Thomas Stevens, "Primus in Indis." 221 



Turning to Foley one finds that, while he himself writes of 



Stevens as " a native of Bulstan," he also cites (iv., 705) from an 



article hy Professor Monier- Williams in the Contemporary Review 



(April, 1878), a passage in which it is stated that 



" The first Englishman known to have reached India via the Cape of Good 

 Hope was a man named Thomas Stevens (also called Stephen de Buston or 

 Bubston in Dodd's Church History, vol. ii., p. 133)." 



Buston, Bubston, Bulstan, Boscombe, Bourton— what was really 



the name of Stevens's birthplace ? The answer is, I believe, 



supplied by the original register of Winchester scholars, in which 



Thomas Stevens, the scholar of 1564, is entered as of " Busheton," 



in the diocese of Salisbury. I do not know whence Mr. Kirby 



derived his " Bourton, Dorset," and it is strange that he did not 



follow the original register, seeing that he gives under the year 



1553 another scholar, Richard Stephens, from "Bush ton, qy. 



Bishopston, Wilts." It would be unfair, however, not to add that 



Bourton, in the liberty of Gillingham, Dorset, is in the diocese of 



Salisbury. See Hutchins, Hist, of Dorset, TIL, 625 (edition 1868). 



Assuming that Busheton or Bushton is the name of the place 



sought for, it remains to locate it. I have looked at two assessment 



rolls at the Eecord Oifice, marked respectively -llf- and -^, which 



relate to the collection in various parts of Wiltshire of a lay subsidy 



granted 13th Eliz. (1571), and find that a Thomas Stevens (who 



was, I suggest, the missionary's father) is named among seven 



persons assessed at " Bushton " in the hundred of Elstub and 



Everley. He was assessed on goods valued at £15, and had to 



pay 25s. No person named Stevens (or Stephens) appears in the 



assessment for Boscombe in Amesbury Hundred, or " Busshopston " 



(Bishopstone St. John the Baptist) in Downton Hundred, or 



" Bysshopston " (Bishopston St. Mary) in Eamsbury Hundred. 



The other persons assessed at Bushton were John Hardinge, John 



Oliver, Thomas and John Haywarde, Eobert Spackman (a surname 



to be particularly noticed), and John Colles — John Oliver for 



lands, the rest for goods. Stevens was deemed to be richer 



than his neighbours in this world's goods. The places entered 



under the hundred of Elstub and Everley are : — Enforde, 



Q 2 



