throw together a few notices on that head. A rose was not a
very unfrequent acknowledgment. Near to the scene of our story, the
tenant of a certain farm called Lime Hurst was compelled to bring a rose
at the feast of St John Baptist. He held other lands; but they were
subject only to the customary rules of the lordship, such as ploughing,
harrowing, carting turves from Ashton-moss to the lord's house, leading
his corn in harvest, &c. This species of service was called boon-work;
and hence the old adage, "I am served like a boon-shearer." It, however,
seems that some trifling present was made in return. In a MS. of
receipts and disbursements belonging to the Cheethams, kept in the time
of Charles II., there is an item for moneys paid for gloves to the
boon-shearers at Clayton Hall, where Humphrey Cheetham, founder of the
college at Manchester, then resided. The acknowledgment of a rose before
mentioned might seem to have some allusion to the Knights Hospitallers.
The estate of Lime Hurst was called John of Jerusalem's land, and the
tithes and rent, in all probability, once went to the support of that
order.

In the Ashton pedigree we find a Nicholas Assheton, as it was then
spelt, who enrolled himself amongst these warrior-monks. It seems not
improbable that the profits of this estate belonged to him.

The custom of heriotship, however, was the most oppressive, being paid
and exacted from the parties at a time when they were least able to
render it. Our tradition will best illustrate this remnant of barbarism,
to which, even in the customs of the most savage tribes, we should
scarcely find a parallel.

In the early records of the Ashton family we find that Thomas Stavely,
or Stayley, held a place called the Bestal by paying one penny at
Christmas. This Bestal was, perhaps, a place of security or confinement.
Adjoining the hall yard, the ancient residence of the Ashtons, is an old
stone building facing the south, now called the Dungeon. It is flanked
at the east and west corners by small towers with conical stone roofs.
The wall is pierced by two pointed windows. Judging from its appearance,
it must have been a place of strength; the name Bestal being probably a
corruption of Bastile, basilion, or bastilion--all of which we find
appropriated to places of this description. Tradition, indeed, says the
ancient lords of Ashton made this a place of confinement, when the power
of life and death were at their command. A field