Part 8

On another occasion, she and one of her nuns were being driven over a common near the Liffey, when they came to a long hedge, for a man had enclosed a portion of the common. But Bridget’s driver had no relish for such encroachments, and determined to assert his “right of way,” so he prepared to drive over the hedge. Bridget told him to go round, but not he—he would assert his right. Over went the chariot with such a bounce, that away flew the coachman, Bridget, and her nun, like rockets; and when they picked themselves up were all badly bruised, and Bridget’s head was cut open. She had it bound up, and continued her journey. When she got home she consulted her physician, who with shrewd sense said, “Leave it alone. Nature is your best doctor.”

In the “Book of Leinster,” compiled in the twelfth century, is a list of saintly virgins who were trained under S. Bridget. It is, however, by no means complete. A few words shall be devoted to some of them. One, very young, had been committed to Bridget when quite a child. Her name was Darlugdach. She slept with Bridget, her foster-mother. Now, as she grew to be a big girl, she became restive, and impatient of the restraints of the convent life at Kildare, and she had formed a plan with another to run away.

The night on which she had resolved on leaving the monastery she was, as usual, sleeping in the same bed with Bridget; and she laid herself in her bosom, her heart fluttering with excitement, and with her mind at conflict between love of her foster-mother and desire to be out and free as a bird.

At last she rose, and in an agony of uncertainty cast herself on her knees, and besought God to strengthen her to remain where she knew she would be safe. Then, in the vehemence of her resolve, she thrust her naked feet before the red coals that glowed on the hearth, and held them there till she could bear it no longer, and limped back to bed, and nestled again into the bosom of the holy mother.

When morning broke, Bridget rose, and looked at the scorched soles of Darlugdach, and touching them said gently, “I was not asleep, my darling child. I was awake and aware of your struggle, but I allowed you to fight it out bravely by yourself. Now that you have conquered, you need not fear this temptation again.”

Darlugdach, when S. Bridget was dying, clung to her, in floods of tears, and entreated her spiritual mother to allow her to die with her. But S. Bridget promised that she should follow speedily—but not yet. Now, on the very anniversary of S. Bridget’s departure, next year, Darlugdach fell ill of a fever and died.

Another of Bridget’s nuns was named Dara, who was blind—indeed, had been born without sight.

One evening Bridget and Dara sat together and talked all night of the joys of Paradise. And their hearts were so full that the hours of darkness passed without their being aware how time sped; and lo! above the Wicklow mountains rose the golden sun, and in the glorious light the sky flashed, and the river glittered, and all creation awoke. Then Bridget sighed, because she knew that Dara’s eyes were closed to all this beauty. So—the legend tells—she bowed her head in prayer; and presently God wrought a great miracle, for the eyes of the blind woman opened, and she saw the golden ball in the east, and the purple mountains, the trees, and the flowers glittering in the morning dew. She cried out with delight. Now for the first time she—

“Saw a bush of flowering elder, And dog-daisies in its shade, Tufted meadow-sweet entangled In a blushing wild-rose braid.

“Saw a distant sheet of water Flashing like a fallen sun; Saw the winking of the ripples Where the mountain torrents run.

“Saw the peaceful arch of heaven, With a cloudlet on the blue, Like a white bird winging homeward With its feathers drenched in dew.”

Then Dara tried to lift up her heart to God in thanksgiving; but her attention was distracted,—now it was a bird, then a flower, then a change in the light,—and she could not fix her mind on God. Then a sadness came upon her, and she cried—

“‘O my Saviour!’ With a sudden grief oppressed,— ‘Be Thy will, not mine, accomplished; Give me what Thou deemest best.’

“Then once more the clouds descended, And the eyes again waxed dark; All the splendour of the sunlight Faded to a dying spark.

“But the closèd heart expanded Like the flower that blooms at night Whilst, as Philomel, the spirit Chanted to the waning light.”

Again, another of Bridget’s nuns was Brunseach; she, however, went, probably on Bridget’s death, to a religious house that had been founded by S. Kieran of Saighir, over which he had set his mother, Liadhain.

She was young and beautiful, and Dioma, the chief of the country of the Hy Fiachach, came by violence and carried her off to his _dun_ or castle.

Kieran was angry, and at once seizing his staff, went to the residence of the prince, and demanded that she should be surrendered to him. The chief shut his gates and refused to admit the saint. Kieran remained outside, although it was winter, and declared he would not return without her.

During the night there was a heavy fall of snow, but the saint would not leave. Then Dioma, taunting him, said, “Come, I will let her go on one condition, that to-morrow I hear the stork, and that he awake me from sleep.”

And actually next morning there was a stork perched on the palisade of the _dun_, and was uttering its peculiar cries. The tyrant arose in alarm, threw himself before the saint, and dismissed the damsel.

However, he had quailed only for a while, and presently renewed his persecution. Brunseach, according to the legend, died of fright, but was brought to life again by S. Kieran—that is to say, she fainted and was revived.

The story is late, and has become invested in fable; but so much of it is true, that Brunseach was carried off by Dioma, and that Kieran managed to get her restored.

It was perhaps through the annoyance caused by the prince that he resolved to leave Ireland. He settled in Cornwall. But he had taken with him his old nurse and Brunseach, and he found for them suitable habitations there. Kieran himself was there called Piran, and he founded several churches. That of his nurse in the Cornish peninsula is Ladock, and Brunseach is known there as S. Buriana.

“Nothing has been recorded of her life and labours in Cornwall, except the general tradition that she spent her days in good works and great sanctity; but the place where she dwelt was regarded as holy ground for centuries, and can still be pointed out. It lies about a mile south-east of the parish church which bears her name, beside a rivulet on the farm of Bosleven; and the spot is called the Sentry, or Sanctuary. The crumbling ruins of an ancient structure still remain there, and traces of extensive foundations have been found adjoining them. If not the actual ruins, they probably occupy the site of the oratory in which Athelstan, after vanquishing the Cornish king, knelt at the shrine of the saint, and made his memorable vow that, if God would crown his expedition to the Scilly Isles with success, he would on his return build and endow there a church and college in token of his gratitude, and in memory of his victories.

“It was on that wild headland, about four miles from Land’s End, that S. Buriana took up her abode; and a group of saints from Ireland, who were probably her friends and companions, and who seem to have landed on our shores at the same time, occupied contiguous parts of the same district. There she watched and prayed with such devotion, that the fame of her goodness found its way back to her native land; and thenceforth Brunseach the Slender, by which designation she had been known there, was enrolled in the catalogue of the Irish saints; but her Christian zeal was spent in the Cornish parish that perpetuates her name.”[4]

Bridget had two disciples of the name of Brig or Briga. This was by no means an uncommon name. A sister of S. Brendan was so called.

Another was Kiara, and this virgin we perhaps meet with again in Cornwall as Piala, the sister of Fingar. Amongst the Welsh and Cornish the hard sound K became P, thus _Ken_ (head), was pronounced _Pen_; so S. Kieran became Piran.

Fingar and his sister formed a part of a great colony of emigrants who started for Cornwall. Fingar had settled in Brittany, but he returned to Ireland and persuaded his sister to leave the country with him. This she was the more inclined to do as she was being forced into marriage in spite of her monastic vows. They left Ireland with the intention of going back to Brittany, but were carried by adverse winds to Cornwall, and landed at Hayle.

King Tewdrig, who had a palace hard by, did not relish the arrival of a host of Irish, and he set upon them and massacred most of them. Kiara, however, was not molested, though her brother was killed. She settled where is now the parish church of Phillack. The scene of her brother’s martyrdom was Gwynear, hard by. She probably did not care to leave the proximity to his grave; she had no one to go with to Armorica, and it seems likely that a larger body of Irish came over shortly after, occupied all the west part of Cornwall, and so made her condition more tolerable.

XI

_S. ITHA_

What Bridget was for Leinster, that was Itha or Ita for Munster; and from the way in which her cult spread through Devon and Cornwall, we are led to suspect that there were a good many religious houses and churches in the ancient kingdom of Damnonia that were under her rule, and looked to Killeedy in Limerick as their mother-house.

S. Itha was a shoot of the royal family of the Nandesi, in the present county of Waterford. Her father’s name was Kennfoelad, and her mother’s was Nect. They were Christians, as appears from the fact of S. Itha having been baptised in childhood.

She was born about 480, and probably at an early date received the veil “in the Church of God of the clan.”

Unfortunately we have not the life of S. Itha in a very early form; it comes to us sadly corrupted with late fables foisted in to magnify the miraculous powers of the saint.

She moved to the foot of Mount Luachra, in Hy Conaill, and founded the monastery of Cluain Credhuil, now Killeedy, in a wild and solitary region, backed by the mountains of Mullaghareirk, and on a stream that is a confluent of the Deel, which falls into the Shannon at Askaton.

The chief of the clan or sept of Hy Conaill offered her a considerable tract of land for the support of her establishment, but she refused to receive more than was sufficient for a modest garden.

Let us try to get some idea of what one of these monasteries was like.

In the first place a ditch and a bank were drawn round the space that was to be occupied, and the summit of the bank was further protected by a palisade of stakes with osier wattling. In such places as were stony, and where no earthwork could well be made, in place of a bank, there was a wall.

Within the enclosure were a number of beehive-shaped cells, either of wattle or of stone and turf. Certainly the favourite style of building was with wood; but of course all such wooden structures have perished, whereas some of those of stone have been preserved. There were churches, apparently small, and a refectory, bakehouses, and a brewery and storehouses.

Outside the defensive wall of enclosure lived the retainers of the abbey. Where an abbot or abbess was head of an ecclesiastical tribe, he or she was bound to find land for each household: nine furrows of arable land, nine of bog, nine of grass-land, and as much of forest. As the population increased, a secular or an ecclesiastical chief was obliged to obtain an extension of territory, or would be held to have forfeited his claims as a chief. This led to incessant feud among the Celtic princes; it forced the saints to be continually striving to obtain fresh grants of land and make fresh settlements. When there was no more chance of obtaining land in Ireland, they sent swarms to Britain and to Brittany, to found colonies there, under the jurisdiction of the saint. This explains the way in which the Celtic saints were incessantly moving about. They were forced to do so to extend their lands so as to find farms for their vassals.

A very terrible story is told of the condition of affairs in Ireland in 657. The population of the island had increased to such an extent that the chiefs could not find land enough for the people. Dermot and Blaithmac, the kings, summoned an assembly of clergy and nobles to discuss the situation and consider a remedy. They concluded that the “elders” should put up prayer to the Almighty to send a pestilence, “to reduce the number of the lower class, that the rest might live in comfort.” S. Fechin of Fore, on being consulted, approved of this extraordinary petition. And the prayer was answered from heaven, but the vengeance of God fell mainly on the nobles and clergy, for the Yellow Plague which ensued, which swept away at least a third of the population, fell with special heaviness on the nobles and clergy, of whom multitudes, including the two kings and S. Fechin of Fore, were carried off.

S. Itha does not seem to have coveted land, and she assumed a different position from that taken by S. Bridget. She was not an independent chieftainess over a sacred tribe, but acted as prophetess to the secular tribe of the Hy Conaill. Just as among the Germans, the warriors had their wise women who attended the tribe, blessed the arms of the warriors, and uttered oracles, so was it among the Celts; and we are assured that the entire sept, or clan, unanimously adopted S. Itha as their religious directress and, in fact, wise woman. In such cases, when a prophecy came true, when a military undertaking blessed by the Saint proved successful, the usage was, that an award was made in perpetuity to him or to her, a tax imposed that must be paid regularly by the tribe.

Thus there were two ways by which a Celtic saint might subsist—either as an independent chieftain over a sacred tribe, or as the patroness or prophetess of a tribe, not owning much land, but drawing a revenue from the sept or clan.

We have a very curious illustration of this in the life of S. Findcua, who was the great seer and prophet of Munster. He blessed the arms of the king seven times in as many battles, and was rewarded for each; he received tribute in this wise: “The first calf, and the first lamb, and the first pig,” from every farm for ever. “For every homestead a sack of malt, with a corresponding supply of food yearly.”

Now there is not a trace of S. Itha having allowed herself on any occasion to degrade herself to blessing and cursing, blessing the arms of the Leinster men and covering their foes with imprecations. She succeeded in inspiring the whole of the people with such reverence, that they were ready to receive what she declared as a message from God, and she used this position for no other object than that of advancing God’s kingdom, stirring up to good works, encouraging peace, and restraining violence. She showed no eagerness for gifts. On one occasion a wealthy man, to whom she had rendered a service, insisted on forcing money on her. She at once withdrew her hand, absolutely refused it, and to show him her determination, washed her hands that, she said, had been defiled by contact with his filthy lucre. God’s gifts were not to be traded with, and profit must not be made out of an office such as that filled by her.

Parents, desirous of having their children brought up to the ecclesiastical state, committed them to her; and thus she became the foster-mother of S. Pulcherius or Mochoemoc, of S. Cumine, and S. Brendan. The latter was committed to her when one year old, and she kept him with her till he was five. Throughout his life Brendan retained not merely the tenderest love for Itha, but such a reverence that he consulted her in all matters of importance.

One day Brendan asked her what three works were, in her opinion, most well-pleasing to God. She replied, “Faith out of a pure heart, sincerity of life, and tender charity.”

“And what,” further asked Brendan, “what are most displeasing to God?”

“A spiteful tongue, a love of what smacks of evil, and avarice,” was her ready reply.

Brendan, as a little fellow, was the pet of the community, and all the sisters loved to have him and dance him in their arms. In the life of S. Brendan is inserted a snatch from an older Irish ballad concerning him:

“Angels in shape of virgins white This little babe did tend. From hand to hand, fair forms of light, Sweet faces o’er him bend.”

S. Erc, Bishop of Slane, seems to have been Itha’s principal adviser and friend; and when the five years of Brendan’s fostering were over, Erc took the little boy away to teach him the Psalms and the Gospels. S. Erc found it rather hard to keep the boy supplied with milk, but a hind with her fawn, so says the legend, was caught, and gave her milk to Brendan.

It may be asked, What was the mode of life of the community of S. Itha?

Unhappily we do not know so much of that of the religious women as we do of that of the monasteries of men, yet we cannot doubt that the rule of the house for women much resembled that in the others. Here is an account of the order as given in the life of S. Brioc, an Irishman by race, though born in Cardigan.

“At fixed hours they all assembled in the church to celebrate divine worship. After the office of vespers (6 p.m.) they refreshed their bodies by a common meal. Then, having said compline, they dispersed in silence to their beds. At midnight they rose and assembled to sing devoutly psalms and hymns to the glory of God. Then they returned to their beds. But at cockcrow, at the sound of the bell, they sprang from their couches to sing lauds. From the conclusion of this office to the second hour (8 a.m.) they were engaged in spiritual exercises and prayer. Then they cheerfully betook them to manual labour.”

Happily one of the monastic offices of the early Irish Church has been deciphered from a nearly obliterated leaf of the Irish MS. _Book of Mulling_: it consisted of the Magnificat. What preceded this is illegible: some verses of a hymn; the reading of the Beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount, a hymn of S. Secundinus, a commemoration of S. Patrick, a portion of a hymn by S. Hilary of Poitiers, the Apostles’ Creed, the Lord’s prayer, and a collect.

The work of the day consisted in teaching the young girls their letters, in needlework, tending the cattle—in which each, abbess included, took turn—grinding corn in the handmill, and cultivating the garden.

Numerous visitors arrived to consult S. Itha, and she most certainly had fixed hours in which to receive them.

One striking instance of the veneration in which she was held is that S. Coemgen of Glendalough, when dying, sent to entreat her to come to him; he would have no one else minister to him in his last sickness, and he begged her, when he expired to place her hand over his mouth and close it.

One Beoan was a famous artificer; he was a native of Connaught. He went to Itha and passed into her service; but was summoned by his military chief to attend him in one of his raids. He departed most reluctantly. Itha was greatly distressed at losing him. As he did not return after a skirmish, she went to the scene of the encounter, and found him grievously wounded, but still living. Under her fostering care he recovered. According to late legend, his head had been cut off and thrown away. She found his body but not his head, so she called “Beoan! Beoan!” Whereupon the head came flying through the air to her, and she set it on again. So a very simple transaction was magnified into a ridiculous fable.

After leaving her, S. Brendan went about with Bishop Erc in his waggon, from which the bishop preached to the people. One day when Erc was addressing a crowd, Brendan was in the back of the waggon, looking over the side, clearly not attending to the sermon. Then a small, fair-haired, rosy-faced girl came near, and seeing the little fellow peeping over the side, she tried to scramble up the waggon-wheel to get to Brendan and play with him. But he laid hold of the reins and lashed her with them, so that she was forced to desist, and fell back crying. Erc was much annoyed at Brendan’s conduct, and sent him into the black-hole in punishment.

Some years later, Itha required Brendan to come to her: she was in great trouble, and needed his assistance. He went accordingly, and with many tears she told him that one of her pupils had run away some time before, and had fallen into very bad courses, which had led at last to her being reduced to be a slave-girl in Connaught. Would he go in search of her and bring her back, with assurance that everything would be forgiven and forgotten?

Brendan readily undertook the task, and succeeded in redeeming the girl and restoring her to her spiritual mother.

Now Brendan himself got into trouble. He had gone with a boat one day to an island, taking with him two lads, one quite young. He left one boy in charge of the boat, and advanced up the land with the other. Then this latter said to him, “Master, the tide will rise before we get back, and I am sure my little brother cannot manage the boat alone.”

“Be silent,” retorted Brendan. “Do you suppose that I do not care for him as much as you do yourself?”

After a while the young man returned to the matter. “I am sure,” said he, “it is not safe to leave the boy unassisted. The current runs very strong.”

“Bad luck to you!” said Brendan, flaming up,—he was a peppery man,—“Go yourself, then;” and the youth took him at his word and found the boy struggling with the boat, tide and wind were driving from shore, and he was unable to control the coracle. The elder ran into the water to assist his brother, and a great wave swept him off his feet and he was drowned, but the little boy escaped.

After this S. Brendan had no peace of mind. He thought himself responsible for the loss of the youth. He had wished him “Bad luck,” and bad luck indeed had fallen to him.

He went at once to his foster-mother, and consulted her.

It is quite possible that the relatives of the drowned youth had taken the matter up, and pursued Brendan in blood-feud. So Itha, after mature consideration, advised Brendan to leave Ireland for a while; and in punishment for his hastiness, and for having caused the death of the youth, she bade him abstain from blood in everything.

So Brendan started. He went to Armorica, and determined to visit Gildas, the historian, who was then at his abbey of Rhuys. Gildas was a sour, ill-tempered man, very hard; and when Brendan arrived, it was just after sundown and the gates of the monastery were closed. He announced who he was—a traveller from Ireland—but Gildas replied that rules must be kept, and it was against his rule to open after set of sun, so Brendan was constrained to spend the night outside the gates.

Thence he went to Dol, but after a while, and a visit to S. David in Wales, he returned to Ireland, and now Itha told him a marvellous story. There was a rumour that far away to the west beyond the horizon was a wondrous land of beauty. He must not remain in Ireland: let him put to sea, sail after the sun as it set, and discover the mysterious land beyond the Atlantic.