Page:Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, Etc., with an Appendix Containing a Rare Tract.djvu/93

 there, giving out that they were stolen, and a reward was offered accordingly. Some time passed before the cattle were found; at length, as had been concerted, some of Sir John's people found them in the above cowhouse; and proceedings in law were immediately commenced against Rhodes for this pretended robbery, against which Rhodes defended himself; but the fact of the cattle being locked up in his building being notorious, and the presumption of his being privy to, if not a principal in, the concealment, was evidence so strong against Rhodes, that he was obliged to come upon terms with Sir John, which caused the loss of his inheritance. Sir John afterwards forfeited the manor of Pilkington: this, in those days, was called a just judgment, and believed to have been inflicted upon him for the above treachery. The manor was given to the Derby family by the crown. The mansion-house was formerly encompassed by a moat, part of which still remains." The late Mr Thomas Barritt, the antiquary, gives the following very diflferent account of the matter:—"In Prestwich parish is a place called the Rhodes, where there is an old hall nearly surrounded with a moat. This appears to have been long ago the seat of some old family of note, but of what name I cannot learn. There is, however, a tradition in that neighbourhood that the first Earl of Derby had lands given him in Lancashire by his stepson, Henry VII., that belonged to gentry in this county; particularly in Broughton, Pilkington, Prestwich, Bury, and Chetham. The owners of these estates not taking the part of Henry, were by him outlawed, and were driven from their homes by the Earl of Derby. Amongst them was Sir John Chetham of Chetham, whose seat was at what is now called Peel, a little beyond Scotland Bridge, Manchester. His house was