In the eighteenth century the Sussex roads were notorious for their bad condition, and little effort was made to improve them, partly owing to an idea that better means of communication would bring many cut-throats, pickpockets, and other undesirable folk down from London. Indeed, when the road to Brighton through Cuckfield was first made, the inhabitants of Hurstpierpoint became so alarmed at the proposal to run it through that place that they petitioned Parliament, and were successful in having it diverted. So bad were some of these Sussex roads that there are records of people having habitually used oxen to draw their coaches. Defoe, for instance, travelling in Sussex in the eighteenth century, came upon a lady, whom he describes as “of very good quality,” being drawn to church in a village near Lewes by six oxen.

OLD SUSSEX

It was largely owing to the isolation produced by faulty means of travel that Sussex villages, up to comparatively recent times, retained so much of old-world quaintness and charm. Many of the labourers of a past generation never moved out of their own district during the whole of their lives. A story used to be told of a Heathfield labourer who, after a quarrel with his wife, deserted his home and went to another village a few miles away. Home sickness, however, soon overcame him, and, coming back to his family, he declared that he had had quite enough of “furrin parts”—nothing like Old England after all! An old lady of the village of Ditchling, who was going up to London, being asked what sort of place she thought she was about to see, replied that she expected it would be “about like the bustling part of Ditchling.”

The old cottages in the villages were formerly full of Sussex ironwork, and of this I made a collection, which includes some very good specimens—fire-dogs and backs, rush-light holders, tongs, and the like—of this extinct industry. At that time I lived in the very centre of what was formerly a great iron-producing district, for near Heathfield were many furnaces which at one time kept half the population in full employ. Many Sussex families owed their fortunes to the ironworks, amongst them the Fullers, one grateful member of which set up the inscription “Carbone et Forcipibus” on the house. The old hammer ponds still existing are extremely picturesque, in many cases having clear rippling streams, containing brook trout, flowing out of them. The last furnace in Sussex—Ashburnham Furnace—was only finally blown out in 1825, having been worked by Lord Ashburnham up to that time; the iron produced there was at one time said to be the best in the world. As the iron industry decayed hop-growing was introduced, which gave some measure of employment to the population which began to find its old occupation gone.

COWDRAY

Some time before I began collecting Sussex ironwork I used to live in quite another part of the county bordering upon Hampshire, and here also I found much of great antiquarian interest. Not many miles distant from our house, for instance, stood the crumbling walls of Cowdray, the beautiful seat which once belonged to the Brownes, and was destroyed by fire in 1793. I have several relics and pictures of this old mansion. At the time of the fire the young owner, Lord Montague, was away on the Continent, and the house was being renovated in view of his return. In the disastrous conflagration perished many valuable relics of art and pictures, for the house being under repair at the time, everything had been stored in the north gallery, which was difficult of access. A picture of Charles I. at Woburn is said to have been one of the few saved, another being a painting of the two brothers Fitzwilliam lying dead in armour. Many relics from Battle Abbey were also destroyed, among them, it is said, the sword of the Conqueror, his coronation robe ornamented with gold and rare gems, and, most interesting perhaps of all, the Roll of Battle Abbey. These had been removed to Cowdray when the seventh Lord Montague sold Battle Abbey in 1717.

After the burning of Cowdray no care appears to have been taken to safeguard any of the contents which remained undamaged. Things, indeed, saved from the fire were taken away to Midhurst by any one who cared to take the trouble, the whole neighbourhood being allowed to roam through the ruins. I myself, indeed, as has been said, possess some relics of Cowdray—several good pieces of carved woodwork (the decoration of the salon) which I purchased near Midhurst from a man whose grandfather, I am very much afraid, had in all probability annexed them without leave.

It was in the Abbots’ Hall at Battle that the curse of fire and water was pronounced against Sir Anthony Browne, who was holding his first great feast there after the spoliation of the monasteries by Henry VIII., the abbey having been granted to him by that king, in whose favour he stood very high. Striding through the crowd of guests and retainers, a monk is said to have made his way to the daïs where Sir Anthony sat, and, raising his voice, to have solemnly cursed him and his posterity. “By fire and water thy line shall come to an end; thus shall it perish out of the land.”

The fact that the eighth Lord Montague was drowned when attempting to shoot the falls of Laufenburg at the very time that Cowdray (then being renovated in view of his coming of age) was consumed by fire has been regarded by many as the fulfilment of the curse, but it must not be forgotten that Sir Anthony Browne himself and his descendants lived quite free from misfortune for some two hundred years. As is well known, the two sons of Lord Montague’s only sister, Mrs. Poyntz, were drowned in the very flower of their youth, before the eyes of their parents, in a boating accident at Bognor in 1815—another sad catastrophe also attributed to the curse. On the death of Mr. Poyntz the Cowdray estate passed out of the Browne family, being divided amongst his sisters, and in 1843 it was sold to the sixth Earl of Egmont for some three hundred thousand pounds. The new possessors of the place made no attempt to restore the ruins of the noble old mansion, a splendid example of domestic architecture, but built a new house on the site of the keeper’s lodge which was pulled down.

OTWAY