dicant state and the mendicity of
Christ our Lord and Saviour. After repeated invitations to
preach to the people, I there delivered, in the vernacular,
seven or eight discourses, and, always under the above-made
protest, I defended in public nine conclusions, on account
of which, and for what else I then said, the friars have
appealed, though without reason, to this Holy See".

The visit to London here alluded to took place in 1356, and, as we have
seen, in 1357, the case was already under judgment at Avignon. For three
whole years the archbishop remained at the Holy See, while a
congregation of Cardinals, specially appointed for the purpose, took
cognizance of the dispute. No official decision was given, but as the
privileges of the mendicant orders were confirmed, and a letter sent to
the English bishops commanding them to not interfere with the friars, it
may be said that the Archbishop failed to make good his cause.

Sec. IX. HIS DEATH.

On the 16th November, 1360, according to Henry of Malmesbury, Richard
Fitz-Ralph slept in the Lord at Avignon. "Of whom", says Fox,[26] "a
certain cardinal hearing of his death, openly protested that the same
day a mighty pillar of the Church was fallen".

In Wadding's _Annals_, it is told that towards the end of his life,
seeing it was not likely he could succeed in his struggle, he withdrew
to Belgium, and there died in the mountains of Hannonia. The same
account appears in the Camden Annals of Ireland. But Ware[27] tells us
that the Armagh copy of these annals agrees with other histories in
placing the death at Avignon. In 1370, his remains were removed by
Stephanus de Valle (who from the see of Limerick was translated to that
of Meath by Urban V. in 1369), and brought back to his native town of
Dundalk, where they were desposited in the church of St. Nicholas. The
memory of his extraordinary merits soon attracted to his tomb crowds of
the faithful. The usage of styling him St. Richard of Dundalk became
quite general, and many miracles were ascribed to his intercession.
Moved by the report of these prodigies, Pope Boniface IX. appointed John
Cotton, Archbishop of Armagh, Richard Young, Bishop-elect of Bangor, and
the Abbot of Osney, near Oxford, as commissioners to institute a
judicial examination of the miracles. The result of their labours is not
known. Stewart, in his _History of Armagh_, mentions[28] that in a synod
held at Drogheda in 154