92 CLENT.

reverted to the Crown. There were three fairs and a court leet. The inhabitants anciently enjoyed peculiar privileges, on account of Clent being royal demesne, were free from serving on juries, from tolls at fairs, and sold ale and other refreshments without license or the intervention of the gauger. St. Kenelm's, above mentioned, is famous for its little church and the associations connected therewith. Near it was a holy well, which sprang up on the site where Kenelm, the young king of Mercia, was murdered by his sister, and the healing properties of the water (especially for sore eyes) were so marvellous as to attract pilgrims in great numbers. A church was erected in memory of the young saint, and a village or town gradually grew up around this nucleus. The monks of Winchcombe, however, claimed and took away the body, but the stream continued to flow till a few years ago, when it was diverted into a brook a short distance off. The town of Kenelmstowe disappeared when the high road from Bromsgrove to Dudley, which formerly lay through it, was changed and carried through the town of Hales. The little church, however, remains, and is well worth a visit on account of its early Norman and other features of interest, and the sculptured figure of a young saint (supposed) projecting from one of the walls - this latter may be Saxon. When the church was restored, a few years ago, some frescoes representing the legend of St. Kenelm were found on the walls. Anciently a fair was held here on the feast of the saint (July 28th), and it was a day ever to be remembered by the good old custom of "crabbing the the parson," or pelting the clergyman with apples - a privilege much enjoyed and held sacred by the rustics, as a kind of quid pro quo to his reverence for the many hard rubs he had no doubt given them during the year. The substitution of sticks and stones for crabs led to the suppression of the practice. The origin of the custom, it is said, was some centuries ago, when a certain clergyman, who served this chapel, abstracted some dumplings from a pot at a farm house where he usually had his Sunday's dinner, and deposited