252 THE LITTLETONS.

over the land. Coal-pits were worked at Pensax three centuries ago, if not earlier. The pits appear to have been worked at one time by the Worcester Corporation, and that city was probably supplied from this source until better roads had rendered more distant pits available. It is said that the first barge load of coal brought to Worcester was in 1570, Richard Denson belonging to the barge, "who lived long after in All Saints' churchyard, a pious devout man." There are at present three coal-pits at work at Pensax; the coal is sulphurous, but is specially used for making coke for hop-drying. J. Higginbottom, Esq., who recently purchased the estate of the Clutton-Brock family in this parish, raises between 3,000 and 4,000 tons of coal annually from his pits. A young heir of the Glutton family lost his life about a century ago by falling with his horse into an old coal-pit. The scenery around Pensax chapel, embracing wooded ravines and precipitous elevations, is of a highly romantic description.

In the seventeenth century Lindridge seems to have been exempt from payment towards the repair of county bridges.

The Littletons.

ANOTHER group of villages - three in number - lying N.E. of Evesham. They are South, Middle, and North Littleton, yet there are but two parishes, North and Middle Littleton constituting one of them. South Littleton is said to have given the name to that ancient and distinguished family now represented by the Lord-Lieutenant of Worcestershire, who, it is stated, were possessed of lands here at a very early period, but the family itself residing at Upton Snodsbury before they removed to Frankley and then to Hagley. In Saxon times the Lattletons belonged