And herewith hauing his speech perfect, he declared how he had seene two moonks stand by him as he thought, whome in his youth he knew in Normandie to haue liued godlie, and died christianlie.  “These moonks (said he) protesting to me that they were the messengers of God, spake these words; Bicause the cheefe gouernors of England, the bishops and abbats, are not the ministers of God, but the diuels, the almightie God hath deliuered this kingdome for one yeere and a day into the hands of the enimie, and wicked spirits shall walke abroad through the whole land.  And when I made answer that I would declare these things to the people, and promised on their behalfe, that they should doo penance in following the example of the Niniuites:  they said againe, that it would not be, for neither should the people repent, nor God take anie pitie vpon them.  And when is there hope to haue an end of these miseries said I?  Then said they; When a grene tree is cut in sunder in the middle, and the part cut off is caried three acres bredth from the stocke, and returning againe to the stoale, shall ioine therewith, and begin to bud & beare fruit after the former maner, by reason of the sap renewing the accustomed nourishment; then (I say) may there be hope that such euils shall ceasse and diminish.” ¶ With which words of the king, though some other that stood by were brought in feare, yet archbishop Stigand made but a ieast thereof, saieng, that the old man raued now in his sickenesse, as men of great yeeres vse to doo.  Neuerthelesse the truth of this prophesie afterwards too plainlie appeared, when England became the habitation of new strangers, in such wise, that there was neither gouernor, bishop, nor abbat remaining therein of the English nation.  But now to make an end with king Edward, he was of person comelie, & of an indifferent stature, of white haire, both head and beard, of face ruddie, and in all parts of his bodie faire skinned, with due state and proportion of lims as was thereto conuenient.  In the yeere before the death of king Edward, a blasing starre appeared, the which when a moonke of Malmesburie named Eilmer beheld, he vttered these words (as it were by way of prophesieng:) Thou art come (saith he) thou art come, much to be lamented of manie a mother:  it is long agone sith I saw thee, but now I doo behold thee the more terrible, threatening destruction to this countrie by thy dreadfull appearance.  In the person of king Edward ceased by his death the noble progenie of the Westsaxon kings, which had continued from the first yeare of the reigne of Cerdike or Cerdicius, the space of 547 yeeres complet.  And from Egbert 266 yeeres.

Moreouer, sith the progenie of the Saxon kings seemeth wholie to take end with this Edward surnamed the Confessor, or the third of that name before the conquest, we haue thought good for the better helpe of memorie to referre the reader to a catalog of the names as well of those that reigned among the Westsaxons (who at length, as ye haue heard, obteined the whole monarchie) as also of them which ruled in the other seuen kingdomes before the same were vnited vnto the said kingdome of the Westsaxons, which catalog you shall find in the description of Britaine, pag. 31, 32, 33.