COLUMBA, commonly called the Apostle of the Highlanders, or Scoto-lrish, is believed to have been one of the earliest teachers of Christianity in Scotland, and is known in history as the founder of the abbey and college of Iona in the Western Isles. He was a native of Ireland : his biographers give his pedigree with great pre cision, but even if its precise accuracy could he trusted, its repetition here would afford the reader nothing more valuable than a series of strange names. Ho is said to have been born in the year 521. According to the best collations of recent investigators, he arrived iu Scotland in the year 563. The island of Hi or Iona, where he established himself with his disciples, may be presumed, from the vestiges of a worship earlier than Christianity still extant there, and commonly called Druidical remains, to have been a seat of the pagan worship of the day, and it is probable that Columba desired to attack the lion in his den. The greater part of the neighbouring weet coast of Scot laud was peopled by the Scots, who had emigrated from Ireland ; the districts south of lona, and the broad tracts of comparatively level land stretching eastward, were inhabited by the people called Picts. Columba is said to have established an equal influence with both races. In the much debated question whether the Picts were of Celtic or Teutonic origin, a passage in Adainnan's Life of Columba' gives perhaps the most distinct, though very limited, evidence that exists ou the subject. It states that Columba, who as an Irishman must have been of tho same Celtic origin as the Scots or Irish Dalriads who surrounded him on the west coast, required an interpreter when he communicated with the king of the Picts. A translation of this
work, with critical comments, was published in 1798, with the title ' The Life of St. Columba, the Apostle and Patron Saint of the ancient Scots and Picts,' by John Smith, D.D., a work full of very absurd blunders. Adamnau's ' Life' contains few biographical facts which can be depended on, but it is a very curious memorial of the manners of the day. Even the dreams and miracles with which it is crowded are instructive when critically examined. Columba is believed to have been the founder of the Culdees, and in connection not only with them, but with the pagan rites which he superseded, his memory is traditionally preserved in the highlands of Scotland. There is a High land proverb, of which the translation is—" Earth, earth, on the mouth of Oran, that he may blab no more." The traditiou con nected with this is that Oran was one of the followers of Columba, who, as a sacrifice at the building of Iona, was buried, whether alive or dead is not stated. This tradition, which is given as the version of the pagan priests, says that Culumba opened the grave three days afterwards, and Oran told him that hell was not such a place as he reported it to be. Whereupon Columba, to prevent his impiously communicating the idea to others, called out to those who were with him iu the words of the proverb. Columba is said to have died in the year 597. There is an account of his life in Chalmers' Caledonia,' 1. 311, and in Jamieson's 'Account of the Culdees.'