In his day the bards in Ireland had become an intolerable nuisance—idle, numerous, and insolent; in fact they had developed into a loafing class, who quartered themselves on the working-classes, on the chiefs and farmers. They went about the country in bands, carrying a silver pot, nicknamed by the people “the pot of Avarice.” Their tyranny was such that he who refused to contribute was mercilessly satirised and disgraced. Three attempts had been made to suppress them, but hitherto to no purpose. At length Aedh, the High King of Ireland, considering them to be too heavy a burden on the land, resolved to banish the whole profession. Summoning a great Convention of all Ireland to Drumceat in 590 to settle important national affairs, he made this one of the chief items. And the fate of the bardic institution would most certainly have been sealed had not Columcille averted it. With 140 followers he had crossed over to attend the Conference, and besides obtaining exemption from military service for the women, and independence and freedom from taxation for Dalriada, which was henceforth simply to help the parent kingdom in affairs of war, he also succeeded in moderating the fury of the chieftains against the bards. Their numbers were reduced and their prestige abated, but the profession was amply compensated for this by acquiring a new and recognised position in the State. No bards except those specially sanctioned were to pursue the poetic calling. But for the maintenance of these latter distinct public estates in land were set apart for the first time, in return for which they were obliged to give public instruction to all comers in the learning of the day, after the manner of university professors. The rate of reward for their poems was also legally fixed, so that from this time down to the seventeenth century the bardic colleges, as distinct from the ecclesiastical ones, taught poetry, law, and history, educating the lawyers, judges, and poets of the Irish nation.