neighbours. The very name Hugh was an
old ducal name, and there is little doubt that William de Avalon, Hugh's
father, claimed kin with the princes of his land. He was a "flower of
knighthood" in battles not now known. He was also by heredity of a pious
mind. Hugh's mother, Anna, a lovely and wealthy lady, of what stock does
not appear, was herself of saintly make. She "worshipped Christ in His
limbs," by constantly washing the feet of lepers, filling these wretched
outcasts with hope, reading to them and supplying their wants. She seems
to have been a woman of intellectual parts, for though she died before
Hugh was ten, he had already learned under her, if not from her, to use
language as the sacrament of understanding and understanding as the
symbol of truth. He had some grip of grammar and logic, and though he
did not brood over "Ovid's leasings or Juvenal's rascalities," rather
choosing to ponder upon the two Testaments, yet we may gather that his
Latin classics were not neglected. The spiritual life of Grenoble had
been nourished by a noble bishop, also Hugh, who had seen the vision of
seven stars resting upon a certain plot of ground, which induced him to
grant the same to St. Bruno, the founder of the Grande Chartreuse. Here
he served himself as a simple monk, laying aside his bishop's robes, not
a score of miles from Avalon. This Hugh was a religious and free
thinking man, who, though he found evil a great metaphysical stumbling
block to faith, yet walked painfully by the latter. He died in 1132 or
thereabouts, and his life was most probably the occasion of our Hugh's
name, and of much else about him.

The De Avalons had two other boys both older than Hugh: William, who
inherited the lands, and Peter, who was settled by his brother Hugh at
Histon, in Cambridge, but he does not seem to have made England his
home. Hugh had also at least one cousin, William, on his mother's side,
who attended upon him at Lincoln, and who (unless there were two of the
same name) developed from a knight into an holy Canon after his great
relative's decease. These relatives were always ready to lend a hand and
a sword if required in the good bishop's quarrels. The last particularly
distinguished himself in a brawl in Lincolnshire Holland, when an armed
and censured ruffian threatened the bishop with death. The good
Burgundian blood rose, and William twisted the sword from the villain's
hand, and with difficulty was prevented from drivi