ST. BRIDGET 
her successors, the abbesses of Kildare. Some of the 
teaching at Kildare was done by the monks from the 
neighboring monastery and the religious of both 
houses seem to have been present together at the 
services in the cathedral at least on the big festival 
days. Down the middle of this cathedral there was 
a partition and the women worshipped on one side 
and the men on the other. 
Dr. Douglas Hyde in his sketch of St. Bridget in 
his volume on the ‘Literary History of Ireland,” 
emphasized the fact that before Bridget’s death a 
regular city and a great school at Kildare rivalling 
that of Armagh itself in fame had arisen around 
her. From the small beginnings which she made be- 
neath the branches of the oak tree when her first 
little church, Cildara, “the church of the oak tree,” 
from which the name is derived, lifted itself up from 
the plain, there came fine developments. She planted 
the mustard seed and it grew. Cogitosus, her biogra- 
pher, describes the great church at Kildare which 
succeeded that first small church. He says that it 
was large and lofty and possessed of many pictures 
as well as many hangings. It was particularly fam- 
ous for its ornamental doorways. Other traditions 
tell us of the many beautiful things there were in 
the church, — artistically decorated chalices, bells, 
patens and shrines. It was probably the intense 
feeling of reverence for the name of Bridget that 
led to the erection and afterwards the preservation 
of the Beautiful Round Tower which still exists 
there. It is the loftiest Round Tower in Ireland, 
)55