erected towards the close of the twelfth century-from 1180 to 1190. Matthew Paris says that Walkeline de Ferrers was at the siege of Acre, in the Holy Land, with the English king, in the third year of his reign (1191). In 1201 he died, and was succeeded by his son Hugh, who dying in 1204 without issue, Isabella, his only sister, wife of Roger Lord Mortimer, became his heir; and this ended the connection of the Ferrers family with the town of Oakham.

The peculiar custom existing in this place, of compelling every Peer of Parliament, the first time he passes through the town, to give a horse-shoe, 'to be nailed upon the castle gate,' is of ancient standing, since it is mentioned by Camden as existing in his time. It is supposed to have come as a liberty from the Ferrers, who were early lords of the demesnes, though there seems no other warrant for this conjecture than the fanciful play upon the words De Ferreriis. By an inquisition found in the hundred rolls, made at Stamford before twelve jurors of the hundred of Martinsley, in the 3d Edward 1. (1257), it seems that a custom analogous was then in existence. The jurors declare on their oath, that it appears to them that the manor and castle of Oakham were formerly in the hands of William the Conqueror, and were worth £100 a-year and upwards; that the king gave them to Hugh, who held that manor for him till Normandy was lost. The successors of Hugh at that time rebelled against King John, who thereupon granted the manor and castle to Isabella de Mor

timer for her life by the same service; and after her death the manor came into the hands of Henry, father of King Edward, who conveyed it with the castle, in fee-dowry, to Senchia, wife of Richard Earl of Cornwall, to hold it for him in chief by the aforesaid service. The jurors at Stamford also found that every bailiff of Richard Earl of Cornwall took at Oakham, as well in the time of King Henry as now, toll of carriages bought or sold, and of all other things there, to the damage of £10 per annum, by what warrant they know not, and this unjustly. They also said that Peter de Nevil took ten marcs unjustly from the men of Oakham and Langham, by virtue of his office, that they should not have their dogs lawed. In the following year the jurors returned that the county of Rutland formerly belonged to the county of Northampton, until Henry 111. granted it to the King of Germany (Richard Earl of Cornwall), whom they found had right of gallows, assize of bread and ale, pillory, and ducking-stool. And they said that the bailiffs of Oakham, in the reigns of Henry III. and Edward I., took toll of carriages, horses bought or sold, and all other merchandize at Oakham-they know not by what warrant. The transition to a commutation of a shoe for a money payment, or the reverse, is easily to be accounted for.

By these inquisitions is seen what was the origin of demanding a horse-shoe at Oakham; at least an insight is gathered into the practice, which has at various periods been countenanced by English monarchs and the highest.

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judicial functionaries. In the second year of Richard II., Edward Plantagenet, second Duke of York, on being created Earl of Rutland, had granted to him the castle, town, and lordship of Oakham, and the whole forest of Rutland. This prince was trampled to death at the battle of Agincourt. By his will, made at Harfleur, 22d of August 1415, he directed the interment of his remains in the College of Fotheringhay, which he had founded. In 1399 the Duke of York was suspected of being concerned in an abortive conspiracy against his relative Henry IV., the Lincolnshire-born king, for which offence Sir John Holland, second son of the Earl of Kent, was beheaded. Another possessor of the castle, the Duke of Buckingham, in the reign of Richard III., was beheaded; as were a second Duke of Buckingham in the reign of Henry VIII., and Lord Thomas Cromwell in the year 1540.

The manor and castle repeatedly reverted to the Crown, and were again repeatedly granted. Among the possessors of them were Richard King of the Romans, brother of Henry III.; Edward Earl of Kent, brother of Edward II.; De Vere Earl of Oxford and Duke of Ireland, favourite of Richard II.; Thomas of Woodstock, uncle to the same king; the two Dukes of Buckingham already named; Thomas Cromwell Earl of Essex; and George Villiers Duke of Buckingham, the witty and profligate favourite of Charles II.

The architecture of the Hall is late Norman, or very early English. It is divided by three shafts on either side. into four bays. It is smaller though earlier than the Hall at

Winchester, but in its sculpture and detail more beautiful. Nothing can exceed the spirit and gracefulness of the sculptured heads under the brackets. Those of Henry 11. and his wife Margaret of Guienne are strikingly fine. The present position of the door is not the original one. When Buck published his view in 1720, the door was at the east end, like that in the refectory at Dover. The ancient roof was probably semicircular, like that existing still in the Bishop's palace at Hereford. The oldest portions of the present roof are two red beams put up by Villiers Duke of Buckingham, who also built the gateway. Altogether, this is one of the most perfect specimens of domestic architecture (twelfth century) in existence.1

With respect to the Horse-shoe custom, a contributor to a periodical work, writing at the latter end of the last century, says: The lord of this castle and manor claims by prescription a franchise of a very uncommon kind, viz. that the first time any peer of this kingdom shall happen to pass through the precincts of this lordship, he shall forfeit as a homage a shoe from the horse whereon he rideth, unless he redeems it with money; and according to the liberality of the nobleman who incurs the forfeit, a shoe is made in size, gilt, decorated, and inscribed with his title, and the date when compounded for, which is placed in the castle, or on

1 Abridged in the main from a Lecture delivered in the Castle Hall, Oakham, by the Rev. Thomas James, M.A., Hon. Canon of Peterborough, and one of the Secretaries of the Architectural Society for the Archdeaconry of Northampton, which includes the county of Rutland.