ARTHUR SUCCEEDS UTHER, HIS FATHER, IN THE KINGDOM OF BRITAIN, AND BESIEGES COLGRIN

Uther Pendragon being dead, the nobility from several provinces assembled together at Silchester, and proposed to Dubricius, Archbishop of Legions, that he should consecrate Arthur, Uther’s son, to be their king.  For they were now in great straits, because, upon hearing of the king’s death, the Saxons had invited over their countrymen from Germany, and were attempting, under the command of Colgrin, to exterminate the whole British race....  Dubricius, therefore, grieving for the calamities of his country, in conjunction with the other bishops set the crown upon Arthur’s head.  Arthur was then only fifteen years old, but a youth of such unparalleled courage and generosity, joined with that sweetness of temper and innate goodness, as gained for him universal love.  When his coronation was over, he, according to usual custom, showed his bounty and munificence to the people.  And such a number of soldiers flocked to him upon it that his treasury was not able to answer that vast expense.  But such a spirit of generosity, joined with valor, can never long want means to support itself.  Arthur, therefore, the better to keep up his munificence, resolved to make use of his courage, and to fall upon the Saxons, that he might enrich his followers with their wealth.  To this he was also moved by the justice of the cause, since the entire monarchy of Britain belonged to him by hereditary right.  Hereupon assembling the youth under his command, he marched to York, of which, when Colgrin had intelligence, he met with a very great army, composed of Saxons, Scots, and Picts, by the river Duglas, where a battle happened, with the loss of the greater part of both armies.  Notwithstanding, the victory fell to Arthur, who pursued Colgrin to York, and there besieged him.

DUBRICIUS’S SPEECH AGAINST THE TREACHEROUS SAXONS, OF WHOM ARTHUR SLAYS MANY IN BATTLE

When he had done speaking, St. Dubricius, Archbishop of Legions, going to the top of a hill, cried out with a loud voice, “You that have the honor to profess the Christian faith, keep fixed in your minds the love which you owe to your country and fellow subjects, whose sufferings by the treachery of the Pagans will be an everlasting reproach to you if you do not courageously defend them.  It is your country which you fight for, and for which you should, when required, voluntarily suffer death; for that itself is victory and the cure of the soul.  For he that shall die for his brethren, offers himself a living sacrifice to God, and has Christ for his example, who condescended to lay down his life for his brethren.  If, therefore, any of you shall be killed in this war, that death itself, which is suffered in so glorious a cause, shall be to him for penance and absolution of all his sins.”  At these words, all of them, encouraged with the benediction of the holy prelate,