S. MODWEN AND "THE DEVILL OK DKAKtLOWE. 55 



" Hoiv two inaydens were saved fro dnnvnynge.'' 



''At that tyme dwelled an holy heremyte whose name was 

 Hardulche in a place called Bredon.* He herde tell of 

 Modwen's holy lyuynge, and went off to her, and bare the 

 legends of holy sayntes lyves. On a day this holy man left 

 his boke at home, and therefore she made greate mone and sayd, 

 ' Father, why brmgest not thou thy booke with thee as thou were 

 wont to do.' ' Madame,' he sayde, ' I forgote.' That tyme saynt 



Hardulche had a celle in yffe (? Scaleclyffe) a 



lytell from Trente. Than she sent two of her maydens in a 

 bote to his hermitage to fetch y° boke. When these two virgins 

 came to a place named Le . . . there arose a grete 

 tempeste, and overturned the bote, and cast y'= maydens into 

 the water, and there they laye with the bote on them in the 

 botome of the water. Whan Sent Modwyn and the heremyte 

 had long taryed the comynge of the two vyrgyns, they went bothe 

 to theyr prayers, askynge Almighty God to siiewe them what was 

 become of these two maydens. Than they arose from prayer, 

 and looked towarde the water, and there was a fayre waye yn 

 the myddes of the water. The water was departyd maruelously 

 asondre in two partes, and stode stedfast on bothe sydes as a 

 ston walle. And therein entred y'' heremyte and Modwen, and 

 went so tyll they came to y*" place where the bote lay, and there 

 the bote lay dry, and the bottom upwarde, and they might go dry 

 all aboute it, and y" water stode over them on every syde. Then 

 the heremyte put forth his handes, and wolde haue lyfte up 

 the bote, but . . . " {Jure the fragment ends). 



The following is from Geoffry's Biography in the British 

 Museum : — 



" There was a certain servant of the King, and an enemy of 

 the church named Alfwin de Hopewasf who often wrought much 

 injury to the monastery of Burton, and with evil machinations, 



* About eight miles east of Burton. 

 + Now " Hoppas," a hamlet between Tarn worth and Lichfield. 



