in Sicily; and the seventh he founded within the walls of Rome in the honour of S. Andrew the apostle, in the which he became a monk. And the remnant of his patrimony he gave for God's sake; so that he that tofore went clothed in clothes of gold and of silk, and adorned with precious stones in the city, when he was monk served in a poor habit the monks. There was at the beginning of his conversation of so perfect a life that it might be said well that he was all perfect. He made great abstinences in eating, in drinking, in waking, and in praying, in so much that he was so travailed that unnethe he might sustain himself. He had put out of his heart all secular things, so that his conversation was in heaven, for he had addressed all his desire for to come to the joy permanable.
On a time it happed that, S. Gregory in his cell of the same abbey whereas he was abbot wrote something, and an angel appeared to him in semblance of a mariner, which seemed as he had escaped from the tempest of the sea, and prayed him weeping to have pity on him. Then S. Gregory commanded that there should be given to him six pence, and then he departed. The same day the angel came again in like wise as he did tofore, and said that he had lost all his good, and prayed him that he would yet help him; on whom S. Gregory had yet pity, and did to be given to him six pence more; yet at the third time he came and made great cry and wept, and prayed him that he would yet help him toward his great loss, so that S. Gregory commanded his provost that he should yet give to this poor man an alms.
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