In the reign of King James the First there lived a man generally reputed a fool, whose name was Nixon. One day, when he returned home from ploughing, he laid the things down which he had in his hands, and continued for some time in a seemingly deep and thoughtful meditation, at length he pronounced in a loud hoarse voice, ‘Now I will prophecy;’ and spoke as follows;
“When a raven shall build in a stone lion’s mouth on the top of a church in Cheshire, then a King of England shall be driven out of his kingdom, and never return more.
“When an eagle shall sit on the top of the house, then an heir shall be born to the Cholmondeley family, and this heir shall live to see England invaded by foreigners, who shall proceed as far as a town in Cheshire; but a miller, named Peter, shall be born with two heels on one foot, and at that time living in a mill of Mr. Cholmondeley’s he shall be instrumental in delivering the nation.
“The person who then governs the nation will be in great trouble, and skulk about:—The invading King shall be killed, laid across a horse’s back like a calf, and led in triumph. The miller having been instrumental in it, shall bring forth the person that then governs the kingdom, and be knighted for what he has done; and after that England shall see happy days. A new set of young men, of virtuous manners, shall come, who shall prosper, and make a flourishing church for two hundred years.
“As a token of the truth of all this a wall of Mr. Cholmondeley’s shall fall, if it falls downwards, the church shall be oppressed, and rise no more; but if it fall upwards, next the rising hill on the side of it, then shall it flourish again. Under this wall shall be found the bones of a British King.
“A pond shall run with blood three days, and the Cross stone Pillar in the forest sink so low into the ground, that a crow from the top of it shall drink of the best blood in England.
“A boy shall be born with three thumbs, and shall hold three kings’ horses, while England shall be three times won and lost in one day.”
The original may be seen in several families in the county, and in particular in the hands of Mr. Egerton, of Oulton, with many other remarkable things; as that Peckforton wind-mill should be removed to Ludington hill and that horses saddled should run about while their girths rotted away. But this is sufficient to prove Nixon as great a prophet as Partridge; and we shall give other proofs of it before we have done with him.
I know your prophets are generally for Raw-head and bloody-bones and therefore do not mind it much; or I might add that of Oulton mill shall be driven with blood instead of water, but these soothsayers are great butchers and every hall is with them a slaughter-house.
Now as for authorities to prove this prophecy to be genuine and how it has hitherto been accomplished, I might refer myself to the whole country of Chester, where it is in every one’s mouth and has been so these forty years. As much as I have of the manuscript was sent me by a person of sense and veracity and as little partial to visions as any body. For my own part I build nothing on this or any other prophecy; only there is something so very odd in the story and so pat in the wording of it that I cannot help giving it as I found it.