Baring-Gould’s sources: Wilson in his Anglican Martyrology on Sept. 12, but Wyon, Menarclus, and the Bollandists on Ang. 31. Authority The life in Capgrave.] Ethelbert, King of Kent, who had been converted to Christ by the preaching of Augustine, had a son, Eadbald, and a daughter, Ethelburga. Eadbald married Emma, daughter of Theodebert, King of Austrasia, and by her had two sons, Ermenred and Ercombert, and one daughter, Eanswitha.

Eadbald built a church at Folkestone, dedicated to S. Peter, now buried under the blue waters of the encroaching sea. He sought to marry his daughter to one of the Northumbrian princes who was still a heathen. She obstinately refused. King Eadbald’s Court was visited by the royal suitor. “ I will marry him,’' said the wise virgin, “ if by prayer to his gods he is enabled to lengthen this log a foot.” In vain did the suitor sue his gods, the log maintained its accustomed length.

Legends of all kinds have accumulated round the name of this young and holy descendant of Hengist and of Clovis. The gaps in her authentic history are filled by incidents which show the idea formed by the Anglo-Saxons of the supernatural power with which a monastic vocation invested a daughter of the sovereign race.

The church of S. Peter at Folkestone was converted into, a convent. As soon as she was installed there as abbess, she made it, after the fashion of all the religious foundations of the time, a great agricultural establishment as well as an ascetic sanctuary and a literary school. There, according to the popular tale, she tamed flocks of wild geese which spoiled her harvests, and which her servants stole from her poultry-yard, and ate, to her great displeasure. With the top of her crosier she dug a canal to bring to her monasteiy a stream of fresh water, which was wanting. She died young, in 640.