Page:The New Forest - its history and its scenery.djvu/247

Rh "Martii 13. Anno dom. 1634. A special license, granted by the moste reverende ffather in God, William Lord Archbishop of Canterbury his Grace, under his Grace's hand and seale, used in the like grants, dated the nyneteenth day of ffebruarie, Anno dom. 1634, and second yeare of his Grace's translation. And confirmed by the Letters patents of our Sovraigne Lord Charles the King's ma.tie that now is . . . . Under the Greate Seale of England ffor Sr White Beconsaw of this parish and county of Southton . . . . (and) Dame Edith hys wife ffor the tyme of their naturell (lives) . . . . to eate flesh on the daies p'hibited by the Lawe . . . . (upon condition of their giving to the) poore of the p'ish . . . . Thirteene shillings . . . ."

Whether or no the knyght and his lady were to give the sum yearly, as seems most probable, it is impossible, from the torn condition of the leaf, to say. Their daughter was the noble Alice Lisle. The licence, of course, refers to the prohibition against eating meat on Fridays and Saturdays, and other specified times, first made by Elizabeth for the encouragement of the English fisheries, which had even in her reign begun to decay. And now that we are on the subject of 229