By the Rev. J. E. Jackson. 17 



others a Scot. It does not perhaps make much difference to us 

 which he was : but the point may be settled upon a classical model. 

 In one of the Latin plays of Plautus, the god Mercury comes in 

 to speak the prologue. He was of a very facetious and versatile 

 humour, anxious to please everybody. " Now," says he, " first of 

 all I come to tell you what this tragedy is about. What, good 

 people, do you frown ? Don't you want a tragedy ? Very well, 

 then I'll tell you what this comedy is about : for without altering a 

 line, I'll make it a comedy ; or, if you like it better, to please all 

 parties, it shall be a tragic-comedy." 



So with the case of Maldulph. Some say Irish, some say Scot, 

 we will say Irish-Scot. And so to call him, is in fact to call him 

 what he really was. For the country now called Scotland was not 

 so named in the days alluded to. Its name then was North 

 Britannia or Caledonia. The Scots were a people of Ireland, and 

 about the year 500, some of them migrated into Caledonia, taking 

 their name with them. Such of them as remained in Ireland, would 

 be distinguished as Irish Scots, and one of these was Maldulph. 



These Irish Scots were men of religion and of learning. It was 

 by their aid in great measure, coming over as missionaries from 

 Ireland, that the Saxon heathens were converted to Christianity. 

 The Christian religion had been brought into Britain long before, 

 but it had become very much debased, and the Irish Scot 

 Missionaries did a great deal to re-establish it, before Augustine 

 came from Rome. 



Maldulph obtained leave to reside under shelter of the fortress, 

 in that part of the town called Burnvale, where a chapel was 

 afterwards erected, now entirely gone. He is spoken of as having 

 been a hermit, probably one (of a class not uncommon in those 

 days) who, being more educated than the rest, and living alone, 

 was the " wise man of the place," consulted by everybody for every 

 thing. Some suppose that he was only a sort of hedge-school- 

 master, a collector of ragged scholars : but it is certain that he 

 must have been a person of learning and position, because we find 

 that among his scholars he reckoned one whom the kings of 

 Wessex were proud to call their relative, the celebrated Aldhelm. 



VOL. VIII. — NO. XXII. C 



