THE CHURCH BELLS OF DORSET. 213 



Town Hall, Weymouth, in 1633, Hilton third in 1637, 

 Manston treble in 1639. I dare not attribute the 1603 Whit- 

 church Canonicorum bells to him, in spite of initials. 



Of Thomas, the third brother, we shall speak in his period. 

 Loders third, 1641, and Chardstock third, 1649, are pretty sure 

 to be Thomas Penning ton's, who cast the tenor at the latter 

 place in 1626, when he was also busy at Trent, Somerset. 

 Ellacombe says that Thomas and John Pennington " lived at 

 Lezant and Stoke Climsland," and were itinerant founders,* but 

 in another place he calls them " of Exon." f 



I think that the historic bell, now recast, from which I copied 

 in 1852 in Child Okeford tower the inscription 



OOD BLESS THE KINO OHA^ILS. 1648 

 IE WM Td 



is doubtless Thomas Pennington's. It is worth enquiring who 

 I. E. and W. M. were. 



' ' To see in what estate they live 

 And nothing to the poore they give " 



is an indication of the ever-painful social problem just before 

 the Parliamentary war. We get it at Preston, 1629, and Abbots- 

 bury, 1636. Some local magnate is the butt, as it would seem. 



The date suggests Anthony Bond, a founder about whom 

 information is earnestly desired. Four bells of his remain in 

 Dorset, all closely connected in locality and time Wimborne 

 Minster tenor, 1629; Steeple second and third, 1633 and 1634; 

 and Coombe Keynes second, 1636. Mr. R. C. Hope, J probably 

 following Lukis, speaks of him as found in Norfolk and 

 Suffolk ; but East Anglia knows him not. The mistake 



tr> 



probably arose from the w mark from Norwich, before we knew 



* Ellacombe's C.B. of Devon, p. 56. 

 t Ellacombe's C.B. of Devon, p. 18. 

 J Journal of the Royal Archaeological Institute, I., 152. 

 An Account of Church Bells, p. 16. 



