park, and is now called the Grove. Here stood the mansion house of the lords of the manor. The church is a curious building, though very old; the windows are numerous, and were once extremely beautiful, as appears by the remains of the painted glass. They were adorned with many coats of arms, and the roof was painted and gilt. The ehurch is 142 feet in lengih, and 54 feet in breadth; and both within and without is adorned with various decorations. In Stow's annals is an account of a terrible thunder-storm, which happened here on Sunday the 4th of August, 1577, in the time of divine service, when the lightning damaged the church, struck down and scorched several persons, and killed a man and a boy. Blithburgh fell to decay upon the suppression of the priory, and gradually decreased till the year 1679, when there was a dreadful fire, in which the loss was computed to amount to 18037. on which many of the inhabitants, not thinking it worth while to rebuild their houses, settled elsewhere. At the distance of about four miles to the east of Blythburgh is SOUTHWOLD, or Sowold, pleasantly seated on a hill, and almost surrounded by the sea and the river Blythe, which has a bridge that leads into the town. In the year 1747 an act passed for effectually cleansing and opening the haven of this place, which had long been choaked up with sand. On the east side of the town is a bay called Solebay, that affords good anchorage, and is sheltered by a promontory about two miles farther south, called Easton Ness. Soleby was rendered memorable by a sharp engagement between the English and Dutch fleets on the 28th of May, 1672, in which the Earl of Sandwich lost his life. Here is, besides the great Guildhall, another in the market place for the dispatch of petty affairs, which, with the church and other structures, afford an agreeable prospect both by sea and land. On On the cliff are two batteries, one of which is a regular fortification, with a good parapet and six guns; the other has only two guns. On this hill, and several others that are near it, are the remains of a camp; and where the ground has not been broken up there are tokens of circular tents, formerly called by the people Fairy-hills, round which they supposed the fairies were wont to dance. Southwold was rendered a town corporate in the year 1489, and is governed by two bailiffs, a recorder, and inferior officers; but it sends no member, to parliament. It is a pleasant, populous town, and consists, according to the late population act, of 270 houses, and 1,054 inhabitants, viz. 430 males and 624 females. The first chapel was thought to have been built here in the reign of King John, but was destroyed by fire about 220 years after its erection. The present chapel was finished about the year 1460, and was afterwards made parochial. It is 143 feet in length, of which the chancel is 43, and the tower 20, and it is 56 feet broad. The cieling of the chance! was handsomely painted, and the painting over the skreen in the nave is very fresh. Every pew was decorated with the representations of birds, beasts, satyrs, and the like; but these suffered greatly in the reign of Henry the Eighth. The tower is above 100 feet high, and is a handsome piece of architecture, composed of free-stone, intermixed with flints of various colours. There is here a meeting-house of protestant dissenters of the denomination of Independents. The entrance into the haven is on the south side of the town, but was subject to be choaked up, till an act of parliament was passed, as we have already observed, for repairing and improving it, and for erecting piers for its security: accordingly, one pier was built on the north side of the port in 1749, and D another another on the south in 1752. When the free British fishery began to be established in 1740, the Pelham and Carteret busses arrived in this harbour from Shetland, and in 1751 buildings and conveniences began to be erected for the making and tanning of nets, and depositing stores; two docks were also made, and many other improvements, so that in 1753, no less than 38 busses sailed from this port. The other trade of this place consists in the home fishery, which employs several small boats, and here they make and refine salt, prepare and export red herrings, red sprats, malt, and corn; and import coals, cinders, and the like. The inhabitants likewise carry on a coasting trade in wool, corn, timber, and lime. Southwold has a tolerable weekly market on Thursdays, indifferently served with provisions. Southwold was at first a small place, consisting only of a few fishermens' huts, but in proportion as they succeeded, they built houses for themselves, and at length became rivals to Dunwich and the other neighbouring towns. Henry the Seventh made this town a free borough, and ordered it to be governed by the abovementioned officers. This town had several benefactions from that king and his son Henry the Eighth, which enabled the merchants to fit out upwards of fifty vessels, and these they employed abroad in the cod fishery, while the industry of those employed on the coast, in catching herrings and other fish, was also very conducive to the improvement of the town; but when Henry the Eighth shook off the Pope's supremacy, the fishery began to decline, though the inhabitants still carried it on, and at the same time engaged in the trade of corn, malt, timber, coals, butter, and cheese. On the 25th of April, 1659, there happened a dreadful fire at Southwold, which, in the space of four hours, consumed the town-hall, market-house, prison, prison, granaries, warehouses, and 238 dwelling houses, besides the fish-houses, tackle-houses, and other out-houses; and the greatest part of the moveable goods, nets, and tackle of the inhabitants, with all their corn, fish, coals, and other commodities; the loss of which amounted to upwards of 40,000%. an immense sum at that time, and ruined above 300 families. This disaster obliged many to seek for habitations in other places, insomuch that the town, which was in a flourishing condition previous to this dreadful calamity, never recovered its former splendour. All the court-baron rolls have been destroyed, by which means the copyholders of the corporation are become freeholders. There is still a great resort of mariners to this town, and it carries on a considerable trade. This town in particula:, as well as all the coast from Harwich to Winterton-Ness, is noted for the first arrival of the swallows to this island, and for their departure, when they leave ours for other climates, not for warmth, but for finding their common prey, viz. the insects, with which the air swarms in our summer evenings, till the cold weather comes in and kills the insects, and then necessity compels the swallows to quit us, and follow their food to some other climate. For the supplies of the markets of London with poultry, in which this part of the country particuarly abounds, they have some few years since, found it practicable to make geese travel on foot, and prodigious numbers are brought up in like droves from the farthest part of Norfolk, even from the fen country, about Lynn and the Washes; as also from the east side of this county; and it is very frequent to meet one or two thousand in a drove. They begin to drive them generally in August, when the harvest is almost over, that the geese may feed on the stubble as they go. Thus they hold on to the end of October, when the roads begin to be too stiff and deep for their broad feet, and short legs, to march in. Besides such methods of driving these creatures on foot, they have invented a new kind of carriage, being carts formed on purpose, with four stories of stages to put the poultry in, one above another, whereby one cart will carry a very great number; and, for the smoother going, they drive with two horses abreast; thus quartering the road for the ease of the poultry, and changing horses, they travel night and day; so that they bring the fowls eighty or a hundred miles in two days and one night. The horses are fastened together by a piece of wood lying crosswise upon their backs, by which they are kept even and together; and the driver sits on the top of the cart, as in the public carriages for the army, &c. In this manner vast numbers of turkey poults and chickens are carried to London every year. In this part, which is called High Suffolk, there are not so many families of gentry or nobility, as in the other side of the country: but it is observed, that though their seats are not here, their estates are: and the pleasure of West Suffolk is much of it supported by the wealth of High Suffolk; for the richness of the lands, and application of the people to all kinds of improvements are scarcely credible. The farmers also are so considerable, and their farms and dairies so large, that it is frequent for a farmer to have upwards of one thousand pounds' stock upon his farm in cows only. RAYDON, a village about one mile and a half to the north-west of Southwold, had formerly a market and a park. The church, which is of great antiquity, is a very ordinary structure, consisting only of one aisle; and there are some signs of a wharf yet remaining, which probably fell to decay about the the time of Henry the Third, through want of trade, which then flourished at Southwold. Here was a priory of Cluniac monks, said to have been founded Before the year 1160, by Duodo Asini, steward to the |