And then Peter received a book of our Lord, wherein he learned the words that he said.  Then as Hegesippus saith:  Peter said thus:  Lord, I have desired much to follow thee, but to be crucified upright I have not usurped, thou art always rightful, high and sovereign, and we be sons of the first man which have the head inclined to the earth, of whom the fall signifieth the form of the generation human.  Also we be born that we be seen inclined to the earth by effect, and the condition is changed for the world weeneth that such thing is good, which is evil and bad.  Lord, thou art all things to me, and nothing is to me but thou only, I yield to thee thankings with all the spirit of which I live, by which I understand, and by whom I call thee.  And when St. Peter saw that the good Christian men saw his glory, in yielding thankings to God and commending good people to him, he rendered up his spirit.  Then Marcel and Apuleius his brother, that were his disciples, took off the body from the cross when he was dead, and anointed it with much precious ointment, and buried him honorably.  Isidore saith in the book of the nativity and death of saints thus:  Peter, after that he had governed Antioch, he founded a church under Claudius the emperor, he went to Rome against Simon Magus, there he preached the gospel twenty-five years and held the bishopric, and thirty-six years after the passion of our Lord he was crucified by Nero turned the head downward, for he would be so crucified:  Haec Isidorus.

That same day Peter and Paul appeared to St. Dionysius, as he saith in his foresaid epistle in these words:  Understand the miracle and see the prodigy, my brother Timothy, of the day of the martyrdom of them, for I was ready in the time of departing of them.  After their death I saw them together, hand in hand, entering the gates of the city, and clad with clothes of light, and arrayed with crowns of clearness and light.  Haec Dionysius.

Nero was not unpunished for their death and other great sins and tyrannies that he committed, for he slew himself with his own hand, which tyrannies were overlong to tell, but shortly I shall rehearse here some.  He slew his master Seneca because he was afraid of him when he went to school.  Also Nero slew his mother.  Then for his pleasure he set Rome afire, which burned seven days and seven nights, and was in a high tower and enjoyed him to see so great a flame of fire, and sang merrily.  He slew the senators of Rome to see what sorrow and lamentation their wives would make.  He fished with nets of gold thread, and the garment that he had worn one day he would never wear it ne see it after.  Then the Romans seeing his woodness [madness], assailed him and pursued him unto without the city, and when he saw he might not escape them, he took a stake and sharped it with his teeth, and therewith stuck himself through the body and so slew himself.  In another place it is read that he was devoured of wolves.  Then the Romans returned and found the frog, and threw it out of the city and there burned it.