ST. PATRICK

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 18967, 19 March 1924, Page 9

ST. PATRICK

1. ./lowing a custom of iong-stqndins in Britain, where the natal day of the national saint is observed as a holiday by the Bank of England, New Zealand has contrived to give no offence to anybody by observing as a bank holiday the birthday of the saint of each of ■ the four nationalities who go to make up the people of New Zealand. Monday happened to be devoted to the pair on saint of Ireland. Green ties were; accordingly worn by all who claim Irish descent, and no ties at all by the bank clerks and .civil servants, who were the principal beneficiaries of the holiday. Masterton as a rule celebrates St. Patrick’s Day by the race-meeting at Opaki, but this year advantage was taken of the half-holi-day on Saturday to get the most likely crowd in the week. Not many people who take part in the St. Patrick’s Day celebrations are aware of the mam facts of the saint’s life. Even the authorities who have written on the subject have confessed to being a good deal at the mercy of conjecture and rather shadowy legends. He appears to have been born somewhere it* the west of England, in the valley of the Severn,,his father being Calpurnius, a middie-clhss landed proprietor and a decurion. The boy Patrick was educated as a Christian and imbued with a great reverence for the keman Empire, just as the average

imy in the Dominion to-day has a rev-ort.L-.ee for the British Empire. Fortunately for Ireland, a band of Irish brigami marauding in England carried Patrick off when he was only 16, and the next we hear of him is as a cowherd m the west or north of Ireland. Naturally there is competition" for the honour. Some accounts say that he worked In County Antrim, which is now part of the Dominion of Ulster, while others place him in Connought.' now under the aegis of the Irish Free State. During his six years’ bondage Sts Patrick became subject to religious emotion, and saw visions which encouraged him to make his escape. Getting tb the coast of Wicklow lie found a small vessel which was engaged in the export of Irish wolf-dogs, and he made good his escape in her to the coast of Gaul (France). For 28 days he travelled through a desert, and at the end of two months he left his companions and betook himself to the monastery of Lerins. After a year or two here he made good' bis return to Britain, and while there conceived the idea of going as a missionary to Ireland, To prepare himself for this, after spending 14 yeais iu study, he was ordained by Bishop Amator. After some disappointments St Patrick was chosen, iu 432, to reclaim the island in which he had served his bondage He landed once more on the coast of Wicklow and, proceeding north, commenced his labours in eastern Ulster with a wooden bard for a place of worship. He defied the high king of Ireland by lighting a tire within sight of Taira, but after many trials of strength won him over. All over Ireland he established churches and overthrew idols. Proceeding to Rome, he returned with valuable relics and founded the church and monastery of Armagh, of which he became bishop. He died in 461, some years after he had entrusted the bishopric to his disciple Bcnignus and gone into retirement. St. Patrick’s importance in the history of Ireland is properly ascribed to the fact that he brought the country into touch with eastern Europe and introduced Latin as the language of the church. He did not introduce Christianity, but he organised various Societies which he found existing in Ireland and reclaimed them from the influence of Pelagianism. Apart altogether from its religious significance, it is safe to say that St. Patrick is more fervently celebrated on his natal day in New Zealand than is any of tho other national saints. St. George, St. David and St. Andrew are Comparatively neglected by their countrymen.