f Louth reverted to
Armagh, and the diocese extended to the west. About the year 1250 its
boundaries came to be what they now are.[84]

In 1139, after settling the affairs of the diocese of Oriel, Malachy
left Ireland on an important mission. It will be remembered that Gilbert
had declared that no archbishop could exercise his functions till the
Pope had sent him the pall. That was the current doctrine of the age.
Now neither Cellach, nor Malachy, nor Gelasius, nor Malchus, nor his
successor at Cashel, had received that ornament. They had therefore, in
the strict sense, no right to the title of archbishop. Malachy resolved
to make request to the Pope in person for palls for the two Irish
metropolitans. So he set out from Bangor for Rome.[85] Of his journey it
is unnecessary to say anything here.[86]

At Rome Malachy was received by Pope Innocent II. with great honour. He
confirmed the erection of the metropolitan see of Cashel. But he
politely declined to grant the palls. They must be demanded, he said, by
a council of the bishops, clergy and magnates; and then they would be
given.

But if the Pope refused Malachy's request, he bestowed on him an office,
the securing of which we may conjecture to have been one of the purposes
of his visit to Rome, though St. Bernard does not say so. Gilbert, now
old and infirm, had resigned the see of Limerick, and with it his
legatine commission. Innocent made Malachy papal legate in his
stead.[87]

Thus Malachy returned to Ireland, still bishop of Down indeed, but
virtually chief prelate of the Irish Church. For the following eight
years he laboured with zeal and vigour. St. Bernard unfortunately gives
little information concerning the details of his administrative work as
legate. But he relates one incident which suggests that in this period
Malachy was instrumental in founding another diocese. He nominated and
consecrated the first known bishop of Cork,[88] not improbably with the
intention that he should unite in his own person the two offices of
coarb of Barre, founder of Cork, and diocesan bishop.

And in this connexion it is worth noticing that he was evidently on
friendly terms with Nehemiah, the first known bishop of the neighbouring
diocese of Cloyne.[89] If that diocese was also founded by him he once
again violated the letter of the Rathbreasail canons, for by them Cloyne
was included in the diocese of Emly.

In 1148 Malachy convened a synod at Inispatrick, an island