matter to the count, and Rumbold was given burial. This is positively all that Theodoric could learn of the history of the saint, three or four hundred years after his time. Popular tradition, however, has busied itself in improving the story, and has made Rumbold, the son of David, king of Scotland, and archbishop of Dublin. There is not the slightest foundation for this, and it is to be regretted that Baronius, led away by the popular story, should have given it prominence in the Roman Martyrology. It will be seen that neither Baldric nor Theodoric say that Rumbolt was even a bishop, much less archbishop of Dublin. The see of Dublin was not raised into an archbishopric till four hundred years later, and indeed Dublin was not even a bishopric till erected by Amlaf in 1008. To escape this difficulty, Miraeus supposes that for Dublin should be read Dumblane, but by this means he falls on another horn, for it is certain that Scotia, among ancient writers, never meant Scotland, but Ireland. On the presumption of the Scottish origin of the bishopric of Mechlin, the see has the Scottish arms for its coat. The fable of his having been of Scottish origin spread to Scotland, and was accepted by the Church there, for S. Rumold or Rumald appears in the Aberdeen Breviary of the 15th cent., printed in 1509, thus: "S. Rumold, bishop of Dunelm, or of Dunblane in Scotland, son of the king of the Scots, apostle and patron of Mechlin, martyr." The lessons for the festival state that he was the son of David, king of Scotland and of Cecilia, daughter of the king of Sicily, and that he was born in the good city of Berwick, after his parents had been long childless, at the supplication of Wallafer, archbishop of Dublin or Dumblane, &c. These lessons are taken from a legendary life of S. Rumbold, written after that of Theodoric, certainly not earlier than the 13th cent., which is minute in all its particulars, giving the very words which angels used when addressing the saint, but which is utterly worthless historically. How the story has developed may be judged by the following list of paintings in the cathedral of Mechlin, illustrating the life of the saint. The inscriptions under each are given: 1. "S. Rumold confirmed the faith and healed many sick. His father, dying, advised him to abdicate the throne and his episcopate." 2. "S. Rumold crossed the sea in a boat of woven vine-twigs. He healed a man blind from his birth in France." 3. "S. Rumold resigned his bishopric into the hands of Pope Stephen II.,1 and devoted himself to works of penance." 4. "S. Rumold ardently desired martyrdom. An angel answered, Friend of God be of good cheer, thou art heard. And having obtained leave of the pope, he departed." 5. "S. Rumold approaching Mechlin on Good Friday, saw a great multitude dancing, whereupon he made to them a lamentable sermon on the Lord's Passion. Count Adolphus, by messengers, invited him to his house." 6. "Like the prophet he predicted that Eliza (Count Adolphus' wife) should bear a son." 7. "The countess brought forth an infant named Libertus, and Rumold baptized the heir at Mechlin." 8. "The infant having been three days under water, the saint by his prayers and genuflexions restored him to life and health." 9. "S. Rumold expels a devil. Liberatus being wounded to death is left for dead. people intercede with the saint, that he may obtain bodily health." 10. "S. Rumold and S. Gummar frequently meet in the road to Lyra (Lier) with crosses and ecclesiastical banners. The staves which they had planted in the ground began to bear leaf." II. "S. Rumold rebuked one of his workmen for adultery. The man thought, I can easily withstand thee, and he invited another to assist in 1 Elected A.D. 752, murdered the same year. The murdering him." 12. 13. "Fisher “S. Rumold died for the truth, rebuking the sins of the workmen; a light from heaven shone on the body thrown into the water." men rowed to the body, and found it hid. The count grieved greatly." The rest relate to marvels after his death, as a Norman attempting to take the weather-cock off the steeple, and tumbling down dead, a woman's cock carried off by a fox, but restored on her invoking S. Rumold, &c. The relics of S. Rumold are preserved at Mechlin in a silver shrine, and are carried in procession round the town on the first Sunday in July. S. REGINA, COUNTESS. (END OF 8TH CENT.) [Later Belgian Martyrologies, as Molanus and Miræus. Saussaye in his Gallican Martyrology. Authority:-The lections for her festival in the office book of Denain, near Valenciennes.] S. REGINA, of S. Reine, as she is called in France, was born of noble parents, in the reign of Pepin, father of Charlemagne, and was given in marriage to Adalbert, one of the nobles at court, a man of great virtue, by whom she had ten daughters, amongst whom was S. Ragnfried (Oct. 8th). In the county of Ostrevandt or French Flanders, the pious couple and their daughters laboured to make the people happy by the gentleness of their rule, and their solicitude for their spiritual and material prosperity. On the death of Adalbert, Regina founded the abbey of Denain, near Valenciennes, and constituted her daughter Ragnfried the first abbess. She lived in the exercise of every virtue till her death. She and Adalbert were laid in the church of Denain, and their daughter was afterwards laid at their side. July 2. THE VISITATION OF THE B. V. MARY. SS. PROCESSUS AND MARTINIAN, MM. at Rome, xst cent. SS. THREE SOLDIERS, who suffered with S. Paul at Rome, A.D. 65. S. MONEGUNDA, W.R. at Tours, circ. A.D. 570. S. OUDOC, B.C. at Llandaff, A.D. 564. S. SWITHUN, B. of Winchester, A.D. 862. S. LIDAN, Ab. of Sezza, in Italy, A.D. 1118. S. OTTO, B. Ap. of Pomerania, A.D. 1139. B. PETER OF LUXEMBURG, Card. B. of Metz, A.D. 1387. THE VISITATION OF THE B. V. MARY. [Roman Martyrology, Sarum and York Kalendars, and Anglican Reformed Kalendar. No such festival in the Eastern Church apart from the Nativity of S. John. The festival originated in France in the middle of the 13th cent. The council of Le Mans, in 1247, speaks of it, and orders its observance in that diocese. S. Bonaventura, general of the Franciscan Order, was most urgent to introduce it. In the assembly of the Order, in 1263, he ordered this festival to be observed throughout the Franciscan Order. As, at that time, the Franciscan Breviary was used in many churches, the celebration of the festival spread, and several churches adopted it from the Franciscans. Pope Urban VI., seeing the Church rent with schisms (A.D. 1378), resolved to institute this festival throughout the Church, in the hopes that God, at the supplication of S. Mary, would visit and relieve, and unite, His Church. He had already prepared a decree on the subject, and enjoined on Cardinal Ady, an Englishman, to prepare an office for the festival, when he died. His successor, Boniface IX., published the decree of his predecessor in the first year of his pontificate. Urban VI. had made it a festival with vigil and octave, Boniface IX. did the same, and indulgenced it. Those churches and countries which adhered to Boniface IX. adopted the festival, and it was celebrated at Cologne and in Liége in 1396, and in the calendar was inserted as a red-letter day. In Liége, however, according to a note in an old Breviary, it had been celebrated before, and for the first time in 1316. The office used was probably that drawn up by Cardinal Ady, and is published in the Cologne Missal of 1512. But the party holding to the antipope at Avignon, with France and Spain, refused to receive the festival, and thus matters stood, till the Council of Basle, in 1441, which decided that the feast should be celebrated throughout the Western Church, and published |