Legends of the holy rood; Symbols of the passion and cross poems. In Old English of the eleventh, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries. Edited from Mss. in the British Museum and Bodleian Libraries, with introduction, translations, and glossarial index, by Richard Morris.

in Iapyng a buffet / and sayde pleynly þat she myght here it that he wolde synne wyth her: thenn[e] the mayster com|maunded hym that he shold performe þat he had [folio CClxx:1] begonne: and for to make hym to synne he shold haue a synguler victory [Orig. virtory.] and rewarde amonge all the other / and thenne commaunded he: that they shold goo loke who that was that laye in the temple. And they wente and loked / and anone they were ware that he was marked wyth the sygne of the crosse: And they beyng aferd escried and sayd / veryly this is an empty vessell. alas he is marked / and wyth this voys all the companye of the wycked spyrytes vanysshed awaye / and thenne the Iewe all amoeuyd came to the bysshop: and tolde to hym all by ordre what was happed: And whan the bisshop herd this / he wepte strongly. and made to voyde all the wymmen out of his hous / and thenne he baptysed the Iewe. Saint gregory reherceth in his dyalogues that a nonne entred in to a gardyne / and sawe a letuse / and coueyted that: and forgate to make the sygne of the crosse / and bote it gloton|essly / and anone fylle doune· and was rauysshe of a deuyl / and there cam to her saynt Equycyen / and the deuyll began to crye and to saye / what haue I doo I satte vpon the letuse / and she came and bote me and anon the deuyll yssued oute by the commaundement of the holy man of god: It is redde in thystorye scolastyke / that the paynems had pe[y]nted on a walle the armes of Serapis / and theodosyen dyde do put them out. and made to be peynted in the same place the sygne of the crosse / and whan the paynems and prestes of thydollis sawe that. anone they dyde them to be baptysed / sayenge that it was gyuen theym to vnderstonde of theyr olders / that tho armes shold endure/tyll that suche a sygne were made there. in whiche were lyf: And they haue a lettre. of whyche they vse / that they calle holy / and had a forme that they sayd it exposed and sygnefyed lyf perdurable /