The Natural History of Wiltshire Part 15

CHAPTER XIII REPTILS AND INSECTS.

[THIS Chapter contains several extraordinary recipes for medicines to be compounded in various ways from insects and reptiles. As a specimen one of them may he referred to which begins as follows:-"Calcinatio Bufonum. R. Twenty great fatt toades; in May they are the best; putt them alive in a pipkin; cover it, make a fire round it to the top; let them stay on the fire till they make no noise," &c. &c. Aubrey says that Dr. Thomas Willis mentions this medicine in his tractat De Febribus, and describes it as a special remedy for the plague and other diseases.-J. B.]

No snakes or adders at Chalke, and toades very few: the nitre in the chalke is inimique to them. No snakes or adders at Harcot-woods belonging to -- Gawen, Esq.; but in the woods of Compton Chamberleyn adjoyning they are plenty. At South Wraxhall and at Colern Parke, and so to Mouncton-Farley, are adders.

In Sir James Long's parke at Draycot-Cerne are grey lizards; and no question in other places if they were look't after; but people take them for newts. They are of that family. About anno 1686 a boy lyeing asleep in a garden felt something dart down his throat, which killed him: 'tis probable 'twas a little newt. They are exceeding nimble: they call them swifts at Newmarket Heath. When I was a boy a young fellow slept on the gra.s.se: after he awak't, happening to putt his hand in his pocket, something bitt him by the top of his finger: he shak't it suddenly off so that he could not perfectly discerne it. The biteing was so venomous that it overcame all help, and he died in a few hours:-

"Virus edax superabat opera: penituaq{ue} receptum Ossibus, et toto corpore pestis erat."- OVID. FASTOR.

Sir George Ent, M.D. had a tenant neer Cambridge that was stung with an adder. He happened not to dye, but was spotted all over. One at Knahill in Wilts, a neighbour of Dr. Wren's, was stung, and it turned to a leprosy. (From Sr. Chr. Wren.)

At Neston Parke (Col. W. Eire's) in Cosham parish are huge snakes, an ell long; and about the Devises snakes doe abound.

Toades are plentifull in North Wilts.h.i.+re: but few in the chalkie countreys. In sawing of an ash 2 foot + square, of Mr. Saintlowe's, at Knighton in Chalke parish, was found a live toade about 1656; the sawe cutt him asunder, and the bloud came on the under-sawyer's hand: he thought at first the upper-sawyer had cutt his hand. Toades are oftentimes found in the milstones of Darbys.h.i.+re.

Snailes are everywhere; but upon our downes, and so in Dorset, and I believe in Hamps.h.i.+re, at such degree east and west, in the summer time are abundance of very small snailes on the gra.s.se and come, not much bigger, or no bigger than small pinnes heads. Though this is no strange thing among us, yet they are not to be found in the north part of Wilts, nor on any northern wolds. When I had the honour to waite on King Charles I.* and the Duke of York to the top of Silbury hill, his Royal Highnesse happened to cast his eye on some of these small snailes on the turfe of the hill. He was surprised with the novelty, and commanded me to pick some up, which I did, about a dozen or more, immediately; for they are in great abundance. The next morning as he was abed with his Dutches at Bath he told her of it, and sent Dr.

Charleton to me for them, to shew her as a rarity.

* [This should be "Charles II." who visited Avebury and Silbury Hill, in company with his brother, afterwards James II., in the autumn of the year 1663, when Aubrey attended them by the King's command. See his account of the royal visit, in the Memoir of Aubrey, 4to. 1845.

- J. B.]

In the peacefull raigne of King James I. the Parliament made an act for provision of rooke-netts and catching crows to be given in charge of court-barons, which is by the stewards observed, but I never knew the execution of it. I have heard knowing countreymen affirme that rooke-wormes, which the crows and rookes doe devour at sowing time, doe turne to chafers, which I think are our English locusts: and some yeares wee have such fearfull armies of them that they devour all manner of green things; and if the crowes did not destroy these wormes, it would oftentimes happen. Parliaments are not infallible, and some thinke they were out in this bill.

Bees. Hamps.h.i.+re has the name for the best honey of England, and also the worst; sc. the forest honey: but the south part of Wilts.h.i.+re having much the like turfe must afford as good, or little inferiour to it. 'Tis pitty these profitable insects should loose their lives for their industry.

"Flebat Aristaeus, quod Apes c.u.m stirpe necatas Viderat incoeptos dest.i.tuisse favos."-OVID. FAST. lib. i.

A plaster of honey effectually helpeth a bruise. (From Mr. Francis Potter, B. D., of Kilmanton.) It seemes to be a rational medicine: for honey is the extraction of the choicest medicinal flowers.

Mr. Butler of Basingstoke, in Hamps.h.i.+re, who wrote a booke of Bees, had a daughter he called his honey-girle; to whom, when she was born, he gave certain stocks of bees; the product of which when she came to be married, was 400li. portion.

(From -- Boreman, of Kingston-upon- Thames, D.D.)

Mr. Harvey, at Newcastle, gott 80li. per annum by bees. (I thinke Varro somewhere writes that in Spaine two brothers got almost as much yearly by them.- J. EVELYN.) Desire of Mr. Hook, R.S.S. a copie of the modelle of his excellent bee-hive, March 1684-5; better than any yet known. See Mr. J. Houghton's Collections, No. 1683, June, where he hath a good modelle of a bee-hive, pag. 166. Mr. Paschal hath an ingeniouse contrivance for bees at Chedsey; sc. they are brought into his house. Bee-hive at Wadham College, Oxon; see Dr. Plott's Oxfords.h.i.+re, p. 263.

Heretofore, before our plantations in America, and consequently before the use of sugar, they sweetened their [drink, &c.] with honey; as wee doe now with sugar. The name of honey-soppes yet remaines, but the use is almost worne out. (At Queen's College, Oxon, the cook treats the whole hall with honey-sops on Good Friday at dinner. - BISHOP TANNER.) Now, 1686, since the great increase of planting of sugar-canes in the Barbados, &c. sugar is but one third of the price it was at thirty yeares since. In the time of the Roman Catholique religion, when a world of wax candles were used in the churches, bees-wax was a considerable commodity.

To make Metheglyn:-(from Mistress Hatchman. This receipt makes good Metheglyn; I thinke as good as the Devises). Allow to every quart of honey a gallon of water; and when the honey is dissolved, trie if it will beare an egg to the breadth of three pence above the liquor; or if you will have it stronger putt in more honey. Then set it on the fire, and when the froth comes on the toppe of it, skimme it cleane; then crack eight or ten hen-egges and putt in the liquor to cleare it: two or three handfulls of sweet bryar, and so much of muscovie, and sweet marjoram the like quant.i.ty; some doe put sweet cis, or if you please put in a little of orris root. Boyle all these untill the egges begin to look black, (these egges may be enough for a hoggeshead,) then straine it forth through a fine sieve into a vessell to coole; the next day tunne it up in a barrell, and when it hath workt itself cleare, which will be in about a weeke's time, stop it up very close, and if you make it strong enough, sc. to carry the breadth of a sixpence, it will keep a yeare. This receipt is something neer that of Mr. Thorn. Piers of the Devises, the great Metheglyn-maker. Metheglyn is a pretty considerable manufacture in this towne time out of mind.

I doe believe that a quant.i.ty of mountain thyme would be a very proper ingredient; for it is most wholesome and fragrant [Aubrey also gives another "receipt to make white metheglyn," which he obtained "from old Sir Edward Baynton, 1640." I have seen this old English beverage made by my grandmother, as here described.-J. B.]

Mr. Francis Potter, Rector of Kilmanton, did sett a hive of bees in one of the lances of a paire of scales in a little closet, and found that in summer dayes they gathered about halfe a pound a day; and one day, which he conceived was a honey-dew, they gathered three pounds wanting a quarter. The hive would be something lighter in the morning than at night. Also he tooke five live bees and putt them in a paper, which he did cutt like a grate, and weighed them, and in an hower or two they would wast the weight of three or four wheatcornes. He bids me observe their thighes in a microscope. (Upon the Brenta river, by Padua in Italy, they have hives of bees in open boates; the bees goe out to feed and gather till the honey-dews are spent neer the boate; and then the bee master rows the boate to a fresh place, and by the sinking of the boate knows when to take the honey, &c.- J. EVELYN.)

CHAPTER XIV.

OF MEN AND WOEMEN.

[THE following instances of remarkable longevity, monstrous births, &c. will suffice to shew the nature of this Chapter. It must be admitted that its contents are unimportant except as matters of curious speculation, and as connected with the several localities referred to.-J. B.]

A PROVERB: -

'Salisbury Plain Never without a thief or twain.'

As to the temper and complexion of the men and woemen, I have spoken before in the Prolegomena.

As to longaeevity, good aire and water doe conduce to it: but the inhabitants are also to tread on dry earth; not nitrous or vitriolate, that hurts the nerves. South and North Wilts.h.i.+re are wett and dampish soiles. The stone walles in the vale here doe also cast a great and unwholsome dampe. Eighty-four or eighty-five is the age the inhabitants doe rarely exceed. But I have heard my worthy friend George Johnson of Bowdon, Esq., one of the judges in North Wales, say that he did observe in his circuit, sc. Montgomery, Flint, and Denbigh, that men lived there as commonly to an hundred yeares as with us to eighty. Mr. Meredith Lloyd hath seen at Dolkelly, a great parish in Merioniths.h.i.+re, an hundred or more of poore people at eighty yeares of age at church in a morning, who came thither bare-foot and bare-legged a good way.

In the chancell of Winterborn Ba.s.set lies interred Mr. Ambrose Brown, who died 166-,aged 103 yeares. Old goodwife Dew of Broad Chalke died about 1649, aged 103. She told me she was, I thinke, sixteen yeares old when King Edward the sixth was in this countrie, and that he lost his courtiers, or his courtiers him, a hunting, and found him again in Falston-lane. In the parish of Stanton St. Quintin are but twenty- three houses, and when Mr. Byron was inducted, 167-, here were eight persons of 80 yeares of age. Mr. Thorn. Lyte of Easton-Piers, my mother's grand- father, died 1626, aged 96; and about 1674 died there old William Kington, a tenant of mine, about 90 yeares of age. A poore woman of Chippenham died about 1684, aged 108 yeares.

Part of an Epitaph at Colinbourne-Kinston in Wilts.h.i.+re, communicated to the Philosophicall Conventus at the Musaeum at Oxford, by Mr.

Arthur Charlett, Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford:- "Pray for the soule of Constantine Darrel, Esq. who died Anno Dni. 1400, and.......

his wife, who died A. Dni. 1495." See it. I doe believe the dates in the inscription are in numerical letters. [In this case the former date was probably left unfinished, when the husband placed the inscription to his wife, and after his death it was neglected to be filled up, as in many other instances. The numerals would be in black letter.- J. B.]

In the chancel at Milsham is an inscription of Isaac Self, a wealthy cloathiers of that place, who died in the 92nd yeare of his age, leaving behind him a numerous offspring; viz. eighty and three in number.

Ella, Countesse of Salisbury, daughter to [William] Longespe, was foundress of Lac.o.c.k Abbey; where she ended her days, being above a hundred yeares old; she outlived her understanding. This I found in an old MS. called Chronicon de Lac.o.c.k in Bibliotheca Cottoniana. [The chronicle referred to was destroyed by the fire which so seriously injured the Cotton MSS. in 1731. The extracts preserved from it do not confirm Aubrey's statements, but place the Countess Ela's death on the ix kal. Sept. 1261, in the 74th year of her age. See Bowles's History of Lac.o.c.k, Appendix, p. v. - J. B.]

Dame Olave, a daughter and coheire of Sir [Henry] Sharington of Lac.o.c.k, being in love with [John] Talbot, a younger brother of the Earle of Shrewsbury, and her father not consenting that she should marry him; discoursing with him one night from the battlements of the Abbey Church, said shee, "I will leap downe to you:" her sweet heart replied he would catch her then; but he did not believe she would have done it. She leap't downe, and the wind, which was then high, came under her coates and did something breake the fall. Mr. Talbot caught her in his armes, but she struck him dead: she cried out for help, and he was with great difficulty brought to life again. Her father told her that since she had made such a leap she should e'en marrie him.

She was my honoured friend Col. Sharington Talbot's grandmother, and died at her house at Lac.o.c.k about 1651, being about an hundred yeares old. Quaere, Sir Jo. Talbot?

[This romantic story seems to have escaped the attention of the venerable historian of Lac.o.c.k, the Rev. Canon Bowles. The late John Carter mentions a tradition of which he was informed on visiting Lac.o.c.k in 1801, to the effect that "one of the nuns jumped from a gallery on the top of a turret there into the arms of her lover." He observes, as impugning the truth of the story, that the gallery "appears to have been the work of James or Charles the First's time."

Aubrey's anecdote has an appearance of authenticity. Its heroine, Olave, or Olivia Sherington, married John Talbot, Esq. of Salwarpe, in the county of Worcester, fourth in descent from John, second Earl of Shrews- bury. She inherited the Lac.o.c.k estate from her father, and it has ever since^ remained the property of that branch of the Talbot family, now represented by the scientific Henry Fox Talbot, Esq.

-J. B.]

The last Lady Prioresse of Priorie St Marie, juxta Kington St.

Michael, was the Lady Mary Dennys, a daughter of the Dennys's of Pocklechurch in Gloucesters.h.i.+re; she lived a great while after the dissolution of the abbeys, and died in Somersets.h.i.+re about the middle or latter end of the raigne of King James the first

The last Lady Abbese of Amesbury was a Kirton, who after the dissolution married to..... Appleton of Hamps.h.i.+re. She had during her life a pension from King Henry VIII.: she was 140 yeares old when she dyed. She was great-great-aunt to Mr. Child, Rector of Yatton Keynell; from whom I had this information. Mr. Child, the eminent banker in Fleet Street, is Parson Child's cosen-german. [The name of the last Abbess of Amesbury was Joan Darell, who surrendered to the King, 4 Dec. 1540. h.o.a.re's Modern Wilts.h.i.+re, Amesbury Hundred, p. 73. J. B.]

When King Charles II. was at Salisbury, 1665, a piper of Stratford sub Castro playd on his tabor and pipe before him, who was a piper in Queen Elizabeth's time, and aged then more than 100.

One goodwife Mills of Yatton Keynel, a tenant of my father's, did dentire in the 88 yeare of her age, which was about the yeare 1645.

The Lord Chancellour Bacon speakes of the like of the old Countesse of Desmond, in Ireland.

Mr. William Gauntlett, of Netherhampton, born at Amesbury, told me that since his remembrance there were digged up in the churchyard at Amesbury, which is very s.p.a.cious, a great number of huge bones, exceeding, as he sayes, the size of those of our dayes. At Highworth, at the signe of the Bull, at one Hartwells, I have been credibly enformed is to be seen a scull of-a vast bignesse, scilicet half as big again as an ordinary one. From Mr. Kich. Brown, Rector of Somerford Magna, (At Wotton in Surrey, where my brother enlarged the vault in which our family are buried, digging away the earth for the foundations, they found a complete skeleton neer nine foot in length, the skull of an extraordinary size. - J. EVELYN.)

George Johnson Esq. bencher of the Middle Temple, digging for marle at Bowdon Parke, Ano. 1666, the diggers found the bones of a man under a quarrie of planke stones: he told me he saw it. He was a serious person, and "fide dignus".

At Wishford Magna is the inscription, "Hic jacet Thomas Bonham, armiger, quondam Patronus istius Ecclesiae, qui quidem Thomas obiit vicesimo nono die Maii, Anno Domini MCCCCLXXIII (1473); el Editha uxor ejus, quae quidem Editha obiit vicesimo s.e.xto die Aprilis, Anno D'ni MCCCCLXIX. (1469). Quorum animabus propitietur Deus.- Amen." They lye both buried under the great marble stone in the nave of this church, where is the above said inscription, above which are their pourtraictures in bra.s.se, and an escucheon now illegible. Beneath this inscription are the small figures of nine young children in bra.s.se.

This Mr. Bonham's wife had two children at one birth, the first time: and he being troubled at it travelled, and was absent seven yeares.

After his returne she was delivered of seven children at one birth. In this parish is a confident tradition that these seven children were all baptized at the font in this church, and that they were brought thither in a kind of chardger, which was dedicated to this church, and hung on two nailes, which are to be seen there yet, neer the bellfree on the south side. Some old men are yet living that doe remember the chardger. This tradition is entred into the register booke there, from whence I have taken this narrative (1659). [See the extract from the register, which is signed by "Roger Powell, Curate there," in h.o.a.re's Modern Wilts. (Hundred of Branch and Dole) p. 49.-J. B.]