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"And his party nominated Brown," he asserted.

"You are mistaken, sir! His party nominated William Goebel," retorted Howe.

"I deny that, sir!" cried Brady.

"Then, prove the truth of your denial! Prove that Dick Talbot ever refused to support the man whom his party declared its standard-bearer, and you will do what no man living has done, or can truly do."

"I have here," and Brady laid his hand on one of the drawers of his desk, "proofs that he had not only voted against Goebel, but openly espoused the cause of Brown. At the proper time I shall bring forth my proofs."

"Then, sir, permit me to tell you that your proofs are lies!"

Howe's face had grown a shade paler, but, except for that, there was no other indication that the interview was drawing dangerously near the line where patience ceases to be a virtue. But Brady feared neither man nor devil.

That much, at least, might be said of him he was no coward.

"The people will decide that case, not Judge Howe," he said mockingly.

"Ah!" exclaimed Howe, with a quick drawing in of the breath, "if his case be given an unbiased trial before the people, I have no fear what the verdict will be. Talbot has nothing to dread from the people of Bourbon County, and you know it."

"It will be left to the people," returned Brady, with a sinister inflection of the voice. "And not only Talbot's record will be laid before them, but the record of others, also."

He rose as he spoke. Howe made another appeal to him not to attempt to disturb the growing harmony in the party. His answer was an oath-bound declaration that he would defeat Talbot, and Howe with him, though it called for the overthrow of Democracy in Bourbon. So, enemies for life, they parted.

(To be continued.)

Francis of Assisi

Theodosia Garrison

Now, when the passion fell on me, I cried
Wild words and bitter, that I might not prove
To my own soul the vastness of this love
That swept me to God's feet as some great tide;
I yearned the torments of the crucified

As men yearn Heaven and the joys thereof,
That I might share the pangs wherewith He strove,
And bear anew His wound in mine own side.
And lo! the darkness fell, and for a space
I felt the torn flesh throb against the rood,
And a great anguish thrill to ecstasy.
Oh, blessed chastisement, divine disgrace!
Alive or dead, I bear the very blood

Of Christ upon the hands and feet of me.

St. Columba, Apostle of Scotland

By A. C. STORER

"How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth glad tidings, that publisheth peace."-Isaias, 52, 7.

N the foremost ranks of her great missionary saints Mother Church places St. Columba, "the Apostle of Scotland," whose zeal in founding churches and monasteries in Ireland, the land of his birth, and in Scotland, the country of his adoption, has won for him the endearing name, "Columbkille, the Dove of the Churches."

Born December 7th, A. D. 521, at Gartan, amid the picturesque wilds of Donegal, Columba's great future is said to have been foretold in a vision to his mother, the Princess Eithne of the royal house of Leinster, an angel declaring to her: "Thou art about to give birth to a son who shall blossom for heaven, who shall be reckoned among the proph

been called, not to the company of the princes of this earth, but to the ranks of that royal and eternal priesthood whose mission it is "to preach the Gospel to the poor, to heal the contrite of heart" (St. Luke, iv, 18). His biographer, Adamnan, the ninth abbot of Iona, tells us his early childhood was passed in the care of a learned and

ST. COLUMBA.

By permission of the artist, E. A. McHardy-Smith.

ets of God, and who shall lead numberless souls to the heavenly country." Belong ing, as he did, to a race which had reigned in Ireland for over six centuries, Columba might himself have succeeded to the throne had he not given at an early age unmistakable signs of having

of

holy priest, from whose tutelage he passed to the great monasteries Moville and Clonard, at both famous schools pursuing his theological studies with ardor, and finally receiving the crowning grace of ordination at

Clonard. The young monk's force of character, eloquence, rare administrative

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abil

ity, and influential connection with many of the provincial kings, combined to raise him with surprising rapidity to positions of importance. He is accredited with the foundation of over thirty

monasteries in Ireland during this period, the largest and most famous being that of Derry, in his native province of Donegal. While ever deeply attached to all his monastic creations, Columba regarded beautiful Derry with special tenderness, as is shown by the following

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Beloved are Sords and Kells,
But sweeter and fairer to me

The salt sea where the sea gulls cry;
When I come to Derry from afar,
It is sweeter and dearer to me-
Sweeter to me.'

Columba's deep affection for the homes of his spiritual sons is still more ardently expressed in another writing attributed to the poet monk:

"O Arran, my sun, my heart is in the west with thee. To sleep on thy pure soil is as good as to be buried in the land of St. Peter and St. Paul. To live within

the sound of thy bells is to live in joy. O Arran, my sun, my love is in the west

with thee."

Besides possessing this strong poetical taste and keen appreciation for all natural as well as spiritual worth and loveliness, he shared to an even unusual degree the national characteristic of intense restlessness and vehement inclination to travel and change of scene and action. Combined with these traits, the indirect cause of Columba's migration to Caledonia appears to have been his assiduity in multiplying copies of Holy Scripture, the natural result of his great devotion to the study of God's Written Word. Thus we are told that this zealous scholar, while visiting Clonard, without permission copied a Psalter particularly prized by its owner, the Abbot Finnian. On discovering this perpetration, Finnian very naturally waxed exceedingly indignant and demanded that the copy

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as well as the original volume should be at once returned to him. Columba's peremptory refusal to comply with the abbot's wish led to the matter being referred to King Diarmid, or Dermott, supreme monarch of all Ireland. The king, although a kinsman of the offender, decided against him, saying that "to every cow belongs its calf" and to every book its copy, and that consequently the copy of the Psalter as well as the original volume must be returned to Finnian. Columba protested, declared the verdict was unjust, and, monk though he was, for the moment desired revenge. Almost immediately an event occurred which still further increased his sense of wrong. A young provincial prince to whom the abbot was deeply attached, was slain by Diarmid's orders while seeking refuge with him, and his indignation at this violation of the laws of sanctuary, as he considered the deed, was unbounded. He at once instigated his relatives, the kings of the West and North, to marshal their forces against Diarmid, who, with his followers, was defeated in the battle of Cool-Drewny and obliged to retreat to Tara. Although victorious, Columba had soon to suffer both from remorse of soul and from the condemnation of his ecclesiastical brethren. The latter solemnly accused him of having caused the shedding of Christian blood, and charged him to win to Our Lord by his preaching as many pagan souls as the number of Christians who had fallen at CoolDrewny.

We have seen thus far how Columba, passionate and imperious as he was by nature, was led by anger, but now, at this crucial point in his career, we behold him responding wholly, and with no backward glance, to the leadings of Divine Grace. Profoundly moved by remorse, he bowed to the sentence pronounced and sought further direction from his confessor. The friend of his

soul not only bade him anew to devote the remainder of his days to missionary labors, but also to spend them in exile from his beloved Ireland. The severe judgment pierced its hearer to the heart, but like a true penitent Columba prepared to obey at once his friend's bid

tions which, though very ancient and occupying the site of the original foundations, are in reality of a much later date.

Even while engaged in all this laborious manual labor, tilling the ground and preparing habitations for the com

ding. Nor was he destined to go alone,munity, Columba ceased not to mourn

into exile. Twelve young disciples, after fervent pleading, obtained permission to accompany their reverend abbot, the youngest, Mochonna, son of the King of Ulster, replying to those who would dissuade him from leaving his country, "My country is where I can gather the largest harvest for Christ." These voluntary exiles chose as their field of labor unconquerable Caledonia, that dread land peopled by the imagination of the times with all manner of demons and evil spirits. Columba and his companions straightway embarked in a frail coracle. or bark of osier covered with hide, and after a tempestuous voyage landed on the desolate little island to which they gave the name of I-Colm-Kill, or, as we know it to-day, the Isle of Iona.*

SO

This missionary undertaking, fraught with mighty consequences to western Christendom, occurred in the year 563. Columba and his monks immediately commenced preparations for the peaceful mission to which from henceforth every energy was to be consecrated. Choosing for the site of their monastery the most sheltered spot the lonely isle afforded, they raised rude huts of branches and wattles, and a church, making its walls of wickerwork and mud, intertwined with growing ivy, and thatching its roof with heather and rushes. Columba's successors replaced these primitive monastery buildings again and again by others hardly more pretentious, and it must be noted that the ruins seen at Iona to-day are of erec

*I is the Celtic for "an island," and "shona" (pronounced "ona") means "blessed," which united, gives Iona, the "Blessed Isle."

his beloved Ireland. "Death in faultless Ireland is better than life without end in Albyn!" he exclaims, and this intense home-longing is poured forth in a message to his native land:

"What joy to fly upon the whitecrested sea, and to watch the waves beat upon the Irish shore! What joy to row the little bark and land among the whitening foam upon the Irish shore! * ** 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 grey eyes when I turn to Erin-to Erin where the songs are so sweet, and where the clerks sing like the birds. * * * 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."

It is said that our saint through all his long exile could never trust himself to speak Ireland's name, and when bidding farewell to guests who were to return thither, could only say, "You will return to the country you love."

After having provided his monks with such material shelter as was needful, Columba devoted every thought to animating the new community with an exalted spirit of self-sacrifice and zeal for souls, and to establishing a comprehensive system of active service which combined the most fruitful forms of intellectual and manual labor. The great abbot then commenced making friendly overtures to the inhabitants of the neighboring regions, confirming many in the faith, converting still greater numbers, and so, little by little, ever carrying the

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TOMBS OF THE KINGS, ST, ORAN'S CHAPEL, AND IONA CATHEDRAL.

sage, believing in Christ, learned, chaste, and charitable: he was noble, he was gentle, he was the physician of the heart of every sage, a shelter to the naked, a consolation to the poor: there I went not from the world one who was more constant in the remembrance of the cross."

Thus during a missionary career of over thirty-four years Columba not only bore the Gospel's glad tidings to the people of the neighboring islands, but undertook countless perilous sea-voyages to the war-like tribes of Caledonia's uttermost north; to those formidable tribes who, according to Tacitus, inhabited the extremities of the earth and were the last and victorious champions of freedom against the Roman invaders.

churches and schools, and taught the civilizing industries of agriculture and navigation. An ancient song expresses the affection inspired by these daring navigators, who counted no danger of the treacherous sea too great to encounter when there was hope of winning souls to their divine Master:

"Honor to the soldiers who live at Iona. There are three times fifty under the monastic rule,

Seventy of whom are appointed to row, And cross the sea in their leathern bark."

Besides making these missionary voyages to Caledonia's Ultima Thule, Columba, in his later years, visited his monastic foundations in Ireland, acting on these occasions as arbiter in various national difficulties, notably in that aris

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