342. "Is named of Kinge Edmunde, whom the comon Chronicles call St Edmund, or Edmund the Martyr; for Bury is but to say a Court or Palace. It was first a Colledge of Priests, founded by Athelstane the kinge of Ingland, to the Honour and Memorye of Edmund that was slayne at Hoxton (then called Eylesdund [or Eglesdon], as Leland thinketh), whose Bones he removed thyther. The hole hystorie of this matter is so enterlaced with miracles, that Polydor himselfe (who beleaved them better then I) began to delye with it; sayinge, _that Monkes weare much delighted with them_" (Lambarde's "Dictionarium," p. 35). 343. This place, which was much frequented by pilgrims, was situate on a lake called Logh Derg, in the Southern part of the county of Donegal, near the borders of Tyrone and Fermanagh. It was surrounded with wild and barren mountains, and was almost inaccessible by horsemen even in summer time, on account of great bogs, rocks, and precipices which environed it. The popular tradition concerning it is as ridiculous as is to be found in any legend of the Romish Martyrology. After continuing in great credit many years, it began to decline; and in the 13th of Henry the Seventh was demolished with great solemnity, on St Patrick's Day, by the Pope's express order. It, however, afterwards came into reputation again, insomuch that, by an order of the Privy Council, dated 13th of September 1632, it was a second time destroyed. From this period, as pilgrimages grew less in fashion, it will appear extraordinary that the place should be a third time restored to its original state, and as much visited as in any former period. In this condition it continued until the second year of Queen Anne, when an Act of the Irish Parliament declared, that all meetings and assemblies there should be adjudged riots and unlawful assemblies, and inflicted a penalty upon every person meeting or assembling contrary to the Statute. The ceremonies to be performed by the pilgrims are very exactly set forth in Richardson's "Great Folly, Superstition, and Idolatry of Pilgrimages in Ireland, especially of that to St Patrick's Purgatory," Dublin, 8vo. 1727. Enough hath been already said on the subject of "Saint Patrick's Purgatory," I shall therefore only add, that it is often mentioned in Froissard's "Chronicle," and that Sir James Melvil, who visited it in 1545, describes it as looking "like an old coal-pit, which had taken fire, by reason of the smoke that came out of the hole" (Melvil's "Memoirs," p. 9., edit. 1683). It is mentioned in Erasmus's "Praise of Folie," 1549, Sign. A: "Whereas before ye satte all heavie and glommyng, as if ye had come lately from Troponius cave, or _Saint Pattrickes purgatorie_."