e
feudatories exercised all the duties and honours of their
feudal jurisdiction in person. In Spenser, where we read of
the _Lady of the Castle_, we are to understand such a
character. See a story of a _Comtesse_, who entertains a
knight in her castle with much gallantry. (_Mem. sur l'Anc.
Chev._, ii. 69.) It is well known that anciently in England
ladies were sheriffs of counties."

To this note of Warton's, Park adds another, which I also give as being
more conclusive on the subject. It is as follow:

["Margaret, Countess of Richmond, was a justice of peace. Sir
W. Dugdale tells us that Ela, widow of William, Earl of
Salisbury, executed the sheriff's office for the county of
Wilts, in different parts of the reign of Henry III. (See
_Baronage_, vol. i. p. 177.) From Fuller's _Worthies_ we find
that Elizabeth, widow of Thomas Lord Clifford, was sheriffess
of Westmoreland for many years; and from Pennant's _Scottish
Tour_ we learn that for the same county Anne, the celebrated
Countess of Dorset, Pembroke and Montgomery, often sat in
person as sheriffess. Yet Riston doubted of facts to
substantiate Mr. Warton's assertion. See his Obs. p. 10., and
reply in the _Gent. Mag. 1782_, p. 573.--PARK."]

T. C. S.

I can answer part of W. M.'s Query, by a reference to a personage who
could not have been very far from being the first instance of the kind
(Query, was she?).

"About this time (1202) Gerard de Camville, his old and
faithful adherent, was restored by John to the possession of
the honours of which he had been deprived by King Richard; and
it is a remarkable circumstance that, on the death of the said
Gerard, in the eighteenth year of the king's reign, his widow,
Nichola Camville (who is described by an ancient historian as
being 'a martial woman of great courage and address') had the
sheriffalty of the county of Lincoln committed to her; which
honourable and important trust was continued to her by a grant
of Henry III.," &c.

The above quotation is taken from Bailey's _Annals of Nottinghamshire_,
now publishing in Numbers (Part III. p. 107.). Should I be wrong in
asking correspondents to contribute towards a list of ladies holding the
above honorable post?

FURVUS.

St. James's.

_Burial of an unclaimed Corpse_ (Vol. vii., p. 262.).--E. G. R.'s
question is easil