was more excellent than that of many who were before him in the Church. Now [once] when he was urging me to make a prayer in his cell and I was unwilling to do so, he spake unto me and related unto me concerning Abbâ Anthony who, he said, “came three times and visited me in this cell. And when I begged and entreated him to pray, straightway he knelt down upon his knees, and prayed, and waited not for me to speak one word about it, but at the first word he corrected me by his obedience. He did not let me finish my speech, but by work he made manifest obedience.” And Didymus said unto me, “Thou also, if thou wishest to walk in his footsteps and [to imitate him] in [his] life and deeds, and in hospitality, and if thou wouldst walk in the life of excellence and in the love of God, remove thyself from contention.”
And this blessed man Didymus himself told me the following story. “Once on a time I was suffering by reason of the wretched Emperor Julian. Now one day, when it was eventide, and I had eaten no food through my anxiety about this matter, whilst I was sitting on my seat I dropped into a light slumber, and there fell upon me a marvellous thing. I saw and behold there were white horses galloping about, and they had on them riders who were dressed in white, and they were crying out and saying, ‘Tell Didymus that Julian died this day at the seventh hour. Rise up, then, and eat, and send and make [this news] known unto Bishop Athanasius, so that he also may know and rejoice.’ And I wrote down the day, and the hour, and the month [wherein this vision took place], and it was found that it had happened even as it had been told me in the vision.”
And the blessed man himself also told me the following story:
Chapter v. the History of the Maiden Alexandra
THERE was a certain maiden of Alexandria whose name was Alexandra, and she left the city and shut herself up in a tomb until the end of her life; she used to receive her food and whatsoever she needed through a window, and no man and no woman saw her face, neither did she see the face of any man, for twelve years. And a few days afterwards she yielded up her soul, and she lay down and went to her rest in peace. Now when her serving woman went to visit her according to her wont, she knocked at the window, but Alexandra gave her no answer, and straightway she knew that she was dead, and she came and made known unto us concerning her mistress. And we took off the door of her cell and we found her body dried up.
