Charles R. Trusty and well beloved we greet you well. Whereas wee are informed from our University of Cambridge that severall of their rights and priviledges (which they have heretofore injoyed by charter and custome) have in these late yeares of publick distraction been intrenched upon by our towne of Cambridge, and some of the officers thereto belonging, particularly the right of setting up the sole publick beame for the weighing of hops and other things of great bulk in Sturbridge faire, which did anciently belong to the said University and their officers, and which as we are informed (besides other evidences) appears by the acts of your courts registred in the mayoralty of Mr Foxton. Now wee being desirous to keepe a good correspondence between our said University and towne, and that either body should enjoy their just rights, have thought fitt to request you to permitt our University and their officers (till you shall shew sufficient cause to the contrary) to enjoy without disturbance the aforesaid right of sole weighing such hops as shall be sould at Sturbridge faire, together with all other their antient priviledges. And upon notice shall be carefull, that no intrenchment bee made upon any of those rights which you may justly claime. Given under our signet manuell at our court of Whitehall the thirtieth day of August in the twelfth yeare of our reigne. (Signed) William Morrice. To our trusty and well beloved the mayor and aldermen of the towne of Cambridge. The original was delivered to Mr John Ewen, mayor, by me Matth. Whenn. 1677. The Corporation of Cambridge ordered the common seal to be affixed to a petition to the King for the prevention of a new fair at Maidstone, which might be prejudicial to Sturbridge Fair. This opposition I assume had reference to the large trade in hops here transacted. (See hereon De Foe’s account of this fair under date 1723.) There is this curious entry in the Corporation Common Day Book:—“It is agreed that Mr. Langley who took great paines in keeping of the Patent for the intended Faire at Maidstone shall have two gynneys given him, to be paid by the Treasurers.” 1683. Dixon, in his “Canidia, or the Witches,” published this year, says:— “A fire licking a Child’s hair Was to be seen at _Sturbridge fair_, With a lambent flame, all over a sweating mare.” And again:— “Women-dancers, Puppet-players, At Bartholomew and Sturbridge-Fairs.” 1686. Mr. Millington, book auctioneer of London, sold in Cooks’ Row in the fair this year (8th Sept.) the library of James Chamberlain, fellow of St. John’s College (1700). 1688. On 10th September the Corporation made an order that the prices of hackney coachmen who drive from Cambridge to Sturbridge fair, or from that fair to Cambridge, from sun rising to sunset, should be 12_d._ for one, two, three, or four persons, and after sunset 18_d._ for the like number of persons.