Part 2 (1/2)

There the wind sings through the oaks and the elms, The joyous note of the blackbird is heard at dawn, The cuckoo chants from tree to tree in that n.o.ble land.

And again he calls it:

A city devout with its hundred crosses, Without blemish and without transgression.

In the years to come, when Columba was in Iona, one cold winter's day the brethren noticed that their beloved abbot was sad and silent.

”What ails you, Father?” asked Diarmaid, his faithful companion.

”My soul is sorrowful,” said Columbcille, ”for my dear monks of Durrow.

Bitter is the weather, and their abbot keeps them hard at work, fasting and a-cold.”

At the same moment Laisren, the abbot of Durrow, felt a sudden inspiration to bid his monks get their dinner, and take a little rest, on account of the severity of the weather. Another day about the same time, when the monks of Durrow were building their new church, Columba in his cell at Iona saw one of them falling from the roof. He cried to G.o.d for help, and his guardian angel--such is the flashlike speed of an angel's flight--caught the monk ere he touched the ground.

More famous even than the ”Book of Durrow” is the celebrated ”Book of Kells,” the most wonderful monument of the art of the Sixth Century that has come down to us. It was written also by the hand of Columbcille for Kells, his third foundation, though some of the ill.u.s.trations were probably added at a later date.

The story runs that not long after the foundation of Durrow, Columba went to Kells, one of the royal seats of Diarmaid, High King of Ireland. Now Diarmaid belonged to the southern branch of the Hy-Nialls and was regarded by the northern branch with no great favour. When Columba arrived the King was absent, and the Saint was treated with scant ceremony by the soldiers of the royal guard, to whom he was probably a stranger. When Diarmaid returned and heard of the insult that had been offered in his royal palace to the greatest and most beloved of the Saints of Erin, one of the royal blood and his own cousin, he was ready to make atonement by any means in his power. He offered to give Columba Kells itself and the surrounding country for the founding of a monastery and a church.

It is possible that Diarmaid, whose seat on the throne was anything but secure at the time, was not unmoved by the thought that the powerful clan of the Hy-Nialls of Tir-Connell would not be slow in avenging the insult to one of their clan. However that may be, Columba accepted the gift with grat.i.tude, and so the monastery and the church of Kells came to be built.

The great Gospel of Columbcille, or the ”Book of Kells,” has been the admiration of all ages. The patience and the delicate skill required for such an undertaking is to be wondered at. Certainly the old monks believed that if a thing were worth doing at all it was worth doing well, particularly if that thing happened to be a copy of the Gospels of Christ.

The untiring zeal and the labours of Columba had indeed brought forth fruit throughout the whole country. His friends and kinsfolk were generous, and churches and monasteries built by the Saint and owning him as their patron and head sprang up in every direction. Derry, Durrow, Kells, Raphoe, Sords, Drumcliff, Kilmacrenan, Drumcolumb, Glencolumbcille are but a few of his foundations. More than ever might it have been said of St. Columba that he was beloved of G.o.d and of man.

But G.o.d shows His love for His Saints in ways which are not the ways of men, and the chastening fires of sorrow and of suffering were to purify that ardent and impulsive nature. The haughty spirit of the descendant of Niall of the Nine Hostages had yet to be conformed to that of his great Master Who is meek and humble of heart.

CHAPTER IV

THE COW AND THE CALF

WE have already spoken of the pilgrimage to Rome of St. Finnian of Moville, and of the treasure that he had brought back with him from over the sea--a copy of the Scriptures translated and corrected by the hand of the great St. Jerome himself. Columba, when at Moville, must often have seen and perhaps even have handled the precious volume. In later days, so great was his desire that each of his monasteries should have its copy of the Word of G.o.d, that he would seek out and transcribe with his own hand all the most carefully written and most authentic ma.n.u.scripts to be found in Ireland.

The love of these old books, regarded by the Saints of Ireland as their most precious treasure, amounted almost to a pa.s.sion with Columba, so that we are hardly surprised to find him journeying to Moville to ask permission from his old master to make a copy of his rare and valuable ma.n.u.script. But he was met by an unexpected rebuff; St. Finnian guarded his treasure with a jealous eye, and feared to trust it in any hands but his own. He firmly refused the request of his old pupil, and no entreaties of Columba could move him from his decision. But the determination of Columbcille was equal to his own, and he resolved to obtain the object of his desire in spite of St. Finnian's prohibition.

He waited until all had gone to rest, and then, armed with parchment and pigments, went softly to the church, where the precious book was kept. Night after night, in spite of weary hand and eye, he laboured at his self-imposed task until the day broke, and men began to stir. To undertake the transcription of the whole book would have been an impossibility, working thus secretly in the night; he therefore confined himself to copying the Psalter. To Columba, poet as he was by nature, the psalms of the ”sweet singer of Israel” were particularly clear, and the wording of the new version gave the force and the melody of the original more perfectly than any rendering up till then in use.

The lonely vigils in the church pa.s.sed quickly, in spite of the weariness that a.s.sailed but could not daunt the enthusiastic scribe.

One night, one of the scholars of Moville, happening to pa.s.s the door of the church, was astonished to see a bright light s.h.i.+ning through the crevices of the door. He stooped and looked through the keyhole.

Keyholes as well as keys were on a large scale in the sixth century, and he obtained a good view of the interior, and of Columba bending over the reading desk with a pile of parchment before him, copying with skilful hand the treasure of Moville. The whole chancel was s.h.i.+ning with a brilliant light which fell directly across the page on which the writer was at work.

The young man, awestruck at the sight, crept softly away, and warned his master of what was taking place. St. Finnian knew Columba's skill in transcription. He made no move until the Psalter was completed, and his old pupil was preparing to depart. Then he accused his guest of having taken a copy of his book without his permission and against his will, and claimed the work as his rightful property.

This was to touch Columba in a tender spot. His nocturnal labours had cost him many weary vigils, but he had borne the weariness gladly for the sake of the prize--to give up the fruit of so much toil was more than could be expected of him. He flatly refused to yield to Finnian's claim. The old man was determined; Columba was firm; neither would give way. It was agreed in the end to appeal to the King at Tara, and to hold his judgment as final. Diarmaid might be considered as a fit judge in such a matter. The friend and patron of the great monastery of Clonmacnoise, founded by Ciaran in his presence and with his help, the King was looked upon by all the Saints of Ireland as their friend.

Moreover, he was Columba's own cousin, and had treated him on a former occasion with reverence and consideration. Columba himself had no doubt that the judgment would be in his favour, and went readily at Finnian's suggestion to lay the matter before him.

But Diarmaid's position on the throne was more secure than it had been in former days. He may have thought that he had less reason to fear the enmity of the Hy-Nialls of Tir-Connell. He had heard much of the sanct.i.ty of Columba, and may have supposed that in spite of his high lineage he would be ready to bear with patience an adverse judgment. He may have been actuated by the old enmity between the two branches of the family; or he may have decided according to his own conscience as he thought right and just. Be that as it may, the judgment came as a thunderclap to Columbcille.

”To every cow,” said the King, ”belongs its own calf.” Since the copy of Columba was the ”son-book” of the ma.n.u.script of Moville, it belonged by rights to its mother, and therefore to Finnian.

Columba's indignation knew no bounds. The judgment was unfair and unjust, he declared; Diarmaid should bear the penalty. With das.h.i.+ng eyes and burning heart he turned his back on King and courtiers, and strode from the royal presence.