—Which may be freely translated:—“Holding on too lightly, if I fall from the tree I shall say nothing about it.” If I suffer from my own negligence I must not complain.
[257] Editor’s Note. The following short pedigree of the first members of the de Garis family in the island may prove interesting:—It is extracted from the proceedings of the law suit re the Fief Handois in 1497. See Additional MSS. British Museum, 30, 188.
In the “Extente” of 1331, Pierre and John de Garis held land in the parishes of St. Peter Port, St. Andrew’s, St. Peter’s-in-the-Wood, and St. Sampson’s. In the “Calendars of Patent Rolls” for the years 1328-36, we find Nicholaa, Abbess of the Holy Trinity, Caen, nominating Peter and William de Garis her Attorneys in the Channel Islands, and in 1332 a Commission was given to Robert de Norton, William de la Rue, and Peter de Garis to survey the King’s Castles and Mills in the islands of Jersey and Guernsey which are reported to be greatly in need of repair, and to certify by whose default, and by whom they fell into decay. In 1380, a William de Garis, described as being “de l’isle de Guerneseye,” sold to “Sire Pierre Payn” the Manor of Malorey in St. Laurent, Jersey, to which parish the Fief Handois also belonged.
[258] Editor’s Note.—A “George Fenien” was in existence at the end of the sixteenth century, and his daughter Collette Fenien, was married to William Brock, ancestor of the Brocks of Guernsey. William Brock died in 1582.
[259] Editor’s Note.—In the “Placita Coronæ” held in the reign of Edward III., William, son of Robert Roland, held land in the Vale parish. In a deed of 23rd of August, 1517, dealing with land in St. Sampson’s parish, south of the “Grand Pont” the “Rue Roland” is mentioned; in 1569, there was living in St. Sampson’s parish a Richard Roland and Collenette Le Retylley, his wife, and (2nd November, 1569) Thomas Roland and Jeanne Blondel, his wife, bought a house in St. Peter Port from Jean Le Montés; so the probabilities are that the Rolands, if they migrated from France, did so before the Huguenot persecutions, and had been domiciled in Guernsey long anterior to the sixteenth century.
[260] Editor’s Note.—Or he may have been the “Monsieur Jean Roland,” son of Thomas and Elizabeth Bailleul, who was Rector of S. Pierre-du-Bois, and imprisoned in the Tower of London in 1665, for his refusal to submit to the Act of Uniformity.
[261] Editor’s Note.—It was this Monsieur Careye, who in September, 1563, bought the Fief Blanchelande from Her Majesty’s Commissioners; he married Collette de la Marche and was buried 15th of July, 1593.
Proverbial Sayings.
We now come to a class of proverbial sayings which might almost claim an exclusive right to the title of “Folk-Lore,”—those relating to the weather and other natural phenomena; and which, being the result of long experience on the part of the people, are religiously believed in by them. Many of these sayings are common, in spirit if not in form, to the greater part of Europe; some of them are confined to certain districts; and, although a few may have a superstitious aspect, such as those which profess to predict what events will happen in the course of the year from an observation of the weather on a particular holy day, yet some of them may be worthy the notice of meteorologists, who have discovered that, in many cases, the probable character of the weather in a particular month may be guessed at by that which prevailed at an earlier season.