250 FOREST OF DEAN. 
extension of the Royal Forests. Thus diminished, it 
was confined to the Hundred of St. Briavel, a district 
about twice the size of the present waste. 
King Stephen granted the Forest to the daughter 
of Fitz-Walter on her marriage with Herbert Fitz- 
Herbert; from her it passed through the families of the 
Bohuns and Newmarches, till it reverted to King John. 
This monarch was often in the district for sport. From 
his time to the present, the ownership of the soil appears 
to have been vested in the Crown; and there was a 
long succession of Wardens of the Forest, and Constables 
of St. Briavel’s Castle, appointed for life by the Crown, 
till the duties of the Warden were vested, in 1834, in 
the Commissioners of Woods and Forests. The earliest 
perambulation of the Forest was in 1282; in 13338, 
Parliament confirmed the perambulation, and reduced it 
to the limits which existed up to 1834, when it was 
disafforested. 
There are many interesting incidents connected with 
the Forest during this long period. It appears to have 
supplied timber for the construction of ships of war 
from an early time, and the oak grown there had the 
reputation of being exceptionally tough and well suited 
for war ships. So well was this reputation known that 
the destruction of the Forest was specially enjoined by 
the Spanish Government on the leaders of the Spanish 
Armada. Evelyn in his ‘‘ Sylva” says on this point :— 
‘“‘T have heard that in the great expedition of 1588 
it was expressly enjoined the Spanish Armada that if, 
when landed, they should not be able to subdue our 
