40 SAINT MODWEN. 
to Ireland at this time and remained there to study. When 
he wished to return to England, the Irish King wanted to 
give him a present. His treasury was empty, so he 
ordered a kinsman to go and rob some church or convent 
and give the spoil to the prince. The noble fell on the 
lands of the convent of Modwenna and pillaged them and 
the Church. S. Modwen took ship and crossed the sea, and 
found Prince Alfrid at Whitby, A.D. 685, and demanded 
redress. The prince promised to pay all, and _ placed 
S. Modwen in the famous double Monastery of Whitby, 
founded by S. Hilda. His own sister Elfleda was there, 
and he committed her to S. Modwen to be instructed. 
- Elfleda was then aged thirty-one, three years later she suc- 
ceeded to the place of S. Hilda as Second Abbess of 
Whitby. Then S. Modwen returned to Ireland and visited 
her foundations there. After a while she made a pilgrimage 
to Rome, and in passing through England, founded a 
religious House at Burton-on-Trent, and left in it some of 
her nuns. She then returned to Ireland, and learning that 
her brother Roan, who was a holy Abbot, was labouring 
in Scotland, she determined to settle there. 
Here she founded several Religious Houses in succession, 
and a Church dedicated to S. Michael on the rock of 
Dunedin or Edinburgh. She also made a foundation at 
Killnicase in Galloway, another on a mountain named 
Dundenel. a third at Dumbarton, a fourth at Stirling, a 
fifth at Dunpeleder, a sixth near the Seal’s Cliffe at 
S. Andrew’s Isle (Ardrossan near Saltcoats), and she is 
said to have died at Langfortin, in Scotland, and her body 
was translated to Burton. 
Such is the brief outline of the life of our patron Saint. 
Now let us try and gather from the early writers what we 
can about her Burton foundation. 
Pinaeus the Bollandist, who, as I said before, quoted 
from Geoffry’s MSS., writes—‘‘ But when Saint Modwen 
