The meeting took place in the convent of Whitby. The king and his son entered first; then, on the one side, Colman, with the bishops and elders of the Britons; and on the other bishop Agilbert, Agathon, Wilfrid, Romanus, a deacon named James, and several other priests of the Latin confession. Last of all came Hilda with her attendants, among whom was an English bishop named Cedda, one of the most active missionaries of the age.[74] He had at first preached the Gospel in the midland districts, whence he turned his footsteps towards the Anglo-Saxons of the East, and after converting a great number of these pagans, he had returned to Finan, and, although an Englishman, had received Episcopal consecration from a bishop, who had been himself ordained by the elders of Iona. Then proceeding westwards, the indefatigable evangelist founded churches, and appointed elders and deacons wherever he went.[75] By birth an Englishman, by ordination a Scotchman, everywhere treated with respect and consideration, he appeared to be set apart as mediator in this solemn conference. His intervention could not however, retard the victory of Rome. Alas! the primitive evangelism had gradually given way to an ecclesiasticism, coarse and rude in one place, subtle and insinuating in another. Whenever the priests were called upon to justify certain doctrines or ceremonies, instead of referring solely to the word of God, that fountain of all light, they maintained that thus St. James did at Jerusalem, St. Mark at Alexandria, St. John at Ephesus, or St. Peter at Rome. They gave the name of _apostolical canons_, to rules which the apostles had never known. They even went further than this: at Rome and in the East, ecclesiasticism represented itself to be a law of God, and from a state of weakness, it thus became a state of sin. Some marks of this error were already beginning to appear in the Christianity of the Britons. [74] Presbyteri Cedda et Adda et Berti Duina, quorum ultimus natione Scotus, cæteri fuere Angli. (Beda, lib. iii, cap. xxi) These presbyters were Cedda and Adda and Berti and Dinna, of whom the last was by nation a Scot, the rest were English. [75] Qui accepto gradu episcopatus et majore auctoritate cœptum opus explens, fecit per loca ecclesias, presbyteros et diaconos ordinavit. (Beda, lib. iii, cap. xxii.) Who having received the episcopal dignity and pursuing the work he had begun with more ample authority, built churches in various places, and ordained presbyters and deacons. [Sidenote: THE DISPUTATION.]