;l ?S; : ' A ^ E BIRDS OF SHERWOOD FOREST. 



a r> * "-'a " J o!k P ^ "j, s^'J. 



mas here in 1315-16, and Edward III. granted a charter 

 to the town of Nottingham, from Clipstone, in the first 

 year of his reign. 



Three abbeys had their sites within the limits of the 

 forest viz., Welbeck, Newstead, and Rufford, and they 

 were each selected by their founders with that exquisite 

 taste which distinguished the " monks of old," though 

 the holy fathers paid more regard to the requirements 

 of the kitchen in their selection, than to the mere beauty 

 of the scenery that surrounded their abodes. 



The abbey of Welbeck was founded in the reign of 

 Henry II. by Thomas de Cuckney for Premonstratensian 

 canons, and the adjoining manor of Cuckney was settled 

 upon it by John Hotham, Bishop of Ely, in 1329. It 

 was the head of all the houses of this order in England 

 and Wales. 



Newstead was founded by Henry II. for a colony of 

 Augustine monks in 1170, and it was granted at the 

 dissolution to Sir John Byron, who converted it into a 

 residence. This Sir John was an ancestor of the poet, 

 who thus in Don Juan described the building : 



" The mansion's self was vast and venerable, 

 With more of the monastic than has been 



Elsewhere preserved ; the cloisters still were stable, 

 The cells too, and refectory I ween. 



An exquisite small chapel had been able, 

 Still unimpaired to decorate the scene : 



The rest had been reformed, replaced, or sunk, 



And spoke more of the baron than the monk." 



K-ufford Abbey was inhabited by Cistercian monks, 

 for whom it was founded in 1148 by the Earl of Lincoln, 

 and after the dissolution of monasteries it came by ex- 

 change into the hands of the Earl of Shrewsbury. In 



