their plight as Adam and Eve after the transgression. Fursey, with ready considerateness, shut them up in his own cell while he provided garments for them; then he led them into the Church, where they passed the whole day in returning thanks for their resurrection. This done, he asked them in what manner they wished to dispose of themselves; supposing, perhaps, as was usual for persons after such an event, that they would think it proper to enter upon a monastic life. But they were of royal parentage, and were desirous of returning to their country and their parents, and the enjoyments from which they had been cut off by death. How to get back was the difficulty; the vessel from which they had been carried on shore in that unseemly and yet fortunate manner, was gone; they had no other, and they besought him with tears in their eyes that he would assist them with means of transport, Perhaps they thought, as well they might, after what they had experienced, that this was an easy thing for St. Fursey. He happened to have in his hand a writer's rule, which he cast into the sea, commanding it to show them the way, and bidding them follow it. Away went the obedient rule, true as the needle, to its direction; the brother and sister followed fear

lessly on foot; crowds flocked to the shore when they beheld two persons walking on the water; the astonishment was heightened when those persons were recognised for the dead restored to life. The rule was taken up and deposited in a church, there to be preserved and venerated in honour of God and St. Fursey; and the Saint received a visit from King Brendin, his kinsmen and people, to solicit the benefit of his prayers.

But bad passions were not more prevalent in the minds of the heathen Gods and Goddesses than they were in monasteries, even in this age, when Saints were more numerous upon earth (and especially in Ireland) than Demigods and Heroes had ever been in the environs of Olympus. The monks of Cluainfert began to envy St. Fursey, and consequently to hate him, insomuch that he found it expedient to withdraw. He departed, therefore, with St. Brandon's permission, and founded a monastery near the lake of Orbsen,* in the diocese of Tuam, where the church, called after him Kill-fursa, stood in later times. Thither his grandfather, Aelfiud, came in sackcloth and ashes to confess his sins, and entreat forgiveness

* Alban Butler, vol. i. 204. stereotype edition.

for having attempted to burn him alive before he was born. The absolution thus humbly asked was freely given. Soon afterwards Phyltan, his father, succeeded to the throne of Munster, and it was about this time that the Saint was favoured with his visions.

. The first occurred when he was on the way to visit his parents: a sudden illness seized him on the road; it was not so severe as to render him incapable of proceeding, and he had advanced, leaning on his companion's arm for support, nearly to the end of his journey, when the hour of vespers arrived, and he stopt to begin his even-song: a darkness then came over his sight, his limbs failed, the body lost all sense, and he was borne, dead to all appearance, into the nearest house. Unconscious of all that was done to him there, he in this trance saw the four hands of two Angels who carried him through the air, and the four wings of each, and the snowy whiteness of their feathers; but their bodies he could not see, because of their exceeding brightness. A third went before armed with a white shield and a fiery sword. He heard also the song of many thousand Angels, and observed, as far as he could distinguish their faces, that they had all a strong family likeness to each other. It was not till one of

these Angels ordered his conductors to carry back the soul they were escorting, that he knew himself to be out of the body; then he expressed a great unwillingness to be so remanded; they promised, however, to come for him again; and while they were singing "The God of Gods shall be seen in Zion," the sweetness of that strain possessed him so entirely, that his soul re-entered its earthly vehicle without knowing how. This was just at cockcrow: he heard voices of lamentation, . . . the mourners by whom his corpse was surrounded, saw the cloth stir with which his face had been covered; they instantly removed it, and to their astonishment the man whom they had been watching through the night, and deploring as dead, sate up and looked about him. He was grieved that there was no prudent person at hand to whom he might repeat all that he had seen; however, he lost no time in confessing and communicating, that he might be ready when the Angels should come for him, fully expecting the speedy fulfilment of their promise. During that day and the following he continued ill; at midnight, when his relations were about his bed, his feet became cold, his hands stiffened as they were extended in prayer,...a second trance ensued,...and he

had then that vision a part of which is related by Bede.

In this second expedition to the spiritual world, he was as little able to see the faces of the Devils by reason of their exceeding blackness, as those of the Angels for excess of light; but he could discern that they had long necks, that they were horribly lean, and that their heads were swoln to the shape of a brass kettle. They threw fiery darts at him, which were received on the shield of his protector; and the uproar with which they made their assaults was so great that he thought it must have been heard over the whole earth. On this occasion he was able to observe the manner in which his soul re-entered the body. While he was beholding that body as a loathsome corpse, which he did not recognize, and was unwilling to approach, he saw the breast open to let in the truant lodger. The Angel assured him that when he was reviving spring water would be poured over him, and he would feel no other pain than that of the burn which he had received in spirit. On a sudden he found himself once more a whole man, stretched on the bed as before, and surrounded by his friends; the cold affusion was administered, and sitting up amid the astonished company, Fursey re