[122] Benignus was, says the author of the Tripartite Life of St. Patrick, an “adolescens facie decorus, vultu modestus, moribus integer, nomine uti et in re Benignus,” and his voice “cunctos oblectans.”
[123] The full title of the work is De Excidio Britaniæ Liber Querulus.
[124] “The penmanship is,” says Bishop Reeves, “of extreme elegance, and is admirable throughout for its distinctness and uniformity.”
[125] “Ferdomnach hunc librum, dictante Torbach, herede Patricii scripsit.” The only word somewhat illegible is “Torbach.”
[126] This is the only complete copy of the Scriptures of the New Testament, which has come down to our times from the Celtic Church of Ireland. The rest were all destroyed by the Danes.
[127] The ornamentation is so minute and elaborate that Professor Westwood declares that he counted in the small space of three quarters of an inch long by less than half-an-inch in width, no fewer than 158 interlacements of a slender ribbon pattern!—Archæol. Journal, vol. x. p. 278.
[128] If the nuns at Clonbroney, Co. Longford, were not before them.
[129] Tripartite, page 37.—“Patrick went to Inver Boinde. He found a wizard in that place who mocked at Mary’s virginity. Patrick sained the earth, and it swallowed up the wizard.”
[130] Aubrey de Vere, Legends of St. Patrick.
[131] See O’Hanlon’s Life of St. Brigid.