To begin with the Irish missionary work in Great Britain. The people of Northern and Western Scotland, who were solidly pagan till the sixth century, were converted by St. Columkille and his monks from Iona, who were all Irishmen; for Iona was an Irish monastic colony founded by St. Columkille, a native of Tirconnell, now Donegal. In the seven kingdoms of England--the Heptarchy--the Anglo-Saxons were the ruling race, rude and stubborn, and greatly attached to their gloomy northern pagan gods. We know that the kingdom of Kent was converted by the Roman missionary St. Augustine; but Christianity made little headway outside this till St. Aidan began his labours among the Northumbrian Saxons. Aidan was an Irishman who entered the monastery of Iona, from which he was sent to preach to the Northumbrians on the invitation of their good king, Oswald. He founded the monastery of Lindisfarne, which afterwards became so illustrious. He was its first abbot; and for thirty years it was governed by him and by two other Irish abbots, Finan and Colman, in succession. He and his companions were wonderfully successful, so that the people of the large kingdom of Northumbria became Christians. Not only in Northumberland but all over England we find at the present day evidences of the active labours of the Irish missionaries in Great Britain. Whole crowds of ardent and learned Irishmen travelled on the Continent in the sixth, seventh, and succeeding centuries, spreading Christianity and secular knowledge everywhere among the people. On this point we have the decisive testimony of an eminent French writer of the ninth century, Eric of Auxerre, who himself witnessed what he records. In a letter written by him to Charles the Bald, king of France, he says:--“What shall I say of Ireland, who, despising the dangers of the deep, is migrating with almost her whole train of philosophers to our coasts?” And other foreign evidences of a like kind might be brought forward. These men, on their first appearance on the Continent, caused much surprise, they were so startlingly different from those preachers the people had been accustomed to. They travelled on foot towards their destination in small companies, generally of thirteen. They wore a coarse outer woollen garment, in colour as it came from the fleece, and under this a white tunic of finer stuff. The long hair behind flowed down on the back: and the eyelids were painted or stained black. Each had a long stout walking-stick: and slung from the shoulder a leathern bottle for water, and a wallet containing his greatest treasure--a book or two and some relics. They spoke a strange language among themselves, used Latin to those who understood it, and made use of an interpreter when preaching, until they had learned the language of the place.