Scottish
missionaries, or, as we should now call them, Irish,[xv]
he learned with rapidity all that a boy could acquire of civil or
ecclesiastical lore, and both in Latin and in theology his progress
amazed his tutors.

Up to this time the world had held possession of his heart, and,
balancing the advantages of a religious and a secular life, he chose, as
most young people would choose, the attractions of court, to which his
parents' rank entitled him, and leaving Glastonbury he repaired to the
court of Edmund.

There his extraordinary talents excited envy, and he was accused of
magical arts: his harp had been heard to pour forth strains of ravishing
beauty when no human hand was near, and other like prodigies, savouring
of the black art, were said to attend him, so that he fled the court,
and took refuge with his uncle, Elphege, the Bishop of Winchester.

A long illness followed, during which the youth, disgusted with the
world, and startled by his narrow escape from death, reversed the choice
he had previously made, and renounced the world and its pleasures.

Ordained priest at Winchester, he was sent back with a monk's attire to
Glastonbury, where he gave himself up to austerities, such as, in a
greater or less degree, always accompanied a conversion in those days;
here miracles were reported to attend him, and stories of his personal
conflicts with the Evil One were handed from mouth to mouth, until his
fame had filled the country round.[xvi]

The influence he rapidly acquired enabled him to commence the great work
of rebuilding Glastonbury, in which he was only interrupted by the
frequent calls which he had to court, to become the adviser of King
Edmund; where indeed he was often in the discharge of the office of
prime minister of the kingdom, and showed as much aptitude in civil as
in ecclesiastical affairs.

Glastonbury being rebuilt, the Benedictine rule [xvii]
was introduced, and Dunstan himself became abbot. It was far the noblest
and best monastic code of the day, being peculiarly adapted to prevent
the cloister from becoming the abode of either idleness or profligacy.

But this was not done without much opposition; the secular priests--as
the married clergy and those who lived amongst their flocks (as English
clergy do now) were called--opposed the introduction of the
Benedictine rule with all their might, and were always thorns in
Dunstan's side.

The unfortunate Edmund, after the sad event at Puc