At Winterton, a village not far from Epworth, at the time of the controversy of which mention has been made, the burials on the North side had all taken place within living memory. It was a matter of doubt whether “a dozen gravestones, over fifty years old, could be found in as many parishes in [that] deanery on the North sides of churchyards[880].” Another Lincolnshire village, Springthorpe, had no Northern graves; while, at Saltfleetby All Saints, so recently as 1880, as the present writer can avouch, not a single stone or grave existed on the North side, though monuments were closely crowded on the South side. Dr Alfred Gatty, who was vicar of Ecclesfield, Yorkshire, for more than fifty years, once stated that, in the early nineteenth century, there were practically no interments in the North yard of his church. In the year 1823 a clergyman was buried in that portion, and the evil reputation was banished[881]. Morwenstow, Cornwall, Hawker’s beloved “Daughter of the Rock,” formerly exemplified the same superstition[882]. The prejudice was especially strong in Norfolk[883]. It was also very prevalent in the neighbouring county of Suffolk[884]. At Newbourne, in that county, while the graveyard was filled on the South, East, and West, the turf had long appeared unbroken on the North. “The bishop had never walked on it,” so ran the story, and all endeavours to break down the superstition proved fruitless for many years[885]. In churchyards situated in the Border Counties, on both banks of the Tweed, the prejudice is barely removed even at the time of writing. John Brand (A.D. 1744-1806) discovered that, in his day, the belief still pervaded many “inland and Northern parts,” but had been “eradicated from the vicinity of the metropolis.” He quotes numerous authorities to prove that the prejudice was also rampant in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales[886]. Another eighteenth century writer, none other than Gilbert White, recorded that the Southern side of the churchyard of Selborne had “become such a mass of mortality that no person [could] be there interred without disturbing or displacing the bones of his ancestors.” However, “two or three families of the best repute” had begun to bury on the North side, and White had hoped that, by degrees, the prejudice might wear out[887]. Frequently we encounter evidence which, without directly alluding to the superstition, implies its existence. A curious bequest made at the close of the seventeenth century will serve as an illustration. Archbishop Tenison having presented a burial ground to the parish of Lambeth, it was deemed necessary, in order to lessen the number of Southern interments, to charge double fees for that portion of the yard[888].