*BUCKINGHAM, (Buckinghamshire) 12 cm. and 17 mm. from Ailesbury, and 44 cm. and 60 mm. from London, is the Co. T. and walled on all sides, but the N. with the Ouse, over which it has 3 stone bridges. A castle was built by the Saxon K. Edw. the Elder in the middle of the T. and it is divided into two parts; one where the Ch. is, the other where the T. hall is. It was a corp. and had summons to send members to Pt. in the R. of Edw.III. but doe not appear to have done so, 'till the 36th of Hen. VIII. though from that of Edw. VI. it has sent 2 members regularly. Q. Mary incorporated it, by the name of a bailiff and 12 burgesses. K. Ch. II. in 1684 granted it a new charter, changing the magistrates into a mayor and ald. but the old charter was restored four years after, and the magistrates are still a bailiff and burgesses. Here is a handsome T. hall, built chiefly at the expence of Sir Ralph Verney, Bt. where are kept the weights and measures of the Co. by act of Pt. of Hen. VII. In the R. of Hen. VIII. the Co. business, which had chiefly been transacted here, was removed in a great part, by the Ld. Ch. Just. Baldwin to his native T. of Ailesbury, of which he had purchased the manor. This T. was many years a wool-staple, and many of its wool-halls are yet standing. It is a large populous place with a great Ch. whose spire, reckoned one of the tallest in England, was blown down in 1698 by a tempest, and never rebuilt. Here is a fr. s. which was a chapel, founded by Tho. Becket, A.B. of Canterbury; and here was formerly a chantry. The Co. gaol was kept in the castle here, 'till it fell to decay; but a new one is just built: and by a late act the former assizes, which had been sometimes at Ailesbury, are always to be held here. On the 25th of March, 1725, a great fire happened here, by which 138 families lost near 33,000 l. in houses and goods. Several paper-mills are erected on the Ouse in its neighbourhood; and its Mt. is on S. with 8 Fairs, viz, on Mond, fe'ennight after Epiphany, St. Mark's, Th. in Whitsun-week, St. Peter, St. Bartholomew's, St. Matthew's, St. Simon and Jude's; and St. Martin's, days.