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 last deed." The commissioner who visited the school in 1868 remarked:—"The building is an old house, through whose thatched roof the rain penetrates in winter, dropping all over the desks, and gathering in pools upon the floor; the room is very small, 30-1/2 by 14-1/2 feet and 7-1/2 feet high to the spring of the roof, and the air being so foul that I was obliged to keep the door open while examining the children." The use of the dilapidated structure here alluded to has been discontinued, and the scholars assemble in a room in the Temperance Hall until a fresh school-*house has been erected.

is the second of the two townships comprised in the ancient parish of Biscopham or Bispham. The Butlers, barons of Warrington, were the earliest lords of Layton. In 1251, Robert Botiler, or Butler, obtained a charter for a market and fair to be held in "his manor of Latton." The estate descended in the same family with some interruptions, until the reign of Henry VIII., when it was sold by Sir Thomas Butler to John Brown, of London, who on his part disposed of it, in 1553, to Thomas Fleetwood. The manor was retained by the Fleetwoods up to the time of the late Sir. P. Hesketh Fleetwood, of Rossall, by whom it was conveyed, through purchase, to the Cliftons, of Lytham. The following abstract from the title deed touching the transfer of the property from John Brown to Thomas Fleetwood will not be without interest to the reader:—

"By Letters Patent under the Great Seal of England, bearing date the 19th day of March, in the first year of the reign of Queen Mary. After reciting that Sir Thomas Butler, Knight, was seized in fee of the Mannour of Layton, otherwise Great Layton, with the Appurtenances, in the county of Lancaster, and that his estate, title, and interest therein by due course of Law, came to King Henry the Eighth, who entered thereon and was seized in fee thereof, and being so seized did by his letters patents under the seal of his Duchy at Lancaster, bearing date the 5th day of April, in the thirty-fourth year of his Reign, (amongst other things) give, grant, and restore unto the said Sir Thomas Butler, his heirs, and Assigns, the said Mannour and its Appurtenances, by virtue whereof the said Sir Thomas Butler entered and was seized in fee thereof, and granted the same to John Brown, Citizen and Mercer of London, his heirs and assigns, and that Brown entered and was seized thereof in fee, and granted and sold the same to Thomas Fleetwood, Esq., his heirs and Assigns, and that the said Thomas Fleetwood entered thereon and was at that time seized in fee thereof. And further reciting that the said Sir Thomas Butler held and enjoyed the said Mannour, with its Appurtenances, from