St Samson
We have already related the story of Samson’s birth. Another legend regarding him tells how one day when the youths attached to the monastery where he dwelt were out winnowing corn one of the monks was bitten by an adder and fainted with fright. Samson ran to St Iltud to tell the news, with tears in his eyes, and begged to be allowed to attempt the cure of the monk. Iltud gave him permission, and Samson, full of faith and enthusiasm, rubbed the bite with oil, and by degrees the monk recovered. After this Samson’s fame grew apace. Indeed, we are told that the monks grew jealous of him and attempted to poison him. He was ordained a bishop at York, and lived a most austere life, though his humanity was very apparent in his love for animals.
He was made abbot of a monastery, and endeavoured to instil temperance into the monks, but at length gave up the attempt in despair and settled in a cave at the mouth of the Severn. Then one night “a tall man” appeared to him in a vision, and bade him go to Armorica, saying to him—so the legend goes: “Thou goest by the sea, and where thou wilt disembark thou 350 shalt find a well. Over this thou wilt build a church, and around it will group the houses forming the city of which thou wilt be a bishop.” All of which came to pass, and for ages the town has been known as the episcopal city of Dol. Accompanied by forty monks, Samson crossed the Channel and landed in the Bay of Saint-Brieuc. One version of the story tells us that the Saint and numerous other monks fled from Britain to escape the Saxon tyranny, and that Samson and six of his suffragans who crossed the sea with him were known as the ‘Seven Saints of Brittany.’
Brittany’s Lawyer Saint
Few prosperous and wealthy countries produce saints in any great number, and in proof of the converse of this we find much hagiology in Brittany and Ireland. Let lawyers take note that while many saints spring from among the bourgeoisie they include few legal men. An outstanding exception to this rule is St Yves (or Yvo), probably the best known, and almost certainly the most beloved, saint in Brittany. St Yves is the only regularly canonized Breton saint. He was born at Kermartin, near Tréguier, in 1253, his father being lord of that place. The house where he first saw the light was pulled down in 1834, but the bed in which he was born is still preserved and shown. His name is borne by the majority of the inhabitants of the districts of Tréguier and Saint-Brieuc, and one authority tells us how “in the Breton tongue his praises are sung as follows:
N’hen eus ket en Breiz, n’hen eus ket unan,
N’hen eus ket uer Zant evel Sant Erwan.
This, in French, runs:
Il n’y a pas en Bretagne, il n’y en a pas un,