MARTELLO TOWERS. The fragments of its church may still be seen behind the cliff; but at present its chief inhabitants are larks and wheatears, which abound here in great perfection. The derivation of its name from a member of the Pelham family, having had as much land granted by William the Conqueror, as he could cover with a bull's hide, resorting to the expedient of cutting it into slips, seems to have been invented to give the Pelhams a greater antiquity than they possess. This noble family arose in the reign of King Edward I. Such, however, is the tradition, and, as the same piece of cunning was exercised by Dido, in founding Carthage, and by the Mansfields, in Germany, under the Emperor Otho, such conveyance seems to have had the stamp of precedent, and to have been considered valid. The remains of a large Dutch ship, called the Amsterdam, wrecked off the coast about a century ago, may still be seen at low water, sometimes appearing four or five feet above the sands. Two miles further on, through pleasant fields, is BEXHILL. Its situation is on the Downs, and commands most extensive views, whilst the hop-gardens, which abound here, just now are looking like so many Arcadian forests. The great natural |