185 



but that there should exist, in some cases at least, some tradition of 

 the patron saint who was so highly honoured ; yet, itmumerable as 

 are the surviving legends of our early teachers, pointing out the re- 

 spective scenes of their labours, recording their fasts, their suffer- 

 ings, and their supposed miracles, detailing the buildings which 

 they raised, and enumerating the churches and monasteries which 

 they founded, — not even a single tradition connects the name of 

 any one of these holy men with a tower,* although in many in- 

 stances positively attaching one to the ancient church in its imme- 

 diate vicinity. 



They have been thought to be towers in which anchorites dwelt, 

 analogously to the manner in which Symeon the stylite is said to 

 have lived on the top of a pillar.-f- To this idea we must object 

 that a hollow tower, from ninety to a hundred and thirty feet high, 

 and finishing in a cone, bears no resemblance to a solid pillar of 

 forty feet,:{: surrounded at top by a railing to support the anchorite's 

 body, and enable him to make himself miserable without the danger of 

 falling to the ground. In the towers they would have been comfortably 

 sheltered from the weather, and would not have been exposed to the 

 gaze of an admiring world, nor would such a confinement have had 

 any thing of the marvellous in the eyes of the multitude. Had such 

 been their purpose, would not enthusiasm have multiplied the abodes 

 of the devotee, around the favourite shrines, as the cells of hermits are 



* It is indeed remarkable, that where any tradition regarding a tower does exist, it always 

 connects the tower with witchcraft or magic. 



f Harris in Ware — Smith's History of Waterford, pp. 357 and 358. 



J Dr. Milner's Tour in Ireland, p. 138. 



At the east end of the ancient cathedral of Down are two square columns, one of which is 

 solid ; the other is hollow, containing winding steps to the top. These, particularly the latter, 

 somewhat resemble the stylite pillar — Harris's History of Down, p. 27- 

 YOT.. XV. B B 



