One Christmas Eve back in the twelfth century, a monk keeping midnight vigil in Lindisfarne priory watched spellbound as two great doors opened all by themselves.

As he sat in his guest room at Durham Abbey, Ranulf de Capella could think of nothing but finding someone to rid him of his painful toothache.

A hungry monk thought he had got away with the tastiest of crimes, but St Cuthbert kept his promise to his beloved birds.