Note 18 — BENTHALL HALL, SHROPSHIRE.

It is remarkable that a superior seigniory or lordship in this estate was retained by the Burnell family till so late a period as the close of the reign of Richard III., while the Benthalls, the subtenants, were lords of the manor, as appears by their descriptions in deeds and on the court-rolls.

So early as in the reign of Edward III., lords of manors began to neglect the military services, on condition of which they held their lands under the tenant in capite (in most instances a powerful baron), who, on his part, owed and neglected services to the king, the supreme owner of the lands. The rights of the superior or intermediate lords becoming disused, the lords of manors gradually acquired the tenure which, in the present day, supposes only a superior right in the sovereign; yet it was not till Henry VII. had grasped the sceptre that the feudal system of military service was totally suppressed.

In effecting national improvement, that sagacious monarch acted on the just conviction that his own paid army was better to be relied on than the retainers of his nobles: he wisely conceived that, having already dethroned their sovereign, they might be little scrupulous of removing his successor, whose personal pretensions to the throne, though strengthened by his marriage, were by no means universally admitted.