a large body of Norman adventurers, and the roll of Battle Abbey, given by Ralph Holinshead, contains the names of 629 Normans, who all became claimants upon the fair territory of Britain, and the Saxon lords were forced to resign their possessions. The landed property in this county was chiefly given to Roger de Montgomery, his kinsman, whom he created Earl of Shrewsbury, and of him, it was mostly held by knights’ service; to William Pantulf he granted 29 lordships, of which Wem was the principal, and he therefore made it the head of his barony. Ralph de Mortimer had fifty manors, of which nineteen were held under Roger de Montgomery; Roger Lacy had 23 manors: Roger Fitz Corbet 24 manors; Osborne Fitz Richard nine; and Guarine de Meez one manor. After so great an agitation as that produced by the conquest, some years were necessary to restore a calm. A violent struggle was made to expel the Normans, and York was the rallying point of the patriot army. To suppress this formidable insurrection, William the Conqueror repaired in person into the north at the head of a powerful army, swearing by the “splendour of God,” his usual oath, that not a soul of his enemies should be left alive. According to William of Malmesbury, confirmed by others, the whole of the country was laid waste from the Humber to the Tees, and for nine years neither spade nor plough was put in the ground, which was the reason why _vasta_ so often occurs in Doomsday book. Knowing the detestation in which he was held, the Norman Bastard, as historians designate him, entertained a constant jealousy of the English, and he obliged them every night at eight o’clock to extinguish their fires and candles at the toll of a bell which obtained the name of “Curfew.” Having by these sanguinary atrocities reduced the country to repose, the Conqueror, in 1080, caused a survey to be taken of all the lands in the kingdom, on the model of the book at Winchester, compiled by order of Alfred the Great. This survey was registered in the national record called the _Doomsday Book_, in which is the extent of the land in each district, the state it was in, whether meadow, pasture, wood, or arable, the name of the proprietor, the tenure by which it was held, and the value at which it was estimated, were all duly entered. In order to make this document complete, and its authority perpetual, commissioners were appointed to superintend the survey, and the returns were made under the sanction of juries of all orders of freemen in each district. After a labour of six years the business was accomplished, and this important document, the best memorial of the Conqueror, written in Roman, with a mixture of Saxon, is still preserved in the Chapter House, Westminster. For many years Doomsday Book remained unprinted, but in the 40th of the reign of George III. his Majesty, by the recommendation of Parliament, and with a proper regard to public interest, directed that it should be