The original parchment, "Testimonium de Licentiatu Theologiæ," is now preserved in Blairs College, Aberdeen.1

Winzet returned to Paris in time for the September meeting of the "Masters of the German Nation," "Anno Domini 1575, pridie divi Mathei." 2 His stay was not protracted.

IX.—APPOINTED ABBOT OF ST JAMES'S, RATISBON.

Winzet next appears at Rome, probably having accompanied Bishop Leslie there that very autumn.

3

Hapless Mary still remaining in confinement but hopeful of release, wrote to Pope Gregory XIII. in October 1575, saying that she sent Bishop Leslie to him to declare her fealty, and to ask the Pontiff to support her as a devout daughter. Leslie was accompanied to Rome by Dr Allen, so that in them Ninian had friends at Court. During the existence of this embassy Winzet was himself graciously called to Rome by the Pope, and was residing there in 1577 when the news of the death of Thomas Anderson, Abbot of Ratisbon, was announced.5 According to the Strachan MS., the abbot died in 1576— probably the spring of 1576-77.6 "The Pontiff, excellent judge of his merits," as Zeigelbauer gracefully expresses it, "having seized this opportune occasion for showing kindness to Ninian," appointed him to the vacant abbacy. May we not surmise

1 Cf. Appendix E.

2 Arch. Nat., Reg. H. 2590, fol. 65.

3 Cal. Stat. Pap. (Scot.),' vol. ii. p. 923.

4 Leslie's ‘Hist.,' translated by Dalrymple, pt. i. p. 62. Scot. Text Society edition.

5 Ziegelbauer, 'Hist.,' pt. iii. p. 360; Brockie MSS., p. 54.

6 Strachan MS., p. 92. Adv. Lib.

7 Ziegelbauer, 'Hist.,' pt. iii. p. 360.

d

that the influence of the ambassador was used in favour of his fellow-countryman ?1

Robert Turner, Professor of Eloquence in the University of Ingolstadt, who was a friend and correspondent of Leslie and of Winzet, in a letter to Erasmus Vendius, Councillor of the Duke of Bavaria, which was written from Rome in 1580, refers to Bishop Leslie as the patron of Ninian and other Scotsmen. He does not, however, specify any particular act of patronage; but we may not err much in conjecturing that the appointment to Ratisbon would be talked of in Rome as the result of Leslie's kindly offices.2

Doubtless the fame of Winzet, as a scholar and polemical champion for the faith, preceded him to the Vatican; and none could have merited this promotion and honour more than he.

Gregory XIII. issued a Bull dated at Rome on the 13th of June 1577, instituting Winzet Abbot of the Benedictine Monastery of St James at Ratisbon.3 But Winzet was a secular priest. Consequently it was necessary for the Pope to dispense in this case with the regular novitiate of one year requisite in the Benedictine Order, and to command Winzet to assume the habit, to make his religious profession, and at one and the same time to be instituted Abbot of the Monastery of St James and its affiliated houses. This was accordingly done. Three bishops were appointed to consecrate Ninian; but it ultimately fell to the lot of a fellow-exile, Thomas Goldwell, Bishop of St Asaph, who was at that time the

1 Irving, 'Lives of Scotish Writers,' vol. i. p. 107. Edin. 1839.

2 Turner, 'Epistolæ,' p. 5. Col. Agrip. 1615. 8vo.

3 Ratisbon MSS. The Bull is given in Appendix A.

suffragan or vice-regent of the Cardinal-Vicar Savelli, to give him the abbot's benediction. The ceremony took place on the 14th July 1577-sixth Sunday after Trinity— in the Church of the Blessed Trinity of the English Nation, in Rome, the church which was anciently attached to Hospice for the reception of English pilgrims, and in which afterwards Cardinal Allen was buried. Thus per saltum, this secular priest was invested with all the powers and privileges of mitre and pontificalia, and with episcopal jurisdiction over fourteen religious houses. The authentic testimonium of the fact of Abbot Ninian's installation by the hand of Goldwell is preserved at Blairs.1 It is to be observed that therein Winzet is styled "magistro in theologia," a title which is also found in the Bull of appointment addressed to "Niniano Winzeto, Presbytero Glasguensis Diœcesis, Magistro in Theologia." A month

later, in another document, he is designated Doctor in Theology. There is no proof that he received this honour from the Pope upon his preferment, as has been supposed.2

Winzet commenced his duties with a spirit of moderation and prudence becoming so scholarly a man and one who had experienced many hardships on account of his faith. Before quitting Rome, he received from the Inquisitors a faculty, dated 1st August 1577, for absolving and reconciling to the Church Scottish heretics and schismatics.

1 Ratisbon MSS. Cf. Appendices F and G. Thomas Goldwell, of All Souls' College, Oxford, Bishop-Elect of St Asaph, 1558, present at the Council of Trent, died in Rome 3d April 1585. Cf. 'The Episcopal Succession,' by W. Maziere Brady, vol. iii. p. 37, Rome 1877; 'Fasti Eccl. Anglic.,' vol. ii. p. 504.

2 Brockie and Ziegelbauer assert that Winzet received the Doctor's degree in Paris before going to Rome. Brockie MSS., p. 54; Ziegelbauer, 'Hist.,' pt.

iii. p. 360.

The faculty was addressed to "Reverendo Niniano Winzeto in Sacre Theologia Doctori." 1

Thus equipped the abbot set out for Ratisbon. He was in his sixtieth year. Leslie, still lingering in Rome, was busy finishing and on the eve of issuing his interesting history, and to it the grateful abbot contributed a prefatory Latin encomium.2

X.-WINZET AT RATISBON.

The superior reached the cloister in the quaint old town of Ratisbon on the 9th of August 1577.3 Out of its ruinous precincts—“ dirutum et collapsum cœnobium "-emerged a solitary monk and a single novice to greet him. There was a deserted air about the ancient place, which had never recovered from the misfortunes it experienced thirty years before in the furious times of the Reformation. But the ruins, when touched by his historic spirit, were soon transformed into an inspiring scene of reconstructive labour. And history had not hesitated to associate the miraculous with the romance that hung about the hoary edifices. Their associations were of home as well. This Irish monastery, dedicated to St James and St Gertrude, was an offshoot of the Monastery of St Peter (Monasterium Sti. Petri Consecrati, or Weih S. Peter) at Ratisbon, which Emma, Abbess of the Obermünster, gave to Marianus Scotus, together with a plot of ground on which a citizen called Bethselinus built for the Irish, at his own cost, the Mon

1 "Facultas absolvendi Scotos qui in hæresim delapsi erant ac legendi libros hæreticos." Ratisbon MSS. Cf. Appendix H.

2 Cf. Appendix D.

3 Ziegelbauer, 'Hist.,' p. 361.

4 Strachan MS., Adv. Lib., p. 92; Papal Bull, Ratisbon MSS., Blairs.

astery of St Peter in 1076. Some maintain that the founders were Scotsmen, and that Marianus was a Culdee from Dunkeld.

Marianus Scotus, or Muiredhach MacRobartaigh, a native of Tir Conaill, Donegal, left Ireland in 1067, and died abroad in 1088. Two years after his death the Monastery of St James and St Gertrude was founded. In IIII it was consecrated, and in 1120 sanctioned by Pope Calixtus as a Benedictine house.

The generous Abbess of the Niederminster bestowed upon the monks a prebend of bread and ale, because St Erhard was buried within the monastery. The beautiful and characteristic Romanesque church, still to be seen in Ratisbon, and known as the "Kirche des Schotten-Klosters zu S. Jacob," bears the impress of the Celtic mind and taste of the twelfth century (1150-1184) in which it was built. For seven centuries, under its classic shadow, were laid the ashes of a long roll of Irish and Scottish monks.

The monastery flourished from the time of the Crusades. It became a halting-place for the pilgrims from Scotland who passed through Germany to the Holy Land.1

Dependent houses sprang from St James's, and owned the rule of its mitred abbot.2 But the Reformation stripped

1 The materials for this sketch of St James are taken from: 'Historia Fundationum nonnullorum Monasteriorum insignium per partes Bojoariæ,' in 'Collectio Scriptorum rerum Historico-Monasticorum Ecclesiasticarum variorum Religiosorum Ordinum,' curante Michaele Kuen, tom. i. (vol. i. and ii.) p. 209; ibid., pp. 216, 217, § xiii; Ulmæ, 1756-68, 6 tom. fol; 'Acta. Sanct. Boll,' tom. ii. pp. 365, 372, under Marianus Scotus; Dr Reeves's Paper in 'Proceed. Royal Irish Acad.,' vol. vii. pp. 290-301; ‘Edinburgh Review,' Jan. 1864, No. 119, p. 171 et seq.; Erskine, 'Sketches and Hints of Church Hist.,' vol. ii. p. 6, Edin. 1790-97.

2 The Sister-Houses were at Wurzburg, Nürnberg, Vienna (St Mary and St Gregory), Memmingen, Eichstadt, Kellheim, Erfurt, Constance, Oels, and St Mary's at Ross-Carbery, Ireland. 'Edin. Rev.,' No. 119, pp. 173, 174, 180.