At the ancient Copped Hall--so named from the {60} Saxon _cop_, signifying the top of a hill--that occupied the site of the present nineteenth-century mansion, the Princess Mary lived during the brief reign of her brother, and from it she addressed in 1551 a remarkable letter protesting against the prohibition to have mass celebrated in her private chapel. There, too, she received the messengers who brought back the king's unfavourable reply, and gave to the chief of them, no less a personage than the Lord Chancellor himself, a ring to be delivered to His Majesty, who was to be informed 'that she would obeye his commandements in all things excepte in theis matters of religion towchinge the mass.' It is noteworthy that three years later, when the tables were turned on the Protestants by the accession of Mary, the same Lord Chancellor should have received orders from her 'to be presente at the burning of such obstinat persons as presently are sent downe to be burned in diverse partes of the county of Essex.' [Sidenote: Epping Forest] Originally part of the great forest of Essex, the beautiful woodlands of Epping, in spite of all the changes through which they have passed, still retain something of their primeval character, and enshrine in their recesses some few relics even of pre-Norman days, of which the most noteworthy are the two camps of Ambresbury Banks and Loughton, for each of which it has been claimed that it was the stronghold from which Queen Boadicea watched the last stand of her army against the invaders, and the massacre of the women and children who had come, as they fondly hoped, to rejoice over a victory! {61} Whether this or any of the many other theories advanced be true, it is certain that long before the Conquest, Epping Forest, which at that date included some sixty thousand or seventy thousand acres, was the property of the Saxon kings, and that in Norman times it was strictly preserved for the royal pleasure, the game-laws being terribly severe and most rigidly enforced. The killing of a stag was in fact more severely punished than the murder of a man, for in the former case the eyes of the offender were put out, whilst for the latter crime a money payment was often accepted. The first king to sanction any disafforesting was Stephen, who allowed certain districts to be cleared for cultivation, and his example was followed by John, who reluctantly gave up the portion north of the main road between Stratford and Colchester, the concession having been wrung from him by the united barons, who compelled him to sign the Charter of Forests, the wording of which is very significant of the terrible oppression to which the people were subjected at the time. Later the concessions were confirmed by Henry III. and by Edward I., who had at first shown signs of going back from the promises of his predecessors, but in 1301 he was brought to a better mind by means of a heavy bribe of money. Gradually, through