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which had so strangely disappeared now covered everything, and
a piercing cold of great intensity obliged the king and his fellow-
giiests to seek shelter and warmth within the Monastery walls
Greatly astonished and moved at what he had seen. King William
c a l l j Albertus to him, and promised to grant him whatever he
might request. Albertus asked for land in the State of Utrecht
whereon to erect a Monastery of his own order. His request was
granted, and he also obtained from the King many other favours.
b IS recOTjd that on the same day that Alexander de’ Medici,
the Duke of Florence, was treacherously killed, in the Villa of
Cosmo de’ Medici, an abundance of all kinds of flowers burst into
Woorn, although quite out of the flowering season ; and on that
J y the Cosmian gardens alone appeared gay with flowers, as
though Spring had come.
©JatRev (SJciprieP/^ ^ fpa co.
At the commencement of the present chapter on extraordinary
and miraculous plants, allusion was made to certain trees which
were reputed to have borne as fruit human heads. A fitting conclusion
to this list of wonders would appear to be an account of a
wondrous ear of Straw, which, in the year 1606, was stated
miraculously to have borne in effigy the head of Father Garnet
who was executed for complicity in the Gunpowder Plot It
would seem that, after the execution of Garnet and his companion
Uldcorne, tales of miracles performed in vindication of their
iMocence, and m honour of their martyrdom, were circulated bv
the Jesuits. But the miracle most insisted upon as a supernatural
conhrmation of the Jesuit’s innocence and martyrdom, was the
story of Father Garnet’s Straw. The originator of this miracle
was supposed to be one John Wilkinson, a young Catholic, who,
at the time of Garnet’s trial and execution, was about to pass over
into France, to commence his studies at the Jesuits’ collecre at
St. Omers. Some time after his arrival there, WilkinsoiJ was
attacked by a dangerous disease, from which there was no hope
of recovery; and while in this state he gave utterance to the story
which Eudaemon-Joannes relates in his own words. Having
J s c n b e d his strong impression that he should “ witness some imme-
toate testimony from God in favour of the innocence of His saint ”
his attendance at the execution, and its details, he proceeds th iis -L
“ Garnet’s hmbs having been divided into four parts, and placed
together with the head m a basket, in order that they might be exhibited
according to law in some conspicuous place, the crowd began
to disperse. I then again approached close to the scaffold and
stood between the cart and the place of execution; and as I lingered
in that situation, still burning with the desire of bearing awav
some rehque, that miraculous ear of Straw, since so highly cele-
brated, came, I know not how, into my hand. A considerable
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