By the Be v. Canon W. H. Jones, F.S.A. 



311 



and indulged in festivities known as Church- Ales, Whitsun-Ales, 

 and the like. It was purchased a few years ago by the trustees of 

 the Saxon Church, and given in exchange for the portion of that 

 building which had been used for the purposes of a free school. The 

 Free School was afterwards transferred to the Church-House, and is 

 still held there. 



0. We now arrive at the Town Hall, a handsome building, 

 erected about thirty years ago on the site of some old gabled and 

 interesting houses, the removal of which took away one of the most 

 picturesque groups of buildings in the town. Opposite to the Town 

 Hall are what are called respectively Horse Street and the Shambles. 

 The former derives its name from an old inn called the " Scribbling 

 Horse" (a corruption of "Scribbling Herse") the last name denoting 

 timeframe on which the cloth when first made was stretched in order 

 that it might be scribbled (i.e., cleared by the teasel from all its 

 inequalities), an operation formerly done by the hand, but now by 

 machinery. The latter, now confined to a narrow paved passage 

 between shops, was termed the " Shambles " because of the butchers'' 

 stalls which were there, or it may be in the Market Place immedi- 

 ately adjoining, in the lower portion of the Town Hall, of which we 

 shall make more particular mention presently, 



7. We pass through the Shambles ; on our way we must notice 

 on the right the old barge-boards on the houses, and the fifteenth 

 century doorway of what is an inn now called the Royal Oak. We 

 pass a narrow lane on the left called Coppice Lane, an indication in 

 its name of the close proximity of the wood to the town at one 

 time, and enter Silver Street, called at different times Fox Street 

 and Gregory Street, presumably from the names of some old in- 

 habitants there, and stop for a moment before a small draper's shop, 

 now kept by Mr. Jennings. This house has some little interest 

 from the fact that here John Wesley, when he came at different 

 times to visit his community here, had his lodgings. One tradition- 

 ary tale is told concerning him. One morning, when he came down, 

 as was his wont, at an early hour, he congratulated his host on 

 owning a "truly English bed." "Why, Mr. Wesley?" was the 

 enquiry. " Because," was the answer, "it has no notion of giving out'* 



