anything upon it. To
these hills we come in the next chapter.

[Illustration: _Near Tarring Neville._]

CHAPTER XXVIII

ALFRISTON

Three routes to Alfriston--West Firle--The Gages--A "Noble
Dame"--Sussex pronunciation and doggedness--The Selmeston
smugglers--Alfriston's ancient inn--The middle ages and P....
P....--Alfriston church--A miracle and a sign--An Alfriston
scholar--Dr. Benbrigg--The smallest church in Sussex--Alfriston as
a centre--A digression on walking--"A Song against
Speed"--Alciston--A Berwick genius--The Long Man of Wilmington.

Alfriston may be reached from Lewes by rail, taking train to Berwick; by
road, under the hills; or on foot or horse-back, over the hills. By
road, you pass first through Beddingham, a small village, where, it is
said, was once a monastery; then, by a southern _detour_, to West Firle,
a charming little village with a great park, which bears the same
relation to Firle Beacon that Wiston Park does to Chanctonbury Ring. The
tower in the east serves to provide a good view of the Weald for those
who do not care to climb the beacon's seven hundred feet and get a
better. The little church is rich in interesting memorials of the Gages,
who have been the lords of Firle for many a long year.

In the house is a portrait of Sir John Gage, the trusted friend of Henry
VIII., Edward VI., and Mary, and, as Constable of the Tower, the gaoler
(but a very kind one) of both Lady Jane Grey and the Princess Elizabeth,
afterwards Good Queen Bess. In Harrison Ainsworth's romance _The
Constable of the Tower_ Sir John Gage is much seen. Sir John was
succeeded at Firle by his son Sir Edward, who, as High Sheriff of
Sussex, was one of the judges of the Sussex martyrs, but who, even Foxe
admits, exercised courtesy to them. Sir Edward's son, Sir John Gage, was
the second husband of the Lady Penelope D'Arcy, Mr. Hardy's heroine,
whose portrait we saw at Parham: who, being courted as a girl by Sir
George Trenchard, Sir John Gage, and Sir William Hervey, promised she
would marry all in turn, and did so. Sir George left her a widow at
seventeen; to Sir John Gage she bore nine children.

Returning from Firle to the high road, we come next, by following for a
little a left turn, to Selmeston, the village where Mr. W. D. Parish,
the rector for very many years, collected most of the entertaining
examples of the Sussex dialect with which I have made so free in a late