Note 1 — Chapter XVII

Here are a few lines from the well-known Adonic poem which he, at the age of 68, addressed to his friend Fedolius—

"Extitit ingensImpia quippe

Causa malorumPygmalionis

Aurea pellis,Regis ob aurum

Corruit auriGesta leguntur.

Munere parvo * * * * *

Cœna Deorum.

Ac tribus illisFœmina sœpe

Maxima lis estPerdit ob aurum

Orta Deabus.Casta pudorem.

Hinc populavitNon Jovis auri

TrogugenarumFluxit in imbre

Ditia regnaSed quod adulter

Dorica pubes.Obtulit aurum

Juraque legumAureus ille

Fasque fides que Fingitur imber."

Rumpitur aure.

Dr. Sigerson in "Bards of the Gael and Gaul," p. 407, prints as Jubainville also does, the whole of this noted poem, and points out that it is shot through and through with Irish assonance. "Not less important than its assonance," writes Dr. Sigerson, "is the fact that it introduces into Latin verse the use of returning words, or burthens with variations, which supply the vital germs of the rondeau and the ballad." I am not myself convinced of what Dr. Sigerson considers marks of intentional assonance in almost every line.

His chief remaining works are a Monastic Rule in ten chapters; a book on the daily penances of the monks; seventeen sermons; a book on the measure of penances; a treatise on the eight principal vices; five epistles written to Gregory the Great and others; and a good many Latin verses. His life is written by the Abbot Jonas, a contemporary of his own.