Lawlok — The Cathuch of St. Columba. 403 



and the omission has been supplied by another hand. It seemed to me, 

 when I saw the MS., to be a contemporary hand. The script of this supple- 

 ment is of much the same type as the cursive minuscule of the last eight 

 lines of fol. 5'', the difference being mainly due to the fact that this supple^ 

 ment was more restricted for space. A line had to be squeezed in between 

 the third and second last lines of the text, and other four lines had to be 

 squeezed into the lower margin. So the size of the script had to be reduced. 

 Most palaeographers would, I fancy, date this supplement later than the 

 Cathaeh. And probably, after comparing the Cathach script with the script 

 on this plate and on Gipolla, C. B., pi. 21, all would allow that Palaeography 

 offers no reason for disbelief of the tradition which assigns the Cathach to 

 the pen of St. Columba. 



II. The Colophon of the Durrow Book. 



From Dr. Lawlor's account,' from Prof. Abbott's final description in 

 " Hermath.," viii, 199 (1893), and from my own notes of a very hasty inspec- 

 tion, the following seems to be a true representation of the colophon : — 



« 



Eogo beatitudinem 



tuam see praesbiter 



patrici ut quicumque 



hunc libellum manu te 



nuerit meminerit colum 



bae scriptoris. qui hoc scrips! 



himet' euangelium. per xii 



a 



dierum spatium. gtia^ diii nri s.s 



Then, after an interval of seven lines, by the same hand : 



Ora pro me fra 

 ter mi dns tecum 

 sit. 



The greater part of the first subscription has been retraced at a later time. 



That the Columba mentioned is St. Columba himself seems certain. 

 Durrow was founded by the Saint, his chief foundation in Ireland. A 



■ He tells me he no longer adheres to the statement in "Book of Mulling," p. 16, 

 that it does not seem probable that St. Columba could have made use of a direct invo- 

 cation of a departed Saint, " rogo beatitudinem tuam, sancte praesbiter Patrici." 

 i 



^ [himet (scarcely mmet) is a mistake for mihimet.] 



a 



^ [gtia (possibly gra) " gratia." The s.s is an early symbol of subscripsi.] 



[56*] 



