It was in consequence of a feud between the leading clans of the royal race of Ireland, that the apostle of the northern Picts first quitted the home of his earlier years and dedicated the remainder of his life to the labours of a missionary. On the occasion of one of those great meetings of the clergy and laity of Ireland, to which such frequent allusion is made in her annals, a son of Aodh, king of Connaught, who happened to be present in full reliance upon a promise of immunity from Columba, was seized and put to death by order of Dermot MacKerval, lord of the southern Hy Nial, and at that time _Ardrigh_, or supreme king of Ireland. Columba, who was then abbot of Durrow, was also a member of the same great sept, and closely allied by birth to the king of one of the northern branches--the Clan Conal; and his kinsmen, bound by the usual ties of relationship to avenge the insult, uniting with the king of Connaught, inflicted so severe a defeat upon the aggressor, that his whole wrath was turned upon Columba, whom he caused to be excommunicated by the leading clergy of Meath. Dreading the further effects of his enemy’s vengeance, Columba bade adieu to his native land; and, under the curse of man, sought those shores to which, under the blessing of God, he was destined to become, indeed, a messenger of good tidings.[5] Arriving with the usual complement of twelve followers, off the coast of Argyle, he obtained permission from Conal, king of the Dalriads, to appropriate the little island of Iona, and after employing himself for two years in establishing and regulating his brotherhood, he prepared to enter upon his allotted task, and to penetrate across the mountain barrier of Drumalban. [Sidenote: A. D. 565.] Not far from the spot where the river Ness issues from the parent lake of which it assumes the name, there still exist the vestiges of an ancient earthwork, ascribed by the tradition of the country to a Pictish king; and thither Columba and his companions bent their steps, for Bruidi MacMalcon, who at this time held supreme sway over both divisions of the Picts, held his court within the ramparts of this _Rath_ or _Dun_. As the arrival of the Christian missionary appears to have been expected, he was opposed by a number of the Pictish Druids, but as their hostility seems to have been limited to the use of incantations and enchantments, little real hindrance could have been offered to his progress, and he reached, without difficulty, the residence of the king. As the gates of the royal fortress close upon the little band, all knowledge ceases of the further proceedings of Columba; the bare record of the success of his mission has descended to posterity, and the people acquiescing, as in duty bound, in their sovereign’s renunciation of idolatry, both divisions of the Pictish people were henceforth united in belief.[6]