143 The Lee Penny. BELONGING TO SIR CHARLES LOCKHART, OF LEE AND CARNWORTH, LANARKSHIRE. This curious piece of antiquity is a stone of a dark red colour and triangular shape, in size about half an inch each side, set in a piece of silver coin; which, though much defaced, by some letters still remaining, is supposed to be a shilling of Edward I., the cross being very plain, as it is on his shillings. It is affirmed, by tradition, to have been in the Lee family since the year 1320 odd; that is, a little after the death of king Robert Bruce, who having ordered his heart to be carried to the Holy Land for burial, one of the noble family of Douglass was sent with it, and is said to have got the crowned heart in his arms from that circumstance. On the other hand, it is alleged that the person who carried the heart was Simon Locard, of Lee, who about that time borrowed a large sum of money from sir William de Lendsay, prior of Air, for which he granted a bond of annuity of ten pounds of silver, during the life of the said sir William de Lendsay, out of his lands of Lee and Cartland. The original bond, dated 1323, and witnessed by the principal nobility of the country, is among the family papers. The sum, which was a great one in those days, is thought to have been borrowed for that expedition; and, on the authority of the story, of his being the person who carried the royal heart, it is affirmed, that he changed his name to "Lockheart;" or, as it is sometimes spelled, "Lockhart," and obtained a heart within a lock for part of his arms, with the motto, "corda serata pando." It is said that this Simon Lockhart having taken a Saracen prince, or chief, prisoner, his wife came to ransom him; and, on counting out the money or jewels, the stone in question fell out of her purse, and she hastily snatched it up, which Simon Lockhart observing, insisted on having it, or retaining his pri soner. Upon this the Saracen lady gave it him, and told him of its many virtues, namely, that it cured all diseases in cattle, and the bite of a mad dog both in man and beast. To effect these wonders the stone is dipped in water, which is given to diseased cattle to drink, and to a person who has been bitten; and the wound, or part infected, is washed with the water. There are no words used in the dipping of the stone, nor any money taken by the servants without incurring the owner's displeasure. People come from all parts of Scotland, and even from Yorkshire, to get the water in which the stone is dipped, to give their cattle, especially when ill of the murrain and black-leg. to the ecclesiastical courts against the laird COPY OF AN ACT OF THE SYNOD AND "Apud Glasgow, the 25 Octobr. "Synod. Sess. 2. ? the brethren of the ministrie of Lanerk, it "Quhilk dye, amongest the referries of was propondit to the Synode, that Gawen Hammiltonne of Raplocke had preferit an complaint before them against Sir James Lockart of Lie, anent the superstitious vsing of an stene set in selver for the curing of diseased cattell, qlk, the said Gawen affirmit, coud not be lawfully vsed, and that they had differit to give ony decisionne therein, till the advice of the Assemblie might be had concerning the same. The Assemblie having inquirit of the maner of vsing thereof, and particularlie vnderstoode, by examinationne of the said Laird of Lie, and otherwise, that the custome is onlie to cast the stene in sume water, and give the diseasit cattil thereof to drink, and qt the sam is dene wtout vsing onie words, such as charmers and sorcerers vse in their unlawful practisess; and considering that in nature they are mony thinges seen to can give a reason, it having pleasit God to work strange effects, qrof no humane witt give vnto stones and herbes special virtues for the healing of mony infirmities in man and beast,-advises the brethren to surcease thir proces, as q'rin they perceive no ground of offence; and admonishes the said Laird of Lie, in the ysing of the said stone, to tak heed that it be vsit heirafter wt the least scandal that possiblie maye bie. "Extract out of the books of the Assemblie helden at Glasgow, and subscribed be thair clerk, at thair comand. "M. ROBERT YOUNG, "Clerk to the Assemblie at Glasgow." When the plague was last at Newcastle, the inhabitants are said to have sent for the Lee Penny, and given a bond for a large sum in trust for the loan; and that they thought it did so much good, that they offered to pay the money, and keep the Lee Penny, but the owner would not part with it. A copy of this bond is alleged to have been among the family papers, supposed to have been spoiled, with many more, by rain getting into the charter-room, during a long minority, and no family residing at Lee. but A remarkable cure is alleged to have been performed about a century ago, on a lady Baird, of Sauchtonhall, near Edinburgh, "who, having been bit by a mad dog, was come the length of a hydrophobia; upon which, having sent to beg the Lee Penny might be sent to her house, she used it for some weeks, drinking and bathing in the water it was dipped in, and was quite recovered."* Good reasons are assigned for rejecting the story of Locard having been the bearer of the heart of Robert Bruce; and there are some ludicrous instances of wonderful cures performed in the north of England on credulous people, by virtue of water wherein the Lee Penny was reputed to have been dipped, and yet neither the water nor the Lee Penny had crossed the Tweed. For the Table Book. THE DEVIL'S PUNCH-BOWL.† You, Mr. Editor,-Have journeyed from London to Portsmouth, and must recollect Hindhead-you will, therefore, sympathize with me :-the luxury of riding round the rim of the Devil's Punch-Bowl is over! Some few years back the road, on one side, was totally undefended against casualties of any description-overturning the coach into the bowl (some three or four Gentleman's Magazine, Dec. 1787, from whence these particulars, and the engraving of the Lee Penny, Further accounts of it from correspondare derived. ents will be acceptable. + A deep valley in Surrey, so called from its circular form. It is about forty-one miles from London. hundred yards deep) the bolting of a horse or any other delightful mishap which could hurl you to the bottom-all is over! They-(the improvers of roads, but destroyers of an awful yet pleasing picture,) -have cut a new road about fifty or sixty feet below the former, and raised a bank, four feet high, round the edge, so that an accident is almost impossible, and no such chance as a roll to the bottom will again occur! The new road is somewhat shorter than the old-the effect completely spoiled the stone to perpetuate the murder of the sailor unheeded the gibbet unseen-and nothing left to balance the loss of these pleasing memorials, but less labour to the horses, and a few minutes of time saved in the distance! Eighteen years since, the usual stoppage, and "Now, gentlemen, if you'll have the goodness to alight, and walk up, you'll oblige," took place. At the present time you are galloped round, and have scarcely time to admire the muchspoken-of spot. The last time I passed the place, on the Independent, when conversing on the subject, our coachee, Robert (or Bob, as he delights to be called) Nicholas, related an anecdote of an occurrence to himself, and which tells much of the fear in which passing the Devil's Punch-Bowl was once held. You shall have it, as nearly as I can recollect it : An elderly lady, with two or three younger ones, and servants, engaged the coach to London, but with a special agreement, that the party should walk round the said bowl," As we understand, it is next to a miracle to go along that horrid place in safety." On the journey, each change of horses was accompanied by an inquiry, how far was the dreaded place? a satisfactory answer was, of course, generally given. When, at length, the coach arrived at the stone-memorial, one-third round the place, the coachman alighted, and pretended to be making some trifling alterations to the harness: his lady-passenger, looking complacently into the vast dell beneath her, inquired its name. "Higgin-bottom, ma'am." "What a delightful but singular looking spot!" was the rejoinder. The coach then drove on. On its arrival at the next stage, Road-lane, the anxious inquiry, «How far off, sir?" was again repeated. "We're passed, ma'am."-" Passed it !— in safety!-bless me!-where was it?""Where I stopped, and you asked the The old stone was destroyed at the alteration of the road; but a new one has very recently been erected on the new road. name of that deep dell-that was the Devil's Punch-Bowl-Higgin-bottom's the right name." The delighted passenger rewarded the coachman for his innocent de ception, and promised always, on that road, to travel under his guardianship. I have spoken of a stone erected on the Bowl, and if, in this "airy nothing," I do not occupy too much space that, undoubtedly, could be better filled, a brief recollection of the fact may close this notice of the Devil's Punch-Bowl: An unfortunate sailor, with a trifle in his pocket, on the way to Portsmouth, fell in, at Esher, with three others, then strangers, and, with characteristic generosity, treated them on their mutual way. The party were seen at the Red Lion, Road-lane, together, which they left, and journeyed forward. On Hindhead they murdered their companion-stripped the body, and rolled it down the Devil's Punch-Bowl. Two men, who had observed the party at the Red Lion, and who were returning home, not long after, on arriving at the spot, observed something which appeared like a dead sheep; one descended, and was shocked to find a murdered man, and recognised the sailor: conjecturing who were his destroyers, they followed in haste. On arriving at Sheet, the villains were overtaken, when in the act of disposing of their victim's apparel. They were apprehended, and shortly afterwards hung and gibbeted near the spot. When at the place of execution one of them observed, he only wished to commit one murder more, and that should be on Faulkner, the constable, who apprehended him!-The following is (or was) the inscription on the stone; and many a kind "Poor fellow!" has been breathed as the melancholy tale has ended. TEN GUINEAS REWARD. WHEREAS Some evil-disposed person or persons did, in the night of Tuesday, the 17th instant, maliciously BREAK, DEFACE, and INJURE the STONE lately put up at Hindhead, by the Trustees of the Lower District of the Sheetbridge Turnpike Road, to perpetuate the memory of a murder committed there, in the place of one removed by John Hawkins, Esq. Whoever will give information of the offender or offenders shall on his, her, or their conviction receive a Reward of TEN GUINEAS, which will be paid by Mr. James Howard, the Surveyor of the said Road. Witley, 26th July, 1827. NOTE. "You, Mr. Editor," says my pleasant correspondent R. N. P., "you, Mr. Editor, have journeyed from London to Portsmouth, and must recollect Hindhead—the luxury of riding round the rim of the Devil's Punch-Bowl-the stone to perpetu &c." Ah me! I travel little beyond books ate the memory of the sailor-the gibbet, and imagination; my personal journeys are only gyration-like portions of a circle, scarcely of larger circumference than that allowed to a tethered dumb_animal. If exceed this boundary, it is only for a few now and then, in either of the four seasons, miles into one of the four counties-to a still flowing water-to enjoy the features of woodland height, a green dell, or beside a nature in loneliness and quiet-the sight of the twilight, and the coming and going of every green thing" in a glorious noontide, the stars-on a sunless day, the vapours of the sky dissolving into thin air, the flitting and sailing of the clouds, the ingatherings of night, and the thick darkness. I No, Mr. R. N. P., no sir, I am very little of a traveller, I have not seen any of the things you pleasure me by telling of in your vividly written letter. I know no gibbet of the murderer of a sailor, except one of the "men in chains" below Greenwich-whom I saw last Whitsuntide twoyears through the pensioners' telescopes from the Observatory -was a slayer of his messmate; nor though I have heard and read of the Devil's Punch-Bowl, have I been much nearer its "rim" than the gibbet of Jerry Abershaw at Wimbledon Common. Abershaw was the last of the great highwaymen who, when people carried money Told of in the Every-Day Book. about them, robbed every night, and some times in the open day, on Bagshot, Wimbledon, Finchley, and other commons, and high roads, in the neighbourhood of Lon don. Some of these highwaymen of the "old school" lived in the wretched purlieus of Saffron-hill, and would mount and "take the road" in the afternoon from the end of Field-lane, at Holborn-bridge, as openly as travellers setting out from an inn. On the order in council, in 1797, which prohibited the Bank from paying in specie, gold went out, and bank-notes came in; and as these were easily concealed, and when stolen were difficult to pass, the business of "the highway" fell off, and highwaymen gradually became extinct. Jerry Abershaw was the most noted, because he was the most desperate, and most feared of these marauders. He was a reckless desperado who, pistol in hand, would literally have your money, or your life;" and perhaps both. He was as famous in his day as Sixteen-string-Jack, or the Flying Highwayman. He shot several persons; his trial excited as much interest as Thurtell's; and the concourse of people at his execution was innumerable. It was in the height of summer; and the following Sunday being fine, London seemed a deserted city; for hundreds of thousands went to see Abershaw hanging in chains. His fame will outlast his gibbet, which I suppose has been down years ago. The papers tell us, that the duke of Clarence, as Lord High Admiral, ordered down the pirates' gibbets from the river-side. These were the last "men in chains" in the vicinage of the metropolis. July, 1827. JERRY ABERSHAW AND THE MEN IN CHAINS. Townsend, the Bow-street officer's interesting examination before the police committee of the House of Commons in June, 1816, contains some curious particulars respecting Abershaw, the pirates," the dangers of the road," and "hanging matters," toward the close of the last century. Q. The activity of the officers of Bowstreet has infinitely increased of late years? A. No doubt about it; and there is one thing which appears to me most extraordi nary, when I remember, in very likely a week, there should be from ten to fifteen highway robberies. We have not had a man committed for a highway robbery lately; I speak of persons on horseback. Formerly there were two, three, or four highwaymen, some on Hounslow Heath, some on Wimbledon Common, some on Finchley Common, some on the Romford Road. I have actually come to Bow-street in the morning, and while I have been leaning over the desk, had three or four people come in and say, 'I was robbed by two highwaymen in such a place;' 'I was robbed by a single highwayman in such a place.' People travel now safely, by means of the horse-patrol that sir Richard Ford planned. Where are there highway robberies now? As I was observing to the chancellor, as I was up at his house on the Corn Bill: he said, Townsend, I knew you very well so many years ago.' I said, Yes, my lord; I remember your coming first to the bar, first in your plain gown, and then as king's counsel, and now chancellor. Now your lordship sits as chancellor, and directs the executions on the recorder's report; but where are the highway robberies now? and his lordship said, 'Yes, I am astonished.' There are no footpad robberies or road robberies now, but merely jostling you in the streets. They used to be ready to pop at a man as soon as he let down his glass. Q. You remember the case of Abershaw? A. Yes; I had him tucked up where he was; it was through me. I never left a court of justice without having discharged my own feeling as much in favour of the unhappy criminal as I did on the part of the prosecution; and I once applied to Mr. Justice Buller to save two men out of three who were convicted; and on my application we argued a good deal about it. I said, 'My lord, I have no motive but my duty; the jury have pronounced them guilty. I have heard your lordship pro nounce sentence of death, and I have now informed you of the different dispositions of the three men. If you choose to execute them all I have nothing to say about it; but was I you, in the room of being the officer, and you were to tell me what Townsend has told you, I should think it would be a justification of you to respite those two unhappy men, and hang that one who has been convicted three times before.' The other men never had been convicted before, and the other had been three times convicted; and he very properly did. And how are judges or justices to know how many times a man has been convicted but by the information of the officer in whose duty and department it is to keep a register of old offenders. The magistrate sits up there, he knows nothing of it till the party is brought before him; he cannot. Q. Do you think any advantages arise from a man being put on a gibbet after his execution? A. Yes, I was always of that opinion; and I recommended sir William Scott to hang the two men that are hanging down the river. I will state my reason. We will take for granted, that those men were hanged as this morning, for the murder of those revenue officers-they are by law dissected; the sentence is, that afterwards, the body is to go to the surgeons for dissection; there is an end of it-it dies. But look at this there are a couple of men now hanging near the Thames, where all the sailors must come up; and one says to the other, Pray what are those two poor fellows there for? Why,' says another, I will go and ask.' They ask. Why, those two men are hung and gibbeted for murdering his majesty's revenue officers.' And so the thing is kept alive. If it was not for this, people would die, and nobody would know any thing of it. In Abershaw's case I said to the sheriff, 'The only difficulty in hanging this fellow, upon this place, is its being so near lord Spencer's house.' But we went down, and pointed out a particular place; he was hung at the particular pitch of the hill where he used to do the work. If there was a person ever went to see that man hanging, I am sure there was a hundred thousand. I received information that they meant to cut him down. I said to sir Richard Ford, 'I will counteract this; in order to have it done right, I will go and sit up all night, and have eight or ten officers at a distance, for I shall nail these fellows;' for I talked cant language to him. However, we had the officers there, but nobody ever came, or else, being so close to Kent-street, they would have come down and sawed the gibbet, and taken it all away, for Kent-street was a very desperate place, though it is not so now. Lord chief justice Eyre once went the Home Circuit; he began at Hertford, and finished at Kingston. Crimes were so desperate, that in his charge to the grand jury at Hertford, he finished-Now, gentlemen of the jury, you have heard my opinion as to the enormity of the offences committed; be careful what bills you find, for whatever bills you find, if the parties are convicted before me, if they are convicted for capital offences, I have made up my mind, as I go through the circuit, to execute every one.' He did so-he never saved man or woman-and a singular circumstance occurred, that stands upon record fresh in my mind. There were seven people convicted for a robbery in Kent-street; for calling in a pedlar, and after robbing the man, he jumped out of window. There were four men and three women concerned; they were all convicted, and all hanged in Kent-street, opposite the door; and, I think, on Kennington Common eight more, making fifteen :-all that were convicted were hung. Q. Do you think, from your long observation, that the morals and manners of the lower people in the metropolis are better or worse than formerly? A. I am decidedly of opinion, that, with respect to the present time, and the early part of my time, such as 1781, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, where there is one person convicted now-I may say, I am positively convinced-there were five then. We never had an execution wherein we did not grace that unfortunate gibbet (at the Old Bailey) with ten, twelve, to thirteen, sixteen, and twenty; and forty I once saw, at twice; I have them all down at home. I remember in 1783, when sergeant Adair was recorder, there were forty hung at two executions. The unfortunate people themselves laugh at it now; they call it a bagatelle.' I was conversing with an old offender some years ago, who has now quite changed his life; and he said, Why, sir, where there is one hung now, there were five when I was young;' and I said, 'Yes, you are right in your calculation, and you are very lucky that you were spared so long, and have lived to be a better man.' I agree with George Barrington-whom I brought from Newcastle-and however great lord chief baron Eyre's speech was to him, after he had answered him, it came to this climax: 'Now,' says he, Townsend, you heard what the chief baron said to me; a fine flowery speech, was it not?' 'Yes' But he did not answer the question I put to him.' Now how could he? After all that the chief baron said to him after he was acquitted-giving him advice-this word was every thing says he, My lord, I have paid great attention to what you have been stating to me, after my acquittal: I return my sincere thanks to the jury for their goodness: but your lordship says, you lament very much that a man of my abilities should not turn my abilities to a better |