Writers of the same period record two facts in relation to Jumieges, which are of some interest as points of natural history.--Vines were then commonly cultivated in this place and neighborhood;--and fishes of so great a size, that we cannot but suppose they must have been whales, frequently came up the Seine, and were caught under the walls of the monastery.--The growth of the vine is abundantly proved: it is not only related by various monkish historians, one of whom, an anonymous writer, quoted by Mabillon, in the _Acta Sanctorum ordinis Sancti Benedicti_, says, speaking of Jumieges, "hinc vinearum abundant botryones, qui in turgentibus gemmis lucentes rutilant in Falernis;" but even a charter of so late a date as the year 1472, expressly terms a large tract of land belonging to the convent, the vineyard[12].--The existence of the English monastic vineyards has been much controverted, but not conclusively. Whether these instances of the northern growth of the vine, as a wine-making plant, do or do not bear upon the question of the supposed refrigeration of our climate by the increase of the Polar ice, must be left to the determination of others.--The whale-fishery of Jumieges rests upon the single authority of the _Gesta Sancti Philiberti_: the author admits, indeed, that it is a strange thing, "et a sæculo inauditum;" but still he speaks of it as a fact that has fallen under his own knowledge, that the monks, by means of hooks, nets, and boats, catch sea-fish[13], fifty feet in length, which at once supply their table with food, and their lamps with oil. The number of holy men who originally accompanied St. Philibert to his new abbey, was only seventy; but they increased with surprising rapidity; insomuch, that his successor, St. Aicadras, who received the pastoral staff, after a lapse of little more than thirty years from the foundation of Jumieges, found himself at the head of nine hundred monks, besides fifteen hundred attendants and dependants of various denominations. During all these early ages, the monastery of Jumieges continued to be accounted one of the most celebrated religious houses in France. Its abbots are repeatedly mentioned in history, as enjoying the confidence of sovereigns, and as charged with important missions. In their number, was Hugh, grandson of Pépin le Bref, or, according to other writers, of Charlemagne. Here also, Tassilo, Duke of Bavaria, and his son, Theodo, were compelled to immure themselves, after the emperor had deposed them; whilst Anstruda, daughter of Tassilo, was doomed to share his imperial bed.