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NOTABILIA OF OLD PENRITH. 
By GEORGE WATSON. 
(Read at Penrith. ) 
Tue Manor oF PENRITH. 
From the earliest historical times, Cumberland was a bone of 
contention between English and Scottish royalty. At length, in 
1236 Henry III. of England and Alexander II. of Scotland agreed 
to a compromise by which certain large districts in Cumberland 
and Northumberland where no castles existed, were assigned to 
the Kings of Scotland, to be held in fealty to the English King. 
Penrith, with the Forest of Inglewood, was one of the manors so 
assigned ; and for the next half century Penrith, nominally English 
but practically Scottish, enjoyed peace—a luxury probably never 
previously experienced, and not again to be enjoyed for some 
centuries. 
This happy state of things came to an end in 1295, when 
Edward I., having quarrelled with the Scottish king, regained the 
ceded manors, and sent the Scots back over the Borders, where, 
however, they would not stop, but were continually coming back, 
not to “Take a cup o’ kindness for auld lang syne,” but to claim 
outgoing tenants’ compensation, by carrying off what was movable 
and destroying what was not. 
Next the manor of Penrith was given to Anthony Beck, the 
watrior Bishop of Durham, who wasa terrible fellow for fighting— 
much more at home in the saddle clad in armour, than in the 
peaceful duties of a bishop. 
