You may know that this story is true because the Irish have always looked on the Isle of Mann as a parcel of their own land. They say that when Saint Patrick put the blessing of God on the soil of Ireland and all creatures that might live upon it, the power of that blessing was felt at the same time in the Island.
Saint Patrick was a mighty man,
He was a Saint so clever,
He gave the snakes and toads a twisht!
And banished them for ever.
And there is proof of the truth of the saying to this day, for while such nasty things do live in England they cannot breathe freely on the blessed soil.
The island was much larger then than it is now, but the magician who for a time ruled over it, as a revenge on one of his enemies, raised a furious wind in the air and in the bosom of the earth. This wind tore several pieces off the land and cast them into the sea. They floated about and were changed into the dangerous rocks which are now so much feared by ships. The smaller pieces became the shifting sands which wave round the coast, and are sometimes seen and sometimes disappear. Later the island was known as Ellan Sheaynt, the Isle of Peace, or the Holy Island. It was a place where there was always sunshine, and the singing of birds, the scent of sweet flowers, and apple-trees blossoming the whole year round. There was always enough there to eat and drink, and the horses of that place were fine and the women beautiful.
THE COMING OF SAINT PATRICK
It was the time that Saint Patrick was coming on horseback to Mann, over the sea from Ireland. When he drew near to the land, Manannan Mac y Leirr, that great wizard that was ruler of Mann, put a charm out of him that made the air round the island thick with mist, so that neither sun nor sky nor sea nor land could be seen. Patrick rode into the thick of the mist, but try as he would he could find no way out of it, and behind him there was a great sea-beast waiting to swallow him up. He didn’t know in his seven senses where he was—east, or west—and was for turning back, when there came to his ears the cry of a curlew, calling: