er being adjured to cherish the memory "Columbae
scriptoris _qui hoc scripsi_." In the _Ulster Annals_, under the year
904, there is the following entry regarding Kells: "Violatio Ecclesiae
Kellensis per Flannum mac Maelsechnalli contra Donchad filium suum, et
alii decollati sunt circa _Oratorium_."--(Dr. O'Conor's _Rerum Hibern.
Scriptores_, tom. iv. p. 243.) Is the scene of slaughter thus
specialised the Oratory or "House of St. Columb," which is still
standing at Kells?[69]]

[Footnote 68: I would say yes, beyond question! It was both oratory and
house, like that of St. Cuthbert on Farne island, described in the
passage quoted _ante_, p. 101, note.--P.]

[Footnote 69: St. Colume, as translated by Mageochagan or Macgeoghegan.
In the original this would be Columbkille, as in all the other
Annals.--P.]

[Footnote 70: In treating of the subsequent fate of the old Irish
oratories, Dr. Petrie remarks, "Such structures came in subsequent times
to be used by devotees as penitentiaries, and to be generally regarded
as such exclusively. Nor is it easy to conceive localities as such
better fitted, in a religious age, to excite feelings of contrition for
past sins, and of expectations of forgiveness, than those which had been
rendered sacred by the sanctity of those to whom they had owed their
origin. Most certain, at all events, it is, that they came to be
regarded as sanctuaries the most inviolable, to which, as our annals
show, the people were accustomed to fly in the hope of safety--a hope,
however, which was not always realised."--(P. 358.)]

[Footnote 71: _Scotichronicon_, lib. v. cap. 36. Goodall's edition, vol.
i. p. 286.]

[Footnote 72: Such cells or oratories, as relics of the holy men who had
been their founders, were always regarded by the Irish, like every other
kind of relics, as their bells, croziers, books, etc. etc., with the deepest
sentiments of veneration, and their injury or violation--"dishonouring,"
as the annalists often term it--was regarded as a sacrilege of
the most revolting and sinful character. And to this pious feeling we may
ascribe the singular preservation to our own times of so many of such
buildings--though, indeed, in many instances, they may only retain the
general form, or a portion of the walls, of the original structure--owing
to the injuries inflicted by time, or, as more frequently, by foreign
violence. Thus, in the great Aran of the _Tiglach Enda_, or "House of
Enda," a portion o