788                          HISTOR Y OF B UCKS CO UNTY.

of Tyburn, to the Delaware opposite the lower end of Biles's island.
It is now divided into many farms, which are among the most
highly cultivated and productive in the county. Certain lands in
this county were sold to be holden in "free and common socage,
and oftlie manor of Pennsbury," paying to William Penn, his heirs
and assigns, on the first day of March in every year, " at the towm
of Pennsbury," one English silver penny for every one hundred
acres.

The oldest grant in the county was that to the "- Free Society cf
Tiaders," made the 22d and 23d of March, 1682, covering tweniy
thousand acres. The object of the company, mostly composed of
gentlemen of London, of which Nicholas Moore was president, was
to carry on trading operations en an extensive scale. The charter,
executed the 24tli of March, conferred the most liberal privileges
ever given to a corporation in this state. They were singular and
extraordinary, and made it iwperiinn in iniperio. The grant was
erected into a manor by the name of the " Manor of Franks," with
the right to hold "a court-baron, court-leet, and view of frank¬
pledge ;" to determine all pleas and controversies, civil and criminal,
and other oflicers and justices were prohibited intermeddling in its
afiairs; it had power to hold two courts yearly; to lay taxes and
impose fines within the manor, and to appoint its own officers. The
corporation was to pay to William Penn the yearly sum of one
shilling upon the day of the vernal equinox, or within tw^enty days
thereafter. The society was to send settlers and mechanics to the
grant, to establish factories, and to have a monopoly of peltries.
Negro servants were to be free after fourteen years service, on
condition that they gave the society two-thirds of the produce of
the land allotted them. On the manor was to be erected a society-
house, where the officers were to live, and the books and papers
were to be kept under three locks and keys. The oflicers were to
continue in oflice.SQven years. Such, in brief, were the provisions
of this extraordinary corporation, which were probably never carried
out, as the "Manor of Franks" has neither location nor history.

Nearly one-half of this grant was located in central Bucks county,
in what are now the townshijis of New^ Britain, Doylestown, and
Warwick. , It originally contained eight thousand six hundred and
twelve, acres, and its north-east boundary ran along the line of
Doylestown, Buckingham and Plumstead, eleven hundred and sixty-
eight perches, or nearly three and three-quarters miles, whicli would