the chronicler, ‘whether in the body or whether out of the body I cannot tell; God knoweth,’ Benedict was transported to Selby, where the Saint said to him, ‘Here shall be my rest for ever, here will I dwell, for I have a delight therein.’ However, in the morning Benedict was still at Salisbury. A few days after, he was shown the way to Lymington by a priest named Theobald, and there he found a ship bound for York, in which he sailed. They had a prosperous voyage, and no sooner did they approach Selby than Benedict at once recognised it as the place he had seen in the vision. ‘Here,’ he said, ‘is the place which the Lord hath chosen; here let me land.’ And no sooner had he set his foot on the bank, than he set up the Cross under a great oak, called by the natives Strihac, about A.D. 1069, the fourth year of William the Conqueror, Here the chronicler expatiates on the beauties of the situation, the sweetness of the waters, the abundance of fish, the commodity of water transport. The very best of stone can easily be brought for building, and everything that goes to York from foreign parts, or from any port in England, has to go by Selby. And first Benedict built a little cell, where he offered continually praises to the most sacred finger, which had since his arrival made a dumb man speak. One day, a nobleman, named Hugh, passing that way, asked him what the cross meant. This led to a firm friendship between them, and they built an oratory in honour of St Germanus. Then Hugh took Benedict and introduced him to King William, who received him most kindly, and gave him one carucate of land at Selby, the wood Flaxey, the ville Rawcliffe, half a carucate in Braydon, and the fishery of Whitgift. Benedict now returned, set up workshops about his chapel, and many left their worldly employments to help in the construction of greater buildings. At this time there was in the neighbouring woods a gang of robbers, led by one Sevam, the son of Sigge. Sevam tried to break into Benedict’s cell at night; but his hand stuck to the wall, and there he remained trembling till morning, when he was only set at liberty on making a vow that he would never offend the blessed Germanus again. A nobleman’s son was cured of epilepsy by a touch of the holy finger. In the ninth year of Henry I. there was a great flood in the river Ouse, after a sudden thaw. It came on so rapidly that when the bell rang for matins there was nothing of it to be seen; but before the office was over, the cloisters were flooded. The chapel being nearer the river was in great danger of being washed away, for water continued to rise for fifteen days. But within the chapel it never prevailed further than the altar step, though it had been two cubits higher outside than in. In the