[14] It has often been said that the life of the saint in the Book of Armagh ignores the Roman Mission. But while the life of Muirchu Maccu Machteni does ignore it, Tirechan's his contemporary's, life, in the same book, distinctly acknowledges it, in these words, "deinde Patricius secundus ab anguelo dei, Victor nomine, _et a Celestino papa_ mittitur cui Hibernia tota credidit, qui eam pene totam bap[titzavit]." (_See_ chap. 56 of Tirechan's life.) [15] In Irish he is usually called Son of Alprann or Alplann, the C of Calpornus being evidently taken as belonging to the Mac, thus Mac Calprainn became Mac Alprainn. In the Brussels Codex of Muirchu Maccu Machteni's life, however, he is called _Alforni filius_, and the place of his birth is called _Ban navem thabur indecha_, supposed to be Killpatrick, near Dumbarton, in Scotland, which is evidently a corruption of his own Bannaven Taberniæ, which seems to mean River-head Tavern; it may be from the two words _navem thabur_ that St. Fiacc's hymn says that he was born in _nemthur_. Patrick himself only gives us two generations of his ancestry, and it is very significant of Irish ways to find Flann of Monasterboice, running it up to fourteen! [16] It is worth while to transcribe this passage as a fair specimen of St. Patrick's style and latinity. "Et ibi scilicet in sinu noctis virum venientem quasi de Hiberione cui nomen Victoricus, cum æpistulis innumerabilibus vidi; et dedit mihi unam ex his et legi principium æpistolæ continentem 'Uox Hiberionacum.' Et dum recitabam principium æpistolæ, putabam enim ipse in mente audire vocem ipsorum qui erant juxta silvam Focluti [in the county Mayo] quæ est prope mare occidentale. Et sic exclamaverunt: 'Rogamus te sancte puer ut venias et adhuc ambulas inter nos.' Et valde compunctus sum corde, et amplius non potui legere. Et sic expertus [_i.e._ experrectus] sum. Deo gratias quia post plurimos annos præstitit illis Dominus secundum clamorum illorum" (Folio 23, 66, Book of Armagh, p. 126 of Father Hogan's Bollandist edition). [17] The "Confession" ends with a certain rough eloquence: "Christus Dominus pauper fuit pro nobis; ego vero miser et infelix, et si opes voluero jam non habeo; neque me ipsum judico quia quotidie spero aut internicionem aut circumveniri, aut redigi in servitatem, sive occassio cujus-libet.... Et hæc est confessio mea antequam moriar." [18] Dr. Healy's "Ireland's Ancient Schools and Scholars," p. 68. [19] It is printed by Haddan and Stubbs, "Councils," etc., vol. ii. p. 314. [20] This is certainly the first time on record that this question--so often repeated since in so many different forms--was asked. [21] See the original in Windsch's "Irische Texte," 1. p. 53, and Todd's "Liber Hymnorum"--