about the island intended. It was small, and the population of

both sexes amounted to only thirty. This is the number in St. Marculf's life as well. Of these one was paralytic, and one lame. They lay on a rock, and the mark of their legs is there to this day, i.e., the day of the biographer. On the same hard rock St. Helerius slept, and the mark of his head is there also.*

They preached, and fastedfasted so effectually, that a few years afterwards, when St. Marculf came to visit, he did not know, them.

And now there are three saints in Jersey; St. Romard, St. Marculf, and St. Helerius. But the times were wicked, and there were pirates abroad.

In

the life of St. Helerius they are called Vandals, in the life of St. Marculf Saxons. If Vandal mean anything, in other words, if

The Hermitage, near Elizabeth Castle, represented in the engraving, is popu larly attributed to St. Helerius or Hilarius, and is interesting geologically as well as historically. It is a mere fragment of a building of rough masonry, on one of a group of detached rocks, evidently torn and broken by the sea since the building was erected.

Other small fragments of similar masonry are on another adjacent rock that may once have been connected. There are also on the rock shown in the illustration very distinct remains of an ancient sea beach, now laid bare by the action of the waves, and likely to be soon removed.

The style of masonry and the nature of the building hardly seem to belong to so ancient a period as that of the real saint.-D. T. A.

it be anything more than a term arising out of the association between the Goths and Vandals, it means either actual pirates from the Slavonian coast of the Baltic, which is not impossible, or Andalusian Spaniards, which is probable. They come, however, in one of the lives from the Orkneys. They come as expected enemies; expected, but feared. St. Marculf had had a dream, which told him what was coming, and he prepared his friends for the worst. The pirates came. The details of their attack are slightly different in the two lives, as are the names and numbers. But they landed. As they were landing, however, one of the saints stretched out his hand, and their ships were all blown off to sea. Then, like the men from the dragon's teeth that were saved by Cadmus, they fought against each other. Still enough were left to decapitate St. Helerius. After which begins the history of his dead body; which may, at the present moment, be either in Jersey, or in Belgium, at the confluence of the Rhine, the Maes, and the Vhal, or in Britany.

Igitur merito lætaris,

Devota Britannia,

Quod thesauro fruaris,

Quod dedit Alemannia.

So runs a later piece of verse.

Another names the Vandals as the murderers.

Hunc quem confecerant sitis et macies,

Minuit capite Vandalis acies,

Novum, quod mortuus propriis manibus,

Cervicem detulit plus centum passubus.

With the name of Magloire, the historical character improves. Magloire, however, belongs to Britany and St. Malo, rather than to Jersey or Guernsey, to St. Helier's or St. Sampson's. Nor is it in the character of the biography that the improvement consists. Similar miracles, similar removals of the body, similar burials in two places at once, characterise St. Magloire's life. Still, he is more historical than either of the other two. He

INTRODUCTION OF CHRISTIANITY.

325

was an Irish missionary; and, as the century was just the time when the Irish was, pre-eminently, the missionary church of the western world, it is more than probable that, like so many other districts, the Channel Islands owed their earliest Christianity to the monks of the school of St. Columbanus.

The fact, however, which lies beyond either doubt or suspicion is that it is to Britany rather than to Normandy that the early ecclesiastical history connects them. It was the diocese of Dol to which they belonged. Nor is this distinction unimportant. Norman as they have been for the last 1,000 years, they seem originally to have been less Norman than Breton; less Norman than Breton so far, at least, as there was, in the sixth century, any notable distinction between the two.

At what period the present broad distinction between the two provinces began is uncertain. The distinction, however, is a valid and decided one. That there are some German and Norse, or Scandinavian, elements in Britany is true; and it is true that there is a good deal of what is Keltic in Normandy. Upon the whole, however, Normandy is the pre-eminently German, and Britany the pre-eminently Keltic portion of France. The local names tell us this, if every other sign were absent; but there is much on each side beyond the names. Up, however, to a . certain point, the Channel Islands seem to have gone with Britany.

The exact details of the introduction of Christianity in the Channel Islands are absolutely unattainable. With readers who are not prepared to receive with implicit belief the whole mass of unproven and miraculous narrative which constitutes the so-called Lives of the Saints, and with critics who are as well aware as they ought to be of the general unauthenticity of all the earliest monastic grants and charters, it is superfluous to enlarge upon this. At the same time, the general character of the first conversions from Paganism is by no means obscure. We can represent it to a great extent.

It was, in the main, Irish; in saying which, it may be well to add that the assertion is not made by an Irishman. When all that can be said or done in the way of deduction from the extravagant claims of the over-patriotic Irish antiquaries of both the last century and the present has been said and done— when the claims for the green land of Erin having been an isle of saints and a sanctuary for simplicity, orthodoxy, and learning, have been set aside, there still remains the undoubted fact that, for the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries, the Irish Church was not only a Christian, but a missionary, one; indeed, with the exception of the two great organized capitals— Rome and Constantinople-it was more so than any other. And it was a Missionary Church in the best sense,-simple, active, and single-minded; with no political ends to subserve, and with nothing but a purely apostolic mission to fulfil. The evidence of this, not resting upon the lives of its saints (though these are, on the whole, more truthful than any others) lies in the earliest accounts of Anglo-Saxon Christianity, and in the numerous German and Italian monasteries which, as has been shown from the Irish MSS. they possess, were regulated after the Irish discipline, and inspected, if not superintended, from Ireland.

These are simply historical facts. In a more special view of the matter, we find that it was with the populations of British and German origin that the Irish missionaries most interested themselves; so that Britany is, of all others, the country in which they are most to be expected. The name, then, of the chief Breton saint, Maglorius, is Irish, and from him comes the name of St. Malo. That the islands were just the spots which such missionaries would choose, we infer from their establishments in the western islands of Scotland; especially Hi, Iona, or Icolmkill. Their discipline was, essentially, anchoritic and recluse; and the lone island, with a rude and simple congregation, was what they best loved. Other propagandists

founded churches; and, in England, we find names like Dunchurch, and Orms-kirk; but, with the Irish, the church was no assembly, but a hermitage, and all the churches in Ireland are cells-Kil-kenny, Kil-dare, Icolm-kill-Columbani-cella. Surely, all this points in the same direction as the name Magloire and as the few historical notices which we possess. More than this, it improves the evidence in favour of the islands having been, at the introduction of Christianity, lone spots such as anchorites would love, rather than marts of trade, or nests of pirates, for which, if we looked to their position alone, we might fairly take them.

That they had always been this, is by no means, asserted. There was, probably, a Roman garrison on one of them. But it was, apparently, one of no historical importance. It is probable, however, that, with some such trifling exception as this, they were, till the time of Maglorius, the permanent occupation of a few fishers, visited occasionally, or periodically, for purposes which will be noticed in the sequel, by the pagans of the mainland.