The Life of St. George,

the Patron Soldier-Saint

of England.

________________

BY

ALICE BREWSTER.

________________

COPYRIGHT

Price 2d., 15/- 100.

FOURTH EDITION.

Published at the Offices of the

ROYAL SOCIETY OF ST. GEORGE,

5, Bloomsbury Square, London.

ST. GEORGE’S DAY.

April 23rd, 1913.

MY DEAR BOY SCOUTS,

            I have only once wished I was a boy, and that once is always. You will wonder why. Because I should love to be a Boy Scout. All the scouts that I know are such jolly good fellows, and it does not make any difference whether they are big or little, you are all so smart and happy looking, so kind, and, I might say, quite anxious to do any one a good turn. Scouts are always ready to stand up and defend the weak, always on their honour to deal out justice one with another, and show kindness even to our dumb animal friends. It seems to me that the Scouts are trying very hard to follow the teachings of our English Patron Saint, George.

It has occurred to me that many of our young Scouts do not know his history, so for them I am going to try and give a short outline of his life. Being only a girl, I hope that my friends, the Scouts, will make allowance, and if my efforts are not so graphically put as boys would like, I hope that, at any rate, they will say, “not bad for a girl.” — I am, my dear boys,

Your very sincere friend and admirer,

ALICE BREWSTER.

TO

THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF ST. GEORGE

THIS LITTLE HISTORY

OF THE

LIFE OF THE PATRON SOLDIER-SAINT OF ENGLAND

is most respectfully dedicated

with the hope

That it may aid them in their great work of reviving

the observance of his Festival and stimulating the

patriotic sentiment of all classes of the English people

both at Home and beyond the Seas.

George of England our

Patron Saint.

The battle cry of our forefathers was: “Saint George for Merrie England.” We all know that he is our Patron Saint, although few know his real history. There are some stories written about him for boys, but they are mostly fairy tales. I am going to try and give here a short, plain, and un-varnished account of what he really did. It will just show how George had a duty to do, and did it simply as a man and a Christian. For the pre-sent I am only going to call him George, and will not add the title of Saint until it has been shown how he earned that distinction. As a rule, people commence life without a title, which comes afterwards, when it has been deserved. In olden times the noblest gentlemen served in the ranks until they had done some great deed, and earned their golden spurs, when they were honoured by being made knights.

             The institution of Boy Scouts is an order of chivalry, and its members should know the history of our English Patron Saint.

            Although George is our Patron Saint, he was not born in England, but at Lydda, in Palestine, about ten or twelve miles from Jaffa, whence come the well-known oranges of that name. In Biblical days it was called Joppa, and it was, and is, one of the principal seaports of the Holy Land. It is situated on the Plain of Sharon, so celebrated for its roses, and, as this fragrant and beautiful flower was George’s favourite, it has become the national emblem of our own dear country—England. He was born A.D. 270, and came of a noble and distinguished family. The world had not been explored then as it is now, and all that was known of it was under the sway of the mighty Emperor of Rome, whose dominions were divided into province, with Governors in charge of them. You will see a resemblance of it to-day in our Empire of Great Britain, whose Governors represent the King in India, Canada, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and all the other Oversea Dominions of His Majesty.

            George’s grandfather was Governor of Cappadocia, and his father Governor of Mitylene, both of which were districts of Asia Minor. The latter, who was a man with a splendid reputation, died whilst George was quite a small boy, leaving him with two baby sisters—Kasea and Matterona.

So great was his father’s renown that the new Governor, who was appointed to succeed him,wanted to adopt George as his own son. As all this happened in Asia Minor, you will be wondering how it was that George became our English Patron Saint, and why it is that his red cross upon the white flag has become our national ensign. If you will give your attention to this little history you will see how it came about.

            Like so many good men, George chose to be a soldier, and entered the Roman Army, and by the time he was twenty he became known as one of its smartest young officers. When he was only twenty-two, Diocletian, the Emperor of Rome, sent him on a mission to England—or I should say Britain, as our country then was so known. It may well be assumed that it was then, and through his instrumentality, that the Empress Helena was converted to Christianity, and through

her, her son Constantine, whereby the course of the whole Roman world in matters of Religion was changed, and Christianity began to take the place of Paganism. Constantine was born at York, and afterwards had the very great distinction of becoming Emperor of Rome and a Christian. You will all of you know that, after the crucifixion of our Lord, Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy Jew, went by night to Pontius Pilate the Roman Governor of Judea, and begged permission to take away the body for burial, and that his request was granted. In the persecutions of the early Christians many of them fled to far away lands, and it is said that this same Joseph of Arimathea made his way into Spain, and thence to Britain, and that he settled down at Glastonbury, in Somerset, where he died and wag sword, a broken lance being on the ground.”

The sword would be part of his Roman equipment.

            Many of you boys probably know well Macaulay’s Lays and can recall those stirring lines in “The Prophecy of Capys”:

“Thine Roman is the pilum, Roman! the broadsword is thine, The serried phalanx, the even ranks, the Legion’s ordered line.”

            Legend and fairy tale have it that the good knight St. George killed a fabulous beast called a dragon. There is no such thing, and what he really did encounter was probably a crocodile, a huge reptile like a gigantic lizard, which will devour not only such large animals as horses and cows, but men and women also. They are quite common in India and Egypt, but as a rule, they are unknown in Asia Minor, through which George was travelling. But it is possible that a stray one may have wandered over there by some extraordinary chance. I lived for some years in the Fiji Islands, where there are no crocodiles, and more than a thousand miles away from Northern Australia and New Guinea, the nearest land where they are to be found. Yet there is a legend there of a gigantic lizard which ravaged the Island of Benga, and which, before its disappearance, destroyed many of the inhabitants. It seems to have been a crocodile which drifted there on a log or on driftwood, after a long voyage across the Pacific Ocean. It happened in the dim and distant past, and time has twisted the strange visitor into a most wonderful monster, so it is not difficult to understand that the people of the country where George slew the dragon turned the beast, whatever it may have been, into something very fantastic. I started by saying that I wanted just to tell you the plain unvarnished story of Saint George, and, looking at it with our modern views, it seems but probable that he encountered something actual and real, and in those days, when there were no guns, it was terrible enough to have to fight a crocodile with only a lance and a short Roman sword.

             By the town of Berytus is a lake, and there it was that the crocodile had taken up its abode, as       such a reptile lives both on land and in water. It filled the people of the neighbourhood with terror and dismay, as it carried off not only their cattle and animals, but also human beings. In their ignorance they looked upon it as having been sent by their heathen gods to devour them, and they thought to turn away their anger by making sacrifices, and daily made offerings to it of sheep and goats; but this did not prevent the evil beast from still killing men, women and children, so at last they came to think that something very precious would have to be offered up to appease the anger of their gods, as heathen people usually foolishly think in such circumstances, and that nothing short of a human sacrifice would suffice. The headman of the place, the Ring of Berytus, called all the people together, and told them that the best thing to do would be to draw lots and see who should be given as a sacrifice to the dragon.

The lots were drawn, and lo! and behold! it fell to his own daughter, the beautiful Princess Sadra.

The celebrated artist, Sir Philip ]3urne-Jones, the Royal Academician, has painted a picture of this event— ”The Princess Sadra Drawing the Lot” —and very likely some of you scouts have seen it. The grief of the King was dreadful, and he offered all his wealth to the people that his daughter might be let off and somebody else offered up instead; but the people said that it was the King himself who had proposed the drawing of the lots, and they thought, too, being heathens, that it fell as it had done by the choice of the gods. So the King wept over her and kissed her, and she was then dressed in her finest clothes as if she were going to her wedding, and taken to the sand pit at the lake, which was the haunt of the monster which had been ravaging the countryside, and left to her fate. It was whilst in this terrible plight that George rode up, as he was making his way to the Court of the Roman Emperor. Seeing the weeping maiden, he asked what troubled her. At first she would not tell, but only implored him to ride away and save himself. The Princess Sadra was nobly minded, and did not want such a handsome young soldier as George to perish on her account. But he was too brave a man to leave a girl in distress, so she told him of the dreadful fate she was expecting, and he said that he would stay and fight the beast. As they were talking, up it came, expecting to have an easy prey as usual, hut George, firmly sitting upon his gallant white war horse, made his sign of the Cross, charged the evil brute and slew it. Look upon the picture on the cover of this, and on our gold coins, and you will see George on his charger, with his Roman sword and helmet, in the act of despatching the dragon. Thus it was that it was killed, and the Princess Sadra delivered from her fearful doom. Her father, the King, wanted George to marry her and remain and live at Berytus, and offered him much treasure and honour, but he would accept no reward, and asked that the money might be given to the poor and needy for the love of Jesus Christ, whose servant he was. Through his noble example the King and all his people forsook their heathen gods and became Christians. They built a church there, which they dedicated to Saint George, after his martyrdom.

            Notwithstanding the supplication of the King and people of Berytus, our noble young soldier did not stay long with them, but rode on to meet his own dreadful death at the hands of the Emperor Diocletian, before whom he appeared to plead for his fellow Christians. At first he was graciously received, because he was such a brave and distinguished officer, whose services the Emperor did not wish to lose. He knew that George was always foremost in the battle, and greatly beloved by his men, who would follow him to the very death. But he refused to spare the Christians, and offered George every inducement to forsake his religion, yet all in vain. In those days people were very cruel, and George was put to the most dreadful torture to induce him to forsake his faith, and, as he refused to do so, he was put to death on the 23rd of April, A.D. 303, at Nicomedea.

            Look in your almanacs and you will see that that date is marked as Saint George’s Day. All English Soldiers—our Sailors, and men of the Royal Air Force, are now entitled to “wear the rose” on Saint George’s—England’s Day, a privilege gained for them by the Royal Society of St. George. The Rose was Saint George’s favourite flower and for that reason, as you have been already told, it became the National Emblem of England. On Saint George’s Day, too, you will see his red cross flying from the towers of the parish churches.

            It was because he died for his faith that he is “numbered with the Saints in glory everlasting,” and that we honour him as Saint George. Nowadays a boy goes into the Navy or Army, or pursues some other avocation. If he distinguishes himself, many honours come to him in the shape of medals, titles, stars or crosses; or he reaps other rewards and riches. A man put to death for his religion is despised by some at the time, but afterwards, when earthly passions have died away, the nobility of self-sacrifice is recognised, and those who so suffer and are faithful unto death receive the martyr’s crown of glory and so it was with our hero George. He gave up his life for his faith when he was only thirty-three years of age.

            You have read what happened to Saint George when he went to plead the cause of his fellow Christians before the Emperor. Yet, notwith-standing this, his friends and relations, at the risk of sharing the same fate, begged his body from Diocletian and took it back to Lydda for burial, as he had asked them, and laid him to rest in the Plain of Sharon, amidst his beloved roses. Only three years after, in A.D. 306, his friend and brother soldier, and our fellow-countryman Constantine, became the first Christian Emperor of Rome, known as Constantine the Great. He put an end to the persecutions of the Christians, built a church at Lydda in memory of Saint George, and chose him as the Patron Saint of his own country, Britain; and thus it is that his red cross is on our flag, and his favourite flower, the rose, became our national emblem. Not only did he do this, but he erected over twenty churches to the memory of his friend. He also built the magnificent Cathedral of Saint Sophia at Constantinople, the finest stained window of which is dedicated to Saint George. Saint Sophia is now

in the hands of the Turks, who have turned it into a Mohammedan mosque, but the window of our English Patron Saint is still there. I have told you how Queen Helena built a church at Glastonbury, in Somerset, which she named after Saint George. Twenty-three years after his martyrdom, in A.D. 32~l, she went to Jerusalem in search of the Holy Cross, upon which our Saviour was crucified. Whilst there she caused another church to be erected, and called it also after Saint George, quite close to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It is supposed that she succeeded in her quest of the True Cross, and brought a portion of it to England, as a fragment of it is said to be encased in the sceptre of King Edward the Confessor, which our Kings still use when they are crowned, and which is preserved with the rest of the Crown jewels in the Tower of London, where, very likely, many of you Scouts have seen it.

            In after days Jerusalem was taken and the Holy Land over-run by the Saracens, or Mohammedans, who destroyed the Church of Saint George at Lydda, which Constantine had built. Then followed the great war of the Crusades, waged by the Christian kings and nobles of Europe in their endeavours to rescue Palestine and the Holy Places from the infidel invaders. Many of our English nobles took part in these conflicts, and their tombs can be seen in various plates. They are generally to be known by the images of the knights lying on top of them with shields bearing the cross of Saint George. The greatest of these warriors was King Richard Coeur de Lion, or the Lionhearted, so called for his bravery. He recaptured Lydda from the Saracens, and found the church there, which contained the grave of Saint George, in ruins. He rebuilt it, and it remains to this very day in memory of our English Patron Saint, revered alike by Christians and Mohammedans, for his great goodness and for having rescued the maiden from the dragon.

            You all know how the Roman Empire decayed, and how her soldiers left Britain, which was then invaded by the Anglo-Saxons, after whom the southern portion was called England. The Britons fought stubbornly against them for a long time, their most renowned leader being King Arthur, who reigned over part of the West of England. He was the head of the Knights of the Round Table, so celebrated for their chivalry and great bravery. They not only called themselves Knights of the Round Table, but also the Brotherhood of Saint George, and were vowed to be true men and of blameless lives. Before this noble order could be joined some brave deed in battle had to be done and the following oath taken :—

“To reverence the King as if he were

Their conscience, and their conscience as their

King;

To break the heathen, and uphold the Christ;

To ride abroad redressing human wrongs;

To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it;

To honour his own word, as if his God’s;

To love one maiden only, cleave to her,

And worship her by years of noble deeds,

Until they won her.”

After that a long time went by, until we hear again of a regular Brotherhood of Saint George. Our. soldiers used to shout his name in battle, but it remained for King Edward III. to formally re-constitute it. In his early boyhood he had read of the noble deeds of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, the gallant Brotherhood of Saint George, and he heartily desired to revive this distinguished order of chivalry. He and his Queen, Philipa of Hainault, made a pilgrimage to the tomb of King Arthur, at Glastonbury, where, too, was buried, Joseph of Arimathea, and where Queen Helena had built the Church of Saint George. He therefore founded the Most Noble Order of the Garter, the Brotherhood of Saint George, in which the principal jewel worn is called the “George,” which bears his cross upon it. On the anniversary of our Saint’s death, the 23rd of April, “Saint George’s Day,” A.D. 1350, King Edward III. and twenty-five Knights of the Garter made their vows at Windsor to dedicate their lives to God’s service, and to uphold all that was good and true. Ever since then the Kings of England have been at the head of this most noble order of chivalry and brotherhood—the most distinguished in the world. There, too, nearly six hundred years later, in the same Chapel of Saint George at Windsor, our young Prince of Wales took the same vows, and was installed as a Knight of the Garter.

            I must now end my simple story. Saint George slew the monster that he encountered on his way and, having delivered the distressed maiden, went on to meet death for his faith at the hands of the Roman Emperor. Some say that he did not encounter anything real, but merely overcame his fear of death, suffering for the sake of his religion and conscience, and that the whole tale is simply an allegory. We all, in some shape or another, meet with dragons on our way through life, in the shape of temptations to do wrong and mean things, and to shirk duty. Each time they are met, think of Saint George, overcome, and so kill them. If we run away and are cowardly, how ashamed we shall feel in after life; but how sweet if we fight and overcome them! So “Fight the good fight with all thy might,” that, when scouting days are done, there will be no regrets for a wasted life, and for all that “might have been.”

 “Then raise the Standard of Saint George,

  For all that’s good and great,

  And try and follow in his steps,

  Old England’s Patron Saint.”

H.R. Grubb, Ltd.,

Printers,

Croydon.

The Royal Society of St. George

FOUNDED 1894

Patrons :

HIS MAJESTY THE KING

HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN

HER MAJESTY QUEEN ALEXANDRA

President :

HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE OF WALES.

OBJECTS :

1. - To encourage and strengthen the spirit of Patriotism

            amongst all of English birth or origin throughout

            the world irrespective of creed or party.

2. - To revive the recognition and celebration throughout

            the world of St. George’s Day – the old English

            festival Day of St. George – and the anniversary of

            the birth and death of Shakespeare – April 23^rd.

3. – To disseminate Patriotic literature more especially

            amongst the young, and to provide English and

            other Schools with the Flag of our Country.

4. -  To further English interest by every possible means.

5. -  To render assistance in furtherance of all English and

            patriotic movements.

6. -  To promote and encourage the physical culture of the

            English people.

7. -   To publish a journal or magazine, “The English

Race,” to help to promote the foregoing objects,

Which are calculated to inspire our fellow-country-

men throughout the world with a jealous pride in

All that concerns the welfare and greatness of their

Native land and Empire.

FULL MEMBERSHIP IS RESTRICTED TO ENGLISH-MEN AND ENGLISH-WOMEN (OR THEIR ISSUE) WHERESOEVER BORN, BEING OF BRITISH SUBJECTS.

______

All people of ENGLISH BLOOD, although citizens

of other countries, are also eligible for membership in any

grade, but without voice or controlling interest in the

affairs of the Society.

Howard Ruff, Hon. Secretary,

                 5, Bloomsbury Square, London, W.C.1