94

A DAY AT SANDWICH.

IT is well known that as the glory of the ancient Roman settlement and fortress of Richborough 1 waned, the town of Sandwich rose gradually into fame and wealth. It lies about a mile and a half south of Richborough, and nearer to the sea, on the southern bank of the Stour, at the point where that river takes an easterly instead of a southern course. It is surrounded on every side by a verdant lea of meadows, occupied as marsh and pasture land, above which rise the church towers and quaint red roofs of the town, after a fashion which gives to the place the air of a foreign city, and you might easily fancy, as you look upon it, that you are beholding one of the mediæval cities of Ghent or Flanders. A nearer view, however, will serve to dispel the illusion; and the stranger, on entering its streets, will find himself in a place ‘Gabiis desertior atque Fidenis'; somewhat like old and decayed Winchilsea,2 only that it lacks

1 See below, page 129.

2 See page 70.

its picturesque position on the hillside, and is not so far gone to decay. But the grass grows in the highways of Sandwich, and scarcely a face is seen peeping out of the gabled windows which flank its streets. Except upon a market-day, you may look in vain up and down its High Street for a passer-by or a child at play; and indeed it is a common local saying that in Sandwich nobody ever goes in or out of the front door of his house except on the occasion of a wedding or a funeral.

Sandwich, or Sandvic, the vicus on the sand, is supposed by most antiquaries to be identical with the Lundenwic of which Saxon chroniclers make mention as the principal port and place of resort for merchants trading between foreign parts and London. It appears to have been called Lundenwic until the Saxons were supplanted by the Danes, when it obtained the name that it still retains. It embraces three parishes-St. Clement's, St. Mary's, and St. Peter's-besides a district which is called the Liberty of the Hospital of St. Bartholomew, and its population is a little above 3,000 souls. These are mostly employed in seafaring pursuits, or in the marketgardens which surround the town, and which are said. to have been among the first in England where vegetables were reared for sale, and are still unusually productive.

Even when the haven and port of Richborough decayed, and the sea gradually left its cliffs, there

was still room at Sandwich for a large and convenient haven. We do not find any mention of Sandwich by name until the year 665, somewhat more than two hundred years after the first appearance of the Saxons in England. But in the times during which the Danes infested our coasts, the port became so frequented that it is styled by the author of the 'Life of Queen Emma' the most noted of all the English ports. From its first rise the place appears to have been regarded as the property of the several sovereigns who ruled over the country; and it continued in this state until 979, when King Ethelred bestowed it upon the Cathedral of Christ Church, Canterbury, free from all secular suit and service, except the duty of repelling invasions, and the repairing of castles and bridges. But this arrangement, so derogatory to the dignity of the town, was of short duration; for in 1023, soon after his accession to the throne, we find that Canute, as was perhaps natural in a Dane, made Sandwich independent, finished the building of the town, and gave, or rather restored, its port, with the profits of the water on both sides of the stream, for the support of the church and of the monks residing there. From this time the town made a rapid rise in its population and importance; and before the end of the century it stood in such high repute that it was made one of the Cinque Ports; and in the days of Edward the Confessor it contained 370 inhabited houses. At the Domesday survey in

1080 we find that 'Sandwiche paid forty pounds of ferme and forty thousand herrings to the food of the monks.'

During the eleventh century the town continued to grow in importance, and ships from all parts entered its convenient harbour, whence foreign merchandise was sent on by land to London. Though partly burnt by the French in 1217, it rose like a phoenix brighter out of its ashes, and was largely recompensed by the favours and privileges bestowed upon it by successive sovereigns. Thus Henry III. confirmed all the tolls and customs before granted to it, and added a market, with the right of taking a toll of twopence upon every cask of wine entered inwards at its port. In the reign of Edward I. the prior and convent of Christ Church, Canterbury, gave up to Queen Eleanor, in exchange for lands elsewhere, all their rights, privileges, and possessions at Sandwich, excepting their houses and keys, and a free passage in the haven in the small boat called the 'vere' boat, and the liberty for themselves and their tenants to buy and sell toll free. The king confirmed this privilege in the same year, and placed in the town the staple for wool.

From nearly the time of the Conquest, Sandwich continued to be one of the chief rendezvous of the Royal fleet, and was continually visited by the English sovereigns on their way to and from the Continent. The town soon showed signs of its in

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creasing prosperity in its population, which contributed no less than 1,500 mariners to the navy of the port; and its navy was so strong that when occasion arose the mayors of Sandwich could furnish no less than fifteen sail of armed vessels, which sadly annoyed the French, and tempted them here, as at Winchilsea, to make frequent reprisals. Thus, no less than twice in the reign of Henry VI. the French succeeded in ravaging the town and plundering its inhabitants, Charles VIII. of France, on one occasion, having sent a force of several thousand men, who landed and sacked the town; and to add to its troubles from foreign enemies, Sandwich was pillaged by the Earl of Warwick in the same king's reign. To prevent the recurrence of such disasters, King Edward IV. surrounded the town with new fortifications of considerable strength, for the repair of which he assessed an annual payment of 100l. out of the revenues of the

customs.

This step gave a new impetus to the trade of the place; and as the harbour was the safest and most convenient refuge from the perils of the Goodwin Sands, and the merchants who frequented it were both spirited and successful, we find that before the end of Edward's reign the receipts of the harbour and custom-house rose to 17,000l., and that the town could boast of no less than ninety-five vessels of superior tonnage.

But it is not always high water on the ocean; and