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of Thanet, who, however, enjoyed them only for three years, and, 

 dying without issue, they passed to his brother John, who, by the 

 death of his aunt, the second daughter of the Countess of Pem- 

 broke, without heirs, became possessed of the whole of the 

 Vetripont and Clifford estates and titles. 



In conclusion I will briefly notice the contrast between the 

 histories of the two races of Clifford and Tufton. The name of 

 Tufton comes from Tufton, a manor in the parish of Northiam in 

 Sussex, held by the family in very early times ; but they are soon 

 found settled in the adjoining county of Kent, probably in the 

 very usual way — by marrying an heiress possessed of lands in that 

 county. Some of the family come into ecclesiastical history very 

 early as benefactors to religious houses, whilst others appear in 

 Kentish manorial records as only farmers and shepherds, paying 

 rent charges in hens, eggs, and sheep — a result no doubt of the 

 old Saxon land law so peculiar to Kent, called gavelkind, by 

 which, on the death of a landowner, his estate was equally divided 

 amongst his children ; the effect of such a law being to create 

 numerous peasant proprietors, and retard the growth of an aris- 

 tocracy. 



While the Tuftons were in this way struggling slowly out of 

 obscurity, the Vetriponts and Cliffords were in full blaze of feudal 

 glory, wasting blood and treasure in war for royal dynasties or 

 foreign conquest. Once, it is true, we read of a Tufton in command 

 of a battalion at the battle of Cressy, and laying siege to Calais ; 

 but, with this exception, we find the rising race of Tuftons steadily 

 adding manor to manor by marriages with heiresses, getting rid of 

 the poverty-creating tenure of gavelkind by Acts of Parliament; 

 and finally, on the dissolution of the monastries— by purchase or 

 by royal favour — becoming owners of immense landed possessions, 

 until in Henry VIII. 's time we find a Tufton seated at the old 

 ecclesiastical manor of Hothfield, in Kent ; a Tufton knighted in 

 1603, a baronet in 161 1, and advanced to the first rank of aris- 

 tocracy as Earl of Thanet, in 1628. 



During all these centuries in which the Tuftons were rising to 

 wealth and distinction, we have seen the very existence of the 



