APPARITION TIDE. 129 



MAY 8. Apparition of St. Michael, archangel. 



St. Peter, b. of Tarentaise, a.-d. 1174. 



St. Victor, martyr, 303. 



St. Wiro, bishop in Ireland. 



St. Odrian, bishop in Ireland. 



St. Gybrian of Ireland, priest, 8th cent. 



Obs. Among the holy Archangels, three are particularly distin- 

 guished in holy writ, Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael. St. 

 i\]ichael has ever been honoured in the holy church as her guardian 

 under God and the protector of the faithful. The church has been 

 encouraged in her devotion towards the Angels by several appari- 

 tions : of the glorious St. Michael it is recoi ded, that in a vision he 

 admonished the Bishop of Siponto to build a church in his honour on 

 Mount Gargano, now called Monte de Saint Angelo, in the kingdom 

 of Naples. The Greeks mention in their Menaea a famous appari- 

 tion of St. Michael at Chone the ancient Colossae in Phrygia. 



Lilly of the Valley Convallaria Maialis flowers. 



Celandine Chelidonium majus flowers. 



Welsh Poppy Palaver Cambricum flowers. 



The Lilly of the Valley is abundantly wild in all the wet places 

 by the sides of ditches and pools in Sussex ; it is in flower from now 

 to the end of May. The Welsh Poppy blows till June, and spa- 

 ringly the rest of the summer. The Great Bracteate Poppy in 

 early years blows, and we have seen the Monkey Poppy in flower 

 on this day at Hackney. 



Swift Cypselus apus arrives. 



This bird, now seen sparingly in the southern counties of England, 

 is (jmmon about the 14th of the month everywhere; it inhabits old 

 ruined buildings, towers and steeples, or under the roofs of houses. 

 In the middle of the hot days it lies still, but of a morning and eve- 

 ning flies about squeaking very loud in search of its food, and it 

 remains abroad longer in the evening than either the Swallow or 

 the ]Manlet. In a warm summer morning these birds may be seen 

 flying round in small companies, and all squeaking together ; in the 

 evening they come forth again ; but there are times in the middle of 

 the day when few or none of these birds are seen. Its bold and ra- 

 pid flight, so contrasted to that of the Sand Martin, is thus well 

 epigrammatized : 



Cypselus in vacuo rapidis volat aethere pennis 

 ^.'ecraetuitaquilas accipitrerave feram. 



