A.D. 794. XING ΟΪΤΑ WITNESSES A HEAVENLY ICIBACLE. 375 city o f Hereford, where it now adorns with its miracles, and glorifies with its virtues, that episcopal see. A.D. 794. lambert, archbishop of Canterbury, died, when he had discharged the duties of that see for twenty-seven years with extraordinary diligence. And he was buried in the chapter house of the church of Saint Augustine, and was succeeded by Athelard, who had been thirteen years bishop of the city of Winchester. The same year, Eanbald, archbishop of York, consecrated Baldulph, bishop of Witerne, which is called in English White Chase. The same year, when Offe, the most mighty king of Mercia, while residing in the city of Bath, was, after the labours of the day, enjoying the rest of night in his royal bed, he was warned by a divine oracle, which was announced to him by an angel, to take up out of the earth Alban, that saint of God, the proto-martyr of the Angles or Britons (which indeed is the correct statement, because it is certain that he was a Briton, and not an Angle, so that it is a mistake to call him the protomartyr of the Angles). And king Offa was at the same time commanded to place the remains of Saint Alban in a repository which should be more worthy of them. Accordingly, the king, being desirous immediately to obey the divine injunctions, having sent for Humbert, archbishop of Mercia, to whom Lichfield had lately been given by this king for his archiépiscopal see, declared to him the will of God on the subject. Then the aforesaid bishop, immediately having joined with himself Ceolwolf, bishop of lindsey, and Unwin, bishop of Leicester, his suffragans, with an exceeding number of people of both sexes and of every age, met the king on a day appointed at Yerolamium. But the king, as he was journeying thither, saw a ray of light issuing from heaven like a huge torch, and descending like a flash of lightning towards the place of the sepulchre. And as this heavenly miracle was beheld by every one, they all by this indication were made more certain of the truth of the vision. Then, when the people had been sanctified by fasting, and alms, and prayers, the bishops, adorned with their sacerdotal mitres, entreated the aid of the blessed martyr to be present to them. . For the place and the memory of the martyr had been entirely lost for about three hundred and forty-four years since the arrival of Saint Germain, bishop of Altisiodora, who with the blessed Lupus, bishop of the city of Troyes, had come to Britain to extirpate