y D. Otho Melander;
and he also gave Desfontaines the subject of _L'Inceste Innocent;
Histoire Veritable_ (Paris, 1644). A similar tale is touched upon in
_Amadis de Gaule_, and in a later century we find _Le Criminel sans le
Savoir, Roman Historique et Poetique_ (Amsterdam and Paris, 1783). It
is also found in Brevio's _Rime e Prose_; Volgari, novella iv; and in
T. Grapulo (or Grappolino), _Il Convito Borghesiano_ (Londra, 1800).
A cognate legend is _Le Dit du Buef_ and _Le Dit de la Bourjosee de
Rome_. (ed. Jubinal, _Nouveau Recueil_; and _Nouveau Recueil du Senateur
de Rome . . ._ ed. Meon.) Again: the _Leggenda di Vergogna, etc. testi
del buon secolo in prosa e in verso_, edited by A. D'Ancona (Bologna,
1869) repeats the same catastrophe. It is also related in Byshop's
_Blossoms_.

In Luther's _Colloquia Mensalia_, under the article 'Auricular
Confession', the occurrence is said to have taken place at Erfurt in
Germany. Julio de Medrano, a Spanish writer of the sixteenth century,
says that a similar story was related to him when he was in the
Bourbonnois, where the inhabitants pointed out the house which had been
the scene of these morbid passions. France, indeed, seems to have been
the home of the tradition, and Le Roux de Lincy in the notes to his
excellent edition of the _Heptameron_ quotes from Millin, _Antiquites
Nationales_ (t. iii. f. xxviii. p. 6.) who, speaking of the Collegiate
Church of Ecouis, says that in the midst of the nave there was a
prominent white marbel tablet with this epitaph:--

Cy-gist la fille, cy-gist le pere,
Cy-gist la soeur, cy-gist le frere;
Cy-gist la femme, et le mary,
Et si n'y a que deux corps icy.

The tradition ran that a son of 'Madame d'Ecouis avait eu de sa mere
sans la connaitre et sans en etre reconnu une fille nommee Cecile. Il
epousa ensuite en Lorraine cette meme Cecile qui etait aupres de la
Duchesse de Bar . . . Il furent enterres dans le meme tombeau en 1512 a
Ecouis.' An old sacristan used to supply curious visitors to the church
with a leaflet detailing the narrative. The same story is attached to
other parishes, and at Alincourt, a village between Amiens and
Abbeville, the following lines are inscribed upon a grave:--

Ci git le fils, ci git la mere,
Ci git la fille avec le pere,
Ci git la soeur, ci git le frere,
Ci git la femme et le mari,
Et ne sont pas que trois corps ici.

When Walpole wrote his tragedy, _The Mysterious Mother_ (1768),