The Washer of the Ford: Legendary moralities and barbaric tales

Colum spake. “O Murtagh my brother, tell me in what way it is that I still keep God crucified upon the Cross.”

There was a sound in the cell as of the morning-laughter of children, of the singing of birds, of the sunlight streaming through the blue fields of Heaven.

Then Murtagh’s voice came out of Paradise, sweet with the sweetness: honey-sweet it was, and clothed with deep awe because of the glory.

“Colum, servant of Christ, arise!”

Colum rose, and was as a leaf there, a leaf that is in the wind.

“Colum, thine hour has not yet come. I see it, bathing in the white light which is the Pool of Eternal Life, that is in the abyss where deep-rooted are the Gates of Heaven.”

“And my sin, O Murtagh, my sin?”

“God is weary because thou hast not repented.”

“O my God and my God! Sure, Murtagh, if that is so, it is so, but it is not for knowledge to me. Sure, O God, it is a blessing I have put on man and woman, on beast and bird and fish, on creeping things and flying things, on the green grass and the brown earth and the flowing wave, on the wind that cometh and goeth, and on the mystery of the flame! Sure, O God, I have sorrowed for all my sins: there is not one I have not fasted and prayed for. Sorrow upon me! – Is it accursed I am, or what is the evil that holdeth me by the hand?”

Then Murtagh, calling through sweet dreams and the rainbow-rain of happy tears that make that place so wondrous and so fair, spake once more:

“O Colum, blind art thou. Hast thou yet repented because that after thou didst capture the great black seal, that is a man under spells, thou, with thy monks, didst crucify him upon the great rock at the place where, long ago, thy coracle came ashore?”

“O Murtagh, favoured of God, will you not be explaining to Him that is King of the Elements, that this was because the seal who was called Black Angus wrought evil upon a mortal woman, and that of the sea-seed was sprung one who had no soul?”

But no answer came to that, and when Colum looked about him, behold there was no soft shining, but only the body of Murtagh the old monk. With a heavy heart, and his soul like a sinking boat in a sea of pain, he turned and went out into the night.

A fine, wonderful night it was. The moon lay low above the sea, and all the flowing gold and flashing silver of the rippling running water seemed to be a flood going that way and falling into the shining hollow splendour.

Through the sea-weed the old Saint moved, weary and sad. When he came to a sandy place he stopped. There, on a rock, he saw a little child. Naked she was, though clad with soft white moonlight. In her hair were brown weeds of the sea, gleaming golden because of the glow. In her hands was a great shell, and at that shell was her mouth. And she was singing this song; passing sweet to hear, it was, with the sea-music that was in it:

A little lonely child am IThat have not any soul:God made me but a homeless wave,Without a goal.A seal my father was, a sealThat once was man:My mother loved him tho’ he was’Neath mortal ban.He took a wave and drownèd her,She took a wave and lifted him:And I was born where shadows areI’ the sea-depths dim.All through the sunny blue-sweet hoursI swim and glide in waters green;Never by day the mournful shoresBy me are seen.But when the gloom is on the waveA shell unto the shore I bring:And then upon the rocks I sitAnd plaintive sing.O what is this wild song I sing,With meanings strange and dim?No soul am I, a wave am I,And sing the Moon-Child’s hymn.

Softly Colum drew nigh.

“Peace,” he said. “Peace, little one. Ah, tender little heart, peace!”

The child looked at him with wide sea-dusky eyes.

“Is it Colum the Holy you will be?”

“No, my fawn, my white dear babe: it is not Colum the Holy I am, but Colum the poor fool that knew not God!”

“Is it you, O Colum, that put the sorrow on my mother, who is the Sea-woman that lives in the whirlpool over there?”

“Ay, God forgive me!”

“Is it you, O Colum, that crucified the seal that was my father: him that was a man once, and that was called Black Angus?”

“Ay, God forgive me!”

“Is it you, O Colum, that bade the children of Hy run away from me, because I was a moon-child, and might win them by the sea-spell into the green wave?”

“Ay, God forgive me!”

“Sure, dear Colum, it was to the glory of God, it was?”

“Ay, he knoweth it, and can hear it, too, from Murtagh, who died this night.”

“Look!”

And at that Colum looked, and in a moon-gold wave he saw Black Angus, the seal-man, drifting dark, and the eyes in his round head were the eyes of love. And beside the man-seal swam a woman fair to see, and she looked at him with joy, and with joy at the Moon-Child that was her own, and at Colum with joy.

Thereupon Colum fell upon his knees and cried, —

“Give me thy sorrow, wild woman of the sea!”

“Peace to you, Colum,” she answered, and sank into the shadow-thridden wave.

“Give me thy death and crucifixion, O Angus-dhu!” cried the Saint, shaking with the sorrow.

“Peace to you, Colum,” answered the man-seal, and sank into the dusky quietudes of the deep.

“Ah, bitter heart o’ me! Teach me the way to God, O little child,” cried Colum the old, turning to where the Moon-Child was!

But lo, the glory and the wonder!

It was a little naked child that looked at him with healing eyes, but there were no seaweeds in her hair, and no shell in the little wee hands of her. For now, it was a male Child that was there, shining with a light from within: and in his fair sunny hair was a shadowy crown of thorns, and in his hand was a pearl of great price.

“O Christ, my God,” said Colum, with failing voice.

“It is thine now, O Colum,” said the Moon-Child, holding out to him the shining pearl of great price.

“What is it, O Lord my God?” whispered the old servant of God that was now glad with the gladness: “what is this, thy boon?”

“Perfect Peace.”

And that is all(To God be the Glory. Amen.)

THE ANNIR-CHOILLE

WHEN Cathal mac Art, that was called Cathal Gille-Muire, Cathal the Servant of Mary, walked by the sea, one night of the nights in a green May, there was trouble in his heart.

It was not long since he had left Iona. The good St. Colum, in sending the youth to the Isle of Â-rinn, as it was then called, gave him a writing for St. Molios, the holy man who lived in the sea-cave of the small Isle of the Peak, that is in the eastward hollow at the south end of Arran. A sorrow it was to him to leave the fair isle in the west. He had known glad years there – since, in one of the remote isles to the north, he had seen his father slain by a man of Lochlin, and his mother carried away in a galley oared by fierce yellow-haired men. No kith or kin had he but the old priest, that was the brother of his father, Cathal Gille-Chriosd, Cathal the Servant of Christ.

On Iona he had learned the way of Christ. He had a white robe; and could, with a shaven stick and a thin tuft of seal-fur, or with the feather-quill of a wild swan or a solander, write the holy words upon strained lambskin or parchment, and fill the big letters, that were here and there, with earth-brown and sky-blue and shining green, with scarlet of blood and gold of sun-warm sands. He could sing the long holy hymns, too, that Colum loved to hear; and it was his voice that had the sweetest clear-call of any on the island. He was in the nineteenth year of his years when a Frankish prince, who had come to Iona for the blessing of the Saint, wanted him to go back with him to the Southlands. He promised many things because of that voice. Cathal dreamed often, in the hot drowsy afternoons of the month that followed, of the long white sword that would slay so well; and of the white money that might be his to buy fair apparel with, and a great black stallion accoutred with trappings wrought with gold, and a bed of down; and of white hands, and white breasts, and the white song of youth.

He had not gone with the Frankish prince, nor wished to go. But he dreamed often. It was on a day of dream that he lay on his back in the hot grass upon a dune, near where the cells of the monks were. The sun-glow bathed the isle in a golden haze. The strait was a shimmering dazzle, and the blue wavelets that made curves in the soft white sand seem to spill gold flakes and change them straightway into little jets of foam or bubbles of rainbow-spray. Cathal had made a song for his delight. His pain was less when he had made it. Now, lying there, and dreaming at times of the words of the Frankish prince, and remembering at times the stranger words of the old pagan helot, Neis, who had come with him out of the north, he felt fire burn in his veins, and he sang:

O where in the north, or where in the south, or where in the east or westIs she who hath the flower-white hands and the swandown breast?O, if she be west, or east she be, or in the north or south,A sword will leap, a horse will prance, ere I win to Honey-Mouth.She has great eyes, like the doe on the hill, and warm and sweet she is,O, come to me, Honey-Mouth, bend to me, Honey-Mouth, give me thy kiss!White Hands her name is, where she reigns amid the princes fair:White hands she moves like swimming swans athrough her dusk-wave hair:White hands she puts about my heart, white hands fan up my breath:White hands take out the heart of me, and grant me life or death!White hands make better songs than hymns, white hands are young and sweet:O, a sword for me, O Honey-Mouth, and a war-horse fleet!O wild sweet eyes! O glad wild eyes! O mouth, how sweet it is!O, come to me, Honey-Mouth! bend to me, Honey-Mouth! give me thy kiss!

When he had ceased he saw a shadow fall upon the white sand beyond the dune. He looked up, and beheld Colum the Saint.

“Who taught you that song?” said the white holy one, in a voice hard and stern.

“No one, O Colum.”

“Then the Evil One is indeed here. Cathal, I promised that you would be having a holy name soon, but that name I will not be giving you now. You must come to me in sackcloth and with dust upon your head, with pain upon you, and with deep grief in your heart. Then only shall I bless you before the brothers and call you Cathal Gille-Mhoire, Cathal the servant of Mary.”

A bitter, sad waiting it was for him who had fire in his young blood and was told to weave frost there, and to put silence upon the welling song in his heart. But at the end of the week Cathal was a holy monk again, and sang the hymns that Colum had taught him.

It was on the eve of the day when Colum blessed him before the brethren, and called him Gille-Muire, that he walked alone, brooding upon the evil of women and the curse they brought, and praying to Mary to save him from the sins of which he scarce knew the meaning. On his way back to his cell he passed old Neis, the helot, who said to him mockingly:

“It is a good thing that sorrow, Cathal mac Art, – and yet, sure, it is true that but for the hot love the slain man your father had for Foam that was your mother, you would not be here to praise your God or serve the woman whom the arch-druid yonder says is the Mother of God.”

Cathal bade the man eat silence, or it would go ill with him. But the words rankled. That night in his cell he woke, with on his lips his own sinful words:

White hands make better songs than hymns, white hands are young and sweet;O, a sword for me, O Honey-Mouth, and a war-horse fleet!

On the morrow he went to Colum and told him that the Evil One would not give him peace. That night the Saint bade him make ready to go east to the Isle of Arran – the sole isle, then, where the Pictish folk would let the white robes of the Culdees go scatheless. To the holy Molios he was to go, him that dwelled in the sea-cave of the Isle of the Peak, that men already called the Holy Isle because of the preaching and the miracles of Molios.

“He is a wise man,” said Colum to himself, “and he was a pagan Cruithne once, and a prince at that, and he knows the sweetness of sin, and will keep Cathal away from the snares that are set. With fasting, and much peril by day and weariness by night, the blood of the youth will forget the songs the Evil One has put into his mind and it will sing holy hymns. Great will be the glory. Cathal Gille-Muire will be a holy man while he has yet his youth upon him; and he will be a martyr to the flesh by day and by night and by night and by day, till the heathen put him to death because of the faith that is his.”

Thus it was that Cathal was blessed by Colum, and sent east among the wild Picts.

It was with joy that he served Molios. For four months he gave him all he had to give. The old saint passed word to Colum that Cathal was a saint and was assured of the crown of martyrdom, and lovingly he urged that the youth should be sent to the Isle of Mist in the north, the great isle that was ruled by Scathach the Queen. There, at the last Summer-sailing, the pagans had flayed a monk alive. A fair happy end: and Cathal was now worthy – and withal might triumph, and might even convert the heathen queen. “She is wondrous fair to see,” he added, “and Cathal is a comely youth.”

But Colum had answered that the young monk was to bide where he was, and to seek to win souls in the pagan Isle of Arran, where the Cross was still feared.

But with the coming of May and golden weather, the blood of Cathal grew warm. At times, even, he dreamed of the Frankish prince and the evil sweet words he had said.

Then a day of the days came. Molios and Cathal went to a hill-dûn where the Pict chieftain lived, and converted him and all the people in the dûn and all in the rath that was beyond the dûn. That eve the daughter of the warrior came upon Cathal walking in a solitary place, among the green pines beyond the rath. She was most sweet to look upon: tall and fair, with eyes like the sea in a cloudless noon, and hair like westward wheat turned back upon itself.

“What is the name men call you by, young druid?” she said. “I am Ardanna, the daughter of Ecta.”

“Your beauty is sweet to look upon, Ardanna. I am Cathal the son of Art the son of Aodh of the race of Alpein, from the isles of the sea. But I am not a druid. I am a priest of Christ, a servant of Mary the Mother of God, and a son of God.”

Ardanna looked at him. A flush came into his face. In his eyes the same light flamed that was there when the Frankish prince told him of the delights of the world.

“Is it true, O Cathal, that the druids – that the priests of Christ and the two other gods, the white-robed men whom we call Culdees, and of whom you are one, is it true that they will have nought to do with women?”

Cathal looked upon the woman no more, but on the ground at his feet.

“It is true, Ardanna.”

The girl laughed. It was a low, sweet, mocking laugh, but it went along Cathal’s blood like cloud-fire along the sky. It was to him as though somewhat he had not seen was revealed.

“And is it a true thing that you holy men look at women askance, and as snares of peril and evil?”

“It is true, Ardanna; but not so upon those who are sisters of Christ, and whose eyes are upon heavenly things.”

“But what of those who are not sisters of your god, and are only women, fair to look upon, fair to woo, fair to love?”

Cathal again flushed. His eyes were still upon the ground. He made no answer.

Ardanna laughed low.

“Cathal!”

“Yes, fair daughter of Ecta?”

“Is it never longing for love you are?”

“There is but one love for us who have taken the vows of chastity.”

“What is chastity?”

Cathal raised his eyes and glanced at Ardanna. Her dark-blue eyes looked at him pure and sweet, though a smile was upon her mouth. He sighed.

“It is the sanctity of the body, Ardanna.”

“I do not understand,” she said simply. “But tell me this, poor Cathal – ”

“Why do you call me poor Cathal?”

“Because you have put your manhood from you – and you so young, and strong, and comely – and are not a warrior, and care neither for the sword, nor the chase, nor the harp, nor for women.”

Cathal was troubled. He looked again and again at Ardanna. The sunset light was in her yellow hair, which was about her as a glory. He had seen the moon as wondrous pale as her beautiful face. Like lilies her white hands were. He had dreamed of that flamelight in the eyes.

“I care,” he said.

She drew nearer, and leaned a little forward, and looked at him.

“You are good to look upon, Cathal – the comeliest youth I have ever seen.”

The monk flushed. This was the devil-tongue of which Colum had warned him. But how sweet the words were: like a harp that low voice. Sure, sweeter is a waking dream than a dream in sleep.

“I care,” he repeated dully.

“Look, Cathal.”

Slowly he raised his eyes. As his gaze moved upward it rested on the white breast which was like sea-foam swelling out of brown sea-weed, for she had a tanned fawn-skin belted and gold-claspt over the white robe she wore, and that had disparted for the warm air to play upon her bosom.

It troubled him. He let his eyes fall again. The red was on his face.

“Cathal!”

“Yes, Ardanna.”

“And you will never put your kiss upon a woman’s lips? Never put your heart upon a woman’s heart? Is it of cold sea water you are made – for even the running water in the streams is warmed by the sun? Tell me, Cathal, would you leave Molios the Culdee, – if – ”

The monk of Christ suddenly flashed his eyes upon the woman.

“If what, Ardanna?” he asked abruptly: “if what, Ardanna that is so witching fair?”

“If I loved you, Cathal? If I, the daughter of Ecta the chief, loved you, and took you to be my man, and you took me to be your woman, would you be content so?”

He stared at her as one in a dream. Then suddenly all the foolish madness that had been put upon him by Colum fell away. What did these old men, Colum and Molios, know? It is only the young who know what life is. They were old, and their blood was gelid.

He put up his arms, as though in prayer. Then he smiled. Ardanna saw a light in his eyes that sprang into her heart and sang a song there that whirled in her ears and dazzled her eyes and made her feel as though she had fallen over a great height and were still falling.

Cathal was no longer pale. A red flame burned in either cheek. The sunset-light behind him filled his hair with fire. His eyes were beacons.

“Cathal, Cathal!”

“Come, Ardanna!”

That was all. What need to say more. She was in his arms, and her heart throbbing against his that leapt in his body like a wolf fallen in a snare.

He stooped and kissed her. She lifted her eyes, and his brain swung. She kissed him, and he kissed her till she gave a low cry and gently thrust him back. He laughed.

“Why do you laugh, Cathal?”

“I? It is I who laugh now. The old men put a spell upon me. I am no more Cathal Gille-Muire, but Cathal mac Art. Nay, I am Cathal Gille-Ardanna.”

With that he plucked the branch of a rowan that grew near. He stripped it of its leaves, and threw them from him north, south, east, and west.

“Why do you do that, Cathal-aluinn?” Ardanna asked, looking at him with eyes of love, and she like a summer morning there, because of the sunshine in her hair, and the wild roses on her face, and the hill-tarn blue of her eyes.

“These are all the hymns that Colum taught me. I give them back. I am knowing them no more. They are idle, foolish songs.”

Then the monk took the branch and broke it, and threw the pieces upon the ground and trampled upon them.

“Why do you that, Cathal-aluinn?” asked Ardanna, wondering at him with her home-call eyes.

“That is the branch of all the wisdom Colum taught me. Old Neis, the helot, was wise. It is a madness, all that. See, it is gone: it is beneath my feet: I am a man now.”

“But O Cathal, Cathal! this very day of the days, Ecta, my father, has become a man of the Christ-faith, him and his; and he would do what Molios asked, now. And Molios would ask your death.”

“Death is a dream.”

With that Cathal leaned forward and kissed Ardanna upon the lips twice. “A kiss for life that,” he said; “and that a kiss for death.”

Ardanna laughed a low laugh. “The monk can kiss,” she whispered: “can the monk love?”

He put his arm about her, and they went into the dim dark greenness.

The moon rose slowly, a globe of pale golden fire which spilled unceasingly a yellow flame upon the suspended billows of the forest. Star after star emerged. Deep silence was in the woods, save for the strange, passionate churring of a night-jar, where he leaned low from a pine branch and called to his mate, whose heart throbbed a flight-away amid the dewy shadows.

The wind was still. The white rays of the stars wandered over the moveless, over the shadowless and breathless green lawns of the tree-tops.

“What is that sound?” said Ardanna, a dim shape in the darkness, where she lay in the arms of Cathal.

“I know not,” said the youth; for the fevered blood in his veins sang a song against his ears.

“Listen!”

Cathal listened. He heard nothing. His eyes dreamed again into the silence.

“What is that sound?” she whispered against his heart once again. “It is not from the sea, nor is it of the woods.”

“It is the moan of Heaven,” answered Cathal wearily: “an acain Pharais.”

II

They found them there in the twilight of the dawn. For long, Ecta looked at them and pondered. Then he glanced at Molios. There were tears in the heart of the holy man, but in his eyes a deep anger.

“Bind him,” said Ecta.

Cathal woke with the thongs. His gaze fell upon Molios. He made no sign, and spake never a word: but he smiled.

“What now, O Molios?” asked Ecta.

“Take the woman away. Do with her as you will – spare or slay. It matters not. She is but a woman, and she hath wrought evil upon this man. To slay were well.”

“She is my daughter.”

“Spare, then, if you will; but take her away. Give her to a man. She shall never see this renegade again.”

With that, two men led Ardanna away. She gave a glance at Cathal, who smiled. No tears were in her eyes: but a proud fire was there, and she brooked no man’s hand upon her, and walked free.

When she was gone, Molios spake.

“Cathal, that was called Cathal Gille-Muire, why have you done this thing?”

“Because I was weary of vain imaginings, and I am young: and Ardanna is fair, and we loved.”

“Such love is death.”

“So be it, Molios. Such death is sweet as love.”

“No ordinary death shalt thou have, blasphemer. Yet even now I would be merciful if I could. Dost thou call upon God?”

“I call upon the gods of my fathers.”

“Fool, they shall not save you.”

“Nevertheless, I call. I have nought to do with thy three gods, O Christian.”

“Hast thou no fear of hell?”

“I am a warrior, and the son of my father, and of a race of heroes. Why should I fear?”

Molios brooded a while.

“Take him,” he said at last, “and bury him alive where his gods perchance will hear his cries and come and save him! Find me a hollow tree.”

“There is a great oak near here,” said Ecta, wondering, “a great hollow oak whose belly would hold five men, each standing upon the other.”

With that he led them to an ancient tree.

“Dost thou repent, Cathal?” Molios asked.

“Ay,” the young man answered grimly; “I repent. I repent that I wasted the good days serving you and your three false gods.”

“Blaspheme no more. Thou knowest that these three are one God.”

Cathal laughed mockingly.

“Hearken to him, Ecta,” he cried; “this old druid would have you believe that two men and a woman make one person! Believe that if you will! As for me, I laugh.”

But with that, at a sign from Molios, they lifted and slung him amid the branches of the oak, and let him slide feet foremost into the deep hollow heart of the tree.

When the law was done, Molios bade all near kneel in a circle round the oak. Then he prayed for the soul of the doomed man. As he ended this prayer, a laugh flew up among the high wind-swayed leaves. It was as though an invisible bird were there, mocking like a jay.

One by one, with bowed heads, Molios and Ecta and those with him withdrew, all save two young men who were bidden to stay. Upon these was bond laid, that they would not stir from that place for three days. They were to let none draw nigh; and no food was to be given to the victim; and if he cried to them, they were to take no heed, – nay, not though he called upon God or the Mother of God or upon the White Christ.