St. Drostan, St. Columcille's friend and disciple, established the
faith in Aberdeenshire and became abbot of Deer; St. Kieran (548)
evangelized Kintyre; St. Mun (635) labored in Argyleshire; St. Buite
(521) did the same in Pictland; St. Maelrubha (722) preached in
Ross-shire; St. Modan and St. Machar benefited the dwellers on the
western and eastern coasts respectively; and St. Fergus in the eighth
century became apostle of Forfar, Buchan, and Caithness.

DISTANT ISLANDS: But Irish monks were mariners as well as apostles.
Their hide-covered currachs were often launched in the hope of
discovering solitudes in the ocean. Adamnan records that Baitan set
out with others in search of a desert in the sea. St. Cormac sought a
similar retreat and arrived at the Orkneys. St. Molaise's holy isle
guards Lamlash Bay, off Arran. The island retreats of the Bass,
Inchkeith, May, and Inchcolm, in the Firth of Forth, are associated
with the Irish saints Baldred, Adamnan, Adrian, and Columcille. St.
Maccaldus, a native of Down, became bishop of the Isle of Man.

Remarkable, too, is the fact that Irish monks sailed by way of the
Faroe Islands to distant Iceland. These sailor-clerics, who settled
on the southeast of the island, were spoken of by later Norwegians as
"papar." After their departure--they were probably driven away by
Norwegian pagans--these Icelandic apostles "left behind them Irish
books, bells, and croziers, wherefrom one could understand they were
Irishmen."

But St. Brendan, the voyager, is the most wonderful of the mariner
monks of Ireland. He accomplished apostolic work in both Wales and
Scotland, but his seafaring instincts urged him to make missionary
voyages to regions hitherto unknown. Some writers, not without