He made no
secret that he was going to sell timber to the tune of several thousand
pounds and settle it on his wife.
Then Richard Bassett, through Wheeler, his attorney, remonstrated in
his own name, and that of his son, against this excessive fall of
timber on an entailed estate.
Sir Charles chafed like a lion stung by a gad-fly, but vouchsafed no
reply: the answer came from Mr. Oldfield; he said Sir Charles had a
right under the entail to fell every stick of timber, and turn his
woods into arable ground, if he chose; and even if he had not, looking
at his age and his wife's, it was extremely improbable that Richard
Bassett would inherit the estates: the said Richard Bassett was not
personally named in the entail, and his rights were all in supposition:
if Mr. Wheeler thought he could dispute both these positions, the Court
of Chancery was open to his client.
Then Wheeler advised Bassett to avoid the Court of Chancery in a matter
so debatable; and Sir Charles felled all the more for the protest. The
dead bodies of the trees fell across each other, and daylight peeped
through the thick woods. It was like the clearing of a primeval forest.
Richard Bassett went about with a witness and counted the fallen.
The poor were allowed the lopwood: they thronged in for miles round,
and each built himself a great wood pile for the winter; the poor
blessed Sir Charles: he gave the proceeds, thirteen thousand pounds, to
his wife for her separate use.
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