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But Gyll had no idea of abandoning his pretensions, and he renewed them with abundant details in his History of Wraysbury, a quarto which contains more than its title implies. He is not content to note (p. 153) that "occasionally those dreary landmarks in the vast desert of human misery, called Coroner's inquests, arise in Wraysbury." He also proves, to his own satisfaction, that "the family of Ghyll, Gyll, Gylle, Gille, Gill, for it is recorded in all these ways, is derived from that one which resided in the North, temp. Edward the Confessor, 1041, at Gille's Land in Cumberland" (p. 99), and that "in 1278 Walter le Gille served as a juryman at Tonbridge" (p. 98). The arms of the Gylls are duly given: "Sable, two chevrons argent, each charged with three mullets of the field, on a dexter Canton, or; a lion passant at guard, gules. Also Lozenges or and vert; a lion rampant at guard, gules." Heralds whom I have consulted have jeered at the Gyll escutcheon, but I cannot bring myself to give their ribald remarks in print. Apparently, the main purpose of the History of Wraysbury is to shew that the Gylls (with a y) are very Superior Persons, and that the Gills (with an i) are People of No Importance. Gyll admits that the latter produced a worthy man in the person of John Gill, "a Baptist divine"; and the historian, when writing of his poor relations (p. 125), emphasizes the fact that John Gill was not an Anabaptist. Anabaptists were evidently an inferior set.

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