hung round with helmets, with boards of war, [shields] and with bright byrnies, [coats of mail] as he had requested. Then the heroes, weeping, laid down in the midst the famous chieftain, their dear lord. Then began on the hill, the warriors to awake the mightiest of funeral fires; the wood-smoke rose aloft dark from the fire; noisily it went, mingled with weeping. His faithful followers afterwards erected the barrow over his ashes:-- a mound over the sea; it was high and broad, by the sailors over the waves the beacon of the war-renowned. They surrounded it with a wall in the most honourable manner that wise men could desire. They put into the mound rings and bright gems, all such ornaments as before from the hoard the fierce-minded men had taken. The date of the erection of the first parish church at Winwick is not known with certainty. Some contend that it was coeval with the introduction of Christianity into the North of England by Paulinus. Although this is incapable of absolute verification, it is generally conceded that a church must have existed for some time antecedent to the Norman conquest. The Domesday Survey, under the head of "Newton Hundred," seems to confirm this. It says, "Under the reign of King Edward" (the Confessor) "there were five hides in Newton: one of these was held in demesne. The church of this manor had one carucate of land, and St. Oswald, of this village, had two carucates, _exempt from all taxation_." Mr. Baines says--"In 1828, while digging a vault in the chancel of this church, there were found, at the depth of eight or ten feet below the floor, three human skeletons of gigantic size, laid upon each other, and over them a rude heap of cubical sandstone blocks of irregular dimensions, varying from one to two feet. No remains of coffins were found in the grave, and the history of the occupants of this mysterious tomb remains undiscovered." It seems, however, not improbable that these interments took place anterior to the building of the church, that the skeletons were the remains of chieftains who perished with Oswald, and that the sacred edifice, dedicated to the warrior saint, was afterwards erected on the spot.