shop of Tours, with whom
he remained for four years. Colgan, in his annotations (14), identifies
Brotgalum as Burdigalum, or Bordeaux. So, too, does Professor Bury, who
tells us that Brodgal was the Irish for Bordeaux, and that "Bordeaux
was a regular port for travellers from Ireland to South Gaul" ("Life of
St. Patrick," Appendix, p. 341).

Trajectus, according to the old maps, was situated on the river
Dordogne, about sixty miles from Tours. From Trajectus St. Patrick had
to walk a distance of about two hundred miles through a desert before
reaching Tours.

"A glance at the map of ancient Gaul," writes Father Bullen Morris,
"will show that in St. Patrick's time a great part of the country
between Trajectus and Tours well deserved the name of a desert. The
network of rivers, tributaries of the Loire, and now known as La
Vienne, La Claire, La Gartempe, &c., must have exposed the country to
periodical inundations in those days. So from Tours in the north to
Limonum, Alerea, and Legora in the south, east and west, we find some
5,000 square miles, which, as far as the ancient map is concerned, give
no signs of possession by man. Travellers entangled amidst these rivers
and morasses must have advanced very slowly, and thus it appears that
both places and time fit in with St. Patrick's narrative. Nature has
changed her face along the line of St. Patrick's journey, and there is
little now to remind us of its primeval desolation, save that the
rivers still preserve some of their old habits, and now and then
combine with the inundations of the giant Loire in setting man at
defiance.

"Time, however, with its alternative gifts and ravages, has left
untouched the traditions regarding St. Patrick's journey. There is
something more than antiquarian interest in the feelings of the
Christian traveller who visits the spot on the banks of the Loire,
where immemorial tradition and an ancient monument mark the place at
which the Saint crossed the river on his way to Marmoutier. At about
twenty miles from Tours the railway between that city and Angers stops
at the station of St. Patrice; the commune is also named after the
Saint, and, as we shall see, there is historical evidence that it has
been thus designated for at least nine hundred years."

"The first witness whose evidence we shall take on the subject of the
Saint's arrival at St. Patrice is one which many believe to have
survived since his time, but on this point the reader m