Page:Stilfrid and Brunswik (1879).pdf/60

 to pray to the Lord God to help him out of those horrors.

And when the time arrived, the dragon Basiliscus moved in his cave, so that the whole castle quaked. Then said the damsel Africa: “Recollect thyself and flee not ; now wilt thou be in such danger as thou hast never heard of nor seen.” And then there came a screaming, hissing and noise of serpents, such that, if four trumpeters had trumpeted with all their might, they could not have been heard for the hissing and noise. And when there crowded up from all sides a multitude of serpents and great lizards and other venomous creatures, eager to slay Brunswik, then began Brunswik to defend himself against them with his sword, slaughtering them by fifty at a single blow; but the more of them he slew, the more there came; some were as thick as beams and others screamed with the voices of devils. Brunswik paid no regard thereto, but met them manfully, and waded in venom to the girdle; the lion, too, tore them mightily and cast them out of the castle by the windows.

The dragon Basiliscus, seeing that he was