The nobles of Hungary, dissatisfied with Matthias Corvinus, their king, son of the great Huniades, begged the king of Poland to allow them to place his son Casimir on the throne. The saint, then not quite fifteen years of age, was very unwilling to consent; but in compliance with his father's will, he went at the head of an army of twenty thousand men to the frontiers in 1471. There hearing that Matthias had formed an army of sixteen thousand men to oppose him, and that pope Sixtus IV. had sent an embassy to divert his father from the expedition, and finding that his soldiers were deserting him in great numbers, he joyfully returned. However, his conduct gave such offence to his father, whose ambition had been roused, that he was forbidden by him to enter Cracow, and ordered to take up his residence in the castle of Dobzki. After this, nothing would again induce him to resume the attempt, though again pressed by the Hungarians, and urged by his father. As the old Russian churches were falling out of repair, Casimir, with more zeal than discretion, persuaded his father to pass an edict forbidding the restoration and reconstruction of churches which did not belong to the Latin rite. Falling into a decline, the physicians recommended that he should relax his rigid chastity, but the young prince indignantly refused to defile his virgin body on the chance of thus prolonging his life a few months; and he died at the age of twenty-three, on March 4th, 1484, and was buried at Wilna, where his body is still preserved. [Illustration: Angels praying] March 5. S. THEOPHILUS, _B. of Cæsarea, in Palestine, circ._ A.D. 200. S. ADRIAN, _M. at Cæsarea, in Palestine_, A.D. 308 (_see S. Eubulus, March 7th_). S. PHOCAS, _M. at Antioch, in Syria, circ._ A.D. 320. S. GERASIMUS, _Ab. in Palestine_, A.D. 475. S. KIERAN OR PIRAN, _of Saigir, B. of Ossory, circ._ A.D. 552. S. VIRGILIUS, _Abp. of Arles, 7th cent._ S DRAUSINUS, _B. of Soissons, after_ A.D. 675. S. PETER DE CASTELNAU, _Mk. M. at S. Gilles, in the Narbonnaise_, A.D. 1209. S. JOHN-JOSEPH OF THE CROSS, _C. at Naples_, A.D. 1734. S. PHOCAS, M. (ABOUT A.D. 320.) [All the Latin Martyrologies, from the mention in which all that is known of him is derived.] At Antioch, after many sufferings endured for the name of Christ, Phocas triumphed over the Old Serpent, a victory which is testified, to this day, by a miracle. For whoever is bitten by a serpent, having touched, full of faith, the door of the basilica of the martyr, is immediately cured, the poison at once losing its power; so says the Roman Martyrology. S. GERASIMUS, AB. IN PALESTINE. (A.D. 475.) [Roman Martyrology. By the Greeks on March 4th and 20th. Authorities:--Mention in the lives of S. Euthymius and S. Quiriacus, by Cyril the Monk, fl. 548]