CHAPTER XXIX

THE TRIUMPH OF SERAPION

AND we also saw in the regions of Arsinoïtes a certain elder whose name was Serapion; he was the father of all the monasteries, and the head of numerous brotherhoods, which contained about ten thousand men, and he took the greatest care in providing for the wants of all the brethren. And in the season of harvest he would make those who worked for hire from year to year bring and gather together to him twelve ardebs of wheat, that is to say, forty bushels, that it might serve for his ministrations to those in want, and might be distributed by his hands, so that in that district no destitute man might be found, and he sent to the needy in Alexandria the Great their gifts. Now the fathers of whom we have already spoken did not at any time neglect to visit the whole of Egypt, but as a result of the toil of the brethren they used to fill boats with food and apparel, and send them year after year to the poor who were in Alexandria, because the poor and needy who lived round about them were too few [to exhaust their benevolence]. And we saw in the region of Babylon and Memphis many great fathers, and many, yea innumerable, monks who were adorned with works which were glorious before God.

Here endeth the Triumph of Serapion