Page:A Book of the West (vol. 2).djvu/18

4 was an abbot in Somersetshire. In his old age his nephew Cuby took his uncle with him to Ireland, where he kept a cow for providing the old man with her milk. A chief carried off the cow, and Cuby left Ireland and brought the aged uncle back with him. Docwin or Cyngar was the founder of S. Kew.

Again, another uncle of S. Cuby was Cado, Duke of Cornwall, who makes a great figure in Geoffrey of Monmouth's fabulous history, and in the Arthurian romances. He was father of Constantine, whom Gildas attacked so venomously in his spiteful letter about 547, and who was converted by S. Petrock in his old age. We have in Cornwall two of his foundations and one in Devon.

After his conversion Constantine went to Ireland and entered a monastery without disclosing who he was. He was discovered by accident; for, having been set to grind corn with a hand-quern, he was overheard laughing and saying, " What would my Cornish subjects think were they to see me thus engaged?"

II. The second group of saints is of Irish-Welsh origin. The Welsh have a droll legend to account for the Irish conquest of Brecknock.

Meurig, king of Garth-Madrin (a part of Brecknockshire), had a daughter, Marchell, who said to her father in coaxing terms, "I do want a fur cloak; the winters here are abominably cold."

"You shall have one," answered the father.

On cool reflection Meurig considered that fur cloaks were expensive luxuries, far beyond the means of a petty Welsh prince.