By the Bev. Canon J. E. Jachon, F.S.A. 27 



the dJfFerent counties. In most of the counties by far the greater 

 number of his " Woithies" are men : and in Wiltshire he appears 

 to have been able to find only three ladies deservmg of heing 

 noticed in his book. It was published in 1662. Time has made 

 some additions to that very small number : and there are also a few 

 names belonging to earlier periods which he might have mentioned, 



but did not. ^t^ ■,. i i j- 



There are several works that record the history of English ladies. 

 We have Mrs. Green's « Lives of the most distinguished m rank, 

 the Queens and Princesses." There is also " Ballard^s Memoirs of 

 Learned Ladies"; also plenty of memoirs of, or by, others who 

 have been conspicuous in Society. But the names sekcted for 

 notice in the present paper will only be those of Wiltshire ladie. 

 who either were born in the county, or belonged to it by lifelong 

 residence and connexion. Also, only those whose names are to be 

 found here and there in different printed works relating to Wiltshire, 

 and are therefore, so far as that goes, historical. 



Of course there must have been at all times ladies who were 

 ornaments to Society, clever, witty, and otherwise emment m their 

 day But that is quite a different thing from being emment aftet 

 their day. If you wish to be, I will not say, eminent, but even 

 named at all in time to come, you must bequeath to posterity some- 

 thing more than merely your name. There is a story somewhere of 

 a gentleman who was going on his travels to the East, whose friends 

 loaded him with all sorts of commissions. Fot one he was to get 

 this- for another that. Some supplied him with money for the 

 purpose; others forgot to do so. As he was steaming along the 

 Mediterranean, and near the end of his voyage, he began to think 

 it time to put his commissions in order, and, if possible, reduce the 

 number of them. So one day he took out all the papers and laid 

 them in a row on the taffrail of the ship. On those papers that 

 had come to him with money enclosed he laid the money ; but the 

 unprepaid commissions, having nothing to keep them down, were 

 blown away by the first breeze. That is very much the case with 

 ourselves and our chances of future reputation. We may fill our 

 part in life very creditably, be clever, popular, perhaps famous, m 



