my specimens and the spore mass brown; this lichen is stated by Miss Smith to be local and scarce in south-western and northern England.

Physcia orbicularis var. virella (Dalla Torre). 7. Trees near Haw Wood; light-brown when dry, turning bright-green when moistened; not uncommon in England, rarer in other parts of the country; the Haw Wood plants grew with Ph. pulverulenta.

Cladonia subsquamosa (Nyl.). 7. On a stump near Rhododendron Drive; the podetia were radiate-cristate; widely distributed in the British Isles but not common; the fruits are reddish-brown.

Lecanactis premnea (Weddell). 7. Three trees near the King Oak, Savernake Forest; a plant with large black prominent apothecia and whitish thallus which is not uncommon in England.

It is stated above that Lecanora galactina is one of the few lichens that grows in the immediate neighbourhood of large towns; I have seen it on rough-cast walls on the front at Cliftonville, Margate, and its variety dissipata is one of the few lichens of the London area, forming ink-like stains, thallus and apothecia being further blackened by smoke, on composite walls, etc., in the more open districts such as South Kensington, Notting Hill, and Camden Town. Specimens from the two latter localities are in the Natural History Museum at South Kensington.

WIDHILL CHAPEL AND MANOR.

By JOHN SADLER.

There is, or was, in the parish of Cricklade St. Sampson a chapel at Widhill, which was the subject of a suit in the Exchequer Court in the early days of James I. There was also a manor, of which the early history is wanting.

The suit in the Court of Exchequer was brought by Andrew Lenn, the Vicar of Cricklade St. Sampson, against William Bonde, and alleged that the vicars had not only the cure of souls of that parish-being great and replenished with 2000 people and upwards-and that the tithing of Northwiddell had time out of mind been reputed and taken to be part of the parish, and there was a Chapel of Ease called the Chapel of Northwidhill within the parish of Cricklade St. Sampson, being distant a mile and a half from the parish Church, the which chapel had always been parcel and member of the parish Church and dedicated and employed for the service of God, and that the vicars had always celebrated divine service there, and enjoyed the tithes and glebe. The Dean and Chapter of Sarum, the patrons, had presented complainant about five years previously and he had ever since celebrated divine service and preached in the parish Church and also at the Chapel of North widhill and had enjoyed the glebe and tithes, until of late one William Bonde pretending the Chapel of Northwiddhill was a concealed chapel, about June previously procured a grant or lease thereof from the King, by the name of the rectory of Estwiddhill, and did most disorderly enter the said chapel by force, kept possession, tore up the pews and turned the house of prayer into a private dwelling, and brought actions against complainant and others.

Defendant's answer is not on the file: but complainant's replication says the chapel had always been a chapel of ease and was a rectory or parsonage and not founded or used for superstitious uses. It had been called sometimes the Chapel of Widhill, sometimes the Chapel of North widhill, and sometimes the parsonage of Estwidhill, and all were the self-same thing. Iles and Kemble mentioned in the Answer occupied under complainant, and paid tithes to him. [Exchequer B. & A. James I., Wilts 187. P.R.O.]

As appears by the Bill, William Bonde had already brought his action against the vicar and others, including George and Michael Kemble-possibly sons of William Kemble, of Widhill, gent., whose will [P.C.C. 31 Wallopp] was proved 30th May, 1600-and threatened to take the profits of the glebe and the tithes. He does not seem to have met with much success, as the Court on 21st Oct., 1605, ordered him to remove himself from possession of the chapel; to suffer the vicar to say divine service there, to celebrate the sacraments as had been formerly accustomed, and to take to his own use the profits of the glebe and the tithes, upon bond of £40 to the King to answer to the Court if judgment should be given against him upon the information for intrusion. William Bonde was ordered to set up the pews

by him pulled down and to answer the vicar's bill within eight days. [ExcheqDecrees & Orders, 3 Jas. I., Ser. II., vol. 3.]

On 29th November following a further order was made. It appeared that the defendant had not given up possession and a process of attachment had been awarded against him; defendant submitted an affidavit stating that he had then done so and removed his wife and children and household goods and would have done so before if he could have found a house to go to; and that he had endeavoured to put up the pews but could not find a carpenter, but would with all convenient speed cause them to be erected and set up. The Court ordered the attachment to be discharged and the contempt respited until the trial [for intrusion]; Bonde being required, according to his own offer, to build up the pews again before Christmas, and to leave in Court the costs of the attachment before the discharge was sealed. [Ib. vol. 2.]

In the meantime evidence had been taken on Commission at Cricklade on 23rd September, by Sir Henry Bainton, Sir Henry Poole, and Symon James, gent. The witnesses were only five: Robert Waters, husbandman, aged 70; Alce Dennis, aged 80; Peeter Knight, yeoman, aged 30, son-in-law of Robert Withers, late Vicar of Cricklade; Thomas Withers, yeoman, aged 40, brother of the late vicar; and Jynnyver Slatter, husbandman, aged 90; all of Cricklade, except Robert Withers, who was of Bishops Cannings, and all agreed that the Chapel of Est Widhill with the glebe and tithes had always belonged to the Vicars of Cricklade; they had known the parsonage house, but did not know whether there was a parsonage there or not-except in name. Alce Dennis deposed that in Queen Mary's time her father, who was an inhabitant of Estwidhill and paid tithes there, brought an action against Sir John Cockle, then Vicar, for not saying service in the Chapel, and had an order to compel him to serve if he had lived; and said “they used to marrie Christen and Administer the Sacraments theere bothe in the tyme of Supersticon and Sithence." [Excheq Depns., 3, Jas. I., Michaelmas Term, Wilts, No. 45.] These depositions were returned into Court and ordered to be read and used, but counsel for Bonde affirmed that they were taken after the return of the Commission, and they were accordingly suppressed unless good cause to the contrary should be shown. But Robert Pittes, of Kemble, gent., made an affidavit on 9th February [1606] that he engrossed the depositions, which were taken on 23rd Sept., and not on 23rd Oct., as is mentioned in the head and title, and the same was misentered by by him in negligence and for no other object. The Court ordered that the date should be amended and the depositions used; and as the vicar was 'of small living" and craved a speedy hearing, the case was ordered to be heard the first sitting next term. [Excheq. Decrees & Orders, Jas. I., Ser. II.. vol. 3, fo. 166d]

66

On 30th June, 1606, the cause came on for hearing, but, as defendant did not appear, it was postponed for a week, and on 7th July it came up again; defendant again failed to appear, and as it was shown by the records of the Court that after commencing his action against the vicar he had not proceeded to trial, but had (as was certified) commenced a suit in the Court of Common Pleas, the Court finally ordered that the said Andrew Lenn and his successors, Vicars of Cricklade St. Sampson, should quietly enjoy the

said chapel, glebe, and tithes as parcel of the said vicarage, &c., until on a new bill to be brought by the said Bonde on other and better matter to be showed and proved, it should be otherwise ordered. And it was further ordered that the said Bonde was not to proceed further against the said Lenn concerning the premises, but was to pay 40s. to plaintiff towards his charges for wrongful vexation.

THE MANOR.

Widehille and Wildehille are mentioned in Domesday, and Canon Jones considered them to be different portions of Widhill," the name now of some farms in the parishes of Broad and Little Blunsdon"; the first probably North Widhill, which was held of Alured of Marlbrough, and the other he considered to be West Widhill, which was held by Tetbald and Humfrey, two of the King's officers.

I can find nothing definite about the manor until, soon after the lawsuit already mentioned, it came into the hands of Robert Jenner, whom I cannot satisfactorily identify. He was grantee, with his wife, Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Longston, citizen and grocer of London, then deceased, of a tenement with garden and orchard, and an inn called the Swan, in Dartford, Kent, from his brother-in-law, Henry Longston, in satisfaction of his wife's portion and of her claim in the estate of her father under the custom of the City of London. Robert Jenner is described as a citizen and goldsmith of London in the indenture of conveyance dated 16th December, 1625. [Close Rolls, 2 Chas. I., pt. 2, No. 18.]

Two years later he figures as a Wiltshire landowner. An indenture of 15th November, 1627, between Thomas Cooke, of Cote, gent., and Robert Jenner, of Widhill [Close Rolls, 3 Chas. I., pt. 19, No. 12.], recites that Thomas Cooke of New Sarum, merchant, by indenture of 23rd May, 28 Henry VII., granted to Edward Tame, of Fairford, all his lands, &c., in Widhill at a yearly rent of £3, which rent had descended to Thomas Cooke of Cote; and Robert Jenner, being then lawfully seised of the fee of the lands, Thomas Cooke sold to him the annual rent of £3. It is not shown how Robert Jenner acquired possession of Widhill, whether by purchase or inheritance, as nothing earlier on the subject has come to light. His dealings in land were not confined to Widhill; he had about this time purchased the manor of Eysey from Sir John Hungerford, of Down Ampney, and Sir Anthony Hungerford, his son, apparently in the names of himself, John Jenner, of Crudwell, yeoman, and William Gibbs, citizen and goldsmith of London; for on 2nd March, 4 Charles I., John Jenner and Wm. Gibbs, in performance of the trust reposed in them by Robert Jenner, conveyed to him all their estate in the manor of Eysey, lately purchased by him of Sir John and Sir Anthony Hungerford [1b. 6 Charles I., pt. 7, No. 11]. He did not, however, keep this manor of Eysey long, but sold it 17th November, 1630, and two closes called Farmer's Closes, heretofore one, in Eysey and Latton, in conjunction with John Jenner and Wm. Gibbs, to Edmund Dunche, of Little Wyttenham, Berks. [Ib., 6 Charles I., pt. 10, No. 32.] Some years later, on 14th February, 23 Charles 1. (1648), he purchased the manor of Marston Meysey and all the property there, which had belonged to the Bishop of Salisbury,for £1092 12s. 9d., from the trustees of Parliament for the

sale of lands and possessions of the late Archbishop and Bishops. [1b. 23 Charles I., pt. 11, No. 6.] Marston Meysey was then part of the ecclesiastical parish of Meysey Hampton, in Gloucestershire; and according to a petition to Parliament from the inhabitants it appears that there had formerly been a Chapel of Ease there, part of which still remained but had been converted to other uses by the late Bishops and their tenants or farmers, and the inhabitants asked permission to re-build and prayed that the tithes and duties arising locally might be assigned to them for the benefit of a godly and pious divine to preach to them, &c. Parliament by an ordinance in April, 1648, gave permissiou for building a Chapel or Church where the former Chapel stood, and for the use of the materials thereof the said Chapel to be a parochial Church called by the name of Marston Mesey; and the bounds and limits as they were known to lie in the County of Wilts to be the bounds and limits of the parish of Marston Meysey: the Church to be a rectory; the incumbents to be from time to time, and at all times "eligible" by Robert Jenner and his heirs and assigns, and presentable only by Robert Jenner, being lord of the manor, his heirs and assigns, as the patron; the two parishes of Meysey Hampton and Marston Meysey to be several and distinct, discharged from all parochial duty, to each other, except that the Rector of Marston Meysey was to pay to the Rector of Meysey Hampton £6 14s. towards the first fruits at such times as they should be due and payable by the Rector of Meysey Hampton. [Lords' Journal, 22nd April, 1648.]

Robert Jenner died 7th December, 1651, and was buried in Cricklade St. Sampson's Church, where there is an altar tomb with an inscription to his memory [Sir T. Phillipps], describing him as a citizen and goldsmith of London, and aged 67. It records his gifts of eight almshouses in the Abbie of Malmesbury, with £40 a year for their maintenance, and a free school to "this" parish, with £20 a year for its maintenance; his building of the parish Church of Marston Meysey "at his own Proper Cost and Charge" and his gifts to London-£20 to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, £15 to the Goldsmiths' Company, for fifteen of the poorest men of the company, £5 to the poor of St. John Zacharias Parish, and £5 to the poor of St. Leonard's Parish in Foster Lane, all yearly for ever. It will be observed that there is no mention of any family or local connection. John Jenner, of Crudwell, was presumably his brother; He made his will 29th October, 1647 [P.C.C. 114 Pembroke], leaving the residue of his goods, &c., to his kinsman, Henry Ottrig, his exor., and appointing his brother, Robert Jenner, one of the overseers; but he mentions no children. The Visitation of Gloucestershire 1682—3 [Edn. Fenwick & Metcalfe] has a pedigree of Oatridge, of Butler's Court, Lechlade, which begins with Simon Oatridge, of Garsdon, Wilts, who married Jane, sister of Robert Jenner, of Widhill, Esq., and had seven sons, including Henry, Robert, Daniel, and John, and a daughter, Abigail-names which all appear in the will of Robert Jenner. But there were other Jenners in the neighbourhood, as the same will plainly shows [P.C.C. 242 Grey]. By it Robert Jenner left £200 a year and a house in Foster Lane, London, to his wife for life; the manor of Marston Meysie to Robert Jenner, son of William Jenner the elder, of Marston Meysie; the advowson of the rectory there to