e words that St. Peter had said to him, and bound
his mouth with the thread, and sealed it, and after returned, and as he
came upward again he met with two enchanters which followed him for to
see if he descended, which were almost dead of the stench of the dragon,
whom he brought with him whole and sound, which anon were baptized, with
a great multitude of people with them. Thus was the city of Rome
delivered from double death, that was from the culture and worshipping
of false idols, and from the venom of the dragon. At the last when St.
Silvester approached toward his death, he called to him the clergy and
admonished them to have charity, and that they should diligently govern
their churches, and keep their flock from the wolves. And after the year
of the incarnation of our Lord three hundred and twenty, he departed out
of this world and slept in our Lord, etc.

OF ST. AUSTIN THAT BROUGHT CHRISTENDOM TO ENGLAND

St. Austin was a holy monk and sent in to England, to preach the faith
of our Lord Jesu Christ, by St. Gregory, then being pope of Rome. The
which had a great zeal and love unto England, as is rehearsed all along
in his legend, how that he saw children of England in the market of Rome
for to be sold, which were fair of visage, for which cause he demanded
license and obtained to go into England for to convert the people
thereof to Christian faith. And he being on the way the pope died and he
was chosen pope, and was countermanded and came again to Rome. And
after, when he was sacred into the papacy, he remembered the realm of
England, and sent St. Austin, as head and chief, and other holy monks
and priests with him, to the number of forty persons, unto the realm of
England. And as they came toward England they came in the province of
Anjou, purposing to have rested all night at a place called Pounte, say
a mile from the city and river of Ligerim, but the women scorned and
were so noyous to them that they drove them out of the town, and they
came unto a fair broad elm, and purposed to have rested there that
night, but one of the women which was more cruel than the other purposed
to drive them thence, and came so nigh them that they might not rest
there that night. And then St. Austin took his staff for to remove from
that place, and suddenly his staff sprang out of his hand with a great
violence, the space of three furlongs thence, and there sticked fast in
the earth. And when St. Austin came to his sta