1891-92]. COLUM CILLE. 143 
Tobar na h-aoise, the well of age. 
Uamh an t-seididh, the cave of blowing. 
Uamh nan calman, the cave of pigeons. 
Uamh na Caisg, the cave of Easter. 
An uiridh riomhach, the splendid bed. 
According to Adamnan, Columba was much devoted to writing. 
Three Latin Hymns are attributed to him. In the Burgundian Library 
at Brussels, there is a collection of some fifteen poems which bear his 
name. Inthe Bodleian Library at Oxford, there is a manuscript which 
it is said, “embraces everything in the shape of Poem or fragment that 
could be called Columba’s, and that industry was able to gather together 
at the middle of the sixteenth century.” A collection bearing the name, 
The Prophecies of St. Columb’Kille, was published in Dublin in 1856. 
Competent scholars, like Eugene O’Curry, strongly maintain that many 
of the poems which bear the name of Colum Cille are forgeries, and are on 
grounds of internal evidence to be assigned to a comparatively modern 
date. The Altus Prosator—Hominum Sator atque Deorum—is the 
name of a celebrated poem or hymn, which was written by St. Columba 
in Iona in honor of the Trinity, when the messengers of Pope Gregory 
came to him with the great cross and other presents. A careful 
edition of the A/tws has been published by Dr. Todd, one of the best 
Irish scholars of our time. 
In Leabhar na h-Uidhri, a copy of which is in my possession, Amra 
Colum Cille or the elegy of the poet Dallan Forgaill on the death of St. 
Columba, is contained. There is also a poem of eight verses which is 
attributed to St. Columba himself. It begins with the words, Dia ard 
airlethhar, May the High God advise us. 
The Gaels of Scotland are familiar with the sayings which have been 
assigned to St. Columba regarding women. “Far am bi bo, bithidh bean, 
agus far am bi bean, bithidh mallachadh. Where a cow will be, there 
will be a woman, and where a woman will be, there will be cursing.” 
It is said that Columba compelled the workmen, who were employed by 
him in the erection of various buildings in Iona, to reside on the shore of 
Mull, that the female members of their families might not come to 
Iona. 
His well known prophecy with regard to the future fortunes of Jona 
has been thus happily paraphrased: 
An I mo chridhe, I mo ghraidh, 
An aite guth manaich, bithidh geum ba, 
