lf
an houre after, Johan was taken very sicke, which increasinge all the
night uppone her, her other sister stille callinge her to come away; in
the morninge they both departed this wretched world together. O the
unsearchable wisdom of God! How deepe are his judgments, and his ways
past fyndinge out!

"Testified by diverse oulde and honest persons yet living; which I
myself have heard their father, when he was alive, report.

"Arthur Polland, Vicar; Henry Homewood, John Pupp, Churchwardens."

[Sidenote: THE SELWYN MONUMENT]

[Sidenote: FRISTON PLACE]

Friston church is interesting, for it contains one of the most beautiful
monuments in Sussex, worthy to be remembered with that to the Shurleys
at Isfield. The family commemorated is the Selwyns, and the monument has
a very charming dado of six kneeling daughters and three babies laid
neatly on a tasseled cushion, under the reading desk--a quaint conceit
impossible to be carried out successfully in these days, but pretty and
fitting enough then. Of the last of the Selwyns, "Ultimus Selwynorum,"
who died aged twenty, in 1704, it is said, with that exquisite
simplicity of exaggeration of which the secret also has been lost, that
for him "the very marble might weep." Friston Place, the home of the
Selwyns, has some noble timbers, and a curious old donkey-well in the
garden.

West Dean, which is three miles to the west, by a bleak and lonely road
amid hills and valleys, is just a farm yard, with remains of very
ancient architecture among the barns and ricks. The village, however, is
more easily reached from Alfriston than Eastbourne.

CHAPTER XXXV

PEVENSEY AND HURSTMONCEUX

A well-behaved castle--Rail and romance--Britons, Romans, Saxons and
Normans at Pevensey--William the Conqueror--A series of sieges--The
first English letter--Andrew Borde, the jester, again--Pevensey
gibes--A red brick castle--Hurstmonceux church--The tomb of the
Dacres.--Two Hurstmonceux clerics--The de Fiennes and the de
Monceux--A spacious home--The ghost--The unfortunate Lord
Dacre--Horace Walpole at Hurstmonceux--The trug industry.

Pevensey Castle behaves as a castle should: it rises from the plain, the
only considerable eminence for miles; it has noble grey walls of the
true romantic hue and thickness; it can be seen from the sea, over which
it once kept guard; it has a history rich in assailants and defenders.
There is indeed nothing in its disfavou