ches,
shall regard it with no common reverence.'" On the following day, at
nocturnal vigils, he went into the church, and knelt down in prayer
beside the altar, and "his attendant Diormit, who more slowly followed
him, saw from a distance that the whole interior of the church was
filled with a heavenly light in the direction of the saint," which, as
he drew near, quickly disappeared. "Feeling his way in the darkness, as
the brethren had not yet brought in the lights, he found the saint lying
before the altar," and all the monks coming in, Columba moved his hand
to give them his benediction, and died 9th June 597, while "the whole
church resounded with loud lamentations of grief." He left behind him an
imperishable memory in the hearts of the people converted by him to the
Christian faith, and in the national church which he so splendidly
helped to build up. He wrote an Altus, and is said to have copied 300
books with his own hand. He was buried at Iona.

After Columba's death, the monastery of Iona appears to have been the
acknowledged head of all the monasteries and churches which his mission
had founded in Scotland, as well as of those previously founded by him
in Ireland. It was a centre of light and life, but the monks were not
permitted to pursue their work unmolested. The monastery was burned and
plundered by the sea-pirates in 795, 798, and 802; in 806 sixty-eight of
the community were ruthlessly slain. The monks remaining were filled
with fear, and before 807 the relics of St. Columba were carried away to
Ireland, and enshrined at Kells. In 818 they were brought back, and the
monastery at Iona was rebuilt with stone. The Danes, however, granted
little respite, and in 878 the relics were again removed, and were
probably placed first at Dunkeld and afterwards at Abernethy,[193] where
the primacy was successively established, and a memorial of which exists
in the Abernethy round tower. The plundering continued at intervals, and
the buildings were more or less ruinous till about 1074, when Queen
Margaret "restored the monastery, ... rebuilt it, and furnished it with
monks, with an endowment for performing the Lord's work." "One of the
present buildings," said the late Duke of Argyll--"the least and the
most inconspicuous, but the most venerable of them all--St. Odhrain's
Chapel, may possibly be the same building which Queen Margaret of
Scotland is known to have erected in memory of the saint, and dedicated
to one of