C H A P. II.
THE valiant St. George, having left the other ſix Champions, as you have heard, after ſome few months travel, arrived within the Egyptian territories, which country was at that time annoyed with a burning dragon, whoſe hunger, if it were not every day appeaſed with the body of a true virgin, he would breathe forth ſuch a ſtench from his noſtrils, as infected the whole country with a horrible plague, which for four and twenty years together continued, till there was not one virgin left but the King's Daughter only, and ſhe ready next day to be offered up in ſacrifice to him, if the dragon in the mean time was not deſtroyed: wherefore the King, her father, proclaimed, that whoſoever would combat with the dragon, and preſerve his daughter's life, in renown thereof ſhould have her to wife, and the crown of Egypt after his deceaſe; all which was made known to St. George, by a hermit of that country; whereupon he reſolved to undertake the adventure, and lodging with the hermit that night, the next morning mounting his ſteed, he took his journey to a valley, whither the King's Daughter was leading by ſage matrons to be made a prey to the dragon's jaws, whom our Engliſh Knight accoſting, returning her back to her father, promiſed to kill that enemy of Egypt's health, or loſe his life in the encounter, and ſo, like a bold adventurous knight, rode to the place where the dragon had his reſidence.
This horrible dragon, whoſe monſtrous proportion would have frightened any body but only St. George, as ſoon as ſhe beheld him, wallowed from her hideous den, and gave him a fierce aſſault with her wings
