the Wealden owners and farmers. Many of the largest contracts for the supply of iron were shared out by the larger to the lesser foundries, and it is from this cause that so many localities claim that their furnace made the railings for S. Paul's Cathedral (temp. Charles II.), the contract having been farmed out by the Lamberhurst Furnace.
The sites of the old furnaces are generally to be traced along the out-crops of the strata, geologically known as the Wadhurst clay, and it was upon the same stiff clay which contained the iron ore that flourished the noble Wealden oaks, now long ago sacrificed for the smelting of the metal. So soon as the Wealden forest trees called by the Celts " Anderida," (An-dar-udu the oak wood) grew scarce, then the iron industry became extinct. Many folks still bewail the treeless forests of Sussex wrecked by the old time industry ; but with the memory of their loss they may associate many a noble thought of brave deeds, long past, for it is not too much to say, and it should not be forgotten by Sussex men, that the weapons in the hands of the makers of England, with which they hewed out the foundations of the Empire, sprang from the soil of Sussex."
In the Descriptive Catalogue of the Muniments of Battle Abbey, by Thomas Thorpe, published 1835, 1S the following : Westalle's Booke of Pannyngrydge, A , regni Regis Hen. VII. xxxviij i.e. 1546. A volume thus designated, contains the Accounts of some Iron Master and exhibits his expenditure in carrying on an extensive concern, during that year. Payments made to the wood cutters, for " coards of Wood " at three pence per coard. The collears were paid in coards of wood and money for coals, after the rate of twenty two pence the load.
A coard of wood, in Sussex, is in measure fourteen feet long, three feet wide, and three feet 2 inches high ; the two inches in height being allowed for shrinking or settling.
Sums paid for carrying Coals out of Pannyngrydge, Olyvers Wood and Asyldey, at four-pence and six-pence the load. "Moyne digged out of Pannyngrydge" refers to the iron ore mined or dug up in the neighbourhood
" Paid unto Black Jack and others, for digging of loads of moyne, at seven pence the load," etc.
Sums paid " to Warnet, the founder and the filler," who from several of the entries it appears was named Anthony.
Sums paid for " carying of lodes of sand from Pannyngrydge unto my forge at Robertsbryge, at xvjd the lode."
Sums paid Mr. Chancellor, for the farm of his Woods at Pannyngrydge ;
sums paid unto the Parson of Penherst, for the farm of the Phurner (Furnace) pond there ; as also for the Tythe of the Phurner there, &c.
Sums paid in reparation, hewing or felling of timber ; foe drawing the same tymbre to the cole-house ; for drawing of timber -
