“On the day appointed, the pile was prepared after noon; the princes and the people assembled to the number of forty thousand; the priests coming barefooted and dressed in their sacerdotal robes. The pile was made with dry branches of olive-trees, fourteen feet long, and four feet high, divided into two heaps, with a narrow path, a foot wide, between each. As soon as the wood began to burn, I myself, Raymond,[51] pronounced these words, ‘If the Lord himself has spoken to this man face to face, and if Saint Andrew has shown him the lance of the Lord, let him pass through the fire without receiving any hurt: or, if not, let him be burnt with the lance which he carries in his hand.’ And all bending the knee, replied, ‘Amen.’ Footnote 51: He was chaplain to Count Raymond of Toulouse. “Then Peter, dressed in a single robe, kneeling before the bishop of Albaric, called God to witness that he had seen Jesus on the cross face to face, and that he had heard from the mouth of the Saviour, and that of the apostles, Peter and Andrew, the words reported to the princes: he added that nothing of what he had said in the name of the saints and in the name of the Lord had been invented by himself, and declared that if there was found any falsehood in his story, he consented to suffer from the flames. And for the other sins that he had committed against God and his neighbours, he prayed that God would pardon him, and that the bishop, all the other priests, and the people would implore the mercy of God for him. This said, the bishop gave him the lance. “Peter knelt again, and making the sign of the cross he reached the flames without appearing afraid. He remained one moment in the midst of the fire, and then came out by the grace of God.... After Peter had gone through the fire, and although the flames were still raging, the people gathered up the brands, the ashes, and the charcoal, with such ardour that in a few moments nothing was left. The Lord in the end performed great miracles by means of these sacred relics. Peter came out of the flames without even his gown being burned, and the light veil which covered the lance-head escaped uninjured. He made immediately the sign of the cross, and cried with a loud voice, ‘God help!’ to the crowd, who pressed upon him to be certain that it was really he. Then, in their eagerness, and because everybody wanted to touch him, and to have even some little piece of his dress, they trampled him under their feet, cut off pieces of his flesh, broke his back-bone, and broke his ribs. He was only saved from being killed there and then by Raymond Pelot, a knight, who hastily called a number of soldiers and rescued him.