churches
nor monasteries, and carried off a great number of the inhabitants as
slaves. Bede denounces and laments this barbarous invasion, attributing
the defeat and death of King Egfrid, which took place in the following
year, to the vengeance of heaven.[193] St. Adamnan was sent to
Northumbria, after the death of this prince, to obtain the release of
the captives. His mission was successful, and he was honoured there as
the worker of many miracles.

The generosity of Finnachta failed in settling the vexed question of
tribute. Comgal, who died in 708, ravaged Leinster as fiercely as his
predecessors, and Fearghal, his successor, invaded it "five times in one
year." Three wonderful showers are said to have fallen in the eighth
year of his reign (A.D. 716 according to the Four Masters)--a shower of
silver, a shower of honey, and a shower of blood. These were, of course,
considered portents of the awful Danish invasions. Fearghal was killed
at the battle of Almhain (Allen, near Kildare), in 718. In this
engagement, the Leinster men only numbered nine thousand, while their
opponents numbered twenty-one thousand. The Leinster men, however, made
up for numbers by their valour; and it is said that the intervention of
a hermit, who reproached Fearghal with breaking the pacific promise of
his predecessor, contributed to the defeat of the northern forces.
Another battle took place in 733, when Hugh Allan, King of Ireland, and
Hugh, son of Colgan, King of Leinster, engaged in single combat. The
latter was slain, and the Leinster men "were killed, slaughtered, cut
off, and dreadfully exterminated." In fact, the Leinster men endured so
many "dreadful exterminations," that one almost marvels how any of their
brave fellows were left for future feats of arms. The "northerns were
joyous after this victory, for they had wreaked their vengeance and
their animosity upon the Leinster men," nine thousand of whom were
slain. St. Samhthann, a holy nun, who died in the following year, is
said to have predicted the fate of Aedh, Comgal's son, if the two Aedhs
(Hughs) met. Aedh Allan commemorated her virtues in verse, and concludes
thus:--

"In the bosom of the Lord, with a pure death, Samhthann passed
from her sufferings."

Indeed, the Irish kings of this period manifested their admiration of
peaceful living, and their desire for holy deaths, in a more practical
way than by poetic encomiums on others. In 704 Beg Boirche "took a