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St. Swidhun, architect and statesman, was born in the neighbourhood of Winchester about the year 800. He was a monk of the old Abbey of Winchester, then prior of the brotherhood, and lastly, from A.D. 852 until his death in 862, Bishop of the See. Egbert, the king, chose him as preceptor to his son Ethelwolf, and he obtained a name respected for uprightness and humility. His last desire is said to have been that he might be buried outside his own cathedral, under the eaves, where his body would receive the droppings from the roof, and his grave be trodden by the feet of the passer-by. This is pretty well all that is actually known of this celebrated saint; but popular regard has not been content with such meagre materials, and further particulars have therefore been invented. Report affirmed that about one hundred years after his death an attempt was made to remove his body to the inside of the church, but that this endeavour was frustrated by a storm of rain which came on suddenly, and continued for forty days. In consequence, the scheme had to be given up, and instead of the saint's bones being moved, a chapel was built over his grave, where many miracles were performed. This, however, is all false, for instead of being a failure, the translation was a great success. The truth of the matter is as follows:-Bishop Ethelwold, the rebuilder of the cathedral, looked back upon the list of his predecessors in the See, and he found Bishop Swidhun to be the most worthy of honour there. Information reached him that that worthy had appeared to divers persons in a vision, and the facts were then taken down in writing, the result of which was that Swidhun was proclaimed a saint by acclamation. King Edgar was informed of the reports, and he gave directions for the formal translation of the remains from without the north side to within the east end of the church. On July 15, 971, after Swidhun had been one hundred and eight years in his humble grave, there was a vast gathering at Winchester to witness the translation, which took place with great éclat, and with the most propitious weather. A few years later,

*This name is formed of the two words swif, strong, bold, and hun, the meaning of which is obscure, although it frequently occurs in names.

on October 20, 980, Ethelwold's new cathedral was dedicated to St. Swidhun, and his merits formed the theme on that occasion. The old cathedral was dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul, and the new fabric was known as St. Swidhun's until Henry VIII. ordered the name of the Holy Trinity to be substituted. The earliest example that has been found of a calendar in which our saint's day appears is one in the library at Rouen, of about A.D. 1000.

We owe our better knowledge of St. Swidhun to the Rev. John Earle,* one of our most learned Saxon scholars, whose researches have added another instance to the many already existing, of the curious way in which a man may be connected in the popular mind with a superstition that history shows us to be inconsistent with the facts of his life. We therefore can have little difficulty in agreeing with Mr. Earle that the belief in a forty days' rain must date back to a period long anterior to the age of St. Swidhun.

Intimately connected with the weeping saints we have been considering are those that inaugurate a more cheerful and agreeable weather. Near the end of most years we have a brief resurrection of summer, which is called in the United States the "Indian Summer," in Northern and Midland Germany, "Old Wives' Summer," and more rarely, the "Girls' Summer." De Quincey speaks of it as "a resurrection that has no root in the past nor steady hold upon the future, like the lambent and fitful gleams from an expiring lamp, mimicking what is called the lightning before death' of sick patients when close upon their end." It has four names in England, according to the time in the year it commences, which are Michaelmas Summer (Sept. 29), St. Luke's little Summer (Oct. 18), Halloween Summer (Oct. 31), and St. Martin's Summer (Nov. 11). The two last are mentioned by Shakespeare. Prince Harry says to Falstaff: "Farewell, thou latter Spring! Farewell All Hallow'n Summer" (First Part of King Henry IV., act i. sc. 2), and in the First Part of King Henry VI. (act i. sc. 2), Joan la Pucelle

says:

*Gloucester Fragments, London, 1861, 4to.

Assign'd am I to be the English scourge. This night the siege assuredly I'll raise : Expect St. Martin's Summer, halcyon days, Since I have entered into these wars.

Here is the place to mention the one exception to the rule that the watery saints are all in June and July. The Feast of St. Simon and St. Jude has obtained the credit of commencing a rainy period, and in Middleton and Decker's old play, The Roaring Girl, or Moll Cutpurse, one of the characters observes: "I know it as well as I know 'twill rain on Simon and Jude's day." This festival falls on the 28th of October, which is about the time of the usual autumn rains; and, according as the rainy season comes earlier or later, one or other of the second summers we have just mentioned is likely to occur.

January 25, the day dedicated to the Conversion of St. Paul, was considered, as we have mentioned before, to be ominous of the future weather of the year. In Hearne's edition of Robert of Avesbury this is set out in the following translation of some Latin lines :

If St. Paul's day be fair and cleare, It doth betide a happy yeare; If it do chance to snow or raine, Then shall be deere all kinds of graine: But if the wind then be alofte, Warres shall vex the realm full ofte; And if the clouds make darke the skie, Both neate and fowle this yeare shall dye. Somewhat the same belief was current as to St. Urban's Day (May 25). If this day is fair the Germans count on a good vintage, but if it is stormy they fear a bad one. The image of this saint used to be carried to the market-places and crowned with flowers, but if these fair-weather saints were unpropitious the people vented their anger upon them. Schenck, in his Treatise on Images, says that in Germany the people used to drag St. Paul and St. Urban in effigy through the streets down to the rivers if their respective feasts happened to occur in foul weather. Besides wet and fineweather saints, they have in France three Icy Saints:

Saint Mamert, Saint Pancrace

Et Saint Servais,

Sans froid ces Saints de Glace ne vont jamais.

The festivals of these saints occur on three consecutive days-viz., the 11th, 12th and 13th of May, and Mr. Blomefield remarks

that these three days coincide with one of those short periods of anomalous cold, or wintry relapse, which occur in the earlier months, and of which that in May is perhaps the one most generally known; thereby again establishing the truth of an old adage -though the phenomenon to which it bears reference has only of late years, comparatively speaking, attracted the attention of meteorologists, or been clearly ascertained to be a fact.

The results of the consideration of these meteorological landmarks may be summed up as follows, in the words of Mr. Blomefield:

Taking one year with another, there is relatively speaking a dry half of the year and a wet half, the latter being further divisible into two wet periods separated by a dry period. In other words, some portion of the summer is wet, and some portion of the autumn is also wet, the saints'-days above named pointing in a general way to the setting in of those periods. But between these two wet periods there usually occurs an interval of fine settled weather, this being also, curiously enough, associated with other saints; if the first wet commence, as it normally would do, about the end of July and continue through August-so that it can be fairly laid to the charge of St. Swithin-then when the dry comes in September, St. Bartholomew is considered as bringing about the change. If this dry period does not set in till later in the season we have then no less than four saint or festival days brought in to mark the fine settled weather, especially if mild as well as fine, and lending their names to what is considered as a second

summer.

It is therefore a mistaken notion to imagine that the association of varieties of weather with certain saints had anything originally to do with superstition. At the present day it is in many instances the proverbs and traditions only that keep the saints in memory; but it was different in old times, and no better mode of impressing upon the masses the results of observation could have been hit

upon. It is also not a little remarkable that meteorologists such as Forster and Blomefield, who have given careful attention to the subject, should find, after consulting a series of records, that, in the main, the so-called superstition of our ancestors was founded upon broad and sound generalizations.

OF

LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE,

A Wayfarer's Notes in the Palatine Counties,-Historical, Legendary, Genealogical, and Descriptive.

By JAMES CROSTON, F.S.A.

Fellow of the Royal Historical Society of Great Britain; Member of the Architectural, Archæological, and Historic Society of Chester; Member of the Council of the Record Society.

99.66

AUTHOR OF

"On Foot through the Peak," "A History of Samlesbury," "Old Manchester and its Worthies," "Historical Memorials of the Church in Prestbury," "Nooks and Corners of Lancashire and Cheshire," &c., &c.

The very favourable reception accorded to Mr. Croston's "NooKS AND CORNERS OF LANCASHIRE
AND CHESHIRE" has encouraged the Publisher to prepare for the press a companion volume, from the pen
of the same Author, under the title of "HISTORIC SITES OF LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE.'

"

The first-named work is now out of print, and any copies that find their way into the market command a considerably enhanced price.

The forthcoming volume, like the one which preceded it, will be illustrative of the history and romance of the two Counties Palatine, and its purpose will be to give to particular localities an individuality and freshness, and to interest the reader by presenting in an entertaining and acceptable form the "sites" of remarkable occurrences and traditional incidents of bygone days. It will be uniform in size, style, and binding, and will form in all respects a companion volume to "NOOKS AND CORNERS OF LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE.'

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we spirit of wordswort prologue to reter ben1, MEAL. Croston Has WELL. trative of the history and romance of the two home counties palatine. Though it is clearly set forth that these descriptions of nooks and corners are not intended as contributions to antiquarian research, not one of them is without abundant illustration from the historic past. The author, however, comes before us primarily in the character of a guide; he gives us the results of his own observations; he makes pilgrimages to some of the most interesting places in Lancashire and Cheshire, and points out to those who are willing to follow him what there is to charm the eye of the lover of nature, and what traces of antiquity there are in ecclesiastical or domestic architecture to be found near the road along which he rambles; and these he renders additionally interesting by recalling the associations of other days, and describing successive scenes witnessed there during the centuries. The distinctive merit of such a book is its power to interest readers in the districts in which they live, and the least that can be said about Mr. Croston's book is that it is admirably adapted to do this."-Manchester Examiner and Times.

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LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE," by JAMES CROSTON, F.S.A., at the Subscription price of 21/

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