would soonest find himself judged worthily. To men like the Duke of Wellington or Mr. Gladstone, who served under him, to the Queen and Prince, whom he served so faithfully, Peel's character would naturally appear exalted by the shadow of death. As his epitaph, it would perhaps be better to let stand the famous passage in which Mr. Disraeli, in his inimitable and epigrammatic style, summed up the character and career of the Minister he had so bitterly opposed. He was not,

notwithstanding his unrivalled powers of despatching affairs, the greatest Minister this country ever produced, because, twice placed at the helm, and on the second occasion with the Court and Parliament equally devoted to him, he never could maintain himself in power. Nor, notwithstanding his consummate parliamentary tactics, was he the greatest of party leaders, for he contrived to destroy the most compact, powerful, and devoted party that ever followed a statesman. Nor, notwithstanding his great sway in debate, was he the greatest of orators, for in many of the supreme requisites of oratory he was singularly deficient. But what he really was, and what posterity will acknowledge him to have been, is the greatest Member of Parliament that ever lived. Peace to his ashes! His name will be often appealed to in that scene which he loved so well, and never without homage even by his opponents.

If, when those lines were written, they fell under the notice of the Sovereign, she must have read them with mixed feelings of acquiescence in their truth, and of resentment against the hand that had penned them. It must have seemed then to her and the Prince almost a sacrilege to find the memory of the friend and adviser, so recently honoured, treated with qualified though warm approval by the politician who in life had so bitterly traduced him. Yet time has curious revenges; for that politician was not only in later days to endorse as Minister much of the policy which Peel inaugurated, but was to stand, both as Minister and friend, in an even closer relation to the Queen than Peel himself ever occupied.

REGINALD B. BRETT.

OLD WENLOCK AND ITS FOLKLORE

THE old town and borough of Much Wenlock, in Shropshire, lies at the foot of the Edge and is encircled by hills. To the east of the little town rise the stately ruins of St. Milburg's Church, whilst beside them stands the prior's house, still a dwelling-house, in good preservation. Medieval customs and traditions have lingered on later than in most places, and the names of many of the streets savour of the past. There is even now a Bull Ring and a Spital Street (a corruption of Hospital Street). The Spital in the days of the abbey was an asylum where the poor and sick could go for a night's lodging, and also served as a shelter for wearied travellers and pilgrims. Above the vicarage rises a green meadow still called the Cockpit. Here in old days the whole village used to turn out and witness the cruel sport that took place there.

In a fine old stone house which was formerly called Ashfield Hall (the town house of the Lawleys, and which was afterwards turned into an inn, and known as the 'Blue Bridge') some workmen who were repairing the house found, in 1853, a roll of parchment. The house at that time belonged to Dr. Brookes. Unfortunately only one sheet was saved, as the men destroyed the rest, alleging that they were sure none of the quality would wish to soil theirselves with such old rubbish.' The document saved related to the resignation of the priory of Bermondsey by John of Cusancia to Henry, superior of the priory of Wenlock, and is dated 1360.

Sir Thomas Botelar, the first Protestant vicar of Much Wenlock, gives a charming description of an entertainment held there, by desire of the burgesses of the town, at the house of Mr. R. Lawley of the Ash, to my Lord Bishop of Worcester, President of the Marches of Wales, and Justice Townsynde, on their way to Bridgnorth,' in 1554. We are told that 'the mansion was decked in the best manner, and that silver plate was placed before them, and that they partook of cakes, fine wafers, wyne white and claret, and sack,' and that when they rose the distinguished guests gave great and gentle thanks.' Charles I. dated some despatches thence, and tradition says slept one night there.

Wenlock still has its stocks, and formerly had its pillory. The

whipping-posts and irons can be seen in the lower part of the old market hall. The gallows was on the Edge top. 'Scolds' and 'shrews' as a punishment were made to wear a bridle. This was a kind of iron helmet which fitted on tightly to the mouth and prevented any movement of the tongue. There was also a cucking or cuckold stool, for ducking women of evil life.

The old folk can many of them remember seeing women wear the bridle, men whipped round the town, and boys and men punished for milder delinquencies by imprisonment in the stocks.

An old friend of mine, Mrs. Swyney, said to me, 'Often have I seen poor Judy Cookson walked round the town in the shrew's bridle. 'Er was said to be the best abuser in the borough, and 'er wud go and curse anybody for three-ha'pence-that was the fee.' Mrs. Swyney's mother once, moved to generous pity at the sight of this brutal punishment, exclaimed that she 'didn't care how much a woman 'ad sinned, no living soul could deserve that torture;' for I heard 'it punished a Christian terrible,' and once during the operation of wearing it 'the poor creature's face streamed with blood, and two teeth fell out in removing the bridle.' Prisoners were whipped from the dungeon below the Guildhall to the White Hart Inn, and so round the town. After they were whipped their stripes were washed with salt and water, and they were let go. All punishments were inflicted on Mondays-market days. Mrs. Swyney was wont to say, 'Judy used to abuse Sir Watkin's agent something terrible, 'im as they called "King Collins," for 'e did what 'e listed and none durst say 'im nay. She was a fearsome pelrollick, it is true, was Judy, but I never knowed as the bridle did 'er any good. It makes me swimey-headed,' the old lady would add, 'only to think of those Mondays, with the relatives all cursing and crying, the lads laughing and jeering, and the lawyer men looking on to see as their law was carried out.'

Every intelligent foreigner believes that during the last century Englishmen habitually bought and sold their wives at Smithfield. A similar case took place at Wenlock some sixty years ago. Mrs. Swyney has often told me the story of how a man by the name of Yates sold his wife, Mattie," to a man called Richards.' Yates brought in his missus in a cart, with a halter round her neck, from Brocton, and sold her for 2s. 6d. When Yates got to the marketplace 'e turned shy, and tried to get out of the business, but Mattie mad' un stick to it. 'Er flipt her apern in 'er gude man's face, and said, “Let be, yer rogue. I wull be sold; I wants a change.' Contrary to what might have been expected, Mattie's second marriage turned out very happily, and she and Richards lived for many years amicably in the Bull Ring. My old friend has often told me that formerly they didn't mess with one baby at a time in christening, but took a whole family at once.' 'I was baptized,' she said, 'with

my brothers Absalom and Beulah, and my sisters Lizzie and Annmeralda. We was five, and we was done by Parson Tinkler. I mind me I was right plaized, for I made out I had left my sins behind me, and mother she 'a gav us suet dumplings and sugar with our baked apples.'

Once I asked Mrs. Swyney whether she thought the girls of the present day better off than the maidens of her own time. 'Nay, madam,' was her reply,' they get higher wage than ever I did, 'tis true; but then,' she added severely, 'they're so lifted up with pride that there's mony a one as clems her belly to embellish her back. Now, there's my great-niece Sarah,' she added with acrimony; 'she's up in a balloon of pride, and her stomach is a-puffled up as high as a fancy puffler pigeon when she goes to church in her feathers and 'er furbelows or walks with her Joe on Sundays. They dus but little work, the wenches, now. When my brother Beulah was but a shaver they made him crow-boy to Farmer Smout, and I was only a shred of a maid when I worked in Squire Forester's gang at weeding and such like. We used oftentimes,' continued the old lady, to see the old gentleman ride out in scarlet with a poweration of gay ladies. The quality then knew 'ow to behave theirselves.' After that, my old friend continued, 'I went to work at the Downes farm. Harvest time was very different to what it is now. In them days there was brewing and baking. Why, us used to bake eight bushels in a day when us 'ad the thirty Welshmen for the mowing as slept in the barn, and the maister used to kill a sheep every day, and there was nought but the bones left come candle time.'

In the last century and even up to the twenties in this I have been told by Mrs. Swyney that girls who got 'overseen '—in other words, who had lost their good name-had to pay penance in church. 'I mind me,' my old friend once told me, ' of a certain Betty Beaman. She and I used to meet at the pump when us did the washing for Farmer Smout. One day as I was holding the pail and she was apumping in 'er burst into tears, for 'er was a-thinking, poor crittur, of 'er young days. 'Er said, "Sally, I bain't what I was, and never shall be, afore I paid penance. That's many a year agone, but standin' up in that there white sheet 'a took something out of me that'll never cum back. The spirit left me, and ever sin', though I can eat my wittles regler, somehow I 'ave a-lived like in the dust. Sure, I 'opes when I goes as some un will 'elp the good Lord to misremember all about me."

In Old Wenlock there was much hard drinking. An old acquaintance of mine, Farmer Tudor, has endless memories of the rollicking bouts indulged in by the gentry and in coarser forms by the young farmers of his youth. It was very dangerous in those days,' he has often told me, to refuse to get drunk in company, for 'the man who wud na pass the bottle bain't a true man' was a received axiom.

My old friend on one occasion after a christening refused to partake not ‘wisely but too well.' Owing to this a quarrel sprang up. The host took off his stockings, and flinging the empty bottles against the door swore that nobody should walk out but bare-footed and over the broken glass. Farmer Tudor, however, being a man of mettle, jumped up and declared that he liked good-fellowship, but wud not get drunk for any man.' As he spoke he seized his opportunity, slipt out of his chair, dashed out of the room, and leapt on hist hill pony, and away he went. A general howl of execration followed his exit, and one big hulking fellow, by name Enoch Lindop, tottered on to his feet and swore he would do for the ' mean-spirited milksop.' Thus saying he took up from a corner a heavy hunting whip with an iron handle, and leading out his big grey mare, rode after my poor friend in hot pursuit. A terrible chase took place over hill and down rocky lanes, with the clear moonlight shining overhead. The plucky mountain pony galloped like a deer, whilst the powerful grey followed close at its heels, and the quiet night rang with the curses of its rider and his vows of vengeance. 'Never,' said my old friend, 'had I such a desperate run with the Wheatland hounds, for I knew I was riding for my life. Lindop was drunk—not drunk enough to tumble off, but drunk enough to kill me in his blind and masterful rage. I felt like a hunted hare. Happily at last I reached the hill above Wenlock. Then I knew I was safe, for the pony was as surefooted as a cat, and I let him come down full speed and dashed up the High Street with a wild clatter that brought a night-cap or two to the closed windows. I was just in time to jump off my little beast, rush up the covered passage that led to my house, enter the door, and lock it securely after me. Through the window I saw the brutal Lindop lash poor Bob with a yell of fury. A second later and I beheld my little steed tear wildly down the street in one direction and my enemy at equal speed disappear down the other.'"

Dr. Brookes, one of our leading burgesses, has told me that when he was elected an hereditary burgess he was requested during the dinner at the Raven Hotel to drink the old accustomed toast out of the mace-Prosperation to the Corporation.'

He, however, declined to do so, as he was told that he must empty the silver cup.

Upon this one of the leading officials present arose and said, 'Doctor, Doctor, don't disgrace yourself."

I have been told that in the early part of the century the people of Wenlock were a very turbulent, hot-headed race. The men were very big, strong, and prone to drink and fight. 'We mightn't ha' been lords then,' an old man once said to me, but we all thought as it was our birthright to get drunk when us was so minded, so long as us did it respectable, as well as to sell our votes if us did that honest. But parsons then they warn't the mighty hunters after wice as they