By the Rev. J. Baron, D.D., F.S.A. 



151 



intimacy with her before she was married to the said earl, which she 

 likewise freely acknowledged to be true : so as this lady, who, through 

 the whole course of her life, had been reputed chaste and honourable, 

 on a sudden change of fortune must be proclaimed through the 

 whole world for a lewd and infamous woman. The wretch who had 

 thus got possession of her grew so insolent as to presume, in his 

 pretended wife's name, to claim in the King's court the earldoms of 

 Lincoln and Salisbury, but with no effect. 1 This occasioned the 

 divorce between the earl and his countess, which historians mention 

 to have been some time before his death. 2 



It is curious that in a previous generation John, Lord Giffard, of 

 Brimsfield, is said to have carried off, from her castle at Canford, 

 A-D. 1271, Matilda, the widow of the third Longespee, and that 

 the marriage was excused upon his paying the King 300 marks. 3 



A.D. 1322. Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, after being formally 

 pardoned for his share in the illegal putting to death of Piers de 

 Gaveston, being again in arms with associated barons against King 

 Edward II. and his favourites, was taken prisoner at Boroughbridge, 

 in Yorkshire, carried to Pontefract, his own castle, to the King and 

 the two Spencers ; and three days after was, in implacable haste, 

 condemned to be hanged, drawn, and quartered ; but in honour to 

 his great birth the sentence was mitigated into the loss of his head; 

 and on the 22nd of March " this noble patriot/' being carried to a 

 hill without the town on a lean white jade without a bridle, was 

 made there to kneel, and when he directed his face to the east was 

 compelled to turn toward Scotland, while a villain of London cut 

 off his head. Of the death of this great peer the King himself 

 did soon repent. Many miracles were reported to be done in the 

 place where he was buried, and a beautiful Church was there erected 

 to the honour of his memory. 4 



1 Cf . Walsingham, sub an., quoted in Bp. Kennett's Par. Ant., vol. i., p. 539 ; 

 Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1818. 



2 Ibid, p. 540. 

 3 Wilts Mag., vol. ii., p. 102. 

 4 Bp. Kennett, who quotes Pakington, Walsingham, Dugdale, Barnes ; Par. 

 Ant., vol. i., pp. 55(5, 7. 



