91 



Collections /or a History of Seagry. 



" Kcc d . Tythe in kind of Nathaniel Houlton Esq William Adye throughout 

 the year 1741. To wit. Tythe Milk, Calf, Lamb. Wool, Apples. 



" N.B.— The miller of Seagry Mils has paid six shillings and eight pence 

 yearly at Lammas for y e mill wheel." 



The rate books begin in 1700, and are well and regularly kept. 



The main incidents in the history of a small country village are 



generally atrocities. Seagry is not without one of the kind; and 



as it stimulated some unknown local bard to emulate the Poet Crabbe, 



the verses are here introduced : — - 



" Lines (in imitation of Crabbe) on Judith Pearce, who was most inhumanly 

 murdered by a gipsey, at Seagry, in this neighbourhood, in the month of 

 November last. [From the Bath Herald of December 2, 1820.] 



" A lonely cottage stands beside the way, 

 A white thatched cot, with honey-suckles gay; 

 There Judith Peaece, a widow, lived alone, 

 By a rough quarry of blue-coloured stone ; 

 Where lurked a wretch, of Egypt's wandering race, 

 A wretch forlorn, without a mark of grace, 

 Whom ruffians left, for such a rogue was he, 

 That even the vilest shunned his company ; 

 Dark was his face, but darker still his mind 

 To pity, and to every tender feeling blind. 

 He had no friends, nor knew the joys of home, 

 But muttering, through the dews of night would roam, 

 Brooding on fancied wrongs, with secret pride, 

 On words, or looks, or benefits denied. 

 Eound his gaunt side a rope for girdle swung, 

 From which a light, short-handled hatchet hung ; 

 A tattered garment did the village fright, 

 A coat by day, a blanket all the night, 

 Which round his neck a butcher's skewer confin'd, 

 Fit fastening such a filthy dress to bind. 

 Judith had often a kind warning given, 

 How far his ways were from the ways of Heaven ; 

 And once too, Judith (which would kindle strife 

 In greater persons) asked him — ' Where's your wife ? ' 

 Once fire denied— a common courtesy ; 

 Yet there seemed danger in his quick black eye ; 

 And so there was, for as she lay in bed, 

 At night the thatch was blazing o'er her head, 

 And Edwaed Buckland, so the villain call, 

 Was met in haste, close to the village wall ; 

 And if as on some villainy he mused, 

 The evening salutation he refused ; 



