SAINT DYMPNA, V. M.

SHE was the daughter of an Irish king, and having by vow consecrated her virginity to God, to avoid the snares to which she saw herself exposed at home, passed to Antwerp, and chose her abode at Ghecl, a village in Brabant, ten leagues from Antwerp. There she served God in retirement and assiduous prayer. But being at length discovered and pursued by those who were the enemies of her chastity, she was murdered by them because the refused to consent to their brutish passion. Her relics were, solemnly taken up by the bishop of Cambray on the 15th of May, and are preserved with veneration in a rich shrine at Gheel. She flourished in the seventh century. See Molanus, Miræus, the Roman Martyrology, Henschenius, t. 3, Maij, p. 477, and Colgan, in MSS. Contin. Act. SS. Hibern.