The said Dame Mabell was
enjoined by her confessor to doe penances by going onest every week
barefout and bare legged to a crosse ner Wigan from the Haghe, wilest
she lived, and is called Mabb ++ to this day; and ther monument lyes in
Wigan church, as you see them ther portry'd."
Sir William Bradshaigh was outlawed during the space of a year and a day
for this offence; but he and his lady, it is said, lived happily
together afterwards until their death. Their effigies on the tomb now
exist but as rude and unshapely masses; time and whitewash, the two
great destroyers of our monumental relics, having almost obliterated
their form, the one by diminishing, and the other by adding to, their
substance.
That Sir William was at the "Holy Wars," must, it is evident, be a
corruption of the story, seeing he was born about the year 1280, ten
years after the last of these unfortunate expeditions. The first
croisade was undertaken by Peter the Hermit, 1095; a second, by Louis
VII of France, 1145; a third, under Richard I of England, 1190; a
fourth, under Philip II of France, 1204; a fifth, under Louis IX,
against Egypt, 1248; and the last, under Louis IX.
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