To placate the dragon, they sacrificed two sheep each day to the dragon, but when they ran out of sheep, they were forced to substitute a human each day instead, using a lottery to determine who would be sacrificed. At the time of George's arrival, the lot had just fallen to the king's daughter, Cleodolinda. No one volunteered to take her place and wouldn't take the king's money to substitute someone else for his daughter, so she was dressed as a bride and sent to the dragon.

George rode in upon this scene. The princess urged him to leave so that he would not die also. George made the Sign of the Cross and then attacked the dragon. After a battle, the saint speared it with his lance. He then fastened the princess's girdle around its neck, and the girl led the dragon into the city. The people were frightened and started to run away, but George told them not to be afraid – that if the whole city would believe in Jesus Christ and be baptised, he would slay the dragon.

George beheaded the dragon, and it was carried away on four ox carts. He accepted no reward for this service, but he asked the king to build churches, honour priests, and to have compassion for the poor.

The discoveries and explorations in Africa, India and the Americas, in areas previously shown on maps as being populated by dragons, presented vast new fields for Church missionary endeavours, and St George was once again invoked as an example of danger faced and overcome for the good of the Church. Meanwhile, the Protestant author, John Bunyan (1628-88), recalled the story of George and the Dragon in the account of the fight between Christian and Apollyon in Pilgrim's Progress (1679 and 1684).

Veneration of St George

St George is still venerated in a large number of places, by followers of particular occupations and sufferers from certain diseases. George is the patron saint of Aragon, Catalonia, Georgia, Lithuania, Palestine, Portugal, Germany and Greece; and of Moscow, Istanbul, Genoa and Venice (second to St Mark). He is patron of soldiers, cavalry and chivalry; knights; archers; farmers, agricultural workers and field workers; Boy Scouts; butchers; horses, riders and saddlers; sufferers from leprosy, skin rashes and skin diseases; and of plague and syphilis. St. George symbolises the struggle against paganism and the never-ending combat between good and evil.

23rd April is St. George's Day. The saint's feast became of increasing importance during the middle ages, and remained a holiday of obligation for English Catholics until 1778.