Javelin Men.—These, no doubt, were the vassals and retainers of the High Sheriff, who attended to protect and guard the Judges, the weapon they carried being the partizan, which is still carried by the yeomen of the guard, which was introduced in the reign of Henry VIII. Mr. Aubrey, the Wiltshire antiquary of Charles II's reign, in a letter published by him in a work called "Miscellanies on several Curious Subjects," says, from information obtained from his grandfather (temp. Henry VIII)—"Lords had their armouries to furnish some hundreds of men. The halls of Justices of the Peace were dreadful to behold: the screens were garnished with corslets and helmets, gaping with open mouths with coats of mail, lances, pikes, halberts, brown-bills, batterdashers, bucklers, and the modern calivers and petronels (in King Charles I's time turned to muskets and pistols). Then an esquire, when he rode to town, was attended by eight or ten men in blue coats with badges;" and it would seem that from the reign of King Charles II the javelin men have continued to be much the same as at present, as in the printed articles of agreement entered into in that reign by sixty-four Wiltshire gentlemen, who were liable to serve the office of High Sheriff, it is stipulated (inter alia) "That no one of the said persons, when he is made sheriff of the said county, have above thirty livery-men, nor under twenty, for his attendance at the assize. * * * And that when any of the said subscribers shall be made sheriffs of the said county, the livery shall be a plain cloth coat or cloke, edged and lined through with sarge, a black hat, and suitable javelin." This curious document, which was signed by one of his ancestors, still remains in possession of Major Goddard.
The Trumpeters.—These were part of the state of every Nobleman, Bishop, and High Sheriff. Mr. Aubrey, in his letter before cited, says—"The Lords kept trumpeters, even to King James;" and as late as the reign of George II there were trumpeters in the establishment of the Archbishop of Canterbury. At ancient banquets, trumpeters were always in attendance. At the Peacock Feast given by Robert Braunche, Mayor of Lynn, to King Edward III, and represented on the tomb of that magistrate, in Lynn Church, the sonorous blast of the trumpets accompanies the introduction of the viands; and at the Lord Mayor's Dinner at Guildhall, on the 9th of November, every toast is announced with a flourish of trumpets, at the top of the hall, which is answered by another flourish from the bottom.
JOHN TALBOT, ESQ., OF SALWARPE.
John Aubrey, Esq., F.R.S., in his Natural History, written between the years 1656 and 1691, says (p. 70)—"Dame Olave, a daughter and co-heire of Sir Henry Sharington, of Lacock, 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 sweetheart replied he would catch her then, but he did not believe she would have done it. She leapt down, 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, Colonel Sharington Talbot's grandmother, and died at her house at Lacock, about 1651, being about a hundred yeares old." To this passage the veteran antiquary, John Britton, Esq., F.A.S., has added this note: "Olave, or Olivia Sherington married John Talbot, Esq., of Salwarpe, in the county of Worcester, fourth in descent from John, second Earl of Shrewsbury; she inherited the Lacock 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." Sir Henry Sherington was the son of Sir William Sherington, one of the ecclesiastical commissioners for Wiltshire on the dissolution of the Chantries; and to him Henry VIII granted the possessions of Lacock Abbey, and a good deal of other monastic property in Wiltshire. Mr. Aubrey was one of the original members of the Royal Society. He attended Charles II and his brother, afterwards James II, on their visit to the Druidical Temple, at Avebury, in 1663; and dined with Oliver Cromwell, the Protector, at Hampton Court, in 1657 or 8, as is stated in his work before cited, pp. 97 and 103.
KING'S NORTON LIBRARY.
An interesting relic of the seventeenth century exists in the old Theological Library in the School in King's Norton churchyard, founded by Thomas Hall, the ejected Puritan of 1662. Hall is well known to literary men as the author of "Funebriæ Floræ, or Downfal of May-day Games," the "Treatise against Long Hair," and other works. An interesting sketch is given of him by Calamy, in his account of the ejected ministers, affixed to his life of Baxter; and also by Wood, in his "Athenæ Oxonienses." The library consists of from six to eight hundred volumes, of all sizes, ranging from about 1580 to 1645 or 1650, and the books contain the name of the donor on the title-page. All the works are devotional, and many of them controversial. There are discoveries of and safeguards against the subtleties of Jesuitism, and against the then recently propounded notions of the Quakers, as well as treatises on doctrinal points, commentaries on the Scriptures, translations from Ovid, and sermons preached before Parliament. The entire collection shows strikingly how, even in the stirring times of civil war, a minister could devote himself to the duties of his sacred calling; and, judging from the evidence presented by his choice, how completely he could isolate himself from the seductions even of theological polemics, for the grand old truth held by all orthodox Christians. It is to be regretted that the library is so little known. It is said that a similar library was established at the little village of Sheldon, near Yardley.
OLD ENGLISH RATS.
The old English black rat (Mus rattus), which has been nearly superseded in this country by the brown Norway rat, still lingers at retired farmhouses in this county, as, for instance, at Grimsend, Alfrick, Clay Green, and Wick, near Worcester. The brown rat was unknown in England till 1730. It is said that the great numbers of these intruders in the Isle of France drove the Dutch from that settlement.