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Edward III.’s reign was long and glorious. It was distinguished by the ever-memorable battle of Cressy. Part of the inhabitants of this town doubtless contributed to the victory thus obtained; for in 1346 the king directed Richard Fitz-Alan to raise two hundred of his vassals from Oswestry and Clun, to attend him in the French wars.

In 1397 Richard, Earl of Arundel and Surrey, was attainted and executed, when Richard II. seized all his lands and manors, and granted them to William le Scrope, Earl of Wiltshire. In the Historia Regum Angliæ we find the following bit of superstition entertained at this period. On this occasion the Earl of Arundel must, of course, have deeply regretted his contempt of the marvellous stone of which John Ross, the Antiquary, of Warwick, writes. “The earl,” says this grave author, “kept a raven in his court; and one day, as he was playing at chess in the garden, the bird,” or, as Ross suggests, “a spirit in that form, brought up (eructavit) a stone having the virtue of invisibility. The earl set no value upon it, contrary to the advice of his nobles; and soon after, being arrested by strong hand, he was committed to ward, and finally beheaded.”