_Of the Angel Victor appearing to Saint Patrick._
And six years had now passed when, under the direction of the Lord, he
had thoroughly learned the Irish tongue, and with prayers and with
tears he unceasingly besought of God that he might be released from
slavery and restored to his country. And on a certain day appeared
unto him, while praying, an angel of the Lord, standing on the crag of
an overhanging rock, and announcing that his prayers and his fastings
had ascended as a memorial before God; and the angel added thereto that
he should soon cast from his neck the yoke of servitude, and, after a
prosperous voyage, return to his own parents. And the servant of God
looked on the angel of God, and, conversing with him face to face
familiarly, even as with a friend, asked who he was, and by what name
was he called. And the heavenly messenger answered that he was the
ministering spirit of the Lord, sent into the world to minister unto
them who have the heritage of salvation; that he was called Victor, and
especially deputed to the care of him, and he promised to be his
helpmate and his assistant in doing all things. And although it is not
needful that heavenly spirits should be called by human names, yet the
angel, being beautifully clothed with an human form composed of the
air, called himself Victor, for that he had received from Christ, the
most victorious King, the power of vanquishing and binding the powers
of the air and the princes of darkness; who had also given to his
servants made of the potter's clay the power of treading on serpents
and scorpions, and of vanquishing and bruising Satan. And in their
mutual colloquy the angel showed unto Patrick an opening in the ground
that had been delved up by the swine, and therein he directed him to
look for gold with which he might redeem himself from the hands of his
cruel master; and he added that a ship to carry him over to Britain was
ready in a harbor two hundred miles distant, and which, by the divine
will, could not have a favorable wind until he should arrive. And the
vision of the angel, thus saying, disappeared, and his speech ended;
and, as the inhabitants assert, the marks of his feet appear even to
this day imprinted on the rock in the Mountain Mis, in the borders of
Dalnardia; and an oratory is erected there in honor of St. Patrick,
wherein the devotion of the faithful is wont to watch and pray.