NOTES—ORIGINAL AND SELECTED.
159
But the connection of the Sotheby family with New Lodge dates from a period
long anterior to William Sotheby's re-erection of it. In May, 1701, the Earl of
Lindsey, chief warden in fee of the Forest of Waltham, granted to James Sotheby
jun., of Gray's Inn, Esq., the keepership of New Lodge Walk, for life. Sotheby,
on his part, covenanted to sufficiently uphold the house or lodge standing thereon,
with the outhouses ; and to provide one or more able, faithful and diligent
keepers or under-keepers, attendant on Her Majesty's vert and venison, and pay
the salaries of the same. By other clauses in the deed he was precluded from
transferring his office without consent, and bound to serve the warrants directed
to him by the Earl, on pain of rendering the grant void.
The original deed of giant, from which these particulars are taken, is now in
my possession ; but will, I hope, shortly find a permanent and fitting home in the
newly-constituted Forest Museum at Queen Elizabeth's Lodge.—W. C. Waller,
Loughton.
Corrigenda.—On page 83, supra, 7th line from the bottom, for "price" read
piece ; and on page 85, for "Wagner" read Wayner.
Cheesemaking in Essex—In connection with the efforts now being made
by the Technical Instruction Committee to revive the industry of cheesemaking
in our county, the following letter, addressed by Dr. H. Laver, F.S.A., to the
Rev. D. Bartrum (who has taken so much interest in the subject), is worth
placing on record. Dr. Laver says :—"It may interest you to know that a few
ago a Devonshire or Somersetshire family took the Grange Farm at Steeple, nine
miles from Maldon, and they introduced there their own customs. They made
splendid clotted cream and cheddar cheese of such a good quality that they had no
difficulty in disposing of it. The late Mr. Oxley Parker, of Woodham, used no
other, as he considered it first-rate. Essex at one time made large quantities of
cheese, as all old descriptions of the county testify, but what its qualities may have
been I do not know. I have, however, at various times seen proofs of the existence
of the industry in the shape of perfect cheese-pressers, and more often of their
remains. In Norden's description of Essex, 1594 (published by the Camden
Society in 1840), par. 8, he says—'The Hundreds of Rocheford, Denge, which lye
on the South-Easte parte of the Shire, yelde milk butter and cheese in admirable
abundance, and in those partes are the great and hugh cheeses made, wondered at
for their massiveness and thickness. They are also made in Tendring Hundred,
where are many wickes or dayries.'
" Page 10.—' Canney Ilandes—and for that the passage over the creek is unfit
for cattle, it is only converted to the feeding of ewes, which men milke, and there-
of make cheese, such as it is, and of the curdes of the whey they make butter
once in the year which serveth the clothier.'
" In all the older notices of the products of the county cheese is always mentioned.
It is a pity that nearly or quite all of our rural industries have disappeared."
It is certain that Essex in the past was not only a cheese-making, but a
cheese-exporting county. Vol. VIII. of the "Acts of the Privy Council," lately
published, shows that letters were sent from the Privy Council in August and
November, 1574, "for staying the transportation of butter and cheese beyond the
seas out of the counties of Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk," owing to the scarcity of
victuals at home.