134 THE RED DEER OF EXMOOR. 



What particular form of tyranny Nicholas, the 

 forester on the Porlock side, had been guilty of we 

 know not, but John le Deneys and Robert le Deneys 

 met him in the tavern of Roger de Cockereye at 

 Doverhay, and beat him so sore that he died. Their 

 free Danish blood no doubt resented the overbearing 

 ways of the forest officer. 



In 1298, Sabina Pecche being then the keeper of 

 the forest, having succeeded her brother Richard de 

 Plecy in his lands and offices, a futher perambulation 

 was made, and this put an end to the long dispute as 

 to Landacre, for this manor was declared outside the 

 regard, and the boundary laid down in a straight line 

 — the line of the present fence from the Gipsy Lane 

 gate — bv Picked Stones to Sherdon Hutch on the 

 Barle, this being the only alteration made in the 

 boundaries. 



As to what happened between 1279, when the 

 second perambulation was made, and 1298, with 

 regard to Landacre, history is silent ; but an exact 

 story of what took place would probably throw some 

 considerable light on the pleasant ways of the 

 forester officers of those days, for from the list of 

 " vills " situated outside the forest, attached to the 

 survey of 1298, we gather that the troublesome and 

 encroaching Fugels and Beres had by some means 

 or other been dispossessed, and the land was held by 

 John Herun, Richard Durrante, Adam Hustleigh, 

 and the heirs of Geoffrey de Scolonde and Eorde de 

 Feynes. The farm, together with all encroachments, 



