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designs of one of these sets indicates the 13th century,” and he has 
no hesitation in pronouncing some of them at least, to be from the 
same mould as those at Tintern. Others are Heraldic tiles of the 
two following centuries with emblems of the Passion and several 
half obliterated inscriptions. 
Well, it may be that our forefathers had many and divers 
patterns submitted to them when about to lay a new floor just as 
we have now, but as there is no reliable account whence these 
tiles came let us endeavour to learn why they were selected, what 
_ tale they tell, and then see if we can discover their original locality. 
One of the tiles appears to be very old and isa crude represent- 
ation of a crowned lion within a border, which I take to be the 
arms of Richard, Earl of Cornwall, King of the Romans, brother 
of Henry III. Richard carries us back to the days of the Crusade 
in which he engaged, and the time when the King was almost a 
puppet in the hands of the Barons. Richard, on one occasion, 
quarrelled with Henry because he had given one of his manors to 
Waleran, and retiring to Marlborough entered into treaty 
with William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, and formed that league 
of the Barons at Stamford, which compelled Henry to grant all 
they asked. 
In compensation for Waleran’s Manor, Richard received all the 
late Queen’s dower. Included in this would be Corsham and most 
likely Bath. Corsham ought to consider Richard and his son 
Edmund as their patron saints as they procured for it the Charter 
and those peculiar privileges they still I believe enjoy. 
Richard married Isabella, daughter of the aforesaid Pembroke, 
_ and widow of Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester. Her son, by 
her first marriage, was Richard de Clare, who is mentioned in the 
Municipal Records of Bath in connection with his son Gilbert— 
_ 27th May (III Ed. I.) The jurors at Bath returned that “ Gilbert 
de Clare holds one theam in Langridge and Freshford which was 
accustomed to do suit at the hundred of Barton Forceesicum and 
such suit has been withdrawn by Richard, father of the said Earl, 
