the Dauphin laid siege to Lincoln. Though the town sided with the besiegers, though 600 knights and 20,000 foot soldiers came to reinforce them, Nicholaa continued her defence of the castle till the Earl of Pembroke arrived with an army to her relief. In the next year she was again appointed Sheriff of Lincoln by Henry III. But this closed her public career, and she died in peace at Swaynston in 1229. (“Sketches from the Past,” _Women’s Suffrage Journal_, March, 1888.) “Several Charters in one of the Duchy of Lancaster’s Cowcher Books, prove that the Constableship of Lincolnshire, the Wardenship of Lincoln Castle, and the Barony of Eye or Haia, always went together. They belonged successively to Robert de Haia, Richard de Haia, and Nicholaa de Haia, who became the wife of Gerarde de Camville.” (Selby’s “Genealogist,” 1889, p. 170.) =They could also be appointed to various Offices.=—As Nicholaa de la Haye was made =Sheriff=, so was the wise and renowned Lady Margaret, Countess of Richmond, made =Justice of the Peace= in the reign of Henry VII.; and the Lady of Berkeley under Queen Mary held the same office. Lady Russell had been appointed Custodian of Donnington Castle for her life, at a Salary of one pound and twopence halfpenny a day, but for Contempt of her Overlord, she was tried in the Star Chamber, Mich., 4 James I. (_See_ “Moore’s Law-Cases.”) =They could act as Femes Soles when married, or as Partners.=—The Countess Lucy [ii.] was one of the few Saxon heiresses that carried her property down into Norman times. She had three Norman husbands, Ivo de Tailleboys, Earl of Anjou, Roger Fitzgerald de Romar, and Ranulph, Earl of Chester. Among the various Charters to the Monastery of Spalding are two, granting and confirming the grant of the Manor of Spalding to the Monks there. The exact words of the second Charter are these, “I, Lucy Countess of Chester, give and grant to the Church and Monks of St. Nicholas of Spallingis with Soc and Sac, and Thol and Them, with all its Customs, and with the liberties with which I best and most freely held in the time of Ivo Tailleboys and Roger Fitzgerald and the Earl Ranulph my Lords in almoign of my soul, for the Redemption of the soul of my father and of my mother, and of my Lords and relatives,” etc. “Inspeximus by Oliver Bishop of London 1284.” (Selby’s “Genealogist,” p. 70, 71.) In the lives of the Berkeleys, from the Berkeley MSS., 1883, published for the Bristol and Gloucester Archæological Society, some interesting particulars are given of the Lady Joane, daughter of Earl Ferrars and Derby, and wife of Lord Thomas of Berkeley, second of the name. “It appears by divers deeds that in the xxvith yeare of Edward the first, as in other yeares, this lady by hir deeds contracted with Richard de Wike and others as if she had been a _feme sole_; and for her seale constantly used the picture of herself holding in her right hand the escutcheon of her husband’s arms, the chevron without the crosses;