"But on the fourth day off they went, with countless droves of beasts and pack-horses, to Medehampstead (Peterborough). And there, dashing at the outer precinct of the Monastery, with its barred gates, they assailed the walls on every side with arrows and machines. At the second assault the Heathen brake in, and, in the very breach, Tubba, the brother of Earl Hubba, fell grievously wounded by a stone cast. By the hands of his guards he was borne into the tent of Hubba his brother, and despaired even of life. Then did Hubba's rage boil over, and he was altogether wild against the monks, so that he slew with his own hand every soul clad in the religious habit; the rest sprang upon the rest; not one in the whole Monastery was saved; both the venerable Abbot Hedda, and all his monks, and all the lay-brethren were massacred; and Brother Turgar was warned by his master, Earl Sidroc, never anywhere to cross the path of Earl Hubba. Every altar was uprooted, every monument broken in pieces, the great library of holy books burnt, the plenteous store of monastic papers scattered to the winds; the precious relics of the holy virgins Kineburgh, Kinswith, and Tibba,[240] trodden under foot; the walls utterly overthrown; the buildings burnt up, church and all, blazing with a bright flame for five whole days after. [Footnote 240: Kineburgh and Kinswith were sisters of Wulfhere, the first Christian King of Mercia. Tibba is usually identified with St. Ebba of Coldingham.] "Then on the fourth day the Host drew together, with spoil beyond tale from all the country round, and set off towards Huntingdon. The two Sidroc Earls, at the crossing of the rivers, ever came last, to guard the rear of the whole army. Now all their host had passed over the river Nene safely; but, as they were themselves crossing, they had the bad luck to lose two carts, laden with untold wealth and plenishing, which sank in a deep eddy of the stream to the left of the stone bridge, so that horses and all were drowned before they could be got out. And while the whole household of Earl Sidroc the younger was busied in drawing out these same carts, and in transferring the spoil to other waggons and carriages, Brother Turgar slipped away and fled to the neighbouring forest. All night did he walk, and with the earliest dawn came into Crowland. There he found his fellow monks, who had got back from Thorney the day before, and were hard at work putting out the fires, which still had the mastery in many of the ruins of the Monastery.