The Legends of Saint Patrick | Page 8

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 face
Forbidding not, they
sprang; but Patrick raised
His hand, and stone-like crouched they
chained and still:
Then, Dichu onward striding fierce, the Saint

Between them signed the Cross; and lo, the sword
Froze in his hand,
and Dichu stood like stone.
The amazement past, he prayed the man
of God
To grace his house; and, side by side, a mile
They clomb the
hills. Ascending, Patrick turned,
His heart with prescience filled.
Beneath, there lay
A gleaming strait; beyond, a dim vast plain
With
many an inlet pierced: a golden marge
Girdled the water-tongues with
flag and reed;
But, farther off, a gentle sea-mist changed
The fair
green flats to purple. "Night comes on;"
Thus Dichu spake, and
waited. Patrick then
Advanced once more, and Sabhall soon was
reached,
A castle half, half barn. There garnered lay
Much grain,
and sun-imbrowned: and Patrick said,
"Here where the earthly grain
was stored for man
The bread of angels man shall eat one day."

And Patrick loved that place, and Patrick said,
"King Dichu, give
thou to the poor that grain,
To Christ, our Lord, thy barn." The strong
man stood
In doubt; but prayers of little orphaned babes
Reared by
his hand, went up for him that hour:
Therefore that barn he ceded,
and to Christ
By Patrick was baptised. Where lay the corn
A
convent later rose. There dwelt he oft;
And 'neath its roof more late
the stranger sat,

Exile, or kingdom-wearied king, or bard,
That
haply blind in age, yet tempest-rocked
By memories of departed
glories, drew
With gradual influx into his old heart
Solace of
Christian hope.
With Dichu bode
Patrick somewhile, intent from him to learn
The

inmost of that people. Oft they spake
Of Milcho. "Once his thrall,
against my will
In earthly things I served him: for his soul
Needs
therefore must I labour. Hard was he;
Unlike those hearts to which
God's Truth makes way
Like message from a mother in her grave:

Yet what I can I must. Not heaven itself
Can force belief; for Faith is
still good will."
Dichu laughed aloud: "Good will! Milcho's good will

Neither to others, nor himself, good will
Hath Milcho! Fireless sits
he, winter through,
The logs beside his hearth: and as on them

Glimmers the rime, so glimmers on his face
The smile. Convert him!
Better thrice to hang him!
Baptise him! He will film your font with
ice!
The cold of Milcho's heart has winter-nipt
That glen he dwells
in! From the sea it slopes
Unfinished, savage, like some nightmare
dream,
Raked by an endless east wind of its own.
On wolf's milk
was he suckled not on woman's!
To Milcho speed! Of Milcho claim
belief!
Milcho will shrivel his small eye and say
He scorns to trust
himself his father's son,
Nor deems his lands his own by right of race

But clutched by stress of brain! Old Milcho's God
Is gold. Forbear
him, sir, or ere you seek him
Make smooth your way with gold."
Thus Dichu spake;
And Patrick, after musings long, replied:
"Faith
is no gift that gold begets or feeds,
Oftener by gold extinguished.
Unto God,
Unbribed, unpurchased, yearns the soul of man;
Yet
finds perforce in God its great reward.
Not less this Milcho deems I
did him wrong,
His slave, yet fleeing. To requite that loss
Gifts will
I send him first by messengers
Ere yet I see his face."
Then Patrick sent
His messengers to Milcho, speaking thus:
"If ill
befell thy herds through flight of mine
Fourfold that loss requite I,
lest, for hate
Of me, thou disesteem my Master's Word.

Likewise I
sue thy friendship; and I come
In few days' space, with gift of other
gold
Than earth concedes, the Tidings of that God
Who made all
worlds, and late His Face hath shown,
Sun-like to man. But thou,
rejoice in hope!"

Thus Patrick, once by man advised in part,
Though wont to counsel
with his God alone.
Meantime full many a rumour vague had vexed
Milcho much musing.
He had dealings large
And distant. Died a chief? He sent and bought

The widow's all; or sold on foodless shores
For usury the leanest of
his kine.
Meantime, his dark ships and the populous quays
With
news still murmured. First from Imber Dea
Came whispers how a
sage had landed late,
And how when Nathi fain had barred his way,

Nathi that spurned Palladius from the land,
That sage with levelled
eyes, and kingly front
Had from his presence driven him with a ban

Cur-like and craven; how on bended knee
Sinell believed, the royal
man well-loved
Descending from the judgment-seat with joy:
And
how when fishers spurned his brethren's quest
For needful food, that
sage had raised his rod,
And all the silver harvest of blue streams

Lay black in nets and sand. His wrinkled brow
Wrinkling yet more,
thus Milcho answer made:
"Deceived are those that will to be
deceived:
This knave has heard of gold in river-beds,
And comes a
deft sand-groper; let him