WHERE THERE IS NOTHING, THERE IS GOD.
The little wicker houses at Tullagh, where the Brothers were accustomedto pray, or bend over many handicrafts, when twilight had driven themfrom the fields, were empty, for the hardness of the winter had broughtthe brotherhood together in the little wooden house under the shadow ofthe wooden chapel; and Abbot Malathgeneus, Brother Dove, BrotherBald Fox, Brother Peter, Brother Patrick, Brother Bittern, BrotherFair-Brows, and many too young to have won names in the great battle,sat about the fire with ruddy faces, one mending lines to lay in theriver for eels, one fashioning a snare for birds, one mending thebroken handle of a spade, one writing in a large book, and one shapinga jewelled box to hold the book; and among the rushes at their feet laythe scholars, who would one day be Brothers, and whose school-houseit was, and for the succour of whose tender years the great fire wassupposed to leap and flicker. One of these, a child of eight or nineyears, called Olioll, lay upon his back looking up through the hole inthe roof, through which the smoke went, and watching the stars appearingand disappearing in the smoke with mild eyes, like the eyes of a beastof the field. He turned presently to the Brother who wrote in the bigbook, and whose duty was to teach the children, and said, 'Brother Dove,to what are the stars fastened?' The Brother, rejoicing to see so muchcuriosity in the stupidest of his scholars, laid down the pen andsaid, 'There are nine crystalline spheres, and on the first the Moonis fastened, on the second the planet Mercury, on the third the planetVenus, on the fourth the Sun, on the fifth the planet Mars, on the sixththe planet Jupiter, on the seventh the planet Saturn; these are thewandering stars; and on the eighth are fastened the fixed stars; butthe ninth sphere is a sphere of the substance on which the breath of Godmoved in the beginning.'
'What is beyond that?' said the child. 'There is nothing beyond that;there is God.'
And then the child's eyes strayed to the jewelled box, where one greatruby was gleaming in the light of the fire, and he said, 'Why hasBrother Peter put a great ruby on the side of the box?'
'The ruby is a symbol of the love of God.'
'Why is the ruby a symbol of the love of God?'
'Because it is red, like fire, and fire burns up everything, and wherethere is nothing, there is God.'
The child sank into silence, but presently sat up and said, 'There issomebody outside.'
'No,' replied the Brother. 'It is only the wolves; I have heard themmoving about in the snow for some time. They are growing very wild, nowthat the winter drives them from the mountains. They broke into a foldlast night and carried off many sheep, and if we are not careful theywill devour everything.'
'No, it is the footstep of a man, for it is heavy; but I can hear thefootsteps of the wolves also.'
He had no sooner done speaking than somebody rapped three times, butwith no great loudness.
'I will go and open, for he must be very cold.'
'Do not open, for it may be a man-wolf, and he may devour us all.'
But the boy had already drawn back the heavy wooden bolt, and all thefaces, most of them a little pale, turned towards the slowly-openingdoor.
'He has beads and a cross, he cannot be a man-wolf,' said the child, asa man with the snow heavy on his long, ragged beard, and on the mattedhair, that fell over his shoulders and nearly to his waist, and droppingfrom the tattered cloak that but half-covered his withered brown body,came in and looked from face to face with mild, ecstatic eyes. Standingsome way from the fire, and with eyes that had rested at last upon theAbbot Malathgeneus, he cried out, 'O blessed abbot, let me come to thefire and warm myself and dry the snow from my beard and my hair and mycloak; that I may not die of the cold of the mountains, and anger theLord with a wilful martyrdom.'
'Come to the fire,' said the abbot, 'and warm yourself, and eat the foodthe boy Olioll will bring you. It is sad indeed that any for whom Christhas died should be as poor as you.'
The man sat over the fire, and Olioll took away his now dripping cloakand laid meat and bread and wine before him; but he would eat only ofthe bread, and he put away the wine, asking for water. When his beardand hair had begun to dry a little and his limbs had ceased to shiverwith the cold, he spoke again.
'O blessed abbot, have pity on the poor, have pity on a beggar who hastrodden the bare world this many a year, and give me some labour to do,the hardest there is, for I am the poorest of God's poor.'
Then the Brothers discussed together what work they could put him to,and at first to little purpose, for there was no labour that had notfound its labourer in that busy community; but at last one rememberedthat Brother Bald Fox, whose business it was to turn the great quern inthe quern-house, for he was too stupid for anything else, was gettingold for so heavy a labour; and so the beggar was put to the quern fromthe morrow.
The cold passed away, and the spring grew to summer, and the quern wasnever idle, nor was it turned with grudging labour, for when any passedthe beggar was heard singing as he drove the handle round. The lastgloom, too, had passed from that happy community, for Olioll, who hadalways been stupid and unteachable, grew clever, and this was the moremiraculous because it had come of a sudden. One day he had been evenduller than usual, and was beaten and told to know his lesson betteron the morrow or be sent into a lower class among little boys who wouldmake a joke of him. He had gone out in tears, and when he came the nextday, although his stupidity, born of a mind that would listen to everywandering sound and brood upon every wandering light, had so long beenthe byword of the school, he knew his lesson so well that he passed tothe head of the class, and from that day was the best of scholars. Atfirst Brother Dove thought this was an answer to his own prayers to theVirgin, and took it for a great proof of the love she bore him; but whenmany far more fervid prayers had failed to add a single wheatsheafto the harvest, he began to think that the child was trafficking withbards, or druids, or witches, and resolved to follow and watch. He hadtold his thought to the abbot, who bid him come to him the moment he hitthe truth; and the next day, which was a Sunday, he stood in the pathwhen the abbot and the Brothers were coming from vespers, with theirwhite habits upon them, and took the abbot by the habit and said, 'Thebeggar is of the greatest of saints and of the workers of miracle. Ifollowed Olioll but now, and by his slow steps and his bent head I sawthat the weariness of his stupidity was over him, and when he came tothe little wood by the quern-house I knew by the path broken in theunder-wood and by the footmarks in the muddy places that he had gonethat way many times. I hid behind a bush where the path doubled uponitself at a sloping place, and understood by the tears in his eyes thathis stupidity was too old and his wisdom too new to save him from terrorof the rod. When he was in the quern-house I went to the window andlooked in, and the birds came down and perched upon my head and myshoulders, for they are not timid in that holy place; and a wolf passedby, his right side shaking my habit, his left the leaves of a bush.Olioll opened his book and turned to the page I had told him to learn,and began to cry, and the beggar sat beside him and comforted him untilhe fell asleep. When his sleep was of the deepest the beggar knelt downand prayed aloud, and said, "O Thou Who dwellest beyond the stars, showforth Thy power as at the beginning, and let knowledge sent from Theeawaken in his mind, wherein is nothing from the world, that the nineorders of angels may glorify Thy name;" and then a light broke out ofthe air and wrapped Aodh, and I smelt the breath of roses. I stirred alittle in my wonder, and the beggar turned and saw me, and, bending low,said, "O Brother Dove, if I have done wrong, forgive me, and I will dopenance. It was my pity moved me;" but I was afraid and I ran away, anddid not stop running until I came here.' Then all the Brothers begantalking together, one saying it was such and such a saint, and one thatit was not he but another; and one that it was none of these, for theywere still in their brotherhoods, but that it was such and such aone; and the talk was as near to quarreling as might be in thatgentle community, for each would claim so great a saint for his nativeprovince. At last the abbot said, 'He is none that you have named, for
at Easter I had greeting from all, and each was in his brotherhood; buthe is Aengus the Lover of God, and the first of those who have gone tolive in the wild places and among the wild beasts. Ten years ago he feltthe burden of many labours in a brotherhood under the Hill of Patrickand went into the forest that he might labour only with song to theLord; but the fame of his holiness brought many thousands to his cell,so that a little pride clung to a soul from which all else had beendriven. Nine years ago he dressed himself in rags, and from that daynone has seen him, unless, indeed, it be true that he has been seenliving among the wolves on the mountains and eating the grass of thefields. Let us go to him and bow down before him; for at last, afterlong seeking, he has found the nothing that is God; and bid him lead usin the pathway he has trodden.'
They passed in their white habits along the beaten path in the wood,the acolytes swinging their censers before them, and the abbot, with hiscrozier studded with precious stones, in the midst of the incense; andcame before the quern-house and knelt down and began to pray, awaitingthe moment when the child would wake, and the Saint cease from his watchand come to look at the sun going down into the unknown darkness, as hisway was.