256 Report of the Meetings jor 1893. 



In Part I. the writer has sketched the history of both town- 

 ships up to the dissolution of the monasteries, upon which they 

 came into the hands of the Crown, of which the tenants con- 

 tinued to hold as they had held aforetime of the prior of 

 Tynemouth. 



The Manor. 



In the Public Eecords remain depositions taken in a suit in 

 the Court of Exchequer in 1615 and 1616, between the tenants 

 of Amble, parcel of the King's manor of Tynemouth, and the 

 tenants of Birling, parcel of the Earl of Northumberland's manor 

 of Warkworth, as to the boundaries of their respective townships, 

 and particularly as to the right of pasturage to some 16 acres of 

 lands on the north side of the river, called Salt-goats,^ whose dis- 

 puted ownership perhaps arose from the gradual shifting of the 

 river's bed to the southward. 



The writer ventures to give copious extracts from these 

 depositions— not that the matter in controversy is of conse- 

 quence — but as showing the importance attached to oral tradition, 

 determined attachment to custom and to supposed rights — the 

 corporate life and co-operation of the townsmen, and side 

 lights of their ways of thinking. 



At the suit of Robert Hudson, Hugh Hodgson, George Browel, Edward 

 Clark, Robt. Smith, Edw. Taylor, Nich. Thew, John Wilson, Barbara Taylor 

 and John Hudson, tenants of Amble, a writ was issued from the Court 

 of Exchequer 28th June 1615, against John Wharrier, Thos. Davy, Robt. 

 Arnold, Hugh Elder, Wm. Wharrier and Thos. Elder, tenants of Birling, 

 defendants; as to the boundary between Amble and Birling. — Depositions on 

 behalf of the plaintiff were taken at Ellington 21st Sept. 1615, before 

 Robt. Widdrington, Robt. Townrow, Henry Thornton and Henry White- 

 head, commissioners for that purpose. 



William Taylor of Hauxley, yeoman, aged 58, deposed " that the town of 

 Amble is commonly reputed to be parcel of the manor of Tynemouth, 

 where, at the King's court, the tenants do suit and service and pay their rents 

 to the King's officers : has heard from his ancestors that the parcel of ground 

 called the Salt-goats, is parcel of the town of Amble and not of Birling : 

 that about 50 years since going with a wain loaden with 'whynnes' to 

 Hauxley, with one Will. Hall and his two sons Nicholas and Edward, near 

 a place called Halsey-dicke-nooke, said Will, pointed out a stone and 

 knocked it with his staff, telling his sons and this deponent to remember 

 that if the bounder betwixt the Queen and the Earl of Northumberland 



^ GOAT — a narrow cavern or inlet into which the sea enters — a small 

 trench. To Goat, verb active — to drive into a trench : a term at golf. — 

 Janjieson's Scottinh Dictionary. 



