it was well for him that he had a prudent counsellor in the person of his widowed mother. In 1403 she gave him her moiety of Gropenhall, which had been acquired by one of the D'Anyers in marriage with the heiress of Boydell, of Gropenhall and had come to her through failure of male issue in her father's family; and he, thereupon, quartered the arms of Boydell with his paternal coat, an augmentation that has ever since been retained. About the same time he added largely to his possessions by his marriage with Joanna, the daughter and heiress of Sir Gilbert de Haydock, of Haydock, near Newton-le-Willows, a wealthy Lancashire Knight; by this alliance he ultimately acquired the extensive estates of the Haydocks, viz.: Haydock, Bradley, Burtonwood, Warrington, Overford, Sonkey, Bold, Newton, Lowton, Golborne, and Walton-le-Dale, an acquisition that explains the close connection of the Leghs of Lyme with Lancashire. His mother was yet in possession of Lyme, and he therefore fixed his abode at Bradley, in Burtonwood, which became the principal residence of the family and so continued until about the year 1569, when the erection of the present mansion of Lyme was begun. Leyland, the antiquary, writing in the time of Henry VIII., says:--"Syr Perse de Lee hath his place at Bradley in a park two miles from Newton." The old house has long since disappeared, but the picturesque ruins of the arched and buttressed gate tower, which formed the principal approach, with a portion of the bastille above for the detention of offenders and doubtful visitors, still remain, a memorial of its ancient stateliness. The manor continued in possession of the family until after the death of Thomas Peter Legh, of Lyme, when it passed by settlement to his son, the Rev. Peter Legh, incumbent of St. Peter's, Newton, who sold it to the late Samuel Brooks, Esq., of Manchester. Though Peter Legh was old enough to take to himself a wife it was fortunate for him that he was as yet too young to take part in the stirring scenes that marked the opening years of the usurper's reign, when The blood of Richard, shed on Pomfret stones, called for retribution, and the realm was filled with turbulence and disquiet, else he might have shared the fate which befel so many other Cheshire men, who, unable to forget the misfortunes of their former master, met at Sandiway, in Delamere Forest, and joined the valiant Hotspur, renowned in song and story, Who was sweet Fortune's minion and her pride,