that is, a boat made of hides, and carried out into deep water beyond the Isle of May. She remained all night alone in the midst of the sea, and when morning dawned she was in safety cast on the sand at Culenros, which, according to sailors’ computation, is thirty miles distant from the Isle of May. Here she suffered the pains of labour; and, as she lay on the ground, suddenly a heap of ashes which the day before had been gathered together close to the shore by some shepherds, was struck by a gust of the north wind, which scattered around her the sparks which lay hid within it. When, therefore, she had found the fire, the pregnant young woman dragged herself at once, as best she could, to the place indicated by God, and in her extreme necessity, with anxious groans, she made a little heap with the wood which had been collected the day before by the foresaid shepherds to prepare the fire. Having lighted the fire, she brought forth a son, the chamber of whose maturity was as rude as that of his conception. Some herds found her there with the child, and while some gave her food, others went straight to the blessed Servanus, who at that time was teaching the Christian law to his clerics, with one accord saying, ‘Sir, thus and thus have we found;’ to whom the saint said, _A Dia cur fir sin_, which in Latin means ‘O utinam si sic esset,’[356] and the youths replied, ‘Yea, father, it is a true tale and no fable which we tell; therefore we pray you, sir, come and see, that thy desire may without delay be satisfied;’ and he also, when he had learnt the order of the events, rejoiced with great joy, and said, ‘Thanks be to God, for he shall be my dear one.’ For as the child was being born, when he was in his oratory after morning lauds, he had heard on high the _Gloria in excelsis_ being solemnly sung. And after an address to his clerics, in which he vindicates the manner in which the conception of the blessed Kentigern had taken place, and ‘praises Him who alone governeth the world, and hath, among others, blessed our country Britain with such a patron,’ this fragment unfortunately terminates.[357] [Sidenote: Jocelyn’s account of his birth.]