month, Noah opened the covering of the ark and saw that the earth was
dry, but he durst not go out, but abode the commandment of our Lord. The
second month, the twenty-seventh day of the month, our Lord said to
Noah: Go out of the ark, thou and thy wife, thy sons and the wives of
thy sons. He commanded them to go conjointly out which disjointly
entered, and let go out with them all the beasts and fowls living, and
all the reptiles, every each after his kind and gender, to whom our Lord
said: Grow ye and multiply upon the earth. Then Noah issued out and his
wife, and his sons with their wives, and all the beasts, the same day a
year after they entered in, every one after his gender. Noah then
edified an altar to our Lord and took of all the beasts that were clean
and offered sacrifice unto our Lord; and our Lord smelled the sweetness
of the sacrifice and said to Noah: From henceforth I shall not curse the
earth for man, for he is prone and ready to fall from the beginning of
his youth. I shall no more destroy man by such vengeance. And then our
Lord blessed them and said: Grow ye and multiply the earth and be ye
lords of all the beasts of the earth, of the fowls of the air, and of
the fishes. I have given all things to you, but eat no flesh with the
blood. I command you to slay no man, nor to shed no man's blood. I have
made man after mine image. Whosomever sheddeth his brother's blood, his
blood shall be shed. Go ye forth and grow and multiply and fill the
earth. This said our Lord to Noah and his sons: Lo! I have made a
covenant with you and with them that shall come after you, that I shall
no more bring such a flood to slay all people, and in token thereof I
have set my rainbow in the clouds of heaven, for who that trespasseth I
shall do justice otherwise on him. Noah lived after the flood three
hundred and fifty years. From the time of Adam until after Noah's flood,
the time and season was alway green and tempered; and all that time men
ate no flesh, for the herbs and fruits were then of great strength and
effect, they were pure and nourishing. But after the flood the earth was