Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/23

Rh hestre in his tyme: He dyd do make without y$e$ weste gate of the toun a fayr brydge of stone at his propre cost/ And on a tyme there came a woman over the brydge with her lappe full of egges: & a rechelles felaw stroglyd and wrestelyd wyth her/ & brak all her egges/ And it happed that this holy bysshop came that waye the same time: & bad the woman lete hym see her egges/ And anone he lyf te vp his honde and blessyd the egges/ & the were made hooll and sounde euerychon by the merytes of this holy bysshop."

Hone prints a doggerel version of the story in 'The Every-day Book,' vol. i. p. 478:—

Mr. Baring-Gould does not mention the egg-mending miracle in his 'Lives of the Saints,' but he used as sources the metrical life by Wolstan of Winchester, 990, and a life by Gotselin, a monk, 1110, as well as referring to William of Malmesbury's 'Gesta Pontificum.' One of these authorities might contain the legend sought by your correspondent, but he would have to go to the British Museum to get at them all.

This miracle is first recorded in the monk Goscelin's 'Vita S. Swithuni,' printed by Surius, and also apud 'Acla Sanctorum' (July 2). The passage in question runs thus:—

"Sanctus Episcopus pontem Wintoniensem, qui est ad Orientem, construxit. Cumquc ei aedificando solicitam navaret operam, quodam die, illo ad opus residents, qusedampaupercula mulier eo venit, ova venalia in vase deferens : quam apprehensam operarii lascivientes et ludibundi, magno incommode affecerunt, ovis universis nonereptis, sed contractis. Ilia igitur pro illata injuria et damno dato, cum lacrymis et ejulatu corain Episcopum conquerenti, vir sanctus pietate permotus, vas, in quo erant reposita ova, corripit, dextra signum Crucis ex- primit, ovaque incorrupta et integra restituit."

A similar incident is related in the life of Blessed Margaret of Ypres, a Dominican tertiary, who died in 1237. Her cult is somewhat obscure. She is often represented in art holding a basket of eggs, of which two or three are falling to the ground.

Pons Wintoniensis is a well-known stone bridge across the Itchin, at the eastern gate of Winchester.

It should be noticed that St. Swithun must be written. The common "Swithin" is an error. Thus in the Breviary ('Propria Angliæ,' July 15) we have Swithúnus.

GOWER FAMILY OF WORCESTERSHIRE (US. iv. 53). MR. H. A. BULLEY'S correction of the account in Nash's ' History of Worces- tershire ' of the descent of the Boughton St. John estate to the Ingrams in the female line contains several statements that genea- logists must question. For instance, lie states that George Gower of Colemers, co. Worcester, second son of William Gower by his wife Eleanor Folliott, and grandson of Henry and Barbara Gower, and great- grandson of William Gower (died 1546), succeeded to the Boughton St. John pro- perty on the death of his elder brother John Gower in 1625, and was father of Abel Gower of Boughton St. John. In the Gower pedigree in Mr. Hardwicke-Jones's ' Hardwicke of Burcott,' published about the same time, we are told that John Gower was succeeded by his nephew Abel, son of George. Mr. William Page, F.S.A., in his Worcestershire section of the " Victoria History of the Counties of England," agrees with these two that Abel was the son and heir of George, but declares that the latter was a brother of William Gower, who died 1546, and that the estate was sold by William's son Henry in 1617 to his cousin Abel. As this Henry died 1548, this was impossible.

Mr. F. A. Crisp in his ' Notes on the Visita- tion of England and Wales,' vol. xi. p. 164, informs us that the estate passed from William Gower in 1546 to his son Henry, who died 1548, and that Henry's grandson Henry sold it in 1617 to his father's cousin Abel (born 1565), son of Robert (died 1599). and grandson of William, who died 1546, This account has all the appearance of being the correct one, is supported by ample and reliable documentary evidence, and is corro- borated by the 1569 ' Visitation of Worcester- shire,' p. 61 (Harl. 1566, fol. 52), where we read that William Gower left by his wife Anne, daughter of Richard Tracy e, a son Henry of Boughton, who married Barbara, daughter of Edward Littleton, by whom he had a son William of Boughton, who married Ellinor, daughter of John Folliott of Pirton, by whcm he was father of Henry and other children. We read further that William and Anne had two other sons, one of whom was Robert of Rydmarli, who married Cicely, daughter of Richard Sheldon, by whom he had, with other issue, a sen Abell. There is nowhere in this account any mention of a George.

MR. BULLEY next tells us that Abel Gower had by his wife Anne Withers a son Abel, born 1620 ; but Mr. Crisp proves conclusively that Anne was Abal's first wife and died