Paulinus was present, and when he had satisfactorily answered all questions, a fearful feeling still seemed to linger amongst the pagans, as to who should first desecrate their old temple, and overthrow the idols and altars before which they had so long worshipped. "Give me a horse and a spear," said Coifi, "and I will." They were brought to him. We cannot help picturing Coifi in his eagerness to get rid of the old religion, nor how Paulinus, with his dark hair, hooked nose, swarthy countenance, and darker eyes, just looked for a moment at Edwin, as the pagan priest hurled his spear at the idol temple, and profaned it. "The people without thought him mad." What Coifi thought of the people is not on record. He knew what the idols were better than they did. Witness the results of his own experience; for day after day, and year after year, had he administered to the shrine, yet received no reward; and doubtless Coifi thought that, let the new religion be what it might, it could not be worse than the old one. When he had hurled his spear against the temple, it was profaned, and could never more be dedicated to the worship of Odin; for such an act was held impious by the ancient Saxon pagans. The building was then destroyed, and the surrounding enclosures levelled to the ground. This scene took place near the Derwent, not far from the spot where Edwin had so narrow an escape from the assassin Eumer. In Bede's time it was called Godmundham, or the home of the gods. After this, Edwin and his nobility were baptized, and through his persuasion, the son of his protector, Redwald, embraced Christianity, and diffused it amongst his subjects in East Anglia. Edwin himself, as we have shown, had in his younger days been a wanderer and an exile; and although we have no account of the privations he endured, they were doubtless great, and perhaps we should not much err in surmising that many a time he had endured the pangs of hunger and thirst: for on a later day he caused stakes to be fastened beside the highways wherever a clear spring was to be found, and to these posts, brazen dishes were chained, to enable the weary and thirsty traveller to refresh himself. For houses were then few and far apart, and the wayfarer had often to journey many a dreary league before he could obtain refreshment, as the monasteries were the only places in which he could halt and bait. In Edwin's reign, and through his kingdom, it is said that a woman with an infant at her breast might walk from the Tweed to the Trent without fearing injury from any one. He seems to have been beloved by all, and Edilburga ever moved beside him like a ministering angel.