60 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



They sail over the waters for five years, and see many islands, but not the one sought. 

 They are nearly engulfed by a whirlpool, but Brendan calms it. [The Irish were, 

 of course, familiar with the whirlpools resulting from tidal movements among the 

 Irish and Scottish islands; that between Rathlin and the coast of Antiim is frequently 

 mentioned in the early literature.] The devil alights on the mast and shows Brendan 

 the mouth of hell; one of the monks asks to see it, and dies at the sight. Brendan 

 revives him, but, we are assured, not without great labour. On a seacoast they find 

 a dead girl of a stature of one hundred feet. Brendan brings her to life and baptizes 

 her, after which she once more expires. [Resuscitation for the sake of baptism is a 

 commonplace of hagiography, but the other elements of the episode bring into the 

 Brendan legend the myth of the muirgeilt, "sea-wanderer" — an Irish variation of 

 the mermaid story — who, according to the independent form of the myth, was bap- 

 tized by Brendan's contemporary and friend, Comgall of Bangor. >] At length they 

 come to an island with high, perpendicular sides [we are reminded of Bishop's 

 Island], on which they see a church whence wonderful singing is heard. After they 

 have long attempted in vain to land, a tablet is let down to Brendan telling him 

 that it is not the island he seeks, and that he is to return home. This he does. 



The Second Voyage follows soon after the first. Brendan visits St. Ita, who had 

 reared him when he was a child, and is told by her that the cause of his failure is that 

 he sought the sacred island in the skins of dead animals. He will find it in a ship 

 built of planks. He acts on this lesson in contagious magic, and builds his ship. 

 Sixty persons are taken on board, among them the carpenters and smiths — as we 

 proceed we find there was only one smith, and probably only one carpenter — and a 

 herald, or buffoon. They set out from St. Enda's monastery on the Aran islands in 

 Galway bay, [This is probably a Connaught version, which had been modified when 

 ocean going ships of the Viking model began to take the place of coracles on the west 

 coast. As will be seen the Navigatio harmonizes the Connaught and Kerry versions, 

 but ignores the wooden ship.] They come to an island where they are attacked by 

 mice as large as cats. The buffoon sacrifices himself — we have all heaid of the 

 faithful self — and receives heaven as his reward. The smith dies at sea, but what 

 became of the carpenter, v^ho in the original form of this version must also have been 

 disposed of, we are not told. They come to an island filled with demons in the shape 

 of pigmies, on which no one can land except him who has waged war and shed blood. 

 Having anchored off it for seven days, they lose their anchor. Brendan blesses the 

 hands of a priest, who then makes a perfectly good anchor — a magical acquisition 

 of technical skill not unknown elsewhere in hagiography and folklore. They find an 

 island where dwells an old hermit, the survivor of twelve who had come from Ireland. 

 At his warning they fly from a monstrous cat which pursues them; Brendan prays, 

 a beast rises from the sea, engages the cat, and both sink. The cat had developed 

 from a "very friendly little cat" brought by the pilgrims at their first coming. [This 

 also is an adaption of another Irish story which has independent existence.^] The 

 old man shows them how to reach the land they sought, and then, after receiving 

 the viaticum, expires. So the goal is finally attained. Here too they are welcomed 

 by an old man, this one clad in feathers as clothes. He has been here for sixty years 



^ Aided Echdach maic Maireda in Standish H. O'Grady Silva Gadelica (London 

 1892), vol. I, pp. 233-327, II, 265-269. C}. Anecdota from Irish Manuscripts, vol. 

 Ill (Halle and Dublin, 1910), p. 10; Annals of Ulster s. a. 572. 



2 Scéla an trir maccléirech, published by Henri Gaidoz in Mélusine, vol. IV 

 (1888), pp. 6-11, and by Whitley Stokes in Lives cf Saints from the Book of Lismore 

 pp. viii-x. See also Plummer in Zeitschrift fiir Cellische Philologie V 128 n.l. 



