Forest of Rossendale. 167 



" TO HIS GRACE THE ARCHBISHOP (SECKER) OF CANTERBURY. 



" May it please your Grace, — I am concerned to hear, by 

 a letter from my good Lord of Chester, that your Grace is the 

 person who has entered a caveat against my nomination to 

 Rossendale Chapel — an adversary I did not expect ; and moreover, 

 should I get clear of your Grace, his Lordship is so generous as to 

 declare that I am in some danger from him. It would have pleased 

 me better to have had less powerful opponents ; but since it 

 happens so, neither your Grace nor his Lordship will, I hope, be 

 offended at my doing my utmost in defence of what I think my 

 right. And if your Grace would honour me with your reasons for 

 opposing me, it would add to the favours received by 



" W. Johnson." 



"L.\MBETH. Nov. nth, 1762. 



"Sir, — My reason for desiring that the Bishop of Chester would 

 not immediately license any person to serve the Cure of Rossen- 

 dale, was, that applications were made to me as Patron of it, the 

 Impropriator being thought to be such of common right, and the 

 nomination to the Chapels being expressly reserved to the Arch- 

 bishop, in the lease of the Rectory, 



" I have not hitherto been able to inform myself sufficiently 

 concerning the strength of this argument : but I am very willing to 

 hear anything which you have to allege on the other side, and 

 hope a contest by law may thus be prevented ; but if it cannot, 

 your endeavours to defend your claim will give no offence to, &c., 



T. Canterbury." 



"May it please your Grace, — It appears that the Vicar of 

 Whalley for the time being has always nominated to the Chapels 

 within the Rectory of Whalley ; nor have any of your Grace's pre- 

 decessors, of whom I have seen several (and most of the Chapels 

 have been vacant in my time) ever made any claim. 



"The nomination to the Chapels being expressly reserved to the 

 Archbishop in the lease of the Rectory, can only be intended as a 

 bar to the Lessee, who, without such an exception, might possibly 



