f the Brussels MS., reproduced in
facsimile as a frontispiece to the present volume, will give the student
a good idea of O'Clery's script and style.

Occasional notes on Declan in the martyrologies and elsewhere give some
further information about our saint. Unfortunately however the alleged
facts are not always capable of reconciliation with statements of our
"Life," and again the existence of a second, otherwise unknown, Declan is
suggested. The introduction of rye is attributed to him in the Calendar
of Oengus, as introduction of wheat is credited to St. Finan Camm, and
introduction of bees to St. Modomnoc,--"It was the full of his shoe that
Declan brought, the full of his shoe likewise Finan, but the full of his
bell Modomnoc" (Cal. Oeng., April 7th). More puzzling is the note in the
same Calendar which makes Declan a foster son of Mogue of Ferns! This
entry illustrates the way in which errors originate. A former scribe
inadvertently copied in, after Declan's name, portion of the entry
immediately following which relates to Colman Hua Liathain. Successive
scribes re-copied the error without discovering it and so it became
stereotyped.

III.--ST. MOCHUDA.

"It was he (Mochuda) that had the famous congregation
consisting of seven hundred and ten persons; an angel
used to address every third man of them."
(Martyrology of Donegal).

In some respects the Life of Mochuda here presented is in sharp contrast
to the corresponding Life of Declan. The former document is in all
essentials a very sober historical narrative--accurate wherever we can
test it, credible and harmonious on the whole. Philologically, to be
sure, it is of little value,--certainly a much less valuable Life than
Declan's; historically, however (and question of the pre-Patrician
mission apart) it is immensely the more important document. On one
point do we feel inclined to quarrel with its author, scil.: that he
has not given us more specifically the motives underlying Mochuda's
expulsion from Rahen--one of the three worst counsels ever given in
Erin. Reading between his lines we spell, jealousy--'invidia
religiosorum.' Another jealousy too is suggested--the mutual distrust
of north and south which has been the canker-worm of Irish political
life for fifteen hundred years, making intelligible if not justifying
the indignation of a certain distinguished Irishman who wanted to know
the man's name, in order to curse its owner, who fi