¹ Blessed Decuman was sprung from an illustrious lineage in the western parts of Cambria, which is now called Wales, from parents who were indeed eminent devotees of the Christian religion. For that nation, before greater Britain, which is now England, had laid aside its barbarous ferocity and abandoned the error of paganism, was initiated into the life-giving sacraments and soon submitted itself to Christ, and deserved to be shaped by the teachings of the Gospel. In that land many shone forth, renowned in faith, distinguished in virtues, and radiant with miracles. Among them Decuman, brought up chastely and instructed in the Catholic faith, gleamed like the morning star among the lesser stars, endowed with every honourable quality of character. After he had passed beyond boyhood at home, as he advanced through the stages of innocent age he began, as a youth of good disposition, not at all to let his mind wander, as is customary, but rather to restrain himself more zealously under regular discipline. Indeed, commandments readily pass into action where grace supplies help and obedience softens authority. For his speech was pure, containing nothing of wantonness and, so far as he could manage it, nothing idle, but was wholly for edification [Ephesians 4:29]. In food and drink he kept the mean of temperance, lest by abstaining altogether he should be accused of superstition, or by taking too much be weighed down by gluttony. And while Blessed Decuman’s contemporaries were variously delighted by the pursuit of hunting, or were occupied by the pursuit of any number of other arts, he, despising every fleshly delight, compelled the flesh to serve the spirit, and, zealously wearing down the thresholds of churches, committed all the more ardently to memory what he heard from the divine Scriptures. Though he was only very slightly trained in the capacity of letters, he had given himself wholly to holiness and, as far as he was able, because of the insolence of courtiers, had betaken himself to contemplation. For deeds teach better than letters; holiness understands better than disputation; and he who loves more knows more. Indeed, Saint Decuman, anticipated by the ardour of the Holy Spirit, was already turning over in his mind what afterwards became clear in deed. And then he would certainly have satisfied his pious desire, but he waited for the ebbing away of the tumultuous crowd and of his insolent fellow-countrymen, whom he detested with all his might. “For no prophet is accepted in his own country” [Luke 4:24], and “a man’s enemies are those of his own household” [Matthew 10:36; cf. Micah 7:6]. Therefore he withdrew because of the scandal, and, committing himself wholly to God alone, postponed until later what he had piously conceived beforehand. At length, watching for the right time and finding an opportunity for a more secret flight, he went to the Severn Sea, without the knowledge of all his own people, and especially of those more familiar to him and those who seemed to him to be more closely joined to him by the bond of human kindness, having Christ alone as witness and guide of his journey. What more is there to say? There was no fare for passage, and no boat either, and his flight had to be hastened because of those following close on his heels. The man of God, trusting in God’s mercy and in no way doubting his power, tied together into a bundle the rods which he found growing in a thicket beside the sea; and, using such a vehicle, he cast himself into the deep. And so, with divine providence steering him, he was carried to the opposite shore near the castle of Dorostorum¹. These are your works, O Christ, who so wonderfully glorify your saints! Truly your ways are in the sea, and your paths in many waters [Psalm 77:19; Vulgate Psalm 76:20]. At the time when Saint Decuman, brought by God, came into England, there was in the territory where he landed a vast solitary wilderness, overgrown with thickets and brambles, spread spaciously far and wide with the density of its woods, raised upwards by the height of its mountains, and wonderfully broken up by the hollowness of its valleys. This dwelling-place pleased him; this seemed suited to his devout purpose, so much so that by the very fact it seemed to say: “This is my rest for ever and ever: here I shall dwell, for I have chosen it” [Psalm 132:14; Vulgate Psalm 131:14]. Thus, then, the holy man, exchanging his homeland for exile, and the caves of the desert for the splendour of a palace, began to live there, to sustain himself on herbs and roots, and to devote himself more frequently to fasts and prayers; taming his flesh with a hair-shirt and painfully afflicting it with vigils; and the more rarely he was among the company of men, the more frequently he was soothed and cherished by the speech of angels. Leading the life of a hermit in this manner, he had lived for many years in the solitude already mentioned. It is also said that he had a cow, by whose milk, at least on the great feasts, he was supported rather than fed, according to the need of the body, just as it is read of Blessed Giles that he had a hind which supplied him with the benefit of her milk. Nor was urgent and unexpected persecution lacking to the saint. For all who wish to live devoutly in Christ suffer persecution [2 Timothy 3:12]. For Christ left this way to his co-heirs [Romans 8:17], as is read in the Gospel: “If they have persecuted me, they will persecute you also” [John 15:20]. And the Apostle too says: “Through many tribulations we must enter into the kingdom” [Acts 14:22]. For what the furnace is to gold, what the file is to iron, what the flail is to grain, this tribulation is to the righteous man [Sirach 2:5; Proverbs 17:3]. Therefore, since Saint Decuman flourished with the virtues of many kinds of signs, which through the negligence of writers have passed out of use and, for the most part, among us into oblivion—otherwise, God granting it, they might have been preserved for edification—a certain man, and indeed himself a man of Belial [1 Samuel 25:25], fiercer than an asp and more savage than a viper, envying the sanctity of so great a father, driven to frenzy in hatred of true virtue and detestation of the Christian name, rushed upon him like a beast and, amid the words of prayer and the entreaties of holy devotion, sent the saint of the Lord to the heavenly realms by cutting off his head. By such a martyrdom, then, he passed to the Lord after so many and such great hardships as he had imposed upon his body, so that by his example he might show more clearly that there is no passage from delights to delights, but that for those who wish to live according to the Gospel, their whole life is to become a cross and a martyrdom [Luke 9:23]. For he is an altogether too delicate soldier who wishes to rejoice here with the world and to reign hereafter with Christ [2 Timothy 2:12]. Nor should this be passed over in silence: when he had been beheaded with a certain mattock, as is said, the trunk of his mangled body raised itself up and began to carry its own head in its hanging arms from the place of beheading as far as the spring of clearest water, in which he had been accustomed to wash his head with his own hands. This spring, down to the present day, is called “Saint Decuman’s spring” in his memory and reverence, and is sweet, necessary, and health-giving for the inhabitants to drink. In that place the head, together with the body, was afterwards sought by the faithful, found, and honourably committed to burial. Ancient miracles are renewed; signs spring up again, brought back to life, which the Lord has deigned to work through the merits of the most blessed Denis of the Gauls, to the praise and glory of his most holy name, who lives and reigns through the immortal ages of ages. Amen.