it is, is still only a remnant. Only
one side of what was once a quadrangular building remains, but the solid
symmetry of its red-brick walls and ivied gables, and the hugeness of
its ornate and lichened barns and granaries, make it as imposing as any
farmhouse well could be. Curiously enough, like the older Crowhurst
Place, the other side of the county, a farmhouse it still remains.

The Slyfields and the Shiers lie in Great Bookham church. Another church
stands not half a mile away from the house, in a smooth and green garden
on the banks of the Mole. Stoke D'Abernon church contains one of the
great possessions of Surrey--the oldest brass in England--a monument
which, besides being the oldest of its kind, is the very knightliest
memorial an English gentleman could have. A plain slab of brass, on
which has been elaborately engraved the figure of a soldier in full
chain mail, with his six-foot lance and its fringed pennon, his long
prick-spurs, and his great two-handed sword, it has lain in an English
church for nearly six centuries and a-half. The Lombardic lettering
which runs round the brass is half illegible, but the form of the old
inscription, perfect in its simple dignity, is clear enough:--

SIRE : IOHAN : DAUBERNOUN : CHIVALER : GIST : ICY :
DEV : DE : SA : ALME : EYT : MERCY.

By Sir John D'Abernon's brass lies that of his son, and between the
dates of the two brasses are fifty years--1277 and 1327. The D'Abernons
were a knightly family, but they never provided an English king with a
great soldier, or a great politician, or with anything much more than
the quiet services of a country gentleman. The founder of the family in
England was Roger de Abernun, who in Domesday Book is a tenant of
Richard de Bienfaite, son of Gilbert Count of Brionne. The first Sir
John D'Abernon, whose brass lies in Stoke D'Abernon church, was the most
distinguished of the family. Like Edmond Slyfield, he was Sheriff of
Surrey and Sussex.

Edmond Slyfield, dead three hundred years before our day (we can see his
brass in Great Bookham church), perhaps often stared at the brass of Sir
John D'Abernon, dead three hundred years before him. Perhaps, little
guessing that within thirty years the Slyfield manors would belong to a
stranger, and the Slyfield name be half forgotten, he reflected
comfortably on the misfortunes of his predecessor in office. For Sir
John was a most unlucky Sheriff, and lost a large sum partly by robbery