The present Mr. Woodburn, who had been the only son, was a man of a liberal education, fond of classical literature, and more deeply learned in all the history, both general and family, of the county, than any other man in it. Nay, there was scarcely a family of any note in England of which he did not possess a knowledge which continually surprised you. He had a real love for topography and family history, which had led him, as it would seem, insensibly to acquire not only this knowledge of domestic annals, but of the titles of almost all the estates in the county, many copies of which, curious and important in their way, he possessed; and this knowledge made him a great authority in cases of disputed title, and had led him to decide the issue of several most noted trials. He had a habit also of noting down all sorts of curious facts which came to his knowledge either in the course of his reading of books, or of the newspapers, or which he heard verbally. These _curiosa_ had accumulated into several volumes, which he kept locked up in his desk, and which he would bring out occasionally as something of public interest was occurring, or as something in conversation had suggested the reference. A somewhat odd medley a stranger would have regarded the contents of these volumes, for amongst public and important facts, would be found jotted down birth-days, dates of weddings, and funerals of his family or neighbours; and even remarkable cases of prolificness of fowls, cattle, and fruit-trees on his farm. There was an entry of the turkey, or the hen that had laid away in the copse or the thicket, and came forth unexpectedly with some fifteen or twenty pouts, or chickens. The tame hawk, which was reared by George, his son, and suddenly flying away, became not only wild, but the scourge of his poultry-yard, by making continual visits to it, till at length shot, stands in immediate succession to the history of the lawyer of the neighbouring town, who, reared at the cost of the clergyman of Cotmanhaye, whose shoeblack and errand boy he had originally been, had grown rich by harassing the poor people of the country round by all sorts of vexatious suits.