Page:Highways and Byways in Lincolnshire.djvu/254

 arches. An incised slab on the floor has figures of John and Elianora Malet, of the late fourteenth or early fifteenth centuries. In the south aisle there is a blocked doorway to the rood loft, and a piscina. The east window is of three lancets. All the woodwork in the church is new and everything in beautiful order. Laceby Church, two miles further on, has a Transition tower, and an Early English arcade with one Norman arch in the middle. There are some blow-wells in the parish, as at Tetney. John Whitgift, Archbishop of Canterbury, at the end of Elizabeth's reign, was formerly rector here.

A mile to the left as we go from Irby to Laceby, lies the fine and well-wooded park of Riby Grove, the seat of Captain Pretyman, M.P. The Royalists won a battle here in 1645, in which Colonel Harrison, the Parliamentary leader, was slain. He was buried at Stallingborough. Riby of late years has been famous for the flocks and herds of the late Mr. Henry Dudding, which at their dispersal in July, 1913, realised in a two days' sale 16,644 guineas. Over 1,800 Lincolnshire long-wool sheep were sold, the highest price being 600 guineas for the champion ram at the Bristol and Nottingham shows, who has gone to South America, in company with another stud ram who made eighty guineas, and several more of the best animals. But though the ram lambs made double figures, as the best had been secured before the sale the prices on the whole were not high, the sheep on the first day averaging just over £4 9s. Among the shorthorns 160 guineas was the highest price; this was given for a heifer whose destination was Germany. It is owing to men like Mr. Dudding that Lincolnshire farming and Lincolnshire flock and stock breeding has so great a name.

About five miles further, we come to the suburbs of Grimsby, and the road runs on past Clee to Cleethorpes.

It is curious how different localities, though in the same neighbourhood, have their own special and different terms for the same thing, thus: alongside the ridge north of Lincoln, each village has its bit of "Cliff," and from Elsham to the Humber each has its bit of "Wold," while on the continuation of the Wold near Caistor from Barnetby to Burgh-on-Bain the same thing is called neither "Cliff" nor "Wold," but "top"; and we have Somerby, Owmby, Grasby, Audleby, Fornaby, Rothwell, Orby, Binbrook, Girsby and Burgh "top," etc. There is an Owmby "Cliff" as well as an Owmby "top,"