“For we Irish [Scoti] are disciples of St. Peter and St. Paul, and of all the divinely inspired canonical writers, adhering constantly to the evangelical and apostolical doctrine.  Amongst us neither Jew, heretic, nor schismatic can be found; but the Catholic faith, entire and unshaken, precisely as we have received it from you, who are the successors of the holy Apostles.  For, as I have already said, we are attached to the chair of St. Peter; and although Rome is great and renowned, yet with us it is great and distinguished only on account of that apostolic chair.  Through the two Apostles of Christ you are almost celestial, and Rome is the head of the churches of the world."[183]

In the year 613 St. Columbanus founded the world-famed Monastery of Bovium, or Bobbio,[184] in a magnificently romantic site on the Apennines.  Near his church was an oratory dedicated to the Mother of God, who, as we shall presently see, was as devoutly worshipped in ancient as in modern Erinn.

Agilulph, the Lombardian monarch, was ever a warm patron of the monks.  Clothaire had now ascended the French throne.  He earnestly pressed the saint to return to Luxeuil, but Columbanus excused himself on the plea of age and infirmities.  He did not fail, however, to send advice for the government of the monasteries which he had founded, where his rule had continued to be observed with the utmost fervour.

St. Columbanus died at Bobbio, on the 21st of November, 615, at the age of seventy-two years.  His name is still preserved in the town of St. Columbano.  His memory has been ever venerated in France and Italy.

While the saint was evangelizing in Switzerland, one of his disciples became seriously ill, and was unable to travel farther.  It was a providential sickness for the Helvetians.  The monk was an eloquent preacher, and well acquainted with their language, which was a dialect of that of the Franks.  He evangelized the country, and the town of St. Gall still bears the name of the holy Irishman, while his abbey contains many precious relics of the literature and piety of his native land.  St. Gall died on the 16th October, 645, at a very advanced age.  The monastery was not erected until after his decease, and it was not till the year 1798 that the abbey lands were aggregated to the Swiss Confederation as one of the cantons.

Another Irish saint, who evangelized in France, was St. Fiacre.  He erected a monastery to the Blessed Virgin in a forest near Meaux.  The fame of his sanctity became so great, and the pilgrimage to his tomb so popular, that the French hackney coaches (fiacre) obtained their name from their constant employment in journeys to his shrine.