western part of the island, held sovereign sway in Hibernia and Caledonia, over the two shores of the Scottish Sea, during the sixth century. Almost without interruption up to 1168, kings springing from its different branches exercised in Ireland the supreme monarchy.

The father of Columbkill was descended from one of the eight sons of the great King Niall, of the Nine Hostages who was supreme monarch of all Ireland from 379 to 405, at the period when St. Patrick was brought to Ireland as a slave. Consequently, he sprang from a race which had reigned in Ireland for six centuries, and in virtue of the ordinary law of succesion might himself have been called to the throne. While still very young Columbkill passed into the great monastic schools under the direction of two holy abbots bearing the name of Finnian, the second of whom was himself trained by a disciple of St. Patrick. The abbot Finnian who ordained Columbkill priest ruled at Clonard, the monastery which he had founded, where there were 3,000 pupils, all eager to receive the instructions of St. Finnian, whom they called "the Master of the Saints."

Before Columbkill had reached the age of 25 years he had presided over the creation of a crowd of monasteries. As many as twenty-seven in Irelan 1 recognized him as their guardian. The most ancient and important of these foundations were situated, as was formerly that of St. Brigid at Kildare, in vast oak forests, from which they took their name. The first was Durrow; the other Derry, now Londonderry. The young Columbkill was especially attached to Derry, where he habitually lived.

At a more advanced age the saint gave vent to his tenderness for his monastic creations in songs, one of which (translated) begins:

"Were all the tributes of Scotia mine,

From its midland to its borders,

I would give all for one little cell

In my beautiful Derry,

For its peace and its purity,

For the white angels that go

In crowds from one end to the other

I love my beautiful Derry."

Columbkill was not only himself a poet, but lived always in great and affectionate sympathy with the bards, who occupied at that time so high a place in the social and political institutions of Ireland.

He

After Ossian and his glorious compeer of the Vosges, Columbkill opens the series of 200 poets whose names have remained dear to Ireland. wrote his verses not only in Latin, but much more frequently in Irish. It seems thus apparent that Columbkill was as much a bard as a monk during the first part of his life. He had the ardent, agitated, Like most Irish quarrelsome character of the race.

saints, and even monks, whom history has kept in mind, he had a passionate love for traveling, and to that passion he added another which brought him more than one misadventure. Books, which were less rare in Ireland than elsewhere, were yet much sought after and guarded with jealous care in the monastic Our libraries, which were their sole depositories. saint had a passion for fine MS., and one of his biographers attributes to him the laborious feat of having transcribed with his own hand 300 copies of the Gospel.

This love of MS. is connected with the decisive event which changed the destiny of Columbkill, and transformed him from a wandering poet and ardent book-lover into a missionary and an apostle. While visiting his ancient master, Finnian, our saint found means to make a clandestine and hurried copy of the abbot's psalter by shutting himself up at night where the psalter was deposited, lighting his nocturnal work, as happened to St. Teresa, by the light which miraculously escaped from his left hand while he wrote with his right.

The abbot, Finnian, discovered what was going on by means of a curious wanderer, who, attracted by that singular light, looked in through the keyhole. Indignant at what he thought a theft, Finnian claimed the copy when it was finished, on the ground that a copy made without permission ought to belong to the owner of the original, seeing that the transcription is the son of the original book.

Columbkill refused to give up his work, and the question was referred to the king in his palace at Tara. King Diarmid, supreme monarch of Ireland, was, like our saint, descended from the great King Niall, but by another son. The king might thus have been suspected for his partiality for his kinsman, and yet he pronounced against him. His judgment was given in a rustic phrase which has passed into a proverb in Ireland-"Le gach boin a boinin, le gach leabhar a leabhran": "To every cow its calf, and consequently to every book its copy."

Columbkill protested loudly. "It is an unjust sentence," he said, "and I will revenge myself. I will denounce to my brethren and my kindred thy wicked judgment. They will listen to my complaint, and punish thee sword in hand." He immediately fled from Tara and arrived safely in his own province, and without delay set to work to excite against King Diarmid the numerous and powerful clans of his relatives and friends, who belonged to a branch of the house of Niall distinct and hostile to that of the reigning monarch.

His efforts were crowned with success. The HyNialls of the North armed against the Hy-Nialls of the South, of which Diarmid was the special chief. They met at Cool-Drewney, on the borders of Ulster and Connaught. Diarmid was completely beaten and obliged to take refuge at Tara. Columbkill, though victor, had soon to undergo the double reaction of personal remorse and the condemnation of many pious souls. The latter punishment was the first to be felt.

He was accussed by a synod convoked at Tara of having occasioned the shedding of Christian blood, and the sentence of excommunication was in his absence pronounced against him. Columbkill was not a man to draw back before his accusers and judges. He presented himself before the synod, which had struck without hearing him. The sentence of excommunication was withdrawn, but he was charged to win to Christ, by his preaching, as many pagan souls as the number of Christians who had fallen in the battle of Cool-Drewney. It was then that his soul seems first to have been troubled, and that remorse planted in it the germs of at once a startling conversion and his future apostolic mission.

Various legends reveal him to us at this crisis of his life wandering along from solitude to solitude, and from monastery to monastery, seeking out holy monks, masters of penance and Christian virtue, and asking them anxiously what he should do to obtain pardon from God for the slaughter of so many victims. At length he found the light which he sought from a holy monk called Molaise, famed for his knowledge of Sacred Scripture, and who had already been his confessor, and whose ruined monastery is still visible in one of the isles of the Atlantic-Innish murray, on the coast of Sligo.

The

This severe hermit confirmed the decision of the synod, and to the obligation of converting to the Christian faith an equal number of pagans as there were of Christians killed in the civil war, he added a new condition, which bore cruelly on a soul so passionately devoted to country and kindred. confessor condemned his penitent to perpetual exile from Ireland. Columbkill bowed to this sentence with sad resignation. "What you have commanded," he said, "will be done." When he acquainted his disciples with his intended emigration, twelve amongst them decided to follow him. So now a voluntary exile, at the age of 42, from his native land, our saint embarked with his twelve companions in one of those great barques of osier covered with hide which the Celtic nations employed for navigation.

Among many adventures, he landed at Iona. Nothing could be more sullen and sad than the aspect of this celebrated isle, where not a single tree has been able to resist the blighting wind and destroying hand of man. Only three miles in length by two in breath, flat and raw, bordered by gray rocks which scarcely rise above the level of the sea, it has not even the wild beauty which is conferred upon the neighboring isles and shores by their lofty cliffs. Upon the narrow surface of the island white stretches of land alternate with scanty pastures, a few poor crops, and the turf bog where the inhabitants find their fuel. Far from having any provision of the glory of Iona, Columbkill's soul was still swayed by a sentiment which never abandoned him-regret for his country. All his life he retained for Ireland the passionate tenderness of an exile, a love which displayed itself in the songs which have been preserved to us, and which date perhaps from the first moments of his exile. The following is a characteristic poem which must have been confided to some traveler as a message from the exile of Iona to his country:

"What joy to fly upon the white-crested sea and to watch the waves break upon the Irish shore! Ah, how my boat would fly if its prow was turned to my Irish oak-grove!

But the noble sea now carries me only to Albyn, the land of ravens.

My foot is in my little boat, but my sad heart everbleeds.

There is a grey eye which ever turns to Erin; but never in this life shall it see Erin, nor her sons, nor her daughters.

From the high prow I look over the sea, and great tears are in my gray eye when I turn to Erin

To Erin, where the songs of the birds are so sweet, and where the clerks sing like the birds; Where the young are so gentle and the old so wise; Where the great men are so noble to look at and the women so fair to wed.

Young traveler, carry my sorrows with thee, carry them to Congall of eternal life.

Noble youth, take my prayer with thee and my blessing: one part for Ireland-seven times may she be blessed

And the other for Albyn. My heart is broken in my breast;

If death comes to me suddenly, it will be because of the great love I bear to the Gael!"

This sorrowful patriotism never faded from his breast, and was evidenced much later in his life by an incident which shows a persevering regret for his lost Ireland along with a tender solicitude for all the creatures of God. One morning he called one of the monks and said to him: "Go and seat thyself by the sea upon the western bank of the island; there thou wilt see arrive from the North of Ireland and fall at thy feet a poor traveling stork long beaten by the winds and exhausted by fatigue. Take her up with pity, feed her, and watch her for three days; after three days' rest, when she is refreshed and strengthened, she will no longer wish to prolong her exile among us-she will fly to sweet Ireland, her dear country, where she was born. I bid thee care for her thus, because she comes from the land where I, too, was born."

Everything happened as he had said and ordered. The evening of the day on which the monk had received the poor traveler, as he returned to the monastery, Columbkill, asking him no questions, said to him: "God bless thee, my dear child; thou has cared for the exile; in three days thou shalt see her return to her country." And, in fact, at the time mentioned the stork rose from the ground in her host's presence, and, after having sought her way for a moment in the air, directed her flight across the sea, straight upon Ireland. However bitter the sadness might be with which exile filled the heart of our saint, it did not for a moment turn him from his work of expiation. As soon as he had installed himself with his companions in that desert, from whence the Christian faith and monastic life were about to radiate over the north of Great Britain, a gradual and almost complete transformation became apparent in him. Without giving up the lovable peculiarities of his character and race, he gradually became a model of penitents, and at the same time for confessors and preachers. This man, so passionate, so irritable, so warlike and vindictive, became, little by little, the most gentle, the humblest, the most tender of fathers and friends. It was he the great head of the Caledonian Church, who, kneeling before the strangers who came to Iona or before the monks returning from their work, took off their shoes washed their feet, and, after having washed them, respectfully kissed them. But charity was still stronger than humility in that transfigured soul. No necessity, spiritual temporal, found him indifferent. The servant of God towards the end of his career consumed his strength in

or

vigils, fasts and dangerous lacerations. The celestial light which was soon to receive him began already to surround him like a garment. Four years before his death he was not so near its termination as he had believed and hoped. But this remnant of existence, from which he sighed to be liberated, was held fast by the filial love of his disciples and the ardent prayers of so many Christian communities founded or ministered to by his zeal. Two of his monksone Irish and one Saxon-saw him one day change countenance, and perceived in his face a sudden expression of the most contrary emotions-first a beatific joy, but a minute after this ray of supernatural joy gave place to an expression of profound sadness. The two spectators pressed him with questions, which he refused to answer. At length they threw themselves at his knees, and begged him with tears not to afflict them by hiding what had been revealed to him. "Dear children,' he said to them, "I do not wish to afflict you. Know, then, that it is thirty years to-day since I began my pilgrimage to Calendonia. I have long prayed God to let my exile end with my thirtieth year, and to recall me to the heavenly country. When you saw me so joyous it was because I could see the angels who already came to seek my soul. But all at once they stopped short, down there upon that rock at the farthest limit of the sea which surrounds our island, as if they would approach to take me and could not. And in truth they could not, because the Lord has paid less regard to my ardent prayer than to that of the many fervent churches which have prayed for me, and which have obtained against my will that I should still dwell in this body for four years. This is the reason of my sadness. But in four years I shall die without being sick. In four years-I know it and see it-they will come back, these holy angels, and I shall take my flight with them towards the Lord."

At the end of the four years thus fixed he arranged everything for his departure. It was only the end of May, and it was his desire to take leave of the monks who worked in the fields. His great age prevented him from walking, and he was drawn in a car by oxen. When he reached the laborers he said to them: "I greatly desired to die a month ago, on Easter Day, and it was granted to me; but I preferred to wait a little longer in order that the festival might not be changed into a day of sadness for you." And when all wept he did all he could to console them. Then, turning towards the east, from the top of his rustic chariot he blessed the island and all its inhabitants-a blessing which, according to local tradition, was like that of St. Patrick, and drove from that day all vipers and venomous creatures out of the island.

On Saturday in the following week he went, leaning on his faithful attendant Diarmid, to bless the granary of the monastery. Seeing there two great heaps of corn, the fruit of the last harvest, he said: "I see with joy that my dear monastic family, if I must leave them this year, will not, at least, suffer from famine." "Dear Father," said Diarmid, "why do you thus sadden us by talking of your death?" "Ah, well," said the saint, "there is a little secret which I will tell you if you will swear on your knees

that you will tell no one till I am gone. To-day is Saturday, which the Holy Scriptures call Sabbath or rest. And it will be truly my day of rest, for it shall be the last of my laborious life. This very night I shall enter into the path of my fathers. Thou weepest, dear Diarmid, but console thyself-it is my Lord Jesus Christ who deigns to invite me to join Him; it is He who has revealed to me that my summons will come to-night."

Then he left the storehouse to return to the monastery, but when he had gone half-way stopped to rest at a spot which is still marked by one of the ancient crosses of Iona. He used the remnants of his strength to climb to the top of a hillock from which he could see all the isle and the monastery, and there lifted up his hands to pronounce a prophetic benediction on the sanctuary he had created. "This little spot," he said, "so small and low, shall be greatly honored, not only by the Scots, kings and people, but also by foreign chiefs and barbarous nations, and it shall be venerated even by the saints of other churches." After this the saint went down to the monastery, entered his cell, and began to work for the last time. He was then occupied in transcribing the Psalter. When he had come to the 33d Psalm and the verse "To those who fear the Lord no good thing will be wanting," "I must stop here," he said: "Baithen will write the rest." Baithen was the steward of Iona, and was to become its abbot. After this the aged saint was present at the nightly office before Sunday in the church. When he returned to his cell he seated himself upon the naked stones, which served the old man for bed and pillow, and which were shown for nearly a century near his tomb. Then he entrusted to his companion a last message for the community. "Dear children," this is what I command with my last words. Let peace and charity reign always among you. If you act thus, following the example of the saints, God, who strengthens the just, will help you, and I, who shall be near Him, will intercede on your behalf, and you shall obtain of Him not only all the necessities of the present life in sufficient quantity, but still more the rewards of eternal life, reserved for those who keep His law."

These were his last words. As soon as the midnight bell had rung for the Matins of the Sunday, he arose and hastened before the other monks to the church, where he knelt down before the altar. Diarmid followed him, but as the church was not yet lighted he could only find him by groping and crying in a plaintive voice, "Where are thou, my Father?" He found Columbkill lying before the altar, and placing himself at his side, raised the old abbot's venerable head upon his knees. The whole community soon arrived with lights, and wept as one man at the sight of their dying Father. The servant of God opened his eyes once more, and turned them to his children on either side with a look of radiant joy. Then with the aid of Diarmid he raised as best he might his right hand to bless them all; his hand dropped; the last sigh came from his lips; and his face remained calm and sweet, like that of a man who had seen a vision of heaven. Such was the death of the first great apostle of Great Britain, St. Columbkill.

A Leinster Love Song.

O, the hawthorn is in bloom, and the primroses have

come

To deck with palest stars the green hedge-row, The violets, here and there, give their perfume to the air

As they nestle in the wayside low.
While I wait for thee,

Gra Machree,

My Joan Móran.

O, the skies are bright and blue and the sunlight shining through,

Gems the rillets cn the mountain side,

While the harmony of notes from a flock of feathered throats

Joins the melody that soars from the tide,

Where wait for thee,

Gra Machree,

My Joan Mó ran.

D

Dr. Douglas Hyde in Kilkenny.

R. DOUGLAS HYDE delivered recently a most interesting lecture on the Irish language movement in Kilkenny to an extremely large audience. Rev. Father Casey presided. On his arrival in Kilkenny he met with a most enthusiastic reception. He was received by Father Casey, president of the local branch of the Gaelic League; Captain the Hon. Otway Cuffe, the members of the Corporation, of the reception committee, and a large crowd of the general public, and accompanied by the St. John's Band to the Town Hall, where an address was presented, in Irish and English, by Father Casey, to which Dr. Hyde appropriately replied. During his visit to Kilkenny Dr. Hyde was the guest of Captain the Hon. Otway Cuffe.

Through the efforts of Mr. Standish O'Grady, Mr. Hanrahan, J. P., and others new life has been infused into the local Gaelic League branch with the result that many new members have joined the classes.

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breeze

Makes my cheek with expectancy glow,

And my heart keeps beating high as I think thou'rt

coming nigh,

For the lonely time is creeping slow

While I wait for thee,

Gra Machree,

My Joan Moran.

O, the glory of the spring, and its bounteous blossoming

To my senses seem a skyless shore,

For my heart and soul and sight are with them both day and night,

I can see but with thine eyes, asthore,

And I wait for thee,

Gra Machree,

My Joan Móran.

O, thy face like opals rare, crowned with silken sunny hair,

Thine eyes, twin forget-me-nots of blue,

And thy rosy lips apart, speak the language of thy heart

In soft music, tender, sweet and true.

Now I wait for thee,

Gra Machree,

My Joan Mó ran.

Ah, my love, at last thou'rt come, and thy presence

makes me dumb

With joy as I hold thee to my breast,

And I proudly think that ne'er have the spirits of the air

Seen a maid so fair, or man so blest.

For thou lovest me

Gra Machree,

My Joan Mó ran.

MARY A. O'REILLY.

F

Society.

ROM the first number of the "Journal of the Galway Archæological Society" (Dublin: Sealy, Bryers & Walker), we learn that the Society was founded at a meeting convened for the purpose in Galway on the 21st of March, 1900. The list of members appended to the journal contains the names of most prominent Galway people. In an inaugural address, published in the journal, the Vice-President, the Most Rev. J. Healy, D. D., Bishop of Clonfert, explains the aims and methods of the Society. Colonel J. P. Nolan, M.P., contributes an article on the Castles of Clare Barony, while the Very Rev. J. Fahey, P.P., writes on "Pre-Norman Galway." The cost of the journal is half-a-crown.

で

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Philadelphia Philo-Celtic Society.

HE usual monthly meeting of the Philo-Celtic Society of Philadelphia was held on Sunday even314 ing, December 2nd, in the society's rooms, North Broad street. The business, which was principally routine, having been disposed of the secretary, Mr. Bernard McGillian, read a communication from M. J. O'Brien, Fort Wayne, Ind., requesting on behalf of a committee of the A. O. H. of that city information to enable them to establish a Philo-Celtic Society in Fort Wayne, Ind.

On the motion of the president, Mr. F. O'Kane, seconded by Mr. McFadden, the secretary was instructed to furnish all requisite information.

The Philo-Celtic Society of Philadelphia has to congratulate itself on the fact that its membership is to-day greater than ever before, during its eighteen years of existence, that its classes are better attended, and that the students evince more earnestness and enthusiasm than ever before with the gratifying result that exceptionally good progress is being made by all the classes.

nave.

ISITORS to the ancient Cathedral of Christ Church, in the Irish metropolis, have their interest specially attracted towards a monument in the It is the effigy, in black marble, of a recumbent knight in chain armor, his steel-gloved hands joined on his breast and a pointed or pavache shield on his arm. Beside it is a smaller monument, showing half the figure of a person.

The mind of the spectator flies back seven centuries for beneath that graven stone, as he is informed, rests the dust of the famous leader of the Anglo-Norman invaders of Ireland, the great Richard de Clare, surnamed Strongbow, Earl of Pembroke and Striguil, Earl of Buckingham, Lord of Tudenham, Lord of Leinster, hereditary Marshal of England, patron of Tintern Abbey and St. Neot's Priory, joint ambassador to Germany in 1167, Governor of Gisors, Justiciary of Ireland, founder of the Knights Hospitalers' priory of Kilmainham and, as the Four Masters term

him, "the greatest destroyer of the clergy and laity that came to Ireland since the time of Turgesius."

The smaller effigy is said to be that of Strongbow's son. Hackett, in his collection of epitaphs, gives the following as from this tomb:

"Nate ingrate, mihi pugnanti terga dedisti, Non mihi, sed genti, regna quoque terga dedisti."

This alludes, according to Banks, to the death of the son, who, having run away from a battle which was finally won by Strongbow, returned to congratulate his sire on his victory, and was by him, in punishment of his cowardice, severed in twain with one sweep of the sword-evidently a sensational legend improvised to explain the mutilated figure, for there is no record that Strongbow ever had a son.

But do the remains of the great captain, the Pizarro of Ireland, really repose beneath this sombre tomb? Is the massive sculptured form really intended to represent him? This is a matter which has long escaped investigation.