these passages would lead us to infer, it was not very likely that on his appointment to the archbishoprick he should sink into the tool of his quondam pupil.

As to the "important reformation" which Lord Lyttleton assumes that the King intended to undertake, we very much doubt whether such a scheme ever entered his head till more than a year after Becket's consecration; and on this account we cannot feel it to be "incredible that he should not have revealed his intentions concerning that affair to a minister whom he was accustomed to trust in his most secret councils."

Upon the whole, we do not think that any charge which has been brought forward against Becket, when chancellor, implies more than what his whole subsequent history confirms-that he was a man of very keen feelings, who followed up with vigour whatever he took in hand, and was, perhaps, ambitiously eager about the success of his projects, and who, moreover, if we are to believe what we are told of his self-denying habits, was the very person to devote himself to a cause which afforded scope at once to his most chivalrous and most ascetic feelings.

The light in which this singular man was regarded while chancellor, by his clerical friends, may, we think, be not unfairly collected from some lines in which John of Salisbury dedicates his book, "De nugis Curialium," which appeared in 1160. They are as follows:

AUCTOR AD OPUS SUUM.

Si mihi credideris, linguam cohibebis, et aulæ
Limina non intres, pes tuus esto domi-
Aspectus hominum cautus vitare memento
Et tibi commissas claude libelle notas.
Omnia sint suspecta tibi, quia publicus hostis
Et Majestatis diceris esse reus.

Ignis edax gladiusque ferox tibi forte parantur,
Aut te pollutâ subruet hostis aquâ.

Stultos, prudentes nimium, pravosque cavetis,
Et quos insignes garrula lingua facit.
Si quis amat verum tibi sit gratissimus hospes.
Si quam delectat gloria vana, cave.
Jure patronatus illum cole, qui velit esse
Et sciat, et possit, tutor ubique tuus,
Ergo quæratur lux cleri gloria gentis
Anglorum, Regis dextera forma boni.
Quæsitus Regni tibi cancellarius Angli
Primus solicitâ mente petendus erit.
Hic est qui Regni leges cancellat iniquas
Et mandata pii Principis æqua facit.
Si quid obest populo, vel moribus est inimicum
Quicquid id est, per eum desinit esse nocens.
Publica privatis qui præfert commoda semper,
Quodque dat in plures ducit in ære suo.

Quod dat habet, quod habet dignis donat, vice versa

Spargit, sed sparsæ multiplicantur opes.
Utque virum virtus animi sic gratia formæ
Undique mirandum gentibus esse facit.

Hujus nosse domum non res est ardua; cuivis
Non duce quæsito semita trita patet.
Nota domus cunctis, vitio non cognita soli,

Lucet, ab hâc lucem dives, egenus, habent.

And with this we will, for the present, close our inquiries respecting Becket's character, which seems to have been in the first instance misrepresented by his contemporaries, and then retailed to us through misrepresented misrepresentations.

EVERY record of a place, with which we are either connected by local habitation or interested by historical or particular associations, is valuable; and it is much to be deplored that more care has not been displayed in the collection and preservation of documents, in which are registered every charitable bequest that has been made, and every local event that has occurred, in the different parishes in the kingdom. With respect to the parish of Hawkchurch, all the diligence which could be used to obtain authentic information respecting its former history has been, I lament to say, but partially rewarded. From the oral testimony of the oldest inhabitants of the place and neighbourhood, little has been gained; and beyond the traditional account of a great encampment having been formed in the parish on Lambert's Castle, of which traces yet exist, and a sanguinary battle having been fought in Hillier's Close, a part of the glebe land, so called from the name of a Colonel Hillier, who was there executed in the civil wars, nothing worthy of particular record is remembered. It has, indeed, been mentioned that there formerly existed an old parchment book, in which were some curious memoranda respecting the local history of the parish, the annual fair, for which a charter was granted in the reign of Henry VI., on Lambert Castle, and which was formerly much frequented by the gentry in the neighbourhood, and other customs that obtained; but the book was taken from the box in which it had been placed by one of the parishioners, and what has become of it, it has been impossible hitherto to discover. It has, in all probability, perished. If the above information be correct, another proof is furnished of the caution with which access to parochial documents and registers should be guarded. The same vigilance and care should be exercised, indeed, towards all documents of local interest and importance, that succeeding generations may be informed of

the events that have occurred in past times, and that by reading of some memorable action performed either by the gallantry of a warrior, or the charities of a Christian on the spot, their local attachments may be enkindled, and their virtuous dispositions strengthened to do the deeds of patriotism and benevolence, and thus to distinguish the period of their residence and the time of their sojourning in their own homes. And blessed shall they be in that generation, and the benedictions of the poor, and the approbation of the just, shall perfume their memories from one generation to another; and what was done on earth from true principle will receive in heaven its due reward in true glory.

From the above, it will be but too evident that I have nought wherewith to invest the spot from which I am writing with any portion of that interest with which the readers of the British Magazine must have regarded the account of the parishes of Hodnet and Eyamplaces hallowed, as it were, by the pious ministrations of a Heber, and the apostolical devotion of a Mompesson.

Hawkchurch, more generally called by the name of Hay-church by those who reside in the place and neighbourhood, and spelt Avekechurch, or Havek-chirche in the Saxon Chronicles, is a parish situated in the western part of Dorsetshire, and adjoining the counties of Devon and Somerset, from the latter of which it is separated by the River Ox, which forms its north-west boundary.*

There formerly existed in the neighbourhood a rich and extensive monastery, or abbey, called Cerne, to which all the lands in this place and in several other contiguous parishes belonged. At the dissolution of the monasteries, the land in Hawkchurch was alienated from the abbots of Cerne, and the whole, together with the regal, manorial, and rectorial rights, were granted, by Henry VIII., to one John Leigh, by whom again in a subsequent reign (of Mary) they were alienated, and sold to Thomas Moore, Esq., of Spargrove, in the county of Somerset, who purchased also the presentation and advowson of the Rectory, with the rectorial manor, consisting, together with the glebe, of about 621 acres of meadow and arable land, at present attached to and forming part of the living. This property continued for several years in the Moore family, and was possessed till within a few years by a gentleman of the name of Wyndham, who married a daughter and heiress of one of the Moores. Mr. Wyndham disposed of the property of Wylde Court, and other lands in the parish, with the advowson and presentation of the living, to the Hon. J. Everard Arundel, from whom the former was purchased by the late Lord Viscount

It is about six miles from Chard, in Somerset, and four from Axminster, in Devon; contains a population of 898 inhabitants, according to the last census, in 1831, and 4136 acres of arable, meadow, and pasture land, the soil of which, however, is but indifferent, being chiefly light mouldy sand, resting upon a compact ferruginous siliceous sand, known by the name of Fox-mould, or else upon a tenacious ferruginous clay full of flints, locally called Red-scrip. The place consists of two tithings Wylde Court and Phillyholme, and was formerly in the hundred of Cerne and Uggscombe, but has lately been constituted a hundred by itself, and is in the Bridport division..