Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 5.djvu/197

This page needs to be proofread.

DROSTAN


161


DROSTE-VISCHERING


who had been Vicar-General of Dublin and the restorer of the Irish College at Rome. This cathedral was greatly enlarged and beautified by Bishop Henry O'Neill, who succeeded Bishop McGivern in 1901.

Under Dr. McGivern's predecessor, Dr. John Pius Leahy, O. P. (1S60-1890), a Dominican priory was founded on the Armagh side of Newry, and a very handsome church erected. The Poor Clares, who went to Newry from Harold's Cross, Dublin, in 1830, were for many years the onlj' nuns north of the Boyne. The Sisters of Mercy founded a convent at Newry in 1855, and have now flourishing establishments in Lurgan, Rostrevor, and Warrenpoint. There is a large diocesan college at Violet Hill near NewTy which is vmder the patronage of St. Colman. To this patron saint of the diocese and its first bishop, besides the church at Dromore already referred to, are also dedi- cated the parish churches at TuUylish, Kilvarlin, in the parish of Magheralin, and Barmneen near Rathfriland in the parish of Drumgath. Few ecclesiastical anti- quities have survived the ravages of time, war, and heresy. Abbey Yard in Newry marks the site of tlie Cistercian abbey founded in the year 1144 by St. Bernard's friend, St. Malachy O'Morgair, and endowed in 1157 by Maurice O'Loughlin, King of All Ireland. It is called in the annals MonasteHum de Viridi Ligno — a name given to Newry from the yew-tree said to have been planted there by St. Patrick, the Irish name being Niubar (and .sometimes Newrkin- tragh, "the yew at the head of the strand") which is latinized Ivorium or Xeroracum, but more commonly as above Viridc Lignum. There are the ruins of an old church half a mile east of Hillto%vn. In the adjoining parish of Kilbroney (church of St. Bronach, a virgin saint of the district) half a mile north-east of Rostrevor is a graveyard with the venerable ruins of a church, an ancient stone cross, and a little to the west St. Brigid's well. Imbedded in a tree in this graveyard, a very antique bell was found about a hundred years ago and is now carefully preserved.

The first Protestant Bishop of Dromore was John Tod, on whom it was bestowed in commendam in 1G06, while he was at the same time Bishop of Down and Connor. It was an imfortunate beginning; for the Protestant historian. Sir James Ware, says Tod was degraded for incontinence and poisoned himself in prison in London. Two of his successors distin- guished themselves more creditably: Jeremy Taylor, who was bishop of these three dioceses from 1661 to 1667, an eloquent preacher and a writer of genius, and Thomas Percy, Bishop of Dromore from 1782 to 1811, whose " Reliques of Ancient Poetry" had a great and enduring influence on English literature.

There are 18 parishes, 42 churches, and 53 priests, a diocesan seminary and a convent of Dominicans at Newry; also 5 convents of Sisters of Mercy, one of Poor Clares, and a college of the Christian Brothers (New- ry). The Catholic population is (1908), 43,014; non- Catholic, 71,187.

O'Hanlon, Lives of the Irish Saints (Dublin, s. d.), VI. 224; Ware-Harris, Antiquities of Ireland (Dublin, 1739-45); ^IAZIi■;K^: IIrmjy, Episcopal Stjccession in England, Scotland, and Inland (Home, 1876). I. 296; Archdall, Monaslicon Hi- brrnirum od MoRAN (Dublin, 1873), I, 285; H.e\-ly, Life and Wrilfnas uf St I'atrick (Dublin, 1905), 324, 494; Reeve8, Down, (\mm>r and Dromore (Dublin, 1847), 303; O'Laverty, Bishops of Doa-k and Connor (Dublin, 1895). 300.

Matthew Russell.

Drostan (Drustan, Dust.vn, Throstan), Saint, a Scottish abbot who flourished about A. D. 600. All that is known of him is found in the "Breviarium Aberdonense" and in the "Book of Deir", a ninth- century MS. now in the University Library of Cam- bridge, but these two accounts do not agree in every particular. He appears to have belonged to the royal family of the Scoti, his father's name being Cosgrach. Showing signs of a religious vocation he was en- trusted at an early age to the care of St. Columba, who v.— 11


trained him and gave him the monastic habit. He accompanied that saint when he visited Aberdour (Aberdeen) in Buchan. The Pictish ruler of that country gave them the site of Deir, fourteen miles farther inland, where they established a monastery, and when St. Columba returned to lona he left St. Drostan there as abbot of the new foundation. On the death of the Abbot of Dalquhongale (Holywood) some few years later, St. Drostan was chosen to suc- ceed him. Afterwards, feeling called to a life of greater seclusion, he resigned his abbacy, w'ent farther north, and became a hermit at Glenesk. Here his sanctity attracted the poor and needy, and many miracles are ascribed to him, including the restoration of sight to a priest named SjTnon. After his death his relics were transferred to Aberdour and honour- ably preserved there. The "Breviary of Aberdeen" celebrates his feast on 15 December. The monastery of Deir, which had fallen into decay, was rebuilt for Cis- tercian monks in 1213 and so continued until the Re- formation.

Dempster, Hist. Eccl. Gent. Scot. (Edinburgh, 1829); Brevi- arium Aberdonense (London, 1854); Innes, Scotland in the Mid- dle Ages (Edinburgh, 1860); Forbes. Kalendar of Scottish Saints (Edinburgh, 1872); Gammack in Diet, of Christ. Biog. (London, 1877).

G. Cyprian Alston. Droste-HiilshoS, .A^nnette Elisabeth. See Huls-

HOFF.

Droste-Vischering, Clemens August von, Arch- bishop of Cologne, b. 21 Jan., 1773, at Miinster, Germany; d. 19 Oct., 1845, in the same city. Besides attending the LTniversity of Miinster, he had as private tutor the well-known church historian Theodore Katerkamp (d. 1834). At an early age he was intro- duced into the circle of learned men that gathered around Baron von Furstenberg and the pious and refined Princess Amelia von Gallitzin, where he im- bibed the thoroughly Catholic principles which char- acterized him while Archbishop of Cologne. After completing his studies he began, in June, 1796, an extensive educational journey under the direction of Katerkamp, through Germany, Switzerland, and Italy, returning to Miinster in Aug., 1797. The fol- lowing year, on 14 May, he was ordained priest by his brother Caspar Maximilian, then Auxiliary Bishop of Miinster. In accordance with the wish of the aged Baron von Fiirstenberg, Vicar-General and Adminis- trator of the Diocese of Miinster, the cathedral chapter elected Clemens August as his coadjutor on IS Jan., 1807, and when Furstenberg resigned six months later, Clemens August became his successor. As administrator he founded in 1808 an independent congregation of Sisters of Mercy, the so-called Klem- ens-Schwestern, who, though practically confined to the Diocese of Miinster, numbered 81 houses and 1126 members in 1904. When in 1813 Munster became part of Napoleon's monarchy, the emperor appointed Baron von Spiegel as Bishop of Munster without the knowledge of the pope, but after Napoleon's fall the pope restored Clemens August to his former oflice in March, 1815. Under Prussian rule the administrator repeatedly came into conflict with the Government on account of his attitude towards mixed marriages and the supervision of theological studies. When by an agreement between the Holy See and the Prussian Government the dioceses of Prussia were again sup- plied with bishops, Clemens August, who was not persona grata to the Prussian Government, withdrew from public life and devoted himself to works of piety and charity. He remained in seclusion even after being consecrated Auxiliary Bishop of Munster with the titular See of Calama in 1S27.

After the death of Baron von Spiegel, the incum- bent of the metropolitan See of Cologne, the Prussian Government, to the surjirise of Catholics and Protes- tants alike, desired Clemens Avigust as his successor.