheriff (shire-reeve) was of the county. But this is not all. A postcript in another hand follows this entry. It may be translated thus:—"Nevertheless, later on, Edric ceased to make this payment, and on their petition the Abbot granted to them his enclosures (hayes) with the grazing thereof to feed their cattle on, at a rent of 10s. per annum, and they" (i.e. the tenants) "acknowledge themselves to be the foresters and keepers of the woods (forestarii et custodes silvarum)."

I will give my nephew's conclusions in his own words. "If this means anything, it means that the Abbot relieved his tenants at Abbot's Bromley from the unwelcome presence of the forester, and allowed them, for a consideration, the grazing in his "hayes," which were small