1 Joseph and Mary pass through a country infested by robbers.

3 Titus a humane thief, offers Dumachus, his comrade, forty groats to let Joseph and Mary pass unmolested.

6 Jesus prophecies that the thieves Dumachus and Titus shall be crucified with him and that Titus shall go before him into paradise.

10 Christ causes a well to spring from a sycamore tree, and Mary washes his coat in it.

11 A balsam grows there from his sweat. They go to Memphis, where Christ works more miracles. Return to Judea.

15 Being warned, depart for Nazareth.

IN their journey from hence they came into a desert country and were told it was infested with robbers; so Joseph and St. Mary prepared to pass through it in the night.

2 And as they were going along, behold they saw two robbers asleep in the road, and with them a great number of robbers, who were their confederates, also asleep.

3 The names of these two were Titus and Dumachus; and Titus said to Dumachus, I beseech thee let these persons go along quietly, that our company may not perceive anything of them.

4 But Damachus refusing, Titus again said, I will give thee forty groats, and as a pledge take my girdle, which he gave him before he had done speaking, that he might not open his mouth or make a noise.

5 When the Lady St. Mary saw the kindness which this robber did shew them, she said to him, The Lord God will receive thee to his right hand and grant thee pardon of thy sins.

6 Then the Lord Jesus answered, and said to his mother, When thirty years are expired, O mother, the Jews will crucify me at Jerusalem;

7 And these two thieves shall be with me at the same time upon the cross, Titus on my right hand, and Dumachus on my left, and from that time Titus shall go before me into paradise;

8 And when she had said, God forbid this should be thy lot, O my son, they went on to a city in which were several idols; which, as soon as they came near to it, was turned into hills of sand.

9 Hence they went to that sycamore tree, which is now called Matarea.

10 And in Materea the Lord Jesus caused a well to spring forth, in which St. Mary washed his coat;

11 And a balsam is produced, or grows, in that country, from the sweat which ran down there from the Lord Jesus.

12 Thence they proceeded to Memphis, and saw Pharoah, and abode three years in Egypt.

13 And the Lord Jesus did very many miracles, in Egypt, which are neither to be found in Gospel of the Infancy nor in the Gospel of Perfection.

14 At the end of three years he returned out of Egypt, and when he came near to Judea, Joseph was afraid to enter;

15 For hearing that Herod was dead, and that Archelaus his son reigned in his stead, he was afraid.

16 And when he went to Judea, an, angel of God appeard to him, and said, O Joseph go into the city of Nazareth, and abide there.

17 It is strange indeed, that he, who is the Lord of all countries, should be thus carried backward and forward, through so many countries.

CHAPTER IX

2 Two sick children cured by water wherein Christ was washed.

WHEN they came afterwards into the city of Bethlehem, they found there several very desperate distempers, which became so troublesome to children by seeing them, that most of them died.

2 There was there a woman who had a sick son, whom she brought, when he was at the point of death, to the Lady St. Mary, who saw her when she was washing Jesus Christ.

3 Then said the woman, O my Lady Mary, look down upon this my son, who is afflicted with most dreadful pains.

4 St. Mary hearing her, said, Take a little of that water with which I have washed my son, and sprinkle it upon him.

5 Then she took a little of that water, as St. Mary had commanded, and sprinkled it upon her son, who being wearied with his violent pains, was fallen asleep; and after he had slept a little, awaked perfectly well and recovered.

6 The mother being abundantly glad of this success, went again to St. Mary, and St. Mary said to her, Give praise to God, who hath cured this thy son.

7 There was in the same place another woman, a neighbour of her, whose son was now cured.

8 This woman's son was afflicted with the same disease, and his eyes were now almost quite shut, and she was lamenting for him day and night.

9 The mother of the child which was cured, said to her, Why do you not bring your son to St. Mary, as I brought my son to her, when he was in the agonies of death; and he was cure by that water, with which the body of her son Jesus was washed?

10 When the woman heard her say this, she also went, and having procured the same water, washed her son with it, whereupon his body and his eyes were instantly restored to their former state.

11 And when she brought her son to St. Mary, and opened his case to her, she commanded her to give thanks to God for the recovery of her son's health, and tell no one what had happened.

CHAPTER X

1 Two wives of one man, each have a son sick. 2 One of them named Mary, and whose son's name was Caleb, presents the Virgin with a handsome carpet, and Caleb is cured; but the son of the other wife dies, 4 which occasions a difference between the women. 5 The other wife puts Caleb into a hot oven, and he is miraculously preserved, 9 she afterwards throws him into a well, and he is again preserved; 11 his mother appeals to the Virgin against the other wife, 12 whose downfall the Virgin prophecies, 13 and who accordingly falls into the well, 14 therein fulfilling a saying of old.

THERE were in the same city two wives of one man, who had each a son sick. One of them was called Mary, and her son's name was Caleb.

2 She arose, and taking her son, went to the Lady St. Mary, the mother of Jesus, and offered her a very handsome carpet, saying, O my Lady Mary accept this carpet of me, and instead of it give me a small swaddling cloth.

3 To this Mary agreed, and when the mother of Caleb was gone, she made a coat for her son of the swaddling cloth, put it on him, and his disease was cured; but the son of the other wife died.

4 Hereupon there arose between them a difference in doing the business of the family by turns, each her week;

5 And when the turn of Mary the mother of Caleb came, and she was heating the oven to bake bread, and went away to fetch the meal, she left her son Caleb by the oven;

6 Whom the other wife, her rival, seeing to be by himself, took and cast him into the oven, which was very hot, and then went away.

7 Mary on her return saw her son Caleb lying in the middle of the oven laughing, and the oven quite as cold as though it had not been before heated, and knew that her rival the other wife had thrown him into the fire.

8 When she took him out, she brought him to the Lady St. Mary, and told her the story, to whom she replied, Be quiet, I am concerned lest thou shouldest make this matter known.

9 After this her rival, the other wife, as she was drawing water at the well, and saw Caleb playing by the well, and that no one was near, took him, and threw him into the well.

10 And when some men came to fetch water from the well, they saw the boy sitting on the superficies of the water, and drew him out with ropes, and were exceedingly surprised at the child, and praised God.

11 Then came the mother and took him and carried him to the Lady St. Mary, lamenting. and saying, O my Lady, see what my rival hath done to my son, and how she hath cast him into the well, and I do not question but one time or other she will be the occasion of his death.

12 St. Mary replied to her, God will vindicate your injured cause.

13 Accordingly a few days after, when the other wife came to the well to draw water, her foot was entangled in the rope, so that she fell headlong into the well, and they who ran to her assistance found her skull broken, and bones bruised.

14 So she came to a bad end, and in her was fulfilled that saying of the author, They digged a well, and made it deep, but fell themselves into the pit which they prepared.

CHAPTER XI

1 Bartholomew, when a child and sick, miraculously restored by being laid on Christ's bed.

ANOTHER woman in that city had. likewise two son's sick.

2 And when one was dead, the other, who lay at the point of death, she took in her arms to the Lady St. Mary, and in a flood of tears addressed herself to her, saying,

3 O my Lady, help and relieve me; for I had two sons, the one I have just now buried, the other I see is fast at the point of death behold how I (earnestly) seek for your from God, and pray to him.

4 Then she said, O Lord, thou art gracious, and merciful, and kind; thou, hast given me two sons; one of them thou halt taken to thyself, O spare me this other.

5 St. Mary then perceiving the greatness of her sorrow, pitied her and said, Do thou place thy son in my son's bed, and cover him with his clothes.

6 And when she had placed him in the bed wherein Christ lay, at the moment when his eyes were just closed by death; as soon as ever the small of the garments of the Lord Jesus Christ reached the boy, his eyes were opened, and calling with a loud voice to his mother, he asked for bread, and when he had received it, he sucked it.

7 Than his mother said, O Lady Mary, now I am assured that the powers of God do dwell in you, so that thy son can cure children who are of the same sort as himself, as soon as they touch his garments.

8 This boy, who was thus cured, is the same who in the Gospel is called Bartholomew.