S. Patrick belongs, we do not doubt, to true history; but there is no doubt as to the richness of the legendary element in his life. Much the same is true of S. Wandrille. Few Englishmen, we suspect, have heard his name; but he was a great figure in an age which Mabillon called golden in its religious aspect, the strange, wild time of the Merwings, the seventh century after Christ. In 648 S. Wandrille founded the abbey of Fontenelle, in the district of Caux. He lived till a great age, his death being probably much later than 667, to which year it has been assigned. His career affords a very vivid picture of the monastic life of the time, standing out amid the darkness of crime. He rightly emphasises the holiness and wisdom and learning of the great bishops of the Merwing age. It was their work as leaders, missionaries, statesmen in the highest Christian sense which the monasteries were called upon to continue and perfect. The monasteries were the refuge and the rallying-ground of those who fought against the secularisation of the Church at the hands of the Gallo-Roman aristocracy. S. Wandrille, born of the great Karling house, was a leader among leaders, statesman among statesmen, monk among monks. He was one who passed from a great though barbaric court, where he had been a trusted official, into the strictness of monastic training, and then into the solitude of secluded communion with God. Such lives as his were the great attractive forces of the seventh century; such retreats as the valley of Fontenelle were the centres of Christian influence of the age. {58} Between these men and Gregory of Tours it might seem that there was little in common. But there were others whose lives combined the interests of the two, the interests of monk and statesman and bishop. [Sidenote: S. Didier.] Another great clerk of the seventh century who must not be forgotten is S. Didier (Desiderius) of Cahors, at one time treasurer of Chlothochar II, and of Dagobert I., the friend of saints like Eloi (Eligius), Ouen, and Arnulf. Through him we learn something of the religious life of Southern Gaul. He died probably in 655, and thus he represented the earlier part of the seventh century. His biographer gives a long list of the holy bishops who were his contemporaries, and of the churches and monasteries which were scattered thickly over the land. The whole tone of his writing--earnest, biblical, spiritual, shows how the Church, in spite of weakness and sloth and failure in some of her chief men, yet held up a standard of right and justice, purity and devotion, which penetrated all over the country, into castles and humble homesteads, and profoundly affected the whole national life. And this work was concentrated in the public eye in those good men who at court, amid good and ill report, lived as servants of Him who went about doing good.