_St. Patrick's Purgatory_ (Vol. vii., p. 552.).--Some degree of doubt
appearing to exist, by the statement in p. 178. of the present volume,
as to the position of the _real_ St. Patrick's Purgatory, I send the
following from Camden:
"The _Liffey_," says he, "near unto his spring head, enlarges
his stream and spreads abroad into a _lake_, wherein appears
above the water an island, and in it, hard by a little
monastery, a very narrow vault within the ground, much spoken
of by reason of its religious horrors. Which cave some say was
dug by Ulysses when he went down to parley with those in hell.
"The inhabitants," he continues, "term it in these days _Ellan
n' Frugadory_, that is, _The Isle of Purgatory_, or _St.
Patrick's Purgatory_. For some persons devoutly credulous
affirm that St. Patrick, the Irishmen's apostle, or else some
abbot of the same name, obtained by most earnest prayer at
the hands of God, that the punishments and torments which the
wicked are to suffer after this life, might _here_ be presented
to the eye; that so he might the more easily root out the sins
and heathenish errors which stuck so fast to his countrymen the
_Irish_."