The Legends of Saint Patrick | Page 7

hungry heart with God, and, cleansed by pain,?In exile found the spirit's native land.?Eve deepened into night, and still he prayed:?The clear cold stars had crowned the azure vault;?And, risen at midnight from dark seas, the moon?Had quenched those stars, yet Patrick still prayed on:?Till from the river murmuring in the vale,?Far off, and from the morning airs close by?That shook the alders by the river's mouth,?And from his own deep heart a voice there came,?"Ere yet thou fling'st God's bounty on this land?There is a debt to cancel. Where is he,?Thy five years' lord that scourged thee for his swine??Alas that wintry face! Alas that heart?Joyless since earliest youth! To him reveal it!?To him declare that God who Man became?To raise man's fall'n estate, as though a man,?All faculties of man unmerged, undimmed,?Had changed to worm and died the prey of worms,?That so the mole might see!"
Thus Patrick mused?Not ignorant that from low beginnings rise?Oftenest the works of greatness; yet of this?Unweeting, that his failure, one and sole?Through all his more than mortal course, even now?Before that low beginning's threshold lay,?Betwixt it and that Promised Land beyond?A bar of scandal stretched. Not otherwise?Might whatsoe'er was mortal in his strength?Dying, put on the immortal.
With the morn?Deep sleep descended on him. Waking soon,?He rose a man of might, and in that might?Laboured; and God His servant's toil revered;?And gladly on that coast Erin to Christ?Paid her firstfruits. Three days he preached his Lord:?The fourth embarking, cape succeeding cape?They passed, and heard the lowing herds remote?In hollow glens, and smelt the balmy breath?Of gorse on golden hillsides; till at eve,?The Imber Domnand reached, on silver sands?Grated their keel. Around them flocked at dawn?Warriors with hunters mixed, and shepherd youths?And maids with lips as red as mountain berries?And eyes like sloes, or keener eyes, dark-fringed?And gleaming like the blue-black spear. They came?With milk-pail, and with kid, and kindled fire?And spread the genial board. Upon that shore?Full many knelt and gave themselves to Christ,?Strong men, and men at midmost of their hopes?By sickness felled; old chiefs, at life's dim close?That oft had asked, "Beyond the grave what hope?"?Worn sailors weary of the toilsome seas,?And craving rest; they, too, that sex which wears?The blended crowns of Chastity and Love;?Wondering, they hailed the Maiden-Motherhood;?And listening children praised the Babe Divine,?And passed Him, each to each.
Ere long, once more?Their sails were spread. Again by grassy marge?They rowed, and sylvan glades. The branching deer?Like flying gleams went by them. Oft the cry?Of fighting clans rang out: but oftener yet?Clamour of rural dance, or mart confused?With many-coloured garb and movements swift,?Pageant sun-bright: or on the sands a throng?Girdled with circle glad some bard whose song?Shook the wild clan as tempest shakes the woods.?Still north the wanderers sailed: at evening, mists?Cumbered the shore and on them leaned the blast,?And fierce rain flashed mingling with dim-lit sea.?All night they toiled; next day at noon they kenned?A seaward stream that shone like golden tress?Severed and random-thrown. That river's mouth?Ere long attained was all with lilies white?As April field with daisies. Entering there?They reached a wood, and disembarked with joy:?There, after thanks to God, silent they sat?In thought, and watched the ripples, dusk yet bright,?That lived and died like things that laughed at time,?On gliding 'neath those many-centuried boughs.?But, midmost, Patrick slept. Then through the trees,?Shy as a fawn half-tamed now stole, now fled?A boy of such bright aspect faery child?He seemed, or babe exposed of royal race:?At last assured beside the Saint he stood,?And dropped on him a flower, and disappeared:?Thus flower on flower from the great wood he brought?And hid them in the bosom of the Saint.?The monks forbade him, saying, "Lest thou wake?The master from his sleep." But Patrick woke,?And saw the boy, and said, "Forbid him not;?The heir of all my kingdom is this child."?Then spake the brethren, "Wilt thou walk with us?"?And he, "I will:" and so for his sweet face?They called his name Benignus: and the boy?Thenceforth was Christ's. Beneath his parent's roof?At night they housed. Nowhere that child would sleep?Except at Patrick's feet. Till Patrick's death?Unchanged to him he clave, and after reigned?The second at Ardmacha.
Day by day?They held their course; ere long the hills of Mourne?Loomed through sea-mist: Ulidian summits next?Before them rose: but nearer at their left?Inland with westward channel wound the wave?Changed to sea-lake. Nine miles with chant and hymn?They tracked the gold path of the sinking sun;?Then southward ran 'twixt headland and green isle?And landed. Dewy pastures sunset-dazed,?At leisure paced by mild-eyed milk-white kine?Smiled them a welcome. Onward moved in sight?Swiftly, with shadow far before him cast,?Dichu, that region's lord, a martial man?And merry, and a speaker of the truth.?Pirates he deemed them first and toward them faced?With wolf-hounds twain that watched their master's eye?To spring, or not to spring. The imperious