THE PKESIDENT's ADDBES3. 23 



or septennial conventions of the whole Irish race, weakened the 

 prestige of the central ruler, increased the power of the pro- 

 vincial chieftains, segregated the clans of Ireland from one 

 another, and opened a new road for faction and dissention 

 throughout the entire island."! 



One day St. Cuimen preached to the disciples of St. Mochuda 

 {circ. 650) and drew them about him ; this enraged the latter 

 saint, who cursed St. Cuimen that never thenceforth should he 

 get any profit out of his sermons. After that Cuimen' s success 

 in preaching left him. J 



King Eaghallach of Connaught put away his wife, and fell 

 desperately in love with his own daughter. This created great 

 scandal, and the saints in Ireland, summoned by St. Fechin of 

 Fore, proceeded to fast against him — a process to be described 

 presently, and then to curse him, so that before the ensuing Bel- 

 tane he might perish at the hands of churls, in a dirty ditch, slain 

 by base weapons ; all which we are informed came to pass, for 

 when out hunting, having killed a stag, some of the churls who 

 were turf-cutting, finding the king alone, murdered him in a 

 peat dyke with their spades, that they might secure the meat for 

 themselves. § 



There is a story in the Legend of St. Herve, the blind poet 

 of Brittany, that shews a process in force in Armorica like that 

 described as customary in Ireland. The prince, Conmore, who 

 had usurped the sovereignty over Dumnonia (in Armorica) about 

 540, incurred the resentment of the bard-saint, and he summoned 

 the bishops of Brittany to the top of Menez Bre, and from the 

 mountain top they united in a sentence of excommunication 

 against Conmore. This is, one cannot doubt, the pagan launching 

 of a lampoon, or a curse,masquerading in mediaeval Latin guise. 



The office of satirist seems speedily to have been absorbed 

 in that of grand curser. But as we learn that Murtogh Mac- 

 Earca was banished Ireland for murdering the crozier bearers, 

 for lampooning him, it would seem that for a while it was 

 transferred to the comarb of the saint. But what tended to 



+ Douglas Hyde : " A Literary History of Ireland," Lond., 1899, p. 226. 

 J Fragmentary Annals, in " Silva Gadelica," ii p. 436. 

 § Fragmentary Annals in " Silva Gadelica," ii, 430, 



