The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-03-17

has been attributed to him by traditions, though minus the miracles. Lately new biography, giving Patrick an unquestioned place in history, has been published py Professor Bury of that very Kings col lege, Cambridge, which is said to repel spiders.
 Three men of Patricks own time bore
 the same name and have survived in rec
 ords. This has confused scholars who
 paid no attention to the myths. One was an earlier bishop of Ireland, named Pat raiss. Another person named Sen Pat raic, and also called "Old Patrick Is now treated as myth by investigators.
 Saint Patricks own name was Latin pseudonym, and as he wrote 1t, Pat rlcius," means "patrician' or gentle man." strengthening the former belief that he was traditional, or the personi- fication of a class in ancient Irish af- fairs.
 Professor Bury's book does nolt con-
 tain the word snakes" nor frogs.
 There are perhaps thousands of people in the world who would still prefer the Saint Patrick of tradition to him of the modern quellenkritik But with them, Of course, the critics have little sympathy.
 That Patrick really lived is now beyond dispute. The important facts about him, indeed, are in his own writing, or at least exist as later manuscript copies or documents he penned himself. There are two of these. The more informative is his Confession" written when he was an old man, and the other his Letter to Coroticus," written against British chieftain who had carried off some Irish converts as slaves. Scholars who for merly doubted the genuineness of the con- fession have since admitted It's authen- ticity, and Professor Bury demonstrates that 1t could hardly be a forgery because at,., tsA., INrr hA most searching modern methods Is con- sistent In every detail, while the strong personal feeling displayed is the highest proof of all that 1t is a genuine docu- ment. And the letter Is identical in style. There are also many other documents of Patricks time or later, from which compact body of genuine information has
 been sifted.
 We have two dates in his life that are fixed beyond dispute. One is that of his coming to Ireland as missionary (4S2 A D) and the other of his death (261 A. D). The date of his birth is uncertain, but 1t assumed to fall between tho years SS7 and 39O The place is named by him. self, a town called Bannaventa, but its precise site is unknown. There Is good evidence, however that 1t lay in south western England, near the River Severn and also near tho sea. No trace of 1t sur wives, but we know thst the saint was an Englishman, or, more exactly, an Anglo Roman. His real name was Gel tic-Succat. But in those times Rome ruled Britain, and to have Roman name gave distinction. So young Succat was called 'Patricius" by his father and had a third name, 1t is conJectured. If he had written his full name aS boy 1t would probably have stood "Patricius Magonus Succat" Patrick's father was Calpurnius, deacon and tax gatherer and gentleman farmer under the Roman government His mothers name was Concessa.
 Rome was then the center of the world.
 It was the age when Puck of Pook's Eiill ! and the centurion Parnesius, and the usurper Maximus, and the Winged Hats, and all those other interesting persons de- scribed in MT. Kipling's latest book, were alive and fighting around the Great Wall. Had it not been for Maximus and the wars of Rome on the continent, Ireland might have had no patron saint. For while these wars were draining England of the Roman troops that should have held her safe from barbarians, the Scots, the Picts, the Gaels, Saxons and Irish | freebooters were making raids into her that settled young Succat's life work. l The boy had been reared Christian and Roman, and doubtless Calurnius meant that his son should be a gentle man-farmer like himself. But at some period before Succat was 20, and probably ] while ha raa undAr IA q aAAt of Irish