Swithun

It's also home to one of Britain's favorite weather legends.

St. Swithin, Bishop of Winchester in the 9th century, asked to be buried outside where rain could fall on his grave.

More than a century later, the monks moved his remains inside the cathedral and, according to legend, it immediately rained for 40 days in protest.

Hence the old rhyme, St. Swithin's day if thou dost rain, for 40 days it will remain.

Keep that one in your back pocket if the sky is open during your visit.

Inside Winchester Cathedral, high above the choir, are medieval mortuary chests containing the mixed remains of Saxon kings and queens, including King Seenot and Queen Emma.

Who relieves poor Tom, that sleeps on the nettle, with the hedge-pig for his pillow? Whilst Smug plied the bellows, she trucked with her fellows.

The freckle-fact mob was a-blows and a-drab, yet Swithin made Oberon jealous.

O torture!

Alack, madam, a poor

So we got prayers A, B, C, and D for right two.

But St. Swithin's on the Lee only knows that prayer A exists because the altar guild sets it to prayer A and the priest just lands the plane.

never thinking that maybe prayer B would be good for, say, a feast of the incarnation, right? Or we have

all these offertory sentences.

That's toronto.ca slash elections.

what says he of st swithin's turn back look st swithin's no rain

oh here's a precious dirty damned rogue that bats himself with expectation of rotten weather and unseasoned hours and he is rich for it an elder brother his barns are full his ricks and mows well trod his garners crack with store ah tis well ha ha a plague consume thee and thy house

oh here st swithin's the fifteenth day variable weather for the most part rain good for the most part rain why it should rain forty days after now more or less it was a rule held afore i was able to hold a plough and yet here are two days no rain ha it makes me muse we'll see how the next month begins if that be better august first second third and fourth days rain and blustering this is well now fifth sixth seventh eighth and ninth rainy with some thunder ah mary this is excellent the other was false printed sure the tenth and eleventh great store of rain oh good good good the twelfth thirteenth and fourteenth days rain good still fifteenth and sixteenth rain good still seventeenth and eighteenth rain good still nineteenth and twentieth good still good still good still good still good still twenty first some rain some rain well we must be patient and attend the heaven's pleasure would it were more though the twenty second twenty third great tempest of rain thunder and lightning oh good again past expectation good i thank my blessed angel never never laid i a penny better out than this to purchase this dear book not dear for price and yet of me as dearly prized as life since in it is contained the very life blood strength and sinews of my happiness blest be the hour wherein i bought this book his studies happy that composed the book and the man fortunate that sold the book sleep with this charm and be as true to me as i am joyed and confided in thee

puts it up enter a hind and gives sordido a paper to read

is this not good is not pleasing this ah god pardon me is it possible that such a spacious villain should live and not be plagued or lies behid within the wrinkled bosom of the world where heaven cannot see him blood methinks tis rare and strange that he should breathe and walk feed with digestion sleep enjoy his health and like a boisterous whale swallowing the poor shall swim in wealth and pleasure is not strange unless his house and skin were thunder-proof i wonder at it methinks now the hectic gout leprosy or some such loathed disease might light upon him of that fire from heaven might fall upon his barns or mice and rats eat up his grain or else that it might rot within the hoary ricks even as it stands methinks this might be well and after all the devil might come and fetch him ay tis true meantime he surfeits in prosperity and thou in envy of him gnawest thyself peaceful get hence until thy vexed spirit wealth in this age will scarcely look on

Uh, this is another one of those aphorisms.

Uh, we were talking about this just recently in the Saint Swithin episode.

Uh, it's one of these aphorisms that I think is only wisdom given certain assumptions or conditions that are not really part of the saying.

Like, as stated, it could be purely terrible advice.

Welcome to those watching online and those here in St Mary's Hook in the Diocese of Sheffield and the East Riding of Yorkshire to this Service for Disability Awareness Sunday 2026.

Linda Herbert, our preacher today, was recorded in St Swithin's Holmesfield in Derbyshire, where she advised on building improvements for better accessibility.

We have arranged our church today around our 350-year-old communion table to symbolise that inclusivity, which was at the heart of the beginnings of the Church of England.

And we will remain seated throughout the service, even for the hymns, just to get a little taste of what it's like for those who are unable to stand.

Bang! He shut the door.

St. Swithin slowly scratched his head.

Well, I am, humph, just so, he said.

How very different the fact is, twixt the profession and the practice.

There were indeed many difficulties to be surmounted and many hardships to be endured.

The weather was stormy; and on the eighth of June, the feast of St. Medard, who holds in the French calendar the same inauspicious place which in our calendar belongs to St. Swithin, the rain fell in torrents.

The Sambre rose and covered many square miles on which the harvest was green.

The Meschin rolled down its bridges to the Meuse.

Profession and practice.

Once when St. Swithin chanced to be a-wandering in Hungary, he being hungered cast around to see if something might be found to stay his stomach.

Nearby stood a little house beside a wood where dwelt a worthy man but poor.

Thither he went, knocked at the door.

The good man came.

St. Swithin said, "I prithee, give a crust of bread to ease my hunger." "Brother," quoth the good man, "I am sadly loath to say," here tears stood on his cheeks, "I've had no bread for weeks and weeks save what I begged.

Had I one bit, I'd gladly give thee half of it." "How," said the saint, "can one so good go lacking of his daily food, go lacking means to aid the poor, yet weep to turn them from his door? Here, take this purse.

Mark what I say.

That's halfway.

Then you join the St. Swithin's Way, which is part of an old pilgrim route from Winchester to Canterbury.

And follow that through the lumpy, bumpy north-eastern part of Hampshire through Alton and Farnham.

And then in Farnham, you join the North Downs Way and you take the first part of the North Downs Way to Box Hill.