[4] Leland, Collect. vol. ii. p. 476.
[5] Arthur went to his mete with many other kings. And there were all the knights of the Round Table except those that were prisoners, or slain at a recounter, thenne at the high feast evermore they should be fulfilled the hole nombre of an hundred and fifty, for then was the Round Table fully accomplished. Morte d’Arthur. The tale of Sir Gauth of Orkeney, c. 1. And see Vol. I. of this work, page 376.
[6] Walsingham, sub anno 1344. Ashmole on the Order of the Garter, cap. v. s. 2.
[7] Preface to the Black Book of the Order of the Garter.
[8] Walsingham, p. 164. Froissart, c. 100.
[9] Supplement to the Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. iii. part 1. p. 139. As the story of Lady Salisbury’s garter is fabulous, we must resort to some other conjectures for an explanation of the famous motto of the order, and the one cited in the text is extremely ingenious and plausible. With much less appearance of truth, Ashmole fancies that Edward by this motto retorted shame and defiance upon him that should dare to think ill of so just an enterprise as he had undertaken for the recovery of his lawful right to the French crown (whose arms he had lately assumed); and that the magnanimity of those knights whom he had chosen into this order was such as would enable him to maintain that quarrel against all who durst think ill of it. Ashmole’s Order of the Garter, p. 184. There never was a knight more fond of impresses, mottoes, and devices, than King Edward III. He not only stamped them upon his own armour and that of his horse, but on his apparel, beds, and household furniture. “It is as it is,” was one of these mottoes. Another was:—
“Ha! ha! the white swan,
By God’s soul I am thy man.”
[10] Gibbon is the chief supporter of the last hypothesis, In his text (vol. iv. c. 23.) he states positively, that “the infamous George of Cappadocia has been transformed into the renowned St. George of England, the patron of arms, of chivalry, and the Garter.” In a note, however, he observes that this transformation is not given as absolutely certain, but as extremely probable. Few people read this note, and, perhaps, Gibbon did not intend they should. He wished to strike their attention by the sentence in his text, and he satisfied his conscience for literary honesty by writing the modification at the bottom of the page.
[11] Froissart, c. 213.
[12] Barnes, p. 444.