_Gervasius de Blois_, another abbot of this monastery, who was
base son to King Stephen, and by him placed as a monk here, and
afterwards made abbot, who died _anno_ 1160, and was buried
under this stone, having this distich formerly thereon:

"_De regnum genere pater hic Gervasius ecce
Monstrat defunctus, mors rapit omne genus_."

Felix Summerly, in his _Handbook for Westminster Abbey_, p. 29.,
noticing the cloisters and the effigies of the abbots, says,--

"Towards this end there lies a large slab of blue marble, which
is called 'Long Meg' of Westminster. Though it is inscribed to
Gervasius de Blois, abbot, 1160 natural son of King Stephen, he
is said to have been buried under a small stone, and tradition
assigns 'Long Meg' as the gravestone of twenty-six monks, who
were carried off by the plague in 1349, and buried together in
one grave."

The tradition here recorded may be correct. At any rate, it carries with
it more plausibility than that recorded by Mr. Cunningham.

EDWARD F. RIMIBAULT.

[Some additional and curious allusions to this probably mythic
virago are recorded in Mr. Halliwell's _Descriptive Notices of
Popular English Histories_, printed for the Percy Society.]

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