SIR W. C. T. has opened a very interesting field for inquiry regarding these blest rings. St. Edward, in his last illness (obiit January 5, 1066), gave a ring which he wore to the Abbot of Westminster. The origin of this ring is surrounded by much mystery. A pilgrim is said to have brought it to the king, and to have informed him that St. John the Evangelist had made known to the donor that the king's decease was at hand. "St. Edward's ring" was kept for some time at Westminster Abbey, as a relic of the saint, and was applied for the cure of the falling sickness or epilepsy, and for cramp. From this arose the custom of our English kings, who were believed to have inherited St. Edward's powers of cure, solemnly blessing every year rings for distribution. It is said, we know not on what authority, that the ring did not always remain at Westminster, but that in the chapel of Havering (so called from _having the ring_), in the parish of Hornchurch, near Rumford in Essex (once a hunting-seat of the kings), was kept, till the dissolution of religious houses, the identical ring given by the pilgrim to St. Edward. Weaver says he saw it represented in a window of Rumford Church. These rings seem to have been blessed for two different species of cure: first, against the falling sickness (comitialis morbus); and, secondly, against the cramp (contracta membra). For the cure of the king's evil the sovereign did not bless rings, but continued to _touch_ the patient. {89} Good Friday was the day appointed for the blessing of the rings. They were often called "medijcinable rings," and were made both of gold and silver; and as we learn from the household books of Henry IV. and Edward IV., the metal they were composed of was what formed the king's offering to the cross on Good Friday. The following entry occurs in the accounts of the 7th and 8th years of Henry IV. (1406): "In oblacionibus Domini Regis factis adorando Crucem in capella infra manerium suum de Eltham, die Parascevis, in precio trium nobilium auri et v solidorum sterlyng, xxv s. "In denariis solutis pro eisdem oblacionibus reassumptis, pro annulis medicinalibus inde faciendis, xxv s."