As soon as they entered the dwelling-place assigned them, they began to imitate the course of life practised in the primitive Church; applying themselves to frequent prayer, watching, and fasting; preaching the word of life to as many as they could; despising all worldly things as not belonging to them; receiving only their necessary food from those they taught; living themselves in all respects in conformity with what they prescribed for others, and being always disposed to suffer any adversity, and even to die for that truth which they preached. In short, several believed and were baptized, admiring the simplicity of their innocent life, and the sweetness of their heavenly doctrine. There was, on the east side of the city, a church dedicated to the honor of St. Martin, built whilst the Romans were still in the island, wherein the queen, who, as has been said before, was a Christian, used to pray.[86] In this they first began to meet, to sing, to pray, to say mass, to preach, and to baptize, until the king, being converted to the faith, allowed them to preach openly, and build or repair churches in all places. [Sidenote: Ethelbert converted] When he, among the rest, induced by the unspotted life of these holy men, and their pleasing promises, which by many miracles they proved to be most certain, believed and was baptized, greater numbers began daily to flock together to hear the word, and forsaking their heathen rites, to associate themselves, by believing, to the unity of the church of Christ. Their conversion the king encouraged in so far that he compelled none to embrace Christianity, but only showed more affection to the believers, as to his fellow-citizens in the heavenly kingdom. For he had learned from his instructors and guides to salvation that the service of Christ ought to be voluntary, not by compulsion. Nor was it long before he gave his teachers a settled residence in his metropolis of Canterbury, with such possessions of different kinds as were necessary for their subsistence.[87] FOOTNOTES: [70] James H. Ramsay, _The Foundations of England_ (London, 1898), I., p. 121. [71] Bede has just been describing a plague which rendered the Britons at this time even more unable than usual to withstand the fierce invaders from the north; also lamenting the luxury and crime which a few years of relief from war had produced among his people. [72] This date is evidently incorrect. Martian and Valentinian III. became joint rulers of the Empire in 450; hence this is the year that Bede probably meant. [73] That is, Thanet, which practically no longer exists as an island. In Bede's day it was separated from the rest of Kent by nearly half a mile of water, but since then the coast line has changed so that the land is cut through by only a tiny rill. The intervening ground, however, is marshy and only partially reclaimed.