68 



refers the "transmarine nations" to the Scots of North Britain and the 

 Picts, as both coming from beyond the friths. Even this unauthorized 

 interpretation, which cannot be correct, if " a circione" means from 

 the west, does not invahdate the testimonies that the inhabitants of Ire- 

 land were deeply concerned as auxiliaries, while it clearly evinces Bede's 

 conception, that the Scotch colonization had then previously taken 

 place. " We call these nations transmarine, not because they are 

 situated out of the island of Britannia, but because they were removed 

 from the part occupied by the Britons, by two friths communicating 

 respectively with sea, the one from the eastern sea, the other from 

 the western."* 



The second devastation, described at great length by Gildas, 

 (cs. 13 and 14,) is referred by Doctor O'Conor to A. D. 396, and by 

 Whitaker-f- to 395. The latter author, in the result of his inquiry, de- 

 tails it as a grand naval expedition from Ireland, commanded by Nial 

 of the nine hostages. |, It seems to have been upon this occasion, that 

 Stilicho distinguished himself in the manner celebrated by his pane- 

 gyrist. "Me too," Britannia is supposed to speak, "when I was 

 perishing under the inflictions of neighbouring nations, me too did 

 Stilicho assist, at the time when the Scots moved all Ireland (lerne) 

 against me, and the sea was harassed with their hostile oars. By 

 his care I was enabled no longer to tremble at the Pict, to dread the 

 Scottish weapons, or listen with fear from all my shores to the doubt- 



* " Transmarinas autem dicimus has gentes, non quod extra Britanniam essent positae, 

 sed quia a parte Britonum erant remotae, duobus sinibus mari interjacentibus, quorum unus 

 ab orientali mari, alter ab occidentali &c." — Bede's Eecl. Hist. 1. 1. c. 12. 



t Hist. Manchester, vol. 1. p. 459. 



j This Nial, the Arthur of the West, was the founder of the noble house of O'Neill ; a 

 family so interwoven with the annals of Ireland, that its biography would be the history of 

 the country. 



