CHAPTER XIITHE EARLS OF THE COUNTY PALATINE

Norman Arches, S. John's. Chester

Towards the end of the eleventh century the clever Norman masons, who loved to invent new patterns and vary their work, introduced other forms of ornamentation such as the 'billet' and 'lozenge' and 'scollop' in their mouldings, and adorned the capitals and even the pillars with rich carving. Carved pillars may be seen in the Norman arcade in the cloisters at Chester.

Cloisters, Chester: Portion of First Norman Abbey of S. Werburgh

The head of a Norman doorway is sometimes filled with a semicircular stone called a tympanum, usually coveredwith a carved picture of some scriptural subject. The tympanum over the door of the Norman chapel at Prestbury represents Christ seated in glory.

Norman Doorway with Tympanum, Prestbury

The Norman windows, like the doorways, were round-headed. The tiny window in the chancel at Woodchurch shows us that they were often mere slits on the outer face of the wall, widening considerably towards the inner face in order that the light entering through the narrowopening might be diffused as much as possible. Very few Norman windows have been allowed to remain in Cheshire, for nearly all have been replaced by larger ones of a different style at a later date when more light was needed.

Norman Window, Woodchurch, showing wide splay inside

The font is sometimes the sole remaining portion of the older Norman church in which it once stood. In the modern church of Wallasey is an ancient font, which by the arcade of semicircular arches carved upon it is evidently the work of the Norman builders, and belonged to the Norman church that formerly stood on the site of the present building. The font of similar pattern atGrappenhall was dug up during a restoration three feet below the floor of the present church, where it had lain for centuries, and there are Norman fonts at Eastham, Bebington, and Burton. In addition to those already spoken of, the churches of Bebington, Bruera, Frodsham, Church Lawton, and Barthomley contain portions of Norman work in some shape or form.

Norman Font at Wallasey

The Norman style of architecture is rarely copied nowadays in the building of churches, being considered too massive and sombre as well as costly. Boys who live in Wirral should, however, walk to the village of Thornton Heath, where they may see a new church built entirely in this style, with every detail copied faithfully from famous old Norman churches.

Other Norman barons were not slow to follow the example of their overlord the Earl of Chester. In 1150 Hamon de Massey, Baron of Dunham Massey, built a priory at Birkenhead for sixteen Benedictine monks. The tolls from a ferry across the Mersey were granted to them for their support, the charges being 'for a horseman two-pence, for a man on foot one farthing, a halfpenny for a footman on market days, and a penny when he had goods or produce with him'. The name of 'Monks Brow' still marks the landing-place of the ferry on the Cheshire side of the estuary. The monks were also freed from attendance at the 'Hundred' Court of the Wirral. The manorsof Tranmere, Bebington, Saughall Massey, and Claughton were also given to the priory, and the priors sat in the council or parliament of the Earls of Chester. The ruined refectory is the only portion of the priory now remaining.

The Abbey of S. Werburgh received grants of land from Earl Hugh's barons as well as a large number of churches and manors from the earl himself. In the course of time one-fourth of the entire city of Chester became the property of the abbey. The abbot also had the right of taking the tolls at the annual fair held at Chester at the Feast of S. Werburgh. The fair lasted for three days, during which time even criminals might visit the city to make their purchases without danger of arrest.

Arms of the See of Chester

Chester had in fact rapidly become the chief seat of trade in the north-west of England, and when the Conqueror ordered the sees of the bishoprics to be removed from thinly populated centres to the large towns, Peter, the first Norman bishop of Lichfield, left Lichfield 'a sordid and desert place' and came to Chester, 'a city of renown,' making the church of S. John his cathedral. Chester did not, however, keep this honour long, for Peter's successor removed to the rich monastery of Coventry. Hence it is that you find three mitres on the arms of the bishopric of Chester.

Earl Hugh Lupus died in the second year of the reign of Henry the First. Three days before his death he had put on the cowl and robe of a Benedictine monk and entered his own monastery at Chester. He was buried in the abbey cemetery, and his only son Richard, a boy of seven years of age, inherited the earldom.

The Abbey of Combermere was founded for another brotherhood of monks called Cistercians. Their 'rule' was even more strict than that of the Benedictines. They wore neither boots nor cowl, and for a portion of the year were allowed but one meal a day; nor were they permitted even to speak to one another. In 1178, John, Baron of Halton, to secure the safety of body and soul previous to making a pilgrimage to Palestine, built a Cistercian abbey at Stanlaw, a dreary spot on the shore of the Mersey estuary, and a third house of the same Order was founded at Pulton on the Dee by Robert Pincerna, butler to Earl Randle II. Stanlaw was almost wholly destroyed by a huge tidal wave which swept up the Mersey, and the monks were removed to Whalley on the banks of the Lancashire Calder. The monks, doubtless, were not sorry for the change, for by the end of the twelfth century the majority of them had grown tired of the simple life, and, becoming more luxurious in their way of living, preferred to build their homes in delectable river valleys, where they could fish the streams to their hearts' content.

Pulton Abbey was not more fortunate, and was much too near to the Welsh to be a comfortable place to live in. The Welsh visits were so frequent and unpleasant that the monastery was abandoned and the monks placed in a fine new abbey at Dieulacresse in Staffordshire.

The monks who kept the abbey records were not always very particular about the truth of the events they relate. They were very superstitious, and ready to believe any story that would increase the fame of their founders, or of their patron saints, to whom they ascribed the power of performing miracles. The story is told that when Earl Richard was making a pilgrimage to the holy well of S. Winifred in Flintshire he was attacked by a band of Welsh insurgents and compelled to take refuge ina neighbouring monastery. He prayed for aid to S. Werburgh, who is said to have instantly parted the waters of the Dee by making new sandbanks, over which the Constable of Chester marched troops to the relief of his lord. These banks were long after known as the Constable's sands.

In the western porch beneath the tower of Prestbury Church are a number of fragments of broken grave-slabs of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. On nearly all is carved a cross, the head of which is usually enclosed within a circle, the ends of the limbs of the cross consisting of a triple lily, the favourite emblem of the Norman sculptors. One only of these fragments tells us over whose remains the slab was placed. An inscription, in which the lettersVIVYN Dare clearly seen, tells us that this fragment formed part of the tombstone of Vivian Davenport, Chief Forester of the Forest of Macclesfield. Hunting was the favourite sport of the Normans, and in Cheshire, as elsewhere, large tracts of forest land were enclosed for the protection of deer and game, and the amusement of the Norman knights. The Conqueror himself set the example by making the New Forest in the south of England, and shortly afterwards the Earl of Cheshire enclosed the Forests of Mara or Delamere in the west and Macclesfield in the eastern part of the county.

The forest laws were very strict. William the Conqueror did not indeed punish offenders with death, but he ordained that 'whoso slew hart or hind man should blind him, that none should touch the harts or the wild-boars, and he made the hare go free. So mightily did he love the high deer as though he were their father. His rich men bewailed it and the poor murmured at it, but he was so stark he recked not of them all.' Theforest laws of Rufus were far more severe, and caused fierce hatred among his poorer subjects. The forests became the haunt of robbers and outlaws, who clothed themselves in suits of 'Lincoln green', the better to escape being seen in the greenwood. Foresters were appointed, whose duty it was to hunt out these lawlessand rebellious men, as well as to preserve the game of the forest.

Grave-slabs at Prestbury

Hugh Lupus made John Done of Utkinton and his heirs Chief Bowbearer and Forester of his Forest of Delamere. The Dones had the right to kill deer and game, take swarms of wild bees, the fallen trees, and such small game as 'foxes, hares, weasels, and other like vermin'; their badge of office was a black bugle horn tipped with gold. Their hunting-seat or 'Chamber in the Forest' was served by ten keepers and two woodsmen. Some of their descendants were buried at Tarporley, and on one of the tombs you may see the badge of the bugle carved.

Earl Richard, the successor of 'the Wolf', married Matilda, niece of King Henry I and a daughter of Stephen of Blois. He was drowned with his wife on his return from France when the ill-fated White Ship went down in 1119.

The next earl was Randle of Meschines. He was one of King Henry the First's chief fighting-men, and led the van at the Battle of Tinchebrai against the king's elder brother Robert.

His son, Randle the Second, played a great part in the civil war of King Stephen's reign. Stephen was quite unable to curb his barons as his predecessors had done, and the Earl of Chester was unruly and ambitious. In addition to his Earldom of Cheshire, he had succeeded to vast estates in Lincoln and the Midlands. His power and influence was so great that he ruled over an extent of country hardly smaller than the ancient Earldom of Mercia. Stephen refused to add the city of Carlisle to the already numerous possessions of the earl, who in anger declared himself on the side of Stephen's rival Matilda when she took up arms, and became one of Stephen's most bitter and active enemies.

The king took Randle prisoner by a stratagem, and the monks of Pulton Abbey were commanded to pray for the earl's safety. When at length he was set free, the earl in a moment of gratitude gave the monks permission to fish the waters of the Dee, and freed them from the tollwhich they were accustomed to pay for grinding their corn in the Dee Mills at Chester. Under the Norman rule the use of handmills, such as the Saxons had used, was strictly forbidden, and everybody had to send his corn to be ground in the mill belonging to his lord.

When the Welsh heard of the earl's captivity they took advantage of his absence and ravaged the county of Cheshire, but were defeated in a battle at Nantwich in 1146 by Robert of Montalt.

Randle died in the same year as King Stephen, and was succeeded by Hugh Kyvelioc. This second Earl Hugh enclosed large stretches of forest-land in East Cheshire, and gave the chief forestership to Richard Davenport. It is Richard's grandson Vivian whose grave-slab we have seen in the church at Prestbury.

To Vivian Davenport's office was also joined the office of Hereditary Grand Serjeant of the Hundred of Macclesfield. The Grand Serjeant received twelve pounds six shillings and eightpence a year, and a fee of two shillings and a salmon for the capture of a master-robber, and one shilling for a common thief. Human life was held cheap in those days. The robbers when caught were beheaded, and their heads sent to Chester, where they were publicly shown as a warning to others. Descendants of the Davenports live now at Capesthorne, and their peculiar crest, a robber's head with a rope round the neck, recalls the gruesome duties of their ancestors.

A portion of the Forest was held by the Venables in return for providing thirty-three huntsmen on hunting days. The Downes of Taxal held their land more cheaply on the northern limits of the Forest, which is now Lyme Park, 'by the blast of a horn on Midsummer Day and one pepper-corn yearly.' Near Overton is a spot still called Gallows Yard, where the Downes had power to execute robbers and criminals. In Lyme Park you may see to this day the red deer that are descended from their wild ancestors of Macclesfield Forest.

When Hugh Kyvelioc was Earl of Chester, Henry the Second ruled England and the greater part of France. He also received at Chester the homage of the King ofScotland. But in the later years of his reign he found it hard to keep together the widely scattered parts of his empire. Rebellions were frequent, and his wife, his sons, and his barons all took up arms against him. Among his discontented barons none was more unruly than Hugh Kyvelioc, who stirred up Brittany against Henry, but he was captured in battle and brought to England. In the great rising of 1173 Geoffrey of Costantin, one of Henry's sons, held the castle of Stockport against the king. Not a stone of this castle is to be seen now, but it stood in the highest part of the town near the Parish Church.

After Hugh Lupus, the greatest of the Earls of Chester was Randle the Third, or Randle Blundeville. Like his predecessors, he was constantly engaged in fighting against the Welsh, on one occasion being besieged in Rhuddlan Castle until he was relieved by a rabble of vagabonds hastily gathered from Chester Fair. This Randle was earl for over fifty years, and was high in favour with three successive kings of England whom he steadfastly supported. Henry the Second gave him in marriage his own daughter-in-law, Constance, the widow of his son Geoffrey. The English historian, Matthew Paris, says that the earl carried the crown at the coronation of Richard the First, and he was present at the signing of the Great Charter by King John, whose side he took in the quarrel with the barons.

The earl ruled Cheshire wisely, favouring especially the towns in his earldom. To Chester, Macclesfield, and Stockport he gave charters by which these towns were freed from certain payments and duties, and were permitted to govern themselves under a mayor of their own choosing. In the new Town Hall of Stockport is a stained glass window commemorating the earl's grant to his baron Sir Robert de Stokeport of the town's first charter of freedom.

His gifts to the Church and the founding of abbeys won for him the title of the 'Good' earl. He did not neglect the poor, for he built and endowed the hospital of S. John, near the North Gate of Chester, for the support of thirteen poor people, with three chaplains tominister to their religious needs. At Boughton, outside the city walls, he founded a hospital for lepers, whose terrible disease was brought to this country by travellers returning from Eastern lands.

In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries men's minds were deeply stirred by the hardships and cruelties put upon pilgrims to the Holy Land. Men of every Christian land and race joined in the Crusades or Holy Wars to win back Jerusalem, which had fallen into the hands of the Saracens, enemies of the Christian faith. Baldwin, Archbishop of Canterbury, came to Chester and preached from the High Cross the duty of all Christian men to rescue the Holy City and the Holy Sepulchre from the power of the unbelievers. Crowds flocked to hear him, and he did not preach in vain. Men of all classes dedicated their lives or their wealth to the service of the Cross. King and baron, soldier and priest, rich and poor alike put on the sign of the Cross, and sailed to the Holy Land, where they vied with one another in deeds of chivalry and valour.

Randle Blundeville joined the Crusades in 1219, and set out with a number of other English knights for Jerusalem. He distinguished himself greatly in Egypt, and when he returned the fame of his brave deeds made him a popular hero, and his adventures were recited or sung in many a stirring ballad.

The stone effigy of Sir William Boydell in Grappenhall Church will give you some idea of a crusading warrior. He is clad in chain armour with a plain surcoat. His legs are crossed, a sign perhaps that he had taken the vows of the Cross, and his head rests on his helmet. A shield is on his left shoulder, by his left side a sword.

Many Crusaders bound themselves by sacred vows and joined different 'Orders' or companies to which the names Knights Templars, Knights Hospitallers, or Knights of Saint John, and so on, were given. The last-named founded a house where the brethren of the Order might live in their old age at Fulshaw, near Wilmslow.

When Randle returned to Cheshire he built in the heart of his earldom the strong castle of Beeston, on thesummit of Beeston Rock, from whose walls he could survey nearly every portion of the county over which he ruled. He entertained Henry the Second at Chester Castle when Henry made an expedition against the Welsh, the troops encamping on Saltney marshes. Henry the Second had high views of the duties of kingship, and was always busily occupied at home or in his continental dominions. But Cheshire saw little or nothing of his son Richard, greatest of all Crusaders, for he spent the greater part of his reign seeking adventures abroad, and left his people to take care of themselves.

Effigy of Crusader: Grappenhall

Earl Randle lived long enough to see the boy king Henry the Third dismiss his guardians and rule on his own account. Almost his last act was to refuse to allowthe clergy of Cheshire to pay the tenth part of their incomes to the pope to aid him in his private wars. In 1232 he died, and was buried with his forefathers in the Abbey Church of Chester.

The greatest churches which the Normans planned were on such a scale that they could not be finished in the lives of their designers. The work was carried on more or less continuously by the builders and architects who came after them. But, as time went on, various improvements were made in the art of building, and new fashions came into being, and the original plans had often to be altered to meet the growing needs of the day, or to allow the newest features of style to be introduced.

The interior of S. John's Church, Chester, will show you some of the changes of style which were taking place in the early part of the thirteenth century. The two rows ofpointedarches over the circular headed arches of the nave tell us that by the time the massive Norman piers and arches were finished, an entirely different form of arch was coming into fashion.

The pointed arch was first used when Norman and Saxon had settled down peaceably side by side. From the fusing of the two nations, the English people grew in strength and power. Norman baron and Saxon peasant had combined to wrest from a wicked king the Great Charter of freedom for the English people. Hence the new style is appropriately called Early English.

The work of church building had often been interrupted. During the civil war of Stephen's reign, the building of churches was almost at a standstill; the Crusades, by drawing large numbers of people from the country, also checked the progress of the work. The raids of the Welsh often destroyed a half-built Cheshire church. But from the time of Magna Charta the erection of sacredbuildings went forward apace, and was continued with even greater zeal and activity through the long reign of Henry the Third.

Ruins of S. John's, ChesterChange from Norman round arch to pointed arch

Ruins of S. John's, Chester

Change from Norman round arch to pointed arch

The pointed arch was the principal feature of the new style, which is, therefore, sometimes called the Pointed style. But we must look carefully at the shape and details before we can be quite sure that an arch belongs to this period of building.

The arch must be tall and narrow, the columns onwhich they rest, round and slender, often grouped together in clusters of three or more. Often the columns consist of slender shafts united on one base and under one capital. The mouldings of the arch, base and capital must be deeply cut and grooved. The pointed arches of S. John's have all these characteristic features. The lower of the two rows of pointed arches is called the triforium or blind story, that is, without windows, for it is built within the slope of the roof over the side aisles of the church. The upper row is the clerestory, containing many window lights. A triforium is only to be seen in the very largest churches. In the ruined portion of S. John's you may see round and pointed arches side by side.

The arches of the nave at Prestbury belong to this period. The columns are very much more slender than the massive columns of S. John's. You will notice that the capital of one of the columns is covered with carved foliage which could only have been done with a chisel. Deep under-cutting is a feature of the Early English style, and shows that the English masons had improved greatly in their skill.

Early English windows, like the arches, are long, narrow, and pointed. From their shape they are called lancets. Sometimes two or more lancets are grouped together side by side under a single 'dripstone' or hood. At the east end of the Chapter-house at Chester is a window consisting of five lancets.

Several portions of Chester Cathedral, or rather the Abbey of S. Werburgh as it was still called, were built during this period. In the north aisle of the choir you may see the point where we pass from the massive Norman masonry to the lighter and more graceful Early English. The piscina or basin built in the wall is the place where you must look for the change.

At the end of the twelfth century the church of Hugh Lupus was already in ruins. Earl Randle was in the Holy Land, and, during his absence, the Welsh were more than usually troublesome. In the early years of the thirteenth century large sums of money were given to the abbey, and the abbots began building in the new style.When Hugh Grylle was abbot, the Chapter-house, in which the business of the abbey was transacted, was built. The number of monks also increased to such an extent that a new and larger refectory was needed.

Boss from Ruins of S. John's Church, ChesterLeft of the boss is a strip of dog-tooth moulding

Boss from Ruins of S. John's Church, Chester

Left of the boss is a strip of dog-tooth moulding

This refectory and the vestibule or entrance hall leading to it contain the most beautiful examples of Early English work to be found in Cheshire, and boys and girls who live in or near Chester should study them carefully. In therefectory is the stone pulpit referred to in a previous chapter, with a staircase and arcade of Early English arches leading to it. The wall above the arches is pierced with a row of 'quatrefoil' openings, with deeply cut mouldings.

Early English Doorway, Chester

In the hollows of the Early English mouldings we sometimes see an ornament pointed like a dog's tooth. You will see it in the moulding round a circular opening over the doorway of the vestibule in the cloisters of the Cathedral. Another ornament which the thirteenth-centurymasons invented and put into their work was the 'cusp', a projection made by the meeting of two curves placed end to end. If you put two cusps into the head of a pointed arch you will find that you have made a trefoil-headed arch. The triforium arches in the choir of the cathedral are all of this description. Quatrefoils are made by arranging four cusps within a circle.

Towards the end of the thirteenth century, Abbot Simon of Whitchurch built the Lady Chapel east of the choir. The windows of this chapel are all lancets, those at the side being arranged in groups of three, while the east window contains five lights. The Lady Chapel looks very new now. It has, in fact, been almost entirely rebuilt since Abbot Simon's day. The mediaeval builders of Cheshire did not select their building-stone very carefully. You will see from the cloisters how the red sandstone has weathered and crumbled to ruin.

The walls of Early English buildings were not so thick as those built by the Normans, and required to be supported on the exterior by buttresses which projected further from the walls than the flat Norman buttresses. You will find Early English buttresses at Audlem and Prestbury.

Many houses in Chester are built over crypts or underground cellars, which were made during the reign of Henry the Third, and consequently show some of the features we have been describing. The oldest of these crypts is under a shop in Bridge Street. It is lighted by a triple lancet window having deep splays. The door of the staircase leading to it has a trefoiled head, and the vaulted stone roof is groined and ribbed like the roof of the cloisters of the cathedral. The roofs of Early English churches were groined in the same way, but with wood instead of stone.

Many Cheshire churches were, no doubt, rebuilt or repaired in the new style. At Bruera there is a pointed doorway under a semicircular arch. Bruera was one of the many churches bestowed on the Abbey of S. Werburgh by Norman lords. A grant of a manor or a church was often made when a baron or some member of his family entered the abbey as a monk of the brotherhood.

Their descendants did not always approve of these gifts. In the Chronicle of S. Werburgh, we read that in 1258 Roger de Montalt, Chief Justice of Chester, tried to recover the churches of Bruera, Coddington, and Neston, which the lord of Montalt had given to the abbey in the days of Earl Hugh. Roger entered Neston Church with a body of armed men, and turned out the monks who had been sent from the abbey to perform the services, and gave the living to his nephew Ralph. The Chronicle speaks of the misfortunes that befell Roger as a warning to other would-be robbers of the Church. His eldest son died within fifteen days, and Roger himself 'died in poverty within two years, the common people being ignorant of the place of his burial'.

Earl Randle 'the Good' had no son to succeed him, and when he died the earldom passed to his nephew John the Scot, the son of Randle's eldest sister. John married the daughter of Llewellyn the Prince of Wales, so that peace was secured for a time between the Welsh and the earl's subjects. He did not live to enjoy his earldom long, however, and he too died without an heir. His wife was suspected of causing his death by poison.

Henry the Third was at this time King of England. He had looked with anxious eyes upon the growing power of the Earls of Chester. Now that a suitable opportunity presented itself, the king decided to take the earldom into his own hands, his excuse being that he was unwilling that so fair an inheritance should be divided 'among distaffs', meaning the sisters of John the Scot. So he gave them each a portion of land and a husband, and appointed John de Lacy, the Earl of Lincoln, as custodian of Cheshire.

A few years later Henry bestowed the earldom on his son Edward, and from that time down to the present day the title of Earl of Chester has belonged to the sonand heir of the reigning monarch. The present Prince of Wales is also Earl of Chester. One of Edward's first acts was to confirm to the barons and the people of Cheshire all the liberties and privileges which Randle had formerly granted them.

Some of these 'liberties' are set forth in the Charter which John the Scot gave to the people of Chester: 'Know that I have conceded and by this my present charter confirmed to all my citizens of Chester that no merchant should buy or sell any kind of merchandise which has come to the city of Chester by sea or by land, except these my citizens of Chester themselves and their heirs, or in accordance with their will, and except in the established fairs, that is on S. John the Baptist's day and at the feast of S. Michael. Likewise I have conceded and by this my present charter confirmed to my citizens of Chester, to have and to hold their guild merchant, as freely as they held it in the time of my uncle, Lord Randle, Earl of Chester.'

Similar charters were given to other Cheshire towns. Earl Randle, who was one of those who saw King John sign the Great Charter, gave to his baron, Sir Robert de Stokeport, a charter for his town of Stockport, with permission to hold markets and fairs, receiving in return the market dues and tolls. Hamon de Massey gave a charter for a weekly market to the inhabitants of Altrincham. Congleton received its charter in the reign of Edward the First from Henry de Lacy, whose statue you may see on the front of Congleton Town Hall. Macclesfield boasts of charters received from Randle Blundeville and from Edward the First, though by the latter the citizens were compelled to grind their corn at the king's mill and bake their bread in the king's oven, paying a toll of one shilling each for this privilege.

In the thirteenth century the merchants and traders of a town formed themselves into guilds, which drew up sets of rules for the regulation and protection of their trade and industries. The merchants met at fixed times in their guild-hall, where they elected the officers of the guild, an alderman, a steward, a chaplain, and an usher, and wherethey transacted the business of the guild. By these laws no merchant could buy or sell goods in the town unless he was a member of the guild. All the members subscribed to the guild, and if one of their number fell into poverty, or was unable to work and provide for himself, he received a sum of money every year from the common chest.

The little schoolroom in the churchyard of Nantwich was the old Guild Hall. The guilds became very rich in time, and bought property and built homes for poor people who had belonged to the guild, and schools where their children might be taught.

The workmen also who worked for the merchants wanted their own guilds, and craft guilds were formed by the different trades of a city, each of the guilds receiving a charter of its own. Several charters of this kind may be seen in the muniment room of the Chester Town Hall.

In mediaeval towns those who were engaged in a particular trade lived near to one another in the same street, to which they often gave the name of their industry. The name of Shoemakers' Row still survives at Chester to tell us where the shoemakers' shops were to be found. Newgate Street was formerly Fleshmonger Lane, and was the chief place of business of the butchers. The Skinners lived in 'Castle Drive', and a portion of Bridge Street known as Mercers' Row was given over to the mercers, drapers, and haberdashers. The trade guilds were formed in the same way as the merchant guilds. Each had its own officers and meeting-place. The Phoenix Tower takes its name from the crest of one of the city guilds, which used the tower as its council-chamber.

While the merchant guild looked after the interests of the trades, the town itself was governed by a mayor and aldermen, who were responsible for the good behaviour of the inhabitants. They also fixed the prices at which food and other necessaries of life were to be sold, and had the control of all markets and fairs. Commonhall Street takes its name from the old Common Hall in which the mayor and aldermen of the city met for their deliberations. The old hall has long since disappeared. The mayor and themagistrates administered justice in the Penthouse or Pentice, which used to stand close to S. Peter's Church in the centre of the city.

During the two great fairs of the city of Chester a large white glove was suspended from the tower of S. Peter's as the symbol of welcome to all strangers to bring their wares into the city for sale. In the church of S. John's is an ancient grave-slab with glove and scissors carved upon it. The slab once covered the remains of a glover; glove-making has always been one of the chief industries of Chester. Another slab shows by the hammer and horseshoe engraved upon it that it belonged to the tomb of a smith.

Tombstone of a Glover, S. John's Church, Chester

One of the privileges of the Shoemakers' Guild was that of providing the ball for the annual game of football played on the Roodee on Easter Monday. The mayor and all the city guilds came to watch the game, which unfortunately did not always end happily, for we read that 'great strife did arise', and many of the players were haled away to be dealt with by the Mayor at the Pentice court. The saddlers provided a silver bell as a prize for the winner of a horse-race on the Roodee.

But the greatest event of the year in mediaeval Chester was the performance of scenes from the Scriptures—mystery plays, as they were called—at the Festival of Whitsuntide. The city guilds bore the whole of the expense and chose the players to perform them, each guild being responsible for one scene. Thus the painters and glaziers performed the Shepherds' Watch and the Angels' Hymn; the vintners acted the part of the Wise Men of the East; the butchers the Story of the Temptation; the glovers the Raising of Lazarus. Scenes from the Old Testament were included, the linen drapers performing the storyof Balaam and the Ass, and the watermen of the Dee, appropriately enough, the story of the Flood.

The plays were put into English verse by Randal Hignet, a monk of S. Werburgh's, and no doubt were originally performed by the monks as a means of instructing the people in the outlines of the Christian faith. As the abbey church was found to be unsuitable they were performed publicly in the streets, in order 'to exhort', as a clerk of the Pentice said, 'the minds of the common people to good devotion as well as for the common weal and prosperity of the city.'

Twenty-five scenes in all were played, and the performance lasted for three days. On the first day the people saw scenes representing the Creation of the World, the Banishment from the Garden of Eden, the Birth of Christ and the Vision of the Shepherds and the Adoration of the Wise Men; on the second day the Passion and Resurrection of Christ; and on the third day stories illustrating the founding of the Christian Church, the Lives of the Saints, and the final Advent of Christ and the Day of Judgement.

The plays were performed on movable stages fitted with wheels. The stages consisted of two stories, the upper one being left open for the plays, the lower one covered with curtains that it might serve as a dressing-room. The first performance took place at the Abbey Gate. The stages then passed one by one to the Water Gate, where a second performance was given. The plays were acted for the third and last time in Bridge Street.

People crowded into Chester from all the country round on these occasions, for the pope granted one thousand days of pardon to all who witnessed the plays. The abbey also grew in wealth, for every one was expected to visit the Abbey Church and lay some offering at S. Werburgh's shrine. To provide a passage for the crowds of pilgrims, side aisles were built round the choirs of famous churches, and behind the high altar a vacant space left where the shrines of saints were placed.

The Cheshire towns which grew in importance during the thirteenth century as a result of the great increase intrade were situated on or near the great roads of Cheshire, which were still, in the main, the old roads laid by the Romans. Their position was generally one of great strength, having been chosen in early times in order that men might be able to beat off the attacks of enemies. Chester was, as you have already seen, guarded on two sides by a bend of the river Dee, and was the meeting-place of Roman roads. Northwich on the Watling Street, Middlewich on Kind Street, and Stockport were all built at a point where two rivers meet. Runcorn, Lymm, and Altrincham are on sandstone heights protected on the north by the Mersey; Macclesfield is astride the main road in East Cheshire, and Nantwich on the highway into Wales. It was only by means of the roads that commerce between the towns could be kept open. The 'Welsh Row' of Nantwich recalls the days when the principal trade of the town was with the wool-weavers of Wales, a trade that was too often interrupted by the fierce outbreaks on the border.

Simon of Whitchurch received the Abbey of S. Werburgh from the hands of another and a greater Simon, the powerful Earl of Leicester, who was engaged in a grim struggle with the king on account of the king's extravagance and misgovernment, and the rule of foreign favourites. Both Henry and his son Edward were, in fact, at this very time prisoners of the earl, for the battle of Lewes, which ended so disastrously for the king, had just been fought. In the same year Earl Simon summoned the famous Parliament in which knights from the shires, and citizens from the boroughs, sat side by side with the nobles and bishops.

Edward had not long received the Earldom of Chester from his father when the Barons' War broke out. Simon de Montfort made an alliance with Llewellyn the Welshprince, and Chester, expecting an attack, was put into a state of defence. Abbot Simon could hardly have commenced building his beautiful Lady Chapel when he saw his church desecrated and turned into barracks by Sir William de la Zouche, the Chief Justice of Chester.

After the defeat of Henry and Edward at Lewes they were compelled to hand over to Earl Simon the Earldom of Chester, and Henry de Montfort, Simon's eldest son, came to Chester and received in his father's name the homage and oath of fealty of the citizens. Lucas de Taney was left in charge of the city.

Edward afterwards escaped from the custody of Earl Simon, and James de Audley seized the castle of Beeston on his behalf. He also besieged Lucas de Taney in the castle of Chester for ten weeks, but did not succeed in taking it on account of the excellent defence made by the garrison. De Taney surrendered when he heard of the death of Simon de Montfort at Evesham, where Edward won a great victory. The chief of the surviving barons were brought as prisoners to Beeston Castle.

But the great prize for which de Montfort fought and laid down his life was won. When Edward came to the throne he learned from the mistakes made by his father, chose his ministers wisely, and gave his people good laws. His reign saw the growth of a full and free parliament, in which all classes of free men were represented. Cheshire did not, however, send any members, but being under the personal eye of the king had still a separate government of its own as well as its own judges and law-courts.

Vale Royal reminds us of the great Plantagenet king, whose motto was 'Keep Troth' and who for thirty-five years did all he could to win the love of his people. Before Edward became king he went on Crusade to the Holy Land, where he distinguished himself by recovering the holy city of Nazareth from the Saracens. On his return he narrowly escaped shipwreck. In his peril he invoked the aid of the Virgin Mary, and vowed that if he were saved he would build a monastery in her honour on his return to his own country. The Chronicletells us that 'the vessel straightway righted itself and was miraculously brought safe into port; the sailors disembarked, the Prince landing last of all, and immediately the vessel broke in pieces, and every fragment of the wreck vanished under the water'.

Edward 'kept his troth' and built a home for one hundred monks of the Cistercian Order at Darnhall. Four years later he laid the foundation stone of a stately Abbey at Vale Royal, in the very heart of Cheshire. Queen Eleanor and a great company of nobles accompanied him. We may not now hear the Angelus tolling its summons to evening prayer, nor see jolly monks fishing the streams of the Weaver, but in the last few months the foundations of the Abbey church where they chanted the mass have been discovered.

The abbey took more than fifty years to build, and it was not until the reign of the third Edward that the monks were able to move from their temporary lodgings to the new and spacious building. The abbey received valuable lands in the neighbourhood of Over, Darnhall, and Weaverham, of which villages the abbot became lord. By the ancient 'customs' of the manor of Darnhall the villagers were required to attend at the manorial, now the abbot's court; the abbot had power of life and death over all his tenants, who had also to grind all their corn at the abbot's mill; at the death of any native the abbot took all his horses, cattle, and pigs, and half of his standing and gathered corn.

Cheshire saw a good deal of Edward the First in the earlier half of his reign. In the year after the ceremonies at Vale Royal we find him at Macclesfield, when he began to build the parish church of S. Michael.

He was the first English king to take in hand the conquest of Wales seriously. In the reign of Henry the Third the Welsh had taken advantage of the king's troubles with his barons, and waged a murderous warfare on the Cheshire border. They advanced as far as Nantwich, and James de Audley, who owned a large part of the barony of Nantwich, saw his castles burnt, woods felled, and cattle destroyed. Preparations were made fora big expedition into Wales, and Prince Edward summoned the knights and barons of Cheshire to Shotwick Castle on the banks of the Dee. A grassy knoll, where once stood the castle keep, is all that is left of the scene of the gathering.

Chester Wall.Roman below; Edwardian above

Chester, from its position at the very gates of North Wales, was the natural meeting-place for the troops, and the starting-point of Edward's expedition against Llewellyn. Soon after his accession he summoned theWelsh princes to do homage to him. This they refused to do, and the king prepared for war. Llewellyn's brother David for a long time fought on the side of the English, and received the manor of Frodsham as his reward.

Edward's first task, however, was to strengthen the defences of Chester so that it might resist all attacks. The enemy frequently came close up to the walls of the city, and raided especially the suburb of Handbridge on the opposite shore of the Dee, naming it Treboeth or 'Burnt Town', a name that tells its own tale.

Edward was a great castle-builder, as many of you have learnt from pictures you have seen of his Welsh castles. The Norman castle of Chester had been constructed largely of wood. Edward now rebuilt it of stone, and greatly enlarged it by adding an outer ward or 'bailey'. He surrounded the whole fortress with 'curtain' walls flanked with towers and protected with a deep ditch. He also set to work to rebuild the walls of the city.

The ancient Roman walls had long since crumbled to their foundations, though here and there a mass of masonry remained standing, and the Roman east gate was still in its place. The stones of which the walls had been built had provided building-material for many centuries. On the east side from the Pepper Gate to the Phoenix Tower Edward built his wall on or near the foundations of the Roman wall, portions of which you may still see on this side of the city. For the most part, however, the new walls were built outside the older ones, and the area enclosed was much greater than that of the Roman town.

The walls were strengthened by a number of watch towers, some of which were not completed until the time of his grandson Edward the Third, when Bonewaldeston's Tower and the Water Tower were built. A wall-tax called 'murage' was levied on the inhabitants of Cheshire for keeping the walls in repair. The citizens of Chester were also made to build a bridge over the Dee. Edward's chief engineer was named Richard, and in return for his services he received for a number of yearsthe Dee Mills, so that for the time being he was the 'Miller of the Dee'.

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