History_, page 289, mentions four ancient Irish romances in the form of
voyages, of which the voyage of Brendan is one. He gives an epitome of
that of the sons of Ua Corra, which seems at least in parts to be almost
equally wild. But that of Brendan has certainly been the most popular.
M. Achille Jubinal, who edited one Latin and two French translations of
it, says that it also exists in Irish, Welsh, Spanish, English, and
Anglo-Norman. The Spanish, English, and Anglo-Norman I have never read,
and of the Welsh I have never heard. Of the Latin I once made a complete
translation from the Latin text published by Jubinal, but I have lost
it, and have had to do the work again so far as necessary for the
present lecture. I remember, however, that from several features, I came
to the conclusion that the Latin text was a translation from Irish, and
the Irish text must present considerable variants, as Dr. Todd in his
book on _St. Patrick, Apostle of Ireland_, page 460, cites from 'An
Irish Life of St. Brendan,' but which must evidently be the fabulous
voyage, four incidents, of which one is about the finding of a dead
mermaid, another about one of the voyagers being devoured alive by
sea-cats, and the third about an huge sea-cat as large as an ox which
swam after them to destroy them, until another sea-monster rose up and
fought with the cat, and both were drowned, none of which incidents
occur in the Latin. However, to the Latin version my defective knowledge
must confine me, and there is enough of it for one lecture, and to
spare. I may, however, say that by the Latin text I do not here mean
only the text published by Jubinal. The present Bollandists were good
enough, some years ago, to edit for me the 'Codex Salmanticensis,' which
contains both the romance and the Life, and I find in the romance
serious divergences from the text given by Jubinal; they are of a kind
which, in my judgment, stamp it beyond all doubt as a later and corrupt
edition, but I have largely compared the texts, although not word for
word.