The main road may be left at the north end of Steyning by a turning on
the left which rises in a mile and a half to Wiston ("Wisson") Park and
church; this is the best route for the ascent of Chanctonbury. The park
commands fine views and is in itself very beautiful; the house dates
from 1576, though several alterations have spoilt the purity of its
style. This manor was once in the hands of the de Braose family, from
whom it passed by marriage to the Shirleys, another famous family. Sir
Thomas Shirley built the present house about 1578. It was Sir Hugh
Shirley to whom Shakespeare referred in _King Henry IV_.

"Hold up thy head, vile Scot, or thou art like
Never to hold it up again. The spirits
Of Shirley, Stafford, Blount, are in my arms."

His great-grandsons were the famous Shirley brothers, whose adventures
were so wonderful that their deeds were acted in a contemporary play.
One went to Persia to convert the Shah and bring him in on the side of
the Christian nations against the Ottomans. On the way he discovered
coffee! His younger brother, who accompanied him, remained in Persia
and married a Circassian princess. The elder, after being taken
prisoner by the Turks, was liberated by the efforts of James I and then
imprisoned in the Tower by the same King for his interference in the
Levant trade. Ruined in pocket and with a broken heart he sold Wiston
and retired to the Isle of Wight. The estates soon afterwards passed to
the Gorings, who still own them.

Wiston church, which stands in the park and close to the house,
contains several monuments to the Shirleys and one of a child, possibly
a son of Sir John de Braose; a splendid brass of the latter lies on the
floor of the south chapel; it is covered with the words 'Jesu Mercy.'