"Eadward's tomb before the high altar soon became the scene of many miracles. As the last English king of the old royal line he was naturally remembered with feelings of affection, that found expression in acts of devotion and legends of his holiness. Among these legends his vision that the seven sleepers of Ephesus had turned on to their left sides is one of the most famous. Another of greater historical importance, as proving that he practised the custom of episcopal investiture, must be reserved for the life of Wulfstan, bishop of Worcester. He is said to have healed many persons, and especially those suffering from ulcers, by touching them. William of Malmesbury declares that those who knew him while he lived in Normandy said that he performed some miracles of this kind before he came to the throne, and that it was therefore a mistake to assert, as some people then did, that he had this power, not because of his holiness, but in virtue of his hereditary royalty. By the end of the twelfth century it appears to have generally been believed that the kings of England had the gift of healing in virtue of their anointing, and down to the early part of the eighteenth century the power of curing the ‘king's evil’ was held to descend as an ‘hereditary miracle’ upon all the rightful successors of the Confessor."