The coast to Newhaven from Rye, if not exactly pretty, becomes once more attractive, and after Fairlight Point the Downs come seaward again, and the coast-line for a considerable distance is once more formed by bold chalk cliffs.

Though Hastings has no longer a harbour and is not, as formerly in the long ago, a port, one must devote to this historic town and ancient Cinque Port at least a passing notice.

Of all the chief towns of the Cinque Ports there are fewer records relating to Hastings than of any other, and this is, perhaps, not to be greatly wondered at when one remembers that at the commencement of the nineteenth century it had sunk from its old-time greatness to the position of a small fishing village. The town will, however, whatever the variation of its fortunes, always remain a “great name in history” because of its association with one of the crises of the world’s evolutionary progress, the Battle of Hastings. Even in early British times there seems no reason for doubt that Hastings was a strongly fortified place, the “forts” being placed on the East Hill as well as on the Castle Hill. The castle was either Roman in its origin or was erected on foundations already existing and belonging to a much earlier period.

Hastings has also historic interest from figuring in the famous Bayeux tapestry under the name of Hastingaceastra. If further evidence were required of the very ancient existence of the place it is afforded by the very considerable discoveries of Roman pottery, coins, and other relics which have from time to time been made. The original name of the district was Rameslie, and at one time it evidently formed part of the property attached to the Abbey of FÉcamp. At the time of the great Survey, the results of which are recorded in the Domesday Book, the place possessed no less than five churches and five score of salt pits or salterns. Under Saxon rule it undoubtedly rose to a position of great importance, and this notwithstanding the fact that it was repeatedly attacked and ravaged by hordes of Danish and other pirates, who did not, however, succeed in gaining any permanent footing. In the time of Athelstan it was of sufficient note to share with Gloucester and Lewes the distinction of being a “mint” town. The more modern name of Hastings is reputed to have been derived from the famous Danish pirate Haestinga, who for a time established a fort or stronghold near the spot.

But as one writes of Hastings, the scene which the white cliffs witnessed on that October morning, 1066, comes insensibly before one’s eyes, when from across the Channel came a fleet of low, long galleys, some under sail and with curious high stems and sterns, most of them with two or three short straight masts like those of luggers, whilst others had strange devices upon their prows, or shields ornamented with crests and coats of arms hung out along their bulwarks.

Fortunately for the voyaging host the sea was calm and the wind blew from a favourable quarter, for the transports of those times were not easy to manage in a gale or contrary wind. At length they drew in close with the land, the prows of the smaller vessels grated upon the sand and shingle of the beach, and then the busy scene of landing both men and horses ensued. William the Norman had come to claim the throne of England, and, with Harold and the English fleet away in the north, had landed without opposition.

He pitched his tents, built himself a wooden castle, and then set about the ravaging of the country round about, till Harold should appear with the English to give him battle.

In hot haste, Harold, Godwin’s son, marched back to London, calling upon his nobles and relatives, Edwin and Morcar amongst the number, to join him; but the two latter held back. Then Harold, having gathered the men of London and Kent and many of the country folk to his standard, marched to meet William, and, reaching Senlac, “lay there on the hillside by a hoar-apple tree.” Gurt, his brother, prayed him to retire again on London, after wasting the country between William and that place, so that the latter could get neither fodder for his horses nor food for his men. Good advice, doubtless, as Harold himself admitted, adding, however, “I was made King to cherish this folk. How shall I lay waste this land of theirs? Nor does it befit an English King to turn from his foes.”

Every one knows the story of the “feasting” English and the “praying” Normans, though whether it be true or not, who shall say? Just as every one knows how went the day on the “bloody heights of Senlac, where, after the attack had been made by a Norman minstrel, who rode up against the English singing a war song of Charlemagne, the last Saxon King, his two brothers, the flower of English fighting men and nobles to a great multitude fell.”

William refused the body of slain Harold to his mother, who pleaded for it, even if she paid its weight in gold; but when Edith Swan’s-neck, whom Harold had loved, found it beneath a heap of slain, the Norman conqueror, his chivalry and perhaps even his sentiment touched, gave it to her, telling them to bury it on the face of the cliff with the words, “He kept the shore well while he lived, let him keep it now he is dead.”

Though this is the supreme historical event connected with Hastings, many times during the reigns of our Norman Kings was the place to witness the assemblage of huge bodies of fighting men. Here in 1094 were gathered at the command of William Rufus no less than 20,000 men for the avowed purpose of transhipment to Normandy. They were, however, disbanded, and the men were deprived by agents of the King of the pay of ten shillings given them, “which great sum in all was duly forwarded to the King, at whose behest it had been filched!” A truly Royal piece of chicanery.

In the fourteenth century the town, which had sprung up to some considerable importance, was raided by the French, sacked, and burned. But by the fifteenth it had grown up again to be a large place with a considerable military force attached to it. By the sixteenth it had received a charter and had a mayor and twelve jurats, a harbour of some size, and a considerable trade in shipbuilding. No traces of the inlet once existing now break the coast-line, and the closest search meets with no reward in discoveries of antiquity. The first Hastings lies fathoms deep under the sea, the second has passed away, and in the third one has the modern town with its long lines of boarding-houses and hotels lining the sea-front. Not very picturesque save when seen at night brilliantly lit, with the numberless fishing boats carrying riding or other lights twinkling like huge glow worms in the foreground.

Hastings during the latter part of the eighteenth and early years of the nineteenth centuries was one of the most notorious places along the whole Sussex coast for smuggling, on account of its convenient landing-places. The lawless Hawkhurst gang, to which reference will later be made, had several of its members hailing from the town, and the bands of smugglers in the immediate district were bold to a degree, often (as we are told) daring to land their cargoes of contraband under the very noses of the preventive men whose duty it was to frustrate such attempts. Wrecking, too, was an occasional variation of occupation for the smugglers, and several vessels are known in the first decade of the last century to have been lured to destruction by false lights shown on the cliffs.

The smugglers extended their operations far inland, daring to take their cargoes as far as Brede and other places for storage. Brede Place, which was one of their resorts, once the home of the Attefords, but afterwards that of the Oxenbridges, has several weird legends connected with it. Not the least uncanny is the story of one Sir Goddard Oxenbridge, who died in 1557, we should imagine little lamented by his neighbours. This owner of the manor, besides being a reputed dealer in the “black arts,” had so strong a liking for human flesh that children of the neighbourhood were constantly disappearing, to the grief of their parents and the “engorgement of this terrible ogre-like being.” For babies this Sir Goddard, who, we are informed, was of great stature and “flourished amazingly on his diet of human flesh,” had an especial partiality. Further, “neither bow, nor arrow, nor axe, nor sword, nor spear could slay this redoubtable giant, but some of the country people about here succeeded at length in making him drunk and in sawing him in half with a wooden saw!” A truly marvellous performance in good keeping with the rest of the tale!

But whether the legend of Sir Goddard Oxenbridge has any real foundation on fact or not, there is little doubt that soon after his death the place acquired so evil a reputation (owing to the appearance of his ghost, “with dripping jaws” and “an uncanny light from his eyes”) that people of a nervous and even those usually of a bold disposition avoided it. The ingenious smugglers of Hastings and the neighbourhood in the eighteenth century were not slow to appreciate the advantages afforded by this gloomy and ruinous old manor house, and they not only sedulously cultivated the idea that Brede was haunted but “put up some other very pretty tales amongst the country folk to dissuade them from approaching the house,” and in addition showed ghostly and mysterious lights. These tactics were so eminently successful that for some years the smugglers retained undisturbed possession of the place, using it as a storehouse for their goods.

There is reputed to be an underground passage leading from the house to the church—a distance of about a mile—but this has not of recent years, nor for all we know ever, been entered nor the existence of it proved. The disappearance of two revenue men was attributed to the Brede Place gang, and in the eighties of the eighteenth century the house was attacked and raided in the smugglers’ absence by the “preventives” in search of their missing comrades. Nothing, not even a tub or bale, was, however, then discovered, only an old man, who was as deaf as the proverbial adder and, it is very likely, as wise as the serpent.

Close to the house is a bridge which bears the name of “Groaning Bridge.” Tradition asserts that it was near here that Sir Goddard was sawn in half, and that the noises which are sometimes heard after dusk are his lamentable cries. Another tale is that it was in the hollow beneath the bridge that some of the smugglers used to hide at nights, and by making “most horrible and terrifying noises and groans so successfully prevented the further advance of any intending intruder towards the house.”

Onward from Hastings to our next port, Newhaven, one passes several of the ancient “limbs” of the Cinque Ports, Pevensey, one of the eight corporate members, the most important. No longer a port, the little town lies nearly a mile inland from the sea, which once almost washed the walls of its fine and impressive castle, set on a mound and surrounded by a rush-grown moat, and visible from afar.

Pevensey is nowadays, too, divided by stretches of flat marshy fields from the Channel, and has little of interest remaining save the traditions of its historic past as a Cinque Port “limb,” the jokes which are recorded against its municipal rulers, and the fact that it undoubtedly occupies the site of Anderida of the Romans. The remains of the Roman walls, which surround the Norman castle of Robert de Moreton, half-brother of the Conqueror, give to the place an interest not exceeded even by that of Lewes or Richborough. Here was once a city or at least a great settlement bordering upon that great, widely extending forest of Anderida, once covering the Weald of Sussex, which was probably as large, though perhaps not so famous, as the New Forest of Hampshire. The departure of the Roman legions was the signal for piratical descents upon our coasts, and the Saxons under Ella landed on the shore near Pevensey, and slew every Briton they came across.

Pevensey Castle has had a stirring and chequered history. Its stalwart walls, now ivy-clad and crumbling, have survived many an attack in those ages when the strongholds of nobles were called upon to resist not alone the assaults of foreign invaders, but also those of English nobles making private war; and within its walls have languished many whose names are written on the page of history for better or for worse. Brave Queen Maude held the place against the forces of Stephen, and only yielded when brought face to face with famine; and it has had yet another brave woman defender (ranking with Lady Bankes, of Corfe, in Dorsetshire) for the Lancastrians in the last year of the fourteenth century, Lady Joan Pelham.

As one writer has put it, “she wielded her pen not less readily than she commanded and directed the sword.” In a letter to her husband—a model of tenderness and felicitous expression—she says, “My dear Lord,—I recommend me to your high Lordship, with heart and body and all my poor might, and with all this I think (of) you, as my dear Lord, dearest and best beloved of all earthly Lords.... I heard by your letter that ye were strong enough with the grace of God for to keep you from the malice of your enemies. And, dear Lord, if it like you to your high Lordship that as soon as ye might that I might hear of your gracious speed, which God Almighty continue and increase. And my dear Lord, if it like you to know my fare, I am here laid by in manner of a siege with the county of Sussex, Surrey, and a great parcel of Kent, so that I may not go out nor no victuals get me, but with much hard.” Then, in the concluding paragraph, we get a sight of the tender heart of a devoted and loving woman, the same in all time and stress, and not variable at all. “Farewell, my dear Lord,” writes the beleaguered Joan Pelham, “the Holy Trinity keep you from your enemies, and soon send me good tidings of you.... By your own poor J. Pelham.” And then the superscription, “To my true Lord.” July 25, 1399.B

A few years later and Edmund, Duke of York, was imprisoned here; and Queen Joan of Navarre, widow of the Duke of Bretagne, and second wife of Henry IV, was also confined here for a period of more than eight long years. The former appears to have been “an uncommon grateful prisoner,” for he is said to have left his gaoler a legacy of £20!

In Pevensey town in the sixteenth century lived a jester (professional or otherwise we have not succeeded in discovering), Andrew Borde, a monk, said to be the original “Merry Andrew,” and the author of two ancient works, still known to the few, called the Boke of Knowledge and The Wise Men of Gotham. His witticisms were apparently not seldom directed against the municipal authorities of Pevensey. On one occasion he makes the Mayor assert, with much access of dignity, “Though Mayor of Pevensey I am yet but a man,” and accuses a Pevensey jury of having brought in a verdict of manslaughter against a yeoman charged with stealing a pair of leather breeches!

Another detailed account of this latter event says that when the man had been brought in guilty of stealing the breeches by the jury, and they were informed that the theft was a capital offence, they were astounded and unwilling to hang the man and so adjourned the Court, dispatching a messenger hot haste to Thomas Willard, Esq., of Eastbourne, the town clerk, to beg his opinion whether it would be possible to reverse the present verdict and bring in a fresh one. It happened that Lord Wilmington, with the Chief Baron of the Exchequer, was at dinner with Mr Willard when the messenger arrived, and upon Mr Willard telling these two gentlemen the nature of the message he had received, the Chief Baron (as a joke, one must suppose) said, “Instruct them to reverse the present verdict and bring in another of manslaughter.” To this advice Lord Wilmington also assented, and Mr Willard advised accordingly, with the humorous result we have already mentioned.

Whilst yet another Mayor, who received an important letter by special messenger whilst engaged in the occupation of mending the thatch on his pig’s stye, on attempting to read the communication upside down, “was so long a-doing it” that the messenger at last ventured to hint respectfully that if he would attempt to read his letter as did ordinary folk he would make speedier progress towards mastering the contents. The reply must have been crushing, “Hold your tongue, sir!” exclaimed his worship with asperity, “understand that while I’m Mayor of Pevensey I hold a letter which end up I choose.”

Andrew Borde’s fame as a mirth provoker was so widespread that we find King Edward VI himself came to visit him. The room which by tradition is pointed out as that in which the youthful Sovereign had the interview with his father’s old physician is nowadays somewhat of a show place, and the house itself is a quaint one.

It is but five miles from Pevensey to Eastbourne, clean and smart-looking even from a distance at sea, and made yet more attractive to the vision by the charming wooded slopes of Paradise which form its setting or background; but there is no harbour or haven, and, in addition, Eastbourne is too new to have much history. Two miles south-west of the town rises Beachy Head, the last of the Downs headlands—rugged, impressive, magnificent, almost sheer in places, and green-capped with close-cropped turf. In former times there have been many wrecks on its wave-washed base, till the Belle Tout lighthouse came in 1831 to fling across the dark waters its saving light, and the more powerful and more modern one at the base of the cliff, near what is known as Parson Darby’s hole, was erected in 1902 to take its place.

Possibly Beachy Head, which towers above us as we sweep round it, but at a respectful distance from the race off the south ledges, with perhaps a flock of tourists on its summit, having the semblance and proportions of flies so far above the water are they, has inspired more poetry than any other headland of the south coast. Most are cognizant of Mr Swinburne’s beautiful ode “To a Seamew,” which is, alas! too long for quotation, and would be spoiled by omission of a single stanza. But from Richard Jefferies’s “The Breeze on Beachy Head” one can cull some vivid lines, and by them bring the headland to the mind’s eye though so far from it. “But,” he says, “the glory of these glorious Downs is the breeze.... It is air without admixture. If it comes from the south, the waves refine it; if inland, the wheat and the flowers and grass distil it. The great headland and the whole rib of the promontory is wind swept and washed with air; the billows of atmosphere roll over it.... Discover some excuse to be up there always, to search for stray mushrooms ... or to make a list of flowers and grasses; to do anything, and, if not, go always without any pretext. Lands of gold have been found, and lands of spices and precious merchandize; but this is the land of health.”

One remembers, too, the description of the headland in King Lear. The truth of which, down to the smallest detail, seems to prove beyond question that Shakespeare himself must have visited the spot and have drunk in the salt sea breeze and felt the glorious sun as have other poets and writers.

And thus, as we leave the gleaming headland astern, we make for Newhaven by way of Seaford. The latter has by far the more attractive history, as should naturally follow the distinction of being a “limb” of the Cinque Ports. The cliffs are very fine all along to Seaford, and once a haven of refuge came very near being made at Cuckmere close by, but the advantages or claims, or both, of Portland further west prevailed.

It was on the water between Beachy Head and Newhaven that on June 30, 1690, De Tourville, Admiral of the French fleet, having gained valuable information from a Lydd publican of the division of the English and Dutch sea forces, bore down upon the latter and gave them battle. Outnumbered though they were—the French had eighty-five ships to the Hollanders’ thirty—the Dutch fought gallantly, but suffered a heavy defeat; whilst the English ships to leeward were unable to come to their allies’ assistance until the victory had been virtually won. The English admiral, Lord Torrington, afterwards nearly shared the fate meted out to Admiral Byng sixty-seven years later, but, although committed to the Tower and tried, to William of Orange’s keen disgust he was acquitted.

Seaford has indeed a chequered history. Like its other stranded neighbours amongst the Cinque and other Ports of the Confederacy, it once possessed its harbour, formed by the Ouse, known even in Roman times. And it sent two representatives to Parliament in the year 1300. Two years later it was commanded to furnish King Edward with a ship for his French expedition, two ships for the King in 1336, and five but eleven years later, so that its growth at that period must have been rapid; but in the reign of the Third Edward the decline of the place was equally marked. It ceased to send members to Parliament, and, with its haven rapidly silting up and the town suffering constant attacks by the French, the place and its inhabitants were soon in evil case. In the reigns of the last-named King and those of Richard II and Henry IV it was repeatedly sacked and burned, and so discontented did the people become with the want of assistance and protection afforded them, more especially in the reign of weak Henry VI, that they were ripe for rebellion, and when Jack Cade appeared they joined him almost to a man.

From this period onwards the Ouse now rapidly filled up, so that there was soon but the mere semblance of a port, and finally the river changed its course, found an outlet near the village of Meeching, and ultimately, in the sixteenth century, formed a harbour at Newhaven, in the mere name of which the downfall of neighbouring Seaford is succinctly told.

The French were not, however, content to leave the poor sea-deserted place alone. They made one of their periodical descents upon it in 1545. But on this occasion, with the assistance of gallant Sir Nicholas Pelham, the invaders were beaten off with heavy loss, the event being commemorated upon the worthy knight’s tomb in the following somewhat halting lines:

In 1640 Seaford was once more empowered to send representatives to Parliament, and later on amongst those who from time to time represented what had become a Treasury Borough we find William Pitt the elder and George Canning.

The wreckers and smugglers of Seaford during the latter half of the eighteenth and early part of the nineteenth century were scarcely less notorious than those of Hastings, Rye, and other places on the Sussex coast. Many a vessel was lured to destruction, and many a cargo run almost in sight of the authorities who existed to put down these malpractices. From a letter of a gentleman of Stafford, Sussex, to one of the newspapers on September 18, 1783, we extract the following account of smuggling as it then existed. “There is,” he writes, “a most convenient port, about a mile from Seaford, for smugglers to land their goods, and so daring are they become, that a dozen or more cutters may frequently be seen laying-to in open day.” On Tuesday evening, between two and three hundred smugglers on horseback came to Cookmere, and received various kinds of goods from the boats, “till at last the whole number were laden, when, in defiance of the King’s officers, they went their way in great triumph. About a week before this upwards of three hundred attended at the same place, and though the sea ran mountains high, the daring men in the cutters made good the landing, to the surprise of everybody, and the men on horseback took all away.”

It is chiefly from such extracts as that which we have just made that any clear idea can be obtained regarding the prevalence of smuggling and the daring tactics of the smugglers of those times.

The prospect of a French invasion in 1803 and 1804 made Seaford and the immediate neighbourhood a scene of unwonted activity. We are told that the Commander-in-Chief, His Royal Highness the Duke of York, and Major-General Lennox issued orders, which were received by the colonel commanding in the district, to the effect “that the French, should they succeed in crossing the British Channel (not English Channel, mark you), would certainly attempt a landing in Seaford Bay,” and the orders went on to say that a strict and vigilant watch was to be kept up in consequence.

The conduct of the farmers in the neighbourhood in putting up and “finding for” large numbers of troops for a lengthy period was greatly commended by one Lieutenant-Colonel Frith in the following year (1804), and the officers of His Majesty’s First or North Battalion of Hampshire Militia, which had been concentrated in Sussex, on leaving Alfriston. The letter from the lieutenant-colonel in question expresses that “They feel that they have been received as brethren engaged in one common cause, the defence of their country, and all that it contains most near and dear.”

Although the French never succeeded in crossing the Channel in force and effecting a landing in Seaford Bay or anywhere else, it is somewhat startling to read such an extract as the following, also taken from a newspaper of the period: “Dec. 28, 1807. On Saturday morning last a daring attempt was made by a French privateer to capture two loaded colliers, lying off Seaford.... The enemy succeeded in capturing and sending away one, and was proceeding to take possession of the other. The latter, however, fortunately mounted two or three swivels, a well-directed discharge from which, it is supposed, gave an unexpected quietus to several of the assailants.”

Little wonder need there be if folk along the coast went uneasily to their beds in those days, “fearing” (as one picturesque if somewhat reckless writer says) “lest they should wake from their peaceful slumbers to find their throats cut by the French.”

The doings of bold John Whitfield, the notorious smuggler, who for his crimes and constant evasions of the Revenue laws was ultimately outlawed, and made his peace by presenting King George II with a parcel of his choicest wines, “than which the King is said to have declared he never drank better,” would fill a book; but, robbed of his picturesqueness and romance, the said Whitfield was, we believe, a sorry villain, and not above murdering a stray “preventive” were he to come athwart his schemes.

However, Seaford of to-day is very different from Seaford of the early years of the last century. Now it is just a pleasant little town nestling at the foot of the Downs, well-sheltered from northerly, north-easterly and north-westerly gales, and yet, from its exposure to the south and west, enjoying warm and invigorating breezes by turn.

It has few objects of interest in the usually accepted sense of the term, but in Church Street under one of the houses is a most interesting and ancient crypt, which is by some supposed to have had some connection with the Hospital of St Leonard, whilst other authorities think that the crypt once formed a part of the ancient Courthouse or Town Hall. The vaulting ribs are of plain design, and the bosses of the Early English type. This is one of the most important relics of ancient Seaford. Unhappily the church was allowed, during the later part of the eighteenth century, to fall into a terrible state of disrepair. Much has from time to time been done to restore it, but the restorations and additions have not invariably been done judiciously or with knowledge.

Newhaven, though a good harbour—in fact, the only real haven of refuge of any consequence or ease of entrance between Folkestone and the Wight—is not a place in which to waste much time. The town is picturesque in parts (as, indeed, are most ports), but it is not much frequented by any save those brought hither by business or stress of weather. Although, even as Meeching, its old name, it finds no mention in the Domesday Book, there is little doubt that it is a place of some antiquity, for there are early Norman traces in the architecture of its church, and also the remains of an encampment with high earthworks on the land side near the shore on the west bank of the river. The modern town which has sprung up on the banks of the Ouse as one of the cross Channel ports dates its origin to the great storm in the year 1570, during which the course of the river was changed from its Seaford outlet to a more direct confluence with the sea at Meeching. In the year 1881 the town was made a port, and since then has gained considerable standing as one of the most frequented places of embarkation for France and as a depÔt for a considerable amount of Continental trade.

It was here that in 1848 Louis Philippe and his Queen, Marie Amelie, landed after escaping from TrÉport in a fishing lugger under the unromantic and not easily distinguished names of Mr and Mrs Smith. The Royal fugitives were welcomed by a well-known Sussex character, William Catt by name, who was not only a prosperous miller but a noted fruit-grower. They afterwards took rooms at the Bridge Hotel, kept, as it happened, by a Mr Smith, which circumstance, we are told, “caused his ex-Majesty some considerable amusement and laughter.”

The town has the distinction (like Kingsbridge in fair Devon) of manufacturing “a local tipple of some potency.” The original brewer, Thomas Tipper by name, after whom the concoction, “Newhaven tipper,” is known, died in the merry month of May, 1785, at, as it was reckoned in those times, the early age of fifty-four. The epitaph on his tomb, after reciting various virtues, declares:

Local tradition asserts that the said Thomas Tipper was a good friend, too, of the local smugglers; but this in the times in which he lived would not invalidate his claim to have never done “one knavish act to get his gold.” His brew, we are told, was prepared with, and owed its “peculiar charm of flavour” to, brackish water, and it is more, we believe, than a mere tale that George IV, whilst at Brighton, imbibed it freely and with no particular harm. One authority goes so far as to assert “with great satisfaction.”

The church of Newhaven is not only interesting, but has a very beautiful situation on the hillside above the town. The one peculiarity in its architecture which strikes one at first sight is the position of its tower placed at the eastern end, while to the east of the tower is placed a fine semicircular apse—which has its counterpart, with other features as well, in the church of Vainville in Normandy—in which one of the small Norman windows can be seen. The pointed windows are of considerably later date.

The interior stone work, where it has not been carelessly and inappropriately restored, is good. The tower chancel is a very fine piece of work, and has been less disfigured than other portions of the building.

This ancient church might well have been a “sailors’ chapel,” such as one finds in places on the North Devon coast and so frequently along the opposite coast of Normandy; but, so far as one can tell, it had no special significance in this respect, though in the churchyard is an obelisk to the memory of Captain James Hanson, a companion of Vancouver on his voyage round the world, who was drowned with over one hundred officers and men by the casting away of his ship, the sloop of war Brazen, off the Ave Rocks in the year 1800.

The coast-line, when one has got out of Newhaven and has laid a course for Shoreham eleven miles distant, is first a series of lofty chalk cliffs, with breezy uplands stretching inland, and then three or four miles of Brighton and Hove shore and sea-front. A long line of houses, hotels and mansions of so distinct a character that, so far as we know, Brighton is never, at least by seamen, mistaken for any other south-coast town. Of “London by the Sea,” as it has been called, there is neither occasion nor space to speak in detail, but that it is of very ancient origin, though at the present day so ultra-modern, there can be little reasonable doubt. The Burrell MSS tell us that “there are three Roman castra, lying in a line over-thwart the Downs from Brighthelmstone to Ditchelling, from south to north. The first, a large one, called the Castle, about a mile from Brighton eastward, and a mile from the sea.” The name is by some supposed to have been derived from Brighthelm, Bishop of Wells, who was afterwards translated to the Archbishopric of Canterbury, and in a volume called The Family Topographer occurs the following statement, “Brighthelm was slain on the down immediately above Brighthelmstone, to which place he gave his name.” Upon what authority this statement is made, or whether it was Brighthelm the Archbishop or some other of the fairly numerous Brighthelms who figure in history in Saxon times, we have been unable clearly to discover.

The one important, authentic and romantic incident in connexion with Brighthelmstone is the escape of Charles II from the fishing village, which it then was, to the French coast after many wanderings subsequent to the Battle of Worcester.

The town suffered, as did so many others, from the attacks of the French, and in the year 1545 they made a descent upon it in force. Holinshed gives a very full and detailed account of their proceedings as follows: “In 37 Henry VIII, 1545, July 8, the Admiral of France, Mons. Donnebatte, hoisted up sailles, and with his whole navy (which consisted of two hundred ships and twenty-six gallies) came forth into the seas, and arrived on the coast of Sussex, before Bright Hampstead, and set certain of his soldiers on land to burn and spoil the country; but the beacons were fired, and the inhabitants thereabouts came down so thick that the Frenchmen were driven to their ships with loss of diverse of their numbers, so they did little hurt there. Immediately hereupon they made to the Isle of Wight, when about two thousand of their men landed, and one of their chief Captains, named Chevalier Daux, a ProvenÇois, being slain with many other, the residue, with loss and shame, were driven back again to their gallies.... They disanctioned (disanchored), and drew along the coast of Sussex, and a small number landed again in Sussex, of whom few returned to their ships, for divers gentlemen of the country, as Sir Nicholas Pelham and others, with such power as was raised upon the sudden, took them by the way and quickly distressed them ... they turned stern, and so got them home again without any act achieved worthy to be mentioned.” As this same account goes on to say, “The number of Frenchmen was great, so that diverse of them who were taken prisoners in the Isle of Wight and in Sussex did report they were three score thousand.” Unless this estimate was purposely and grossly exaggerated, the force was one of the largest ever launched against these shores.

A most interesting and curious map, dated “1545 Julye 37 Hen. VIII,” is in the Cottonian Library, and was apparently drawn for the chief purpose of exhibiting the attack to which we have just referred, and to afford a plan of the coast, with the possible end in view of the establishment of fortifications and defensive works. It is quaintly illustrated, and upon the sea are more than twenty ships, the largest with four masts, several three, some two, and the remainder one, upon which is hoisted a huge lateen sail. The decks of the larger ships are raised in two or more tiers at both bow and stern like those of the Roman galleys, and each ship is flaunting half a score of flags and pennons. Some have huge fleurs de lis in gold on blue, others a red cross on white. On the sea, towards the west side of the map, is inscribed the following curious and, we fear, inaccurate information: “Shypes may ride all somer tem in a myle the towne in V fathome water.” On the eastern side of the map is the following inscription regarding the doings of the French: “Thesse grete shyppes rydeng hard abode shore by shoting into the hill and wallies on the towne, so sore oppressed the towne that the countrey dare not adventure to resscue it.”

Then, as regards the land portion of this curious map, at the bottom of the sea near “Hoove” is written, “Upon this west pte may lond C.M. p’sones (100,000 persons) unletted by any p’vision there.” On the hills are several “wynde mylles,” and above them “the becon of the town” blazing away in a dish-like cresset on a high pole. Many of the houses shown are on fire, and a spot is marked by the following announcement, “Here landed the galeys.”

There is on the producer’s part of this map a delightful and utterly reckless disregard for what is commonly known as perspective. The roads are in most cases drawn as though absolutely perpendicular, necessitating the most acrobatic feats of the inhabitants who pass along them. As for the “galeys,” some of them have performed somersaults on landing on the beach, whilst others are tumbling backwards. The houses are drawn rather smaller than the people who live in them, and there are other equally entertaining anachronisms; but this curious production probably served its main purpose, for defensive towers were built and other steps taken to frustrate any further depredations which might be attempted by the French.

Brighthelmstone had its “quiver” at the thought of the Armada, a little less than half a century later. During a false alarm in 1586, when a fleet of fifty sail appeared in the offing, great activity was shown by the inhabitants, who immediately dispatched a messenger to Lord Buckhurst, lord lieutenant of Sussex, telling him of the suspicious vessels, and he promptly assembled all the men he could muster, “with their armes,” and took up a position between Brighthelmstone and Rottingdean. By nightfall we are told his force numbered 1,600 men, and was later on reinforced by the addition of a body of Kentish men. As the fleet made no movement to attack nor any demonstration of hostile intent, at last a fishing boat or two, “with bold men who feared neither death nor capture,” put off from the beach to reconnoitre. They then discovered that the supposed Armada was but the Dutch wine fleet from Spain, held back by the unfavourable direction of the wind from proceeding to their destination up Channel, and thus, so far as Brighthelmstone is concerned, ended its doings with the Armada.

In the terrific storms of December 27, 1703, and in 1705, Brighthelmstone suffered so severely that it is scarcely too much to say that it was ruined. So greatly also did it decline in the next few years that in 1725 the author of A Tour Through Great Britain speaks of the place as “a poor fishing town, old-built on the very edge of the sea,” and goes on to say that it has a likelihood of being soon entirely swallowed up owing to the rapid encroachment of the sea.

With Brighton, as it came to be called later on, in the days when it was emerging from decline and obscurity to flourish under the Georgian patronage it received, and with the Brighton of to-day, which is one of the great seaside resorts of the world, there is neither necessity nor space to deal. We must on to Shoreham, the quaint little fishing village of smuggling days, now threatened in the near future with development as a seaside resort. Here there is a haven into which one can run in stress of weather, although few, we imagine, would choose to remain in it longer than necessary.

In the old smuggling times it was notorious, and even in the present day there are “tub holes” in not a few of the older houses, and not many years ago, in a house near by the church, one such was brought to light when the back part of the building was pulled down. It was connected with the shore by a passage, long ago filled up at its seaward end, and in the latter were found more than a score of “tubs,” and several packages of tea and lace. Of the spirit one who was there states “it was by no means bad, over-woody, perhaps, but still by no means entirely spoiled and certainly not undrinkable.” Of the tea none was of use, and the lace was much rotted, notwithstanding the thick oilskin covers to the bales, and in most instances the rats had made use of it for nesting purposes. In the centre of two bales, however, some yards were found undamaged, which, as the lace was well on for a century old, more than paid for the alterations which the owner of the house was making.

But even Shoreham, straggling and uninteresting as it mostly is nowadays, has figured in what has been called “rustling and purple romance” in the past, for was it not from Shoreham, or, at all events, hard by, between it and Hove, that Charles II escaped? The story of Charles’s wanderings is so well known that there is no need to recapitulate them here, but there is a most interesting document entitled, “The last act, in the miraculous Storie of his Mties escape; being a true and perfect relation of his conveyance, through many dangers, to a safe harbour; and out of the reach of his tyranicall enemies, by Colonell Gounter; of Rackton in Sussex; who had the happiness to bee instrumentall in the business (as it was taken down from his mouth by a person of worth a little before his death),” which in the part referring to the King’s movements at Shoreham is, we think, worth quotation.

We are told that on the evening before his escape, “At supper, the King was cheerful, not showing the least signe of feare or apprehension of any daunger....” The boatman and also Charles’s host were present at supper, the latter waiting upon the King, and then afterwards “the Coll. (Colonel Gounter) began to treat with the boateman (Tettersfield by name, afterwards referred to as Tattersall), asking him in what readiness he was. He answered he could not of (get off) that night, because for more securitie he had brought his vessel into a breake, and the tyde had forsaken it, soe that it was on ground.... The King, then opening the wenddowe, tooke notice, that the wind was turned and told the master of the Shipp. Whereupon because of the wind and a cleere night, the Coll. offered 10ll (ten pounds) more to the man to gett off that night. But that could not bee. However they agreed, he should take in his company that night. But it was a great business that they had in hand, and God would have them to knowe soe, both by the difficulties that offered themselves, and by his help, he afforded to remoove them.”

When, however, all was thought to be settled, the boatman demanded the insurance of his vessel, and, after some demur, Colonel Gounter agreed to this, he placed the figure at £200. Obtaining a promise of this, he yet appears to have raised difficulties in the way of a start, much to the Colonel’s fear and annoyance. The Colonel then appears to have taken a stand by telling the man that there were other boats to be had, more especially after the man had declined to move unless he had Colonel Gounter’s bond for payment of the money.

Then we are told, “In this contest the King happily interposed. Hee saith right (said his Matie) a Gentleman’s word, especially before witnesses, is as good as his bond. At last [delightful phrase!] the man’s stomach came downe, and carrie them he would, whatever became of it, and before he would be taken, hee would run his boat under the water. Soe it was agreed that about tooe in the morning they should be aboard. The boateman in the meane tyme, went to provide for necessaries, so he (the Colonel) persuaded the King to take some rest. He did in his cloaths, and my Ld. Willmot with him, till towards twoo of the morning. Then the Coll. called them up, showing them how the tyme went by his watch. Horses being ledd by the back way towards the beach. They came to the boate, and found all readie. So the Coll. tooke his leave, craving his Maties pardon if anything had happened through error, nor want of will or loyaltie.... The Coll. abided there, keeping the horses in a readiness in case any thing unexpected had happened.

“At 8 of the clock I (the Colonel) saw them on sayle and it was afternoone before they were out of sight. The wind (O Providence) held very good till the next morning, to ten of the clock brought them to a place in Normandie called Fackham (FÉcamp), some three miles from Havre de Grace. 15 Oct. Wenseday. They were no sooner landed, but the wind turned and a violent storm did arise soe much that the boateman was forced to cutt his cable, lost his anchor to save his boate, for which he required of me 8ll, and had it. The boate was back againe at Chichester by Friday to take his fraught.”

Then follows a significant note, “I was not gone out of the towne of Brighthelmstone twoe houres but soldiers came thither to search for a tall black man 6 foot and 4 inches high.”

Accounts vary as to whether the King actually came to Shoreham at all. By some it is thought that the day or two previous to his coming to an inn at Brighton were spent at Ovingdean at the house of a Mr Mansell about three miles from Brighton, or what is now Kemp Town.

That the King did not always, after his Restoration, remember those who had been of service to him during the period of his adversity is proved by the story that even Tattersall was forgotten. The old seaman took a curious way of reminding his Sovereign of his neglect. He sailed the boat in which he had carried Charles to FÉcamp up the Thames and moored it off Whitehall. The hint was taken. Charles directed that the brig should be taken into the Royal Navy as a fifth-rate ship of war, and renamed her the Royal Escape. Tattersall himself was duly appointed captain with a substantial salary, and a pension in addition of £100 per annum, an amount equal in value to about £380 of present-day money. This was also for several generations paid to Tattersall’s descendants.

An ivy-clad cottage on Southwick Green is still pointed out as that in which Charles slept on the night before his escape to France. It is known as King Charles’s Cottage, but how far tradition is to be relied upon in this instance we are unable positively to assert.

Shoreham harbour formerly was of much greater area than nowadays, when, as one writer puts it, “Nature has been too kind to Shoreham folk by giving them too much land, by taking from them most all the water save that which lies in the channel of the Adur.” In former times, indeed, Shoreham had some reputation for the building of fast-sailing luggers and other craft, many of which, in the last half of the eighteenth and early years of the nineteenth centuries, were engaged in smuggling ventures and privateering.

And who could blame the descendants of the men who suffered so much in early times from the attacks of their neighbours across Channel if they profited by the purchase of their goods in the shape of cognac and lace, or, at a pinch, helped themselves without purchase when the two countries found themselves at war?

Shoreham privateers were not a whit less skilfully handled and bravely fought than those sailing out of larger and more famous ports of the west country. The town, in Armada times, had furnished a fair share of ships and men with which to fight the Spanish Dons, and the spirit which animated the local seamen of the Elizabethan age was not “dead bones” in those of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as is shown by the extraordinary exploits of a certain Captain Gyffard. He was an enterprising man this Captain Gyffard, who when he was ashore (which was not, we are told, very often) had his anchorage at West Blatchington, while he did his seafaring and fitting out at Shoreham. That he was a man of great ambitions we gather from the fact that he had a scheme by which the then Duke of Buckingham was to finance him, and share the spoil. There appeared something dangerously like piracy in the detailed scheme of the worthy captain, and the Duke failed his man. But Captain Gyffard found money and men, and after all many a goodly prize was towed by him into Shoreham.

Another worthy of the town, a certain Captain Scrass, had less nicety of judgement regarding the right of others than we could have liked. One day, whilst cruising in search of plunder aboard his ship, the Dolphin, he espied a Dutch man-o’-war standing up Channel with a prize in tow, which proved to be a Swansea barque. Scrass gallantly went to the rescue, recaptured the Welsh ship and promptly set sail, and towed her in triumph to Shoreham; but, mark you, as his own prize! Poor Powell, her master, was in dire distress, but, notwithstanding his arguments and appeals, Scrass “froze on to his prize,” and refused to give her up, and even her dispossessed captain’s appeals to the Admiralty, made over and over again, had no effect, and he never appears to have received either justice or satisfaction.

Shoreham has had the dubious honour in the past (to be accurate, in 1770) of having its returning officer for Parliamentary elections summoned to the Bar of the House to give an account of his misdeeds. It happened in this way. The Borough in those days sent two representatives to Parliament, and it occurred to a body of ingenious souls that these elections might be made the source of much profit to themselves, so they formed themselves into an organization called the Christian Club! It met at the inn for the reputed purpose of transacting charitable and other highly commendable business. The members were not summoned by the usual means of letters or verbal notice, but by the hoisting of a certain flag on the inn. The funds by which the members used to grant assistance to each other were the proceeds of “rigged” elections. In those days there were comparatively few electors, so that most were members of the Christian Society; but at last their real object was discovered. One of the defeated candidates lodged a petition, and it was then found that the Returning Officer had calmly secured the election of the gentleman who enjoyed (on the payment of an agreed and substantial sum) the good will of the Christian Society members, by the simple expedient of disallowing the votes recorded for his opponent. It is said that this revelation of corruption helped materially the passing of the great Reform Bill. However that may be, the Returning Officer was severely censured, the right of voting was extended to every forty-shilling holder in the Rape of Bramber; and as a punishment no less than eighty-five (or about three-fifths) of the Shoreham “free and independent” electors were disfranchised.

It is New Shoreham that most people see, and that usually passes under the name of Shoreham. The old Shoreham, with its interesting and fine Norman church, is but a tiny place nowadays, famous chiefly for its wooden bridge over the Adur leading to the old smuggling inn known as the Old Sussex Pad, which was burned to the ground a few years ago, and was once the haunt and hiding place of the most notorious smugglers of the district, and literally honeycombed with secret chambers, “tub holes,” and recesses for the stowing away “of humans when there was a hue and cry, and smuggled goods.”

New Shoreham Church, dating from about 1100, is one of the finest in Sussex. It was once attached to the Abbey of Saumur, to which foundation it was presented by William de Braoze, Lord of Bramber.... It is around this church of St Mary that by far the oldest and most picturesque portion of the little town is found. Here the eighteenth-century houses, grey and time worn, and perhaps a little sedate in appearance, are grouped so that they form a little colony of ancient things by themselves, and have a charm which few fail to appreciate. In one of them once lived a certain Captain Henry Roberts, a Shoreham man, who accompanied Captain Cook on several of his voyages, and ultimately died of fever at sea. In others dwelt several merchants of distinction at the end of the eighteenth century, whose wealth rumour asserted was not unconnected with smuggling, privateering, and the slave trade.

Two poets of great distinction have found inspiration at Shoreham (and how many artists with brush and colours we wonder?), and have written of the old church, and the shallow, yellow, and almost currentless stream, which when the tide has rushed Channel-ward is little more than a large ditch, and leaves a great expanse of sand, mud flats, and oyster beds uncovered. The fine poem On the South Coast in Astrophel, and other Poems, by Mr Swinburne is too long for complete quotation. Here, however, is a portion which calls up Shoreham to the memory:

But one must not linger by the way, for the harbour itself, as we have already said, is not one to remain over long in.

And so up anchor and away with the ebb down the coast; flat and uninteresting now, though in the background at first rise pleasant heights, with Lancing College buildings and Chapel amid some trees on the slope of a ridge above the Adur. That strange conglomeration of derelictions from duties manifold converted into the semblance of quite imposing and sometimes artistic habitations known as “Bungalow Town” is soon passed; and then the serried rows of houses marking Worthing sea-front soon lie stretched out along the low, shingly shore. But there is nothing here to detain us, for Worthing has not much history that concerns us, and is not a port (though a pleasant spot enough and picturesque) with the conspicuous clump of trees marking ancient Chanctonbury Rings to the north, and we are bound for the last haven we shall enter before dropping anchor in the busy waters of Portsmouth Harbour.

Littlehampton is a quaint port on the River Arun, which is so delightful from just beyond Ford Junction onwards. All the way to Pulborough one has flower-decked fields, old and ruined castles, picturesque villages, and historic manor-houses to cause one to stray from the river’s bank on exploration bent. Of course, there is no great depth of water much above Arundel for even small craft; though fairly large vessels can get up as far as Arundel town bridge.

Formerly Littlehampton, which has a narrow but picturesque entry past the jetty with its lighthouse, and the windmill in the background, was a place with trade of some considerable importance, which the rise of Newhaven much injured.

The place, like Shoreham, has attracted many artists, amongst them that charming painter of truly English rural landscapes Mr B.W. Leader, R.A. The town should be celebrated if for nothing else for its sunsets. “Out of Italy,” exclaims one enthusiastic artist, “I have seen no sunsets with such a range and splendour of tints as at Littlehampton in Sussex.”

The town can, however, also lay claim to some antiquity, for an allusion to it appears in the Domesday Book, proving that it was then a place within the usual meaning of the word. But even before then it was known as “Hanton,” was held in Anglo-Saxon times by one “Countess Goda, and furnished land for one plough, with two cottars and one acre of meadow.” For long from its position near the mouth of the Arun it was known as the Port of Arundel, the estuary being in ancient times much wider than one would now imagine. In former times the town seems to have attained to considerable size and importance, owing chiefly to the trade between it and the Conqueror’s Duchy and the passage to and fro “of many notable knights and commoner folk.”

It was here that William Rufus landed in 1097 after one of his periodical visits to his Duchy. And to Littlehampton came some of the prisoners from Crecy, brought hither across seas by Richard FitzAlan, the 13th Earl of Arundel, in 1347. He was wise to bring them if the story is true that their “ransoms were of so great a summe that they served to paye for the building of the Great Hall at Arundell,” and other additions.

Another Richard FitzAlan (his grandson), in the reign of Henry IV, brought no less than eighty French ships captured in the Channel, and laden with 20,000 tuns of wine, into the port; which Froissart averred made it possible to purchase in London the best wine for fourpence a gallon! And at Littlehampton? Well, small wonder that “men and wenches were merry, and had full stomachs and light hearts for many a day thereafter.”

Many other strange things and important personages throughout the centuries were landed at this little Sussex port, amongst them “a great wale,” and Philip Howard, who, after having been taken on the high seas, was brought to Littlehampton, and conveyed thence to London, the Tower, and the scaffold.

Its trade in the Middle Ages would appear from contemporary accounts of its houses, buildings and population, and maps to have been much larger than the size of the place would lead one to presume. In 1672, however, it had only its church, manor house, and fourteen other dwelling houses, and a few warehouses. But during the succeeding hundred years several attempts were made to improve the harbour, and the depth of water over the bar, and from the Grub Street Journal of January 1, 1736, a copy of which, framed and glazed, is now in the possession of one of the inhabitants, we learn “The new Harbour at Littlehampton in Sussex was opened on Monday, and there was 7 feet of water at half spring tide, and 9 feet when the tide was highest, and in all likelihood it will prove the best harbour on that coast.”

But these high hopes were destined to be unrealized, and Littlehampton has made practically no progress as a port during the last hundred years, though its popularity as a pleasant and pretty holiday resort is ever increasing. It was to the Earl of Surrey in 1790 that the town owed its start as a health resort, and after Surrey House was built other fashionable folk resorted hither.

There is still a certain amount of shipbuilding done; but we have never of late years seen any vessel on the stocks approaching in size the craft of 900 tons which were formerly launched. And we fancy the industry—perhaps because of the greater use of steam—is a declining if not a dying one.

With the demolition of the old parish Church of St Mary in 1826 to provide a larger building Littlehampton’s sole really ancient building disappeared. The modern (old style) building does not commend itself to the fastidious in architecture; although it scarcely, perhaps, entirely merits the uncomplimentary epithets which have been applied to it from time to time by architects and others. In it there are a few interesting relics, and fragments of the fine earlier building which was Transitional Norman in character. They include the Norman (some say pre-Norman) font, of bowl-shaped design which fitted it for immersion.

But if the town itself nowadays has to rely rather upon its modern than its old-time attractions, it can boast of a neighbourhood wonderfully rich in beautiful scenery, and historic memories and buildings. A week or even more at Littlehampton can be well spent in visiting such places as Arundel; lovely North Stoke, where the Arun winds at the foot of wooded hills most delightfully; South Stoke; Amberley, with its beautiful church, churchyard, and fine castle; Felpham; and Clymping, with its fortress church, to name but a few.

Most leave the picturesque little port with regret and carry away memories of its sands, edged most delightfully with grass lawns, and backed by pleasant residences.

From Littlehampton onward to Selsey Bill the coast is flat and utterly without scenic interest, though its story is rich with romance. Millions of sea birds feed in the marshes of the Bill, and its immediate neighbourhood, but the seals which are said to have given it its name are those of long ago. Once round the Bill, and Portsmouth is right ahead, with the Wight winking at one in the shimmering haze of a bright summer day.