THE FAXMOTJTH MANTJSORIPT, 197 



said Corporation, and so continued to his death, in 1693, thirty 

 years. From a thousand flagrant instances of pride and insolence, 

 as bragging upon all occasions that he should never scruple to 

 spend (^^li^^Sciinf"'^) £100 to make Sir Peter, the son, spend £20, 

 and would make Sir Peter sensible he could afford to do it. I 

 say — insolent — from a particular instance which I had from Sir 

 Peter's own mouth, which was, that Sir Peter being among them 

 at a town meeting, and Sir Peter uttering some unguarded 

 expression, Mr. Pogers privately proposed to his brethren the 

 laying Sir Peter by the heels (in the stocks), as 3ii Peter had 

 it afterwards from the mouth of one of them. 



About the year 1672, one Yermuden,"^* an engineer, being 

 in the country, and observing how much wacer 77as wanting at 

 the public Key, before the water house there (■^^•^ere*") '^^s built, 

 or any water coming to the place, — he, projecting from his 

 levelling the ground to lay down the Manour Mills, bring the 

 water (^ wat^r^') to ^^6 K^y, and thereby ereci mills, and mill 

 houses, and mill pool, which was done and pe::fec(:ed at the 

 expense of upwards of £700 — greatly benefitting all the lands, 

 through which the said water passed ; as may, in some fields, 

 still be seen, the old trenches carrying the same, the mill pool 

 now a stone quarry, and the old mill houses still to be seen. 

 But Mr. Eogers (■'^^a.^ers^) could not sit easy under so great an 

 improvement being made on Sir Peter's estate. He soon found 

 out (as envy and malice are two (-f ^j) quick sights), that in 

 bringing the said water to the Key, unknown to Sir Peter 

 (or probably (? not) minded by any other) that the said water 

 passed through any other lord's land ; but upon examination it 

 appeared that, in levelling the said water to the Key, it had 

 been diverted for about 30 yards out of, and from, its antient 

 course, in the unminded corner of a field, which John Chapman 

 held of Sir Yyal Vyvyan, part of a tenement called Monglar, 

 (jion^gier) ^^ the Same appears to this day to run. Mr. Eogers, 

 by his attorney, Jno. Newman, gave notice to Sir Vyal Yyvyan of 

 this great diversion of 30 yards of watercourse, upon which he 



*Sir Cornelius Vermuyclen came to England to stop Dagenham Breach 

 on the Thames. This celebrated Dutch engineer first di-ained the fens of 

 Lincolnshire, and was in high favour with Charles I, by whom he was knighted 

 in 1629, it is supposed he went abroad about 1666 and died shortly afterwards ; it 

 is probable he is the Vei-muden referred to, as the date of his leaving England is 

 uncertain. Ed. 



