He was born on the 7th of December, 521,[2] twenty-nine years after the reputed death of St. Patrick, and four years[Pg 167] before that of St. Brigit, at Gartan[3] in Donegal, a wild but beautiful district of which his father was the prince. The reigning10 monarch of Ireland was his half-uncle, while his mother Ethne was the direct descendant of the royal line of Cáthaoir [Cauheer] Mór, the regnant family of Leinster, and he himself would have had some chance of the reversion of the monarchy12 had he been minded to press his claims. Reared at Kilmacrenan, near Gartan, the place where the O'Donnells were afterwards inaugurated, he received his first teaching at the hands of St. Finnén or Finnian in his famous school at Moville, for already since Patrick's death Ireland had become dotted with such small colleges. It was here at this early age that his school-fellows christened him Colum-cille, or Colum of the Church, on account of the assiduity with which he sought the holy building. At this period the Christian13 clergy14 and the bardic15 order were the only two educational powers in Ireland, and after leaving St. Finnian, Columcille travelled south into Leinster to a bard16 called Gemmán[4] with whom he took lessons. From him he went to St. Finnén or Finnian of Clonard. While studying at Clonard it was the custom for each of the students to grind corn in his turn at a quern, but Columcille's Irish life in the Book of Lismore tells us na?vely, in true old Irish spirit, "howbeit an angel from heaven used to grind on behalf of Columcille; that was the honour which the Lord used to render him because of the eminent18 nobleness of his race." St. Ciaran [Keeran] was at this time a fellow-student with him, and Finnian, says the Irish life, saw one night a vision, "to wit, two moons arose from Clonard, a golden moon and a silver moon. The golden moon went into the north[Pg 168] of the island, and Ireland and Scotland gleamed under it. The silver moon went on until it stayed by the Shannon, and Ireland at her centre gleamed." That, says the author, signified "Columcille with the grace of his noble kin19 and his wisdom, and Ciaran with the refulgence20 of his virtues21 and his good deeds."
Leaving Clonard behind him, Columcille passed on to yet another school—this time to that of Mobhí at Glasnevin, near Dublin, where there were as many as fifty students at work, living in huts or cells grouped round an oratory22, some of whom were famous men in after-time, for they included Cainnech and Comgall and Ciaran. A curious incident is recorded of these three and of Columcille in the Irish life in the Book of Lismore.
Columcille was driven from Glasnevin by the approach of the great plague which ravaged the country, and of which his teacher Mobhí died.
"Once on a time," says the author, "a great church was built by Mobhí. The clerics were considering what each of them would like to have in the church. 'I should like,' said Ciaran, 'its full of church children to attend the canonical23 hours.' 'I should like,' said Cainnech, 'to have its full of books to serve the sons of life.' 'I should like,' said Comgall, 'its full of affliction and disease to be in my own body: to subdue24 me and repress me.' Then Columcille chose its full of gold and silver to cover relics26 and shrines27 withal. Mobhí said it should not be so, but that Columcille's community would be wealthier than any community, whether in Ireland or in Scotland."[5]
[Pg 169]
Betaking himself northward29 with a growing reputation, he was offered by his cousin, then Prince of Aileach, near Derry, and afterwards monarch of Ireland, the site of a monastery31 on the so-called island of Derry, a rising ground of oval shape, covering some two hundred acres, along the slopes of which flourished a splendid forest of oak-trees, which gave to the oasis32 its name of Derry or the oak grove33. Columcille, like all Gaels—and indeed all Celts—was full of love for everything beautiful in nature, both animate34 and inanimate, and so careful was he of his beloved oaks that, contrary to all custom, he would not build his church with its chancel towards the east, for in that case some of the oaks would have had to be felled to make room for it. He laid strict injunctions upon all his successors to spare the lovely grove, and enjoined35 that if any of the trees should be blown down some of them should go for fuel to their own guest-house, and the rest be given to the people.
This was Columcille's first religious institution, and, like every man's firstling, it remained dear to him to the last. Years afterwards, when the thought of it came back to him on the barren shores of Iona, he expressed himself in passionate36 Irish poetry.
"For oh! were the tributes of Alba mine
From shore unto centre, from centre to sea,
The site of one house, to be marked by a line
In the midst of fair Derry were dearer to me.
That spot is the dearest on Erin's ground,
For the treasures that peace and that purity lend,
For the hosts of bright angels that circle it round,
Protecting its borders from end to end.
The dearest of any on Erin's ground
For its peace and its beauty I gave it my love,
Each leaf of the oaks around Derry is found
To be crowded with angels from heaven above.
[Pg 170]My Derry! my Derry! my little oak grove,
My dwelling37, my home, and my own little cell,
May God the Eternal in Heaven above
Send death to thy foes38 and defend thee well."[6]
Columcille was yet a young man, only twenty-five years of age, when he founded Derry, but both his own genius, and more especially his great friends and kinsfolk, had conspired to make him famous. For the next seventeen years he laboured in Ireland, and during this time founded the still more celebrated39 schools of Durrow in the present King's County, and of Kells in Meath, both of which became most famous in after years. Durrow,[7] which, like Derry, was named from[Pg 171] the beautiful groves40 of oak which were scattered41 along the slope of Druim-caín, or "the pleasant hill," seems to have retained to the last a hold upon the affections of Columcille second only to that of Derry. When its abbot, Cormac the voyager, visited him long years afterwards in Iona, and expressed his unwillingness42 to return to his monastery again, because, being a Momonian of the race of Eber, the southern Ui Neill were jealous of him, and made his abbacy unpleasant or impossible, Columcille reproached him in pathetic terms for abandoning so lovely an abode—
"With its books and its learning,
A devout43 city with a hundred crosses."
"O Cormac," he exclaimed—
"I pledge thee mine unerring word
Which it is not possible to impugn44,
Death is better in reproachless Erin
Than perpetual life in Alba [Scotland]."[8]
[Pg 172]
And on another occasion, when it strikes him how happy the son of Dima, i.e., Cormac, must be at the approach of summer along the green hillside of Rosgrencha—another name for Durrow—amid its fair slopes, waving woods, and singing birds, compared with himself exiled to the barren shores of rugged45 Iona, he bursts forth46 into the tenderest song—
"How happy the son is of Dima! no sorrow
For him is designed,
He is having, this hour, round his own cell in Durrow
The wish of his mind:
The sound of the wind in the elms, like the strings47 of
A harp48 being played,
The note of the blackbird that claps with the wings of
Delight in the glade49.
With him in Rosgrencha the cattle are lowing
At earliest dawn,
On the brink50 of the summer the pigeons are cooing
And doves on his lawn," etc.[9]
Columcille continued his labours in Ireland, founding churches and monasteries51 and schools, until he was forty-two[Pg 173] years of age. He was at this time at the height of his physical and mental powers, a man of a masterful but of a too passionate character, of fine physique, and enjoying a reputation second to that of none in Erin. The commentator52 in the Féilire of Angus describes his appearance as that of "a man well-formed, with powerful frame; his skin was white, his face was broad and fair and radiant, lit up with large, grey,[10] luminous53 eyes; his large and well-shaped head was crowned, except where he wore his frontal tonsure54, with close and curling hair. His voice was clear and resonant55, so that he could be heard at the distance of 1,500 paces,[11] yet sweet with more than the sweetness of the bards56." His activity was incessant57. "Not a single hour of the day," says Adamnan, "did he leave unoccupied without engaging either in prayer, or in reading, or in writing, or in some other work;" and he laboured with his hands as well as with his head, cooking or looking after his ploughmen, or engaged in ecclesiastical or secular58 matters. All accounts go to show that he was of a hot and passionate temperament59, and endowed with both the virtues and the faults that spring from such a character. Indeed this was, no doubt, why in the "famous vision"[12][Pg 174] which Baithin saw concerning him, he was seated only on a chair of glass; while Ciaran was on a chair of gold, and Molaisse upon a chair of silver. The commentator on the Féilire of Angus boldly states that, "though his devotion was delightful60, he was carnal and often frail61 even as glass is fragile." Aware of this, he wore himself out with fastings and vigils,[13] and no doubt—
"Lenior et melior fit accedente senectu,"
for Adamnan describes him, from the recollections of the monks62 who knew him, as being angelic in aspect[14] and bright in conversation, and despite his great labours yet "dear to all, displaying his holy countenance64 always cheerful." A curious story is told in the Leabhar Breac, of the stratagems65 to which his people resorted to checkmate his self-imposed penance66; for having one day seen an old woman living upon pottage of nettles67, while she was waiting for her one cow to calve and give her milk, the notion came to him that he too would thenceforward live upon the same, for if she could do so, much more could he, and it would be profitable to his soul in gaining the kingdom of heaven. So, said the writer, he called his servant—
"'Pottage,' saith he, 'from thee every night, and bring not the milk with it.'
"'It shall be done,' said the cook.
"He (the cook) bores the mixing-stick of the pottage, so that it became a pipe, and he used to pour the meat juice into the pipe, down, so that it was mixed through the pottage. That preserves the cleric's (Columcille's) appearance. The monks perceived the[Pg 175] cleric's good appearance, and they talked among themselves. That is revealed to Columcille, so he said, 'May your successors be always murmuring.'
"'Well now,' said Columcille, said he, to his servant, 'what dost thou give me every day?'
"'Thou art witness,' said the cook, 'unless it come out of the iron of the pot, or out of the stick wherewith the pottage is mixed, I know nought68 else in it save pottage!'"
It was now, however, that events occurred which had the result of driving Columcille abroad and launching him upon a more stormy and more dangerous career, as the apostle of Scotland and the Picts. St. Finnian of Moville, with whom he studied in former days, had brought back with him from Rome a copy of the Psalms70, probably the first copy of St. Jerome's translation, or Vulgate, that had appeared in Ireland, which he highly valued, and which he did not wish Columcille to copy. Columcille however, who was a dexterous71 and rapid scribe, found opportunity, by sitting up during several nights, to make a copy of the book secretly,[15] but Finnian learning it claimed[Pg 176] the copy. Columcille refused it, and the matter was referred to King Diarmuid at Tara. The monarch, to whom books and their surroundings were probably something new, as a matter for legal dispute, could find in the Brehon law no nearer analogy to adjudicate the case by, than the since celebrated sentence le gach boin a boinín, "with every cow her calf72," in which terms he, not altogether unnaturally73, decided74 in favour of St. Finnian, saying, "with every book its son-book, as with every cow her calf."[16] This alone might not have brought about the crisis, but unfortunately the son of the king of Connacht, who had been present at the great Convention or Féis of Tara, in utter violation75 of the law of sanctuary76 which alone rendered this great meeting possible, slew77 the son of the king's steward78, and knowing that the penalty was certain death, he fled to the lodging79 of the northern princes Fergus and Domhnall [Donall] who immediately placed him under the protection of St. Columcille. This however did not avail him, for King Diarmuid, who was no respecter of persons, had him promptly80 seized and put to death in atonement for his crime. This, combined with his unfortunate judgment82 about the book, enraged83 the imperious Columcille to the last degree. He made his way northward and appealed to his kinsmen84 to avenge85 him. A great army was collected, led by Fergus and Domhnall, two first cousins of Columcille, and by the king of Connacht, whose son had been put to death. The High-king marched to meet this formidable combination with all the troops he could gather. Pushing his way across the island he met their combined forces in the present county of Sligo,[Pg 177] between Benbulbin and the sea. A furious battle was delivered in which he was defeated with the loss of three thousand men.
It was soon after this battle that Columcille decided to leave Ireland. There is a great deal of evidence that he did so as a kind of penance, either self-imposed or enjoined upon him by St. Molaíse [Moleesha], as Keating says, or by the "synod of the Irish saints," as O'Donnell has it. He had helped to fill all Ireland with arms and bloodshed, and three thousand men had fallen in one battle largely on account of him, and it was not the only appeal to arms which lay upon his conscience.[17] He set sail from his beloved Derry in the year 593, determined86, according to popular tradition, to convert as many souls to Christ as had fallen in the battle of Cooldrevna. Amongst the dozen monks of his own order who accompanied him were his two first cousins and his uncle.
It was death and breaking of heart for him to leave the land of Erin, and he pathetically expresses his sorrow in his own Irish verses.
"Too swiftly my coracle flies on her way,
From Derry I mournfully turned her prow87,
I grieve at the errand which drives me to-day
To the Land of the Ravens88, to Alba, now.
* * * * *
How swiftly we travel! there is a grey eye
Looks back upon Erin, but it no more
Shall see while the stars shall endure in the sky
Her women, her men, or her stainless89 shore.
[Pg 178]From the plank90 of the oak where in sorrow I lie,
I am straining my sight through the water and wind,
And large is the tear of the soft grey eye
Looking back on the land that it leaves behind.
To Erin alone is my memory given,
To Meath and to Munster my wild thoughts flow,
To the shores of Moy-linny, the slopes of Loch Leven,
And the beautiful land the Ultonians know."
He refers distinctly to the penance imposed upon him by St. Moleesha.
"To the nobles that gem17 the bright isle91 of the Gael
Carry this benediction92 over the sea,
And bid them not credit Moleesha's tale,
And bid them not credit his words of me.
Were it not for the word of Moleesha's mouth
At the cross of Ahamlish that sorrowful day,
I now should be warding93 from north and from south
Disease and distemper from Erin away."
His mind reverts94 to former scenes of delight—
"How dear to my heart in yon western land
Is the thought of Loch Foyle where the cool waves pour,
And the bay of Drumcliff on Cúlcinnê's strand95,
How grand was the slope of its curving shore!
* * * * *
O bear me my blessing96 afar to the West,
For the heart in my bosom97 is broken; I fail.
Should death of a sudden now pierce my breast
I should die of the love that I bear the Gael!"[18]
[Pg 179]
Columcille is the first example in the saddened page of Irish history of the exiled Gael grieving for his native land and refusing to be comforted, and as such he has become the very type and embodiment of Irish fate and Irish character. The flag in bleak98 Gartan, upon which he was born, is worn thin and bare by the hands and feet of pious99 pilgrims, and "the poor emigrants100 who are about to quit Donegal for ever, come and sleep on that flag the night before their departure from Derry. Columcille himself was an exile, and they fondly hope that sleeping on the spot where he was born will help them to bear with lighter101 heart the heavy burden of the exile's sorrows."[19] He is the prototype of the millions of Irish exiles in after ages—
"Ruined exiles, restless, roaming,
Longing102 for their fatherland,"[20]
and the extraordinary deep roots which his life and poetry have struck into the soil of the North was strikingly evidenced this[Pg 180] very year (1898) by the wonderful celebration of his centenary at Gartan, at which many thousands of people, who had travelled all night over the surrounding mountains, were present, and where it was felt to be so incongruous that the life of such a great Irish patriot103, prince, and poet, in the diocese, too, of an O'Donnell, should be celebrated in English, that—probably for the first time in this century—Irish poems were read and Irish speeches made, even by the Cardinal-Primate and the Bishop104 of the diocese.
Of Columcille's life on the craggy little island of Iona, of his splendid labours in converting the Picts, and of the monastery which he established, and which, occupied by Irish monks, virtually rendered Iona an Irish island for the next six hundred years, there is no need to speak here, for these things belong rather to ecclesiastical than to literary history.
Columcille himself was an unwearied scribe, and delighted in poetry. Ample provision was made for the multiplication105 of books in all the monasteries which he founded, and his Irish life tells us that he himself wrote "three hundred gifted, lasting106, illuminated107, noble books." The life in the Book of Lismore tells us that he once went to Clonmacnois with a hymn108 he had made for St. Ciaran, 'for he made abundant praises for God's household, as said the poet,
"Noble, thrice fifty, nobler than every apostle,
The number of miracles [of poems] are as grass,
Some in Latin, which was beguiling109,
Others in Gaelic, fair the tale."'
Of these only three in Latin are now known to exist, whilst of the great number of Irish poems attributed to him only a few—half a dozen at the most—are likely to be even partly genuine. His best known hymn is the "Altus," so called from its opening word; it was first printed by Colgan,[21] and[Pg 181] its genuineness is generally admitted. It is a long and rudely-constructed poem, of twenty-two stanzas111, preserved in the Book of Hymns112, a MS. probably of the eleventh century. Each stanza110 consists of six lines,[22] and each line of sixteen syllables113. There is a pause after the eighth syllable114, and a kind of rhyme between every two lines. The first verses run thus with an utter disregard of quantity.
"Altus pros115?tor, vetustus dierum et ingenitus,
Erat absque origine primordii et crepidine,
Est et erit in s?cula s?culorum infinitus,
Cui est unigenitus Christus et Spiritus Sanctus," etc.
The second Latin hymn is a supplement to this one, composed in praise of the Trinity, because Pope Gregory who, as the legend states, perceived the angels listening when the "Altus" was recited to him, was yet of opinion that the first stanza of the original poem, despite its additional line, was insufficient116 to express a competent laudation of the mystery, consequently Columcille added, it was said, fifteen rude-rhyming couplets of the same character as the "Altus," but it is very doubtful whether they are genuine. The third hymn, the "Noli Pater," is still shorter, consisting of only seven rhyming couplets with sixteen syllables in each line. It was in ancient times considered an efficient safeguard against fire and lightning. Some of his reputed Irish poems we have already glanced at; three that Colgan considered genuine were printed by Dr. Reeves in his "Adamnan;" and another, the touching118 "Farewell to Ara," is contained in the "Gaelic Miscellany" of 1808; and another on his escape from[Pg 182] King Diarmuid, when the king of Connacht's son was put to death for violating the Féis at Tara, is printed in the "Miscellany" of the Irish Arch?ological Society.[23] There are three verses, composed by him as a prayer at the battle of Cooldrevna, ascribed to him in the "Chronicon Scotorum;" and there is a collection of fifteen poems attributed to him in the O'Clery MSS. at Brussels, and nearly a hundred more—mostly evident forgeries—in the Bodleian at Oxford119.[24] He does not seem to have ever written any work in prose.
There are six lives of Columcille still extant, the greatest of them all being that in Latin by Adamnan,[25] who was one of his successors in the abbacy of Iona, and who was born only twenty-seven years after Columcille's death. This admirable work, written in flowing and very fair Latin, was derived120, as Adamnan himself tells us, partly from oral and partly from written sources. A memoir121 of Columcille had already been written by Cuimine Finn or Cummeneus Albus,[26] as Adamnan calls him, the last Abbot of Iona but one before himself, and that memoir he almost entirely122 embodied123 in his third book. He had also some other written accounts before him, and the Irish poems, both of the saint himself and of other bards, amongst them Baithine Mór, who had enjoyed his personal friendship, and St. Mura, who was a little his junior—poems[Pg 183] now lost. He had also constant opportunities of conversing124 with those who had seen the great saint and had been familiar with him in life, and he was writing on the spot and amidst the associations and surroundings wherein his last thirty years had been spent, and which were inseparably connected with his memory. The result was that he produced a work, which although not ostensibly a history, and dealing125 only with the life of a single man, and that rather from the transcendental than from the practical side, is nevertheless of the utmost value to the historian on account not only of the general picture of manners and customs, but still more on account of its incidental references to contemporary history. "It is," says Pinkerton, who, as Dr. Reeves remarks, was a writer not over-given to eulogy126, "the most complete piece of such biography that all Europe can boast of, not only at so early a period but even through the whole Middle Ages." Adamnan's other great work on Sacred Places is mentioned by his contemporary, the Venerable Bede, but he is silent as to Columcille's life. There is, however, abundant internal evidence of its authenticity128. This evidence, however it might satisfy the minds of mere129 Irish students like Colgan and Stephen White, proved insufficient, however, to meet the exacting130 claims of certain British scholars. "I cannot agree," said Sir James Dalrymple, in the last century, "that the authority of Adamnanus is equal, far less preferable to that of Bede, since it was agreed on all hands to be a fabulous131 history lately published in his name, and that he was remarkable for nothing, but that he was the first abbot of that monastery who quit the Scottish institution, and became fond of the English Romish Rites132."[27] Dr. Giles, too, who thought of editing it, tells us in his translation of Bede's "Ecclesiastical History," that he had "strong doubts of[Pg 184] Adamnan's having written it."[28] And, finally, Schoell, a German, professed133 to have convinced himself that Adamnan's preface could not have been written by the same hand which wrote the life, so different did the style of the two appear to him, and wholly rejected it as a work of the seventh century written at Iona.
But it so happened that shortly before the year 1851, when Schoell was impugning134 the genuineness of this work, the ancient manuscript from which it had been copied by the Irish Jesuit, Stephen White—and, from his copy, printed by Colgan—actually came to light again, discovered by Dr. Ferdinand Keller at the bottom of an old book-shelf in the public library of Schaffhausen, into which it had been turned with some other old manuscripts and books. A close examination of this remarkable text written in a heavy round Irish hand, in nearly the same type of script as the Books of Kells and Durrow, and of a more archaic135 character than that of the Book of Armagh (written in 807), rendered it certain that here was a codex of great value and antiquity136. Nor was the usual colophon containing the scribe's name and asking a prayer for him missing. That name was Dorbene, a most rare one, of which only two instances are known, both connected with Iona, the first of which records the death of Faelcu, son of Dorbene, in 729, but as we know that Faelcu died in his eighty-second year his father could hardly have been the scribe. The other Dorbene was elected abbot of Iona in 713 and died the same year, so that it may be regarded as almost certain that this book was written by him and that this copy is in his handwriting. We have in this codex, then, the actual handwriting[29] of a contemporary of Adamnan himself, the handiwork[Pg 185] of the generation which succeeded Columcille, a volume a hundred years older than even the Book of Armagh, a volume which had been carried over to some of the numerous Irish institutions on the Continent after the break-up of Iona by the Northmen. There are several corrections of the orthography137 in a different and later hand, the date of which is fixed138 by Dr. Keller at 800-820, and these are evidently the work of a German monk63, who was displeased139 with the peculiar140 orthography of the Irish school, and who made these emendations after the MS. had been brought from Iona to the Continent. The following passage describing the last hours of Columcille will both serve as a specimen141 of Adamnan's style and also afford a minutely particular account of the end of this great man. Its accuracy can hardly be impugned142 as it is written by one who had every minute particular from eye-witnesses, and as the actual manuscript from which it is printed was copied from the author's own, either during his life or within less than ten years after his death.[30]
Adamnan first tells us of several premonitions which the saint had of his approaching end, how he, "now an old man, wearied with age," was borne in his waggon143 to view his monks labouring in the fields on the western slope of the island, and intimated to them that his end was not far off, but that lest[Pg 186] their Easter should be one of grief, he would not be taken from them until it was over. Later on in the year he went out with his servant Diarmuid to inspect the granary, and was pleased at the two large heaps of grain which were lying there, and remarked that though he should be taken from his dear monks, yet he was glad to see that they had a supply for the year.
"And," says Adamnan, "when Diarmuid his servant heard this he began to be sad, and said, 'Father, at this time of year you sadden us too often, because you speak frequently about your decease.' When the saint thus answered, 'I have a secret word to tell you, which, if you promise me faithfully not to make it known to any before my death, I shall be able to let you know more clearly about my departure.' And when his servant, on bended knees, had finished making this promise, the venerable man thus continued, 'This day is called in the sacred volumes the Sabbath, which is interpreted Rest. And this day is indeed to me a sabbath, because it is my last of this present laborious144 life, in which, after the trouble of my toil145, I take my rest; for in the middle of this coming sacred Sunday night, I shall to use the Scripture146 phrase, tread the way of my fathers; for now my Lord Jesus Christ deigns147 to invite me, to whom, I say, at the middle of this night, on His own invitation, I shall pass over; for it was thus revealed to me by the Lord Himself.' His servant, hearing these sad words, begins to weep bitterly: whom the saint endeavoured to console as much as he was able.
"After this the saint goes forth from the barn, and returning to the monastery sits down on the way, at the place where afterwards a cross let into a millstone, and to-day standing148 there, may be perceived on the brink of the road. And while the saint, wearied with old age, as I said before, sitting in that place was taking a rest, lo! the white horse, the obedient servant who used to carry the milk-vessels between the monastery and the byre, meets him. It, wonderful to relate, approached the saint and placing its head in his bosom, by the inspiration of God, as I believe, for whom every animal is wise with the measure of sense which his Creator has bidden, knowing that his master was about to immediately depart from him, and that he would see him no more, begins to lament149 and abundantly to pour forth tears, like a human being, into the saint's lap, and with beslavered mouth to make moan. Which when the servant saw, he proceeds to drive away the tearful mourner, but the saint stopped him, saying, 'Allow him, allow him who loves me, to[Pg 187] pour his flood of bitterest tears into this my bosom. See, you, though you are a man and have a rational mind, could have in no way known about my departure if I had not myself lately disclosed it to you, but to this brute150 and irrational151 animal the Creator Himself, in His own way, has clearly revealed that his master is about to depart from him.' And saying this he blessed the sorrowful horse [the monastery's] servant, as it turned away from him.
"And going forth from thence and ascending152 a small hill, which rose over the monastery, he stood for a little upon its summit, and as he stood, elevating both his palms, he blessed his community and said, 'Upon this place however narrow and mean, not only shall the kings of the Scots [i.e., Irish] with their peoples, but also the rulers of foreign and barbarous nations with the people subject to them, confer great and no ordinary honour. By the saints of other churches also, shall no common respect be accorded it.'
"After these words, going down from the little hill and returning to the monastery, he sat in his cell writing a copy of the Psalms, and on reaching that verse of the thirty-third Psalm69 where it is written, 'But they that seek the Lord shall lack no thing that is good;' 'Here,' said he, 'we may close at the end of the page; let Baithin write what follows.' Well appropriate for the parting saint was the last verse which he had written, for to him shall good things eternal be never lacking, while to the father who succeeded him [Baithin], the teacher of his spiritual sons, the following [words] were particularly apposite, 'Come, my sons, hearken unto me. I shall teach you the fear of the Lord,' since as the departing one desired, he was his successor not only in teaching but also in writing.[31]
"After writing the above verse and finishing the page, the saint enters the church for the vesper office preceding the Sunday; which finished, he returned to his little room, and rested for the night on his couch, where for mattress153 he had a bare flag, and for pillow a stone, which at this day stands as a kind of commemorative[Pg 188] monument beside his tomb.[32] And there, sitting, he gives his last mandates154 to the brethren, in the hearing of his servant only, saying, 'These last words of mine I commend to you, O little children, that ye preserve a mutual155 charity with peace, and a charity not feigned156 amongst yourselves; and if ye observe to do this according to the example of the holy fathers, God, the comforter of the good, shall help you, and I, remaining with Him, shall make intercession for you, and not only the necessaries of this present life shall be sufficiently157 supplied you by Him, but also the reward of eternal good, prepared for the observers of things Divine, shall be rendered you.' Up to this point the last words of our venerable patron [when now] passing as it were from this wearisome pilgrimage to his heavenly country, have been briefly158 narrated159.
"After which, his joyful160 last hour gradually approaching, the saint was silent. Then soon after, when the struck bell resounded161 in the middle of the night,[33] quickly rising he goes to the church, and hastening more quickly than the others he entered alone, and with bent162 knees inclines beside the altar in prayer. His servant, Diarmuid, following more slowly, at the same moment beholds164, from a distance, the whole church inside filled with angelic light round the saint; but as he approached the door this same light, which he had seen, swiftly vanished; which light a few others of the brethren, also standing at a distance, had seen. Diarmuid then entering the church, calls aloud with a voice choked with tears, 'Where art thou, Father?' And the lamps of the brethren not yet being brought, groping in the dark, he found the saint recumbent before the altar: raising him up a little, and sitting beside him, he placed the sacred head in his own bosom. And while this was happening a crowd of monks running up with lights, and seeing their father dying, begin to lament. And as we have learned from some who were there present, the saint, his soul not yet departing, with eyes upraised, looked round on each side, with a countenance of wondrous165 joy and gladness, as though beholding166 the holy angels coming to meet him. Diarmuid then raises up the saint's right hand to bless the band of monks. But the venerable father himself, too, in so far as he was[Pg 189] able, was moving his hand at the same time, so that he might appear to bless the brethren with the motion of his hand, what he could not do with his voice, during his soul's departure. And after thus signifying his sacred benediction, he straightway breathed forth his life. When it had gone forth from the tabernacle of his body, the countenance remained so long glowing and gladdened in a wonderful manner by the angelic vision, that it appeared not that of a dead man but of a living one sleeping. In the meantime the whole church resounded with sorrowful lamentations."[34]
Besides the lives of Columcille, written by Adamnan and Cummene, at least four more exist; an anonymous167 life in Latin, printed by Colgan and erroneously supposed by him to be that of Cummene; a life by John of Tinmouth, chiefly compiled from Adamnan, which is also printed by Colgan; the old Irish life contained in four Irish MSS., namely, in the Leabhar Breac, in the Book of Lismore, in a vellum MS. in Edinburgh, and in an Irish parchment volume found by the Revolutionary Commissioners168, during the Republic, in a private house in Paris, and by them presented to the Royal Library of that city—
"Qu? regio in terris nostri non plena laboris!"
This life has been printed from the Book of Lismore by Dr. Whitley Stokes. The last and most copious169 life is a compilation170 of all existing documents and poems both in Latin and Old Irish, and was made by order of O'Donnell in 1532.
"Be it known," says the preface, "to the readers of this Life that it was Manus, son of Hugh, son of Hugh Roe171, son of Niall Garv, son of Turlough of the wise O'Donnell, who ordered the part of this Life which was in Latin to be put into Gaelic; and who ordered the part that was in difficult Gaelic to be modified, so that it might be clear and comprehensible to every one; and who gathered and put together the parts of it that were scattered through the old[Pg 190] Books of Erin; and who dictated172 it out of his own mouth with great labour and a great expenditure173 of time in studying how he should arrange all its parts in their proper places, as they are left here in writing by us; and in love and friendship for his illustrious saint, relative, and patron, to whom he was devoutly174 attached. It was in the Castle of Port-na-tri-námhad [Lifford] that his Life was indited175, when were fulfilled 12 years and 20 and 500 and 1000 of the age of the Lord."
This life, written in a large vellum folio, is preserved in the Bodleian Library at Oxford and has never yet been printed.[35]
The remains176 of Columcille, which after a three days' wake were interred177 in Iona, were left undisturbed for close upon a hundred years. They were afterwards disinterred and placed within a splendid shrine28 of gold and silver, which, in due time, became the prey178 of the marauding Norsemen. The belief is very general that his remains found their last resting-place in Downpatrick, along with those of St. Patrick and St. Brigit. The present appearance of the spot where they are supposed to lie, may be gathered from the indignant verses[36] of a member of a now defunct179 literary body, to which I had the honour of belonging some years ago, one of those numerous Irish literary societies which produce verses as thick as leaves in Vallombrosa.
"I stood at a grave by the outer wall
Of the Strangers' Church in Down,
All lorn and lost in neglect, and crossed
By the Church of the Strangers' frown.
All lorn and waste, and with footsteps crossed
The grave of our Patrons Three,
Not a leaf to wave o'er that lonely grave
That seemed not a grave to me!
[Pg 191]But a trench180 where some traitor181 was flung of yore—
'Twas "a sight for a foeman's eye"!
Where Patrick still and Saint Columbkille
And the Dove[37] of the Oak Tree lie.
* * * * *
Those men who spoke182 bravely of rending183 chains
(And never a fetter184 broke!)
Those men who adored the flashing sword
(When never a tocsin spoke!)
Those little men, who are very great
In marble and bronze, are still
The city's pride, whilst that trench holds Bride
And Patrick and Columbkille!"
********
[1] Also often called St. Columba, to be strictly185 distinguished186 from Columbanus, who laboured on the Continent. The name is written sometimes Colomb Cille and Colum Kille or Columkille. It is pronounced in Irish Cullum-kill?, and means literally187 the "Dove of the Church," but in English the name is generally pronounced Columkill.
[2] As calculated by Dr. Reeves, who coincides with the "Four Masters" and Dr. Lanigan. The other Annals waver between 518 and 523.
[3] See the lines in O'Donnell's life of the saint, ascribed to St. Mura:
"Rugadh i nGartan da dheóin / S do h-oileadh i gCill mhic Neóin
'S do baisteadh mac na maise / A dTulaigh De Dubhghlaise."
[4] He is called "Germán the Master" in the Book of Lismore life. In the life of Finnian of Clonard he is called Carminator nomine gemanus, who brings to St. Finnian "quoddam carmen magnificum."
[5] A similar story of Cummain the Tall, of Guaire the Connacht king who still gives his name to the town of Gort, which is Gort Inse-Guaire, and of Cáimine of Inisceltra, is told in the Leabhar na h-Uidhre, and printed by Whitley Stokes in a note at p. 304 of his "Lives from the Book of Lismore." Each of the three got as he had desired, for, says the chronicler, "all their musings were made true. The earth was given to Guaire. Wisdom was given to Cummain. Diseases and sicknesses were inflicted188 on Cáimine, so that no bone of him joined together in the earth, but melted and decayed with the anguish189 of every disease and of every tribulation190, so that they all went to heaven according to their musings." (See for the same story the Yellow Book of Lecan, p. 132, of facsimile.)
[6] Literally, "Were the tribute of all Alba mine, from its centre to its border, I would prefer the site of one house in the middle of Derry. The reason I love Derry is for its quietness, for its purity, and for the crowds of white angels from the one end to the other. The reason why I love Derry is for its quietness, for its purity, crowded full of heaven's angels in every leaf of the oaks of Derry. My Derry, my little oak grove, my dwelling and my little cell, O Eternal God in heaven above, woe191 be to him who violates it."
"Is aire, caraim Doire
Ar a reidhe, ar a ghloine,
's ar iomatt a aingel find
On chind go soich aroile."
This poem is taken from a Brussels MS., copied by Michael O'Clery for Father Colgan, and by him accepted apparently192 as genuine. Some of it may very well be so, only, as usual, it has been greatly altered and modified in transcription, as may be seen from the above verse. (See p. 288 of Reeves' "Adamnan.") Some of the verses are evidently interpelations, but the Irish life in the Book of Lismore distinctly attributes to him the verse which I have here given, going out of its way to quote it in full, but the third line is a little different as quoted in the life: "ár is lomlan aingeal bhfinn."
[7] In Irish Dair-magh, "oak-plain." Columcille seems to have been particularly fond of the oak, for his Irish life tells us that it was under a great oak-tree that he resided while at Kells also. The writer adds, "and it"—the great oak-tree—"remained till these latter times, when it fell through the crash of a mighty193 wind. And a certain man took somewhat of its bark to tan his shoes with. Now, when he did on the shoes, he was smitten194 with leprosy from his sole to his crown." It is well known to this day that it is unlucky, or worse, to touch a saint's tree. I have been observing one that was, when in the last stage of decrepitude195, blown down a few years ago at the well of St. Aracht or Atracta, a female saint of Connacht in the plains of Boyle; yet, though the people around are nearly famished196 for want of fuel, not one twig197 of it has yet been touched. In the Edinburgh MS. of Columcille's life we read how on another occasion he made a hymn to arrest a fire that was consuming the oak-wood, "and it is sung against every fire and against every thunder from that time to this." (See Skene's "Celtic Scotland," vol. ii. pp. 468-507.)
[8] "Is sí mo cubhus gan col
's nocha conagar m' eiliughadh
Ferr écc ind Eirind cen ail30
Ina sir beatha ind Aipuin."
For the whole of this poem, in the form of a dialogue between Cormac and Columcille, see p. 264 of Reeves' "Adamnan." It is very hard to say how much or how little of these poems is really Columcille's. Colgan was inclined to think them genuine. Of course, as we now have them, the language is greatly modernised; but I am inclined to agree with Dr. Healy, who judges them rather from internal than from linguistic198 evidence; and while granting, of course, that they have been retouched by later bards, adds, "but in our opinion they represent substantially poems that were really written by the saint. They breathe his pious spirit, his ardent199 love for nature, and his undying affection for his native land. Although retouched, perhaps, by a later hand, they savour so strongly of the true Columbian spirit that we are disposed to reckon them amongst the genuine compositions of the saint." ("Ireland's Schools and Scholars," p. 329.) "The older pieces here preserved," says Dr. Robert Atkinson in his preface to the contents of the facsimile of the Book of Leinster, "and of whose genuineness and authenticity there seems no room for doubt, ex. gr., the Poems of Colum Cille, bear with them the marks of the action of successive transcribers, whose desire to render them intelligible200 has obscured the linguistic proofs of their age."
[9] Literally, "How happy the son of Dima of the devout church, when he hears in Durrow the desire of his mind, the sound of the wind against the elms when 'tis played, the blackbird's joyous201 note when he claps his wings; to listen at early dawn in Rosgrencha to the cattle, the cooing of the cuckoo from the tree on the brink of summer," etc. (See Reeves' "Adamnan," p. 274).
"Fuaim na goithi ris in leman ardos peti
Longaire luin duibh conati ar mben a eti."
[10] He himself refers to his "grey eye looking back to Erin" in one of his best-known poems.
[11] In token of which is the Irish quatrain quoted in his life—
"Son a ghotha Coluim cille,
mór a binne os gach cléir
go ceann cúig ceád déag céimeann,
Aídhbhle réimeann, eadh ba réill."
[12] "So then Baithine related to him the famous vision, to wit, three chairs seen by him in heaven, even a chair of gold and a chair of silver and a chair of glass. Columcille explained the vision. Ciaran the Great, the carpenter's son, is the chair of gold for the greatness of his charity and his mercy. Molaisse is the chair of silver because of his wisdom and his piety202. I myself am the chair of glass because of my affection, for I prefer the Gaels to the men of the world, and Kinel Conall [his own tribe] to the [other] Gaels, and the kindred of Lughid to the Kinel Conall." (Leabhar Breac, quoted by Stokes, "Irish Lives," p. 303; but the reason here given for being seated on a chair of glass is, as Stokes remarks, unmeaning.)
[13] "Jejunationum quoque et vigiliarum indefessis laboribus sine ulla intermissione, die noctu-que ita occupatus ut supra humanam possibilitatem uniuscujusque pondus specialis videretur opens," says Adamnan in the preface to his first book.
[14] "Erat enim aspectu angelicus, sermone nitidus, opere sanctus, ingenio optimus, consilio magnus ... et inter127 h?c omnibus carus, hilarem semper faciem ostendens sanctam, spiritus sancti gaudio intimis l?tificabatur pr?cordiis."
[15] This copy made by Columcille is popularly believed to be the celebrated codex known as the Cathach or "Battler," which was an heirloom of the saint's descendants, the O'Donnells. It was always carried three times round their army when they went to battle, on the breast of a cleric, who, if he were free from mortal sin, was sure to bring them victory. The Mac Robartaighs were the ancestral custodians203 of the holy relic25, and Cathbar O'Donnell, the chief of the race at the close of the eleventh century, constructed an elaborately splendid shrine or cover for it. This precious heirloom remained with the O'Donnells until Donal O'Donnell, exiled in the cause of James II., brought it with him to the Continent and fixed a new rim81 upon the casket with his name and date. It was recovered from the Continent in 1802 by Sir Neal O'Donnell, and was opened by Sir William Betham soon after. This would in the previous century have been considered a deadly crime, for "it was not lawful204" to open the Cathach; as it was, Sir Neal's widow brought an action in the Court of Chancery against Sir William Betham for daring to open it. There turned out to be a decayed wooden box inside the casket, and inside this again was a mass of vellum stuck together and hardened into a single lump. By long steeping in water however, and other treatment, the various leaves came asunder205, and it was found that what it contained was really a Psalter, written in Latin, in a "neat but hurried hand." Fifty-eight leaves remained, containing from the 31st to the 106th Psalm, and an examination of the text has shown that it really does contain a copy of the second revision of the Psalter by St. Jerome, which helps to strengthen the belief that this may have been the very book for which three thousand warriors206 fought and fell in the Battle of Cooldrevna.
[16] Keating says that this account of the affair was preserved in the Black Book of Molaga, one of his ancient authorities now lost. The king decided, says Keating, "gorab leis gach leabhar a mhaic-leabhar, mar5 is le gach boinn a boinín."
[17] "These were," says the commentator on St. Columcille's hymn, the "Altus," "the three battles which he had caused in Erin, viz., the battle of Cúl-Rathain, between him and Comgall, contending for a church, viz., Ross Torathair; and the battle of Bealach-fheda of the weir207 of Clonard; and the battle of Cúl Dremhne [Cooldrevna] in Connacht, and it was against Diarmait Mac Cerball [the High-king], he fought them both." Keating's account also agrees with this, but Reeves has shown that the two later battles in which he was implicated208 probably took place after his exile.
[18] Literally: "How rapid the speed of my coracle and its stern turned towards Derry. I grieve at the errand over the proud sea, travelling to Alba of the Ravens. There is a grey eye that looks back upon Erin: it shall not see during life the men of Erin nor their wives. My vision o'er the brine I stretch from the ample oaken planks209; large is the tear from my soft grey eye when I look back upon Erin. Upon Erin is my attention fixed, upon Loch Leven [Lough Lene in West Meath], upon Linè [Moy-linny, near Antrim], upon the land the Ultonians own, upon smooth Munster, upon Meath.... Carry my benediction over the sea to the nobles of the Island of the Gael, let them not credit Moleesha's words nor his threatened persecution210. Were it not for Moleesha's words at the Cross of Ahamlish, I should not permit during my life disease or distemper in Ireland.... Beloved to my heart also in the west is Drumcliff at Cúlcinne's strand: to behold163 the fair Loch Foyle, the form of its shores is delightful.... Take my blessing with thee to the west, broken is my heart in my breast, should sudden death overtake me it is for my great love of the Gael."
[19] Dr. Healy's "Ireland's Schools and Scholars," p. 293. A fact which is also confirmed by Dr. Reeves, p. lxviii of his "Adamnan," where he says: "The country people believe that whoever sleeps a night on this stone will be free from home-sickness when he goes abroad, and for this reason it has been much resorted to by emigrants on the eve of their departure." I cannot say whether the breaking up of old ties produced by the National Board—which has elsewhere so skilfully211 robbed the people of their birthright—may not have put an end to this custom within the last few years.
[20] "Deoraidhe gan sgith gan sos,
Mianaid a dtír 's a ndúthchas."
This verse was either composed or quoted by John O'Mahony, the Fenian Head-centre, when in America.
[21] Also in the "Liber Hymnorum," vol. ii.; and again in 1882 with a prose paraphrase212 and notes by the Marquis of Bute, who says: "the intrinsic merits of the composition are undoubtedly213 very great, especially in the latter capitula [i.e., stanzas], some of which the editor thinks would not suffer by comparison with the Dies Ir?." Dr. Dowden, Bishop of Edinburgh, has printed, in his pleasant little volume on the "Celtic Church in Scotland," p. 323, a most admirable translation of it into English verse by the Rev11. Anthony Mitchell.
[22] Except the first stanza, which being in honour of the Holy Trinity has seven lines.
[23] This poem begins—
"M'?nuran dam is in sliab,
A rig grian rop sorad sed,
Nocha n-eaglaigi dam ní,
Na du mbeind tri ficit céd."
I find other verses attributed to him in the MS marked H 1. 11. in Trinity College, Dublin.
[24] Laud117, 615.
[25] Edited in 1857 for the Irish Arch?ological Society by Dr. Reeves, afterwards Bishop of Down, with all the perfection which the most accurate scholarship and painstaking214 research could accomplish. It is not too much to say that his name is likely to remain in the future associated with those of Adamnan and Columcille.
[26] Book iii., chapter 5 of Adamnan's "Life of Columcille."
[27] Alluding215 to the fact that Adamnan tried to persuade his countrymen to change their mode of calculating Easter, and to adopt the Roman tonsure. Sir James Dalrymple is here engaged in defending the Presbyterian view of church government.
[28] "It is to be hoped," Dr. Reeves caustically216 remarked, "that the doubts originated in a different style of research from that which made Bede's Columcilli an island, and Dearmach [Durrow] the same as Derry!"
[29] "It may be objected," says Dr. Reeves, "that it was written by another person of this name, or copied by a later hand from the autograph of this Dorbene. The former exception is not probable, the name being almost unique, and found so pointedly217 connected with the Columbian society; the latter is less probable, as the colophon in Irish MSS. is always peculiar to the actual scribe and likely to be omitted in transcription, as is the case of later MSS. of the same recension preserved in the British Museum." "Hoc ipsum MS. credi posset authographum Dorbbenei," says Van der Meer, a learned monk, "subscriptio enim illa in rubro vix ab alio descriptore addita fuisset; characteres quoque antiquitatem sapiunt s?culi octavi."
[30] He died in 704, and Dorbene the scribe in 713. It is necessary to be thus particular, even at the risk of being tedious, to correct the unlearned assertions of people who can write that in treating of the "lives of St. Patrick and St. Columba, one's faith is tried to the uttermost, leading not a few to deny the very existence of the two missionaries218" ("Irish Druids and Religions," Borwick, p. 304); or the biassed219 dicta of men like Ledwich who says that all Irish MSS. "savour of modern forgery220."
[31] "Post h?c verba de illo descendens monticellulo, et ad monasterium revertens, sedebat in tugurio Psalterium scribens; et ad ilium tricesimi tertii psalmi versiculum perveniens ubi scribitur, Inquirentes autem Dominum non deficient221 omni bono, Hic, ait, in fine cessandum est pagin?; qu? vero sequuntur Baitheneus scribat. Sancto convenienter congruit decessori novissimus versiculus quem scripserat, cui numquam bona deficient ?terna: succesori vero sequens patri, spiritalium doctori filiorum, Venite filii, audite me, timorem Domini docebo vos, congruenter convenit; qui, sicut decessor commendavit, non solo ei docendo sed etiam scribendo successit."
[32] It is still shown at the east end of the Cathedral in Iona, surrounded by an iron cage to keep off tourists.
[33] "The saint had previously222 attended at the vespertinalis Dominic? noctis missa, an office equivalent to the nocturnal vigil, and now at the turn of midnight the bell rings for matins, which were celebrated according to ancient custom a little before daybreak."—Reeves. The early bells were struck like gongs, not rung, hence the modern Irish for "ring the bell" is bain an clog223, "strike the bell."
[34] This scene took place, as Dr. Reeves has shown, "just after midnight between Saturday the 8th and Sunday the 9th of June, in the year 597."
[35] It is to be hoped that it may soon see the light as one of the volumes whose publication is contemplated224 by the new Irish Texts Society. The copy of it used by Colgan is now back in the Franciscans' Library in Dublin, a beautiful vellum written for Niall óg O'Neill.
[36] P. 50 of a little volume called "Lays and Lyrics225 of the Pan-Celtic Society," long out of print, by P. O'C. MacLaughlin.
[37] Evidently alluding to the passage in her Irish life which says, "Her type among created things is as the Dove among birds, the vine among trees, and the sun above stars." There is a Latin distich on this grave in Downpatrick which I have seen somewhere,
In burgo Duno tumulo tumulantur in uno
Brigida Patricius atque Columba pius.
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conspicuously
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renowned
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missionary
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mar
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monarch
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| 圣地，圣坛，神圣场所( shrine的名词复数 ) | |
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28
shrine
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| n.圣地，神龛，庙；v.将...置于神龛内，把...奉为神圣 | |
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29
northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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30
ail
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| v.生病，折磨，苦恼 | |
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31
monastery
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| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
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32
oasis
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| n.（沙漠中的）绿洲，宜人的地方 | |
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33
grove
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| n.林子，小树林，园林 | |
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34
animate
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| v.赋于生命，鼓励；adj.有生命的，有生气的 | |
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35
enjoined
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| v.命令( enjoin的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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36
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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37
dwelling
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| n.住宅，住所，寓所 | |
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38
foes
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| 敌人，仇敌( foe的名词复数 ) | |
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39
celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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40
groves
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| 树丛，小树林( grove的名词复数 ) | |
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41
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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42
unwillingness
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| n. 不愿意，不情愿 | |
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43
devout
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| adj.虔诚的，虔敬的，衷心的 (n.devoutness) | |
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44
impugn
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| v.指责，对…表示怀疑 | |
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45
rugged
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| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
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46
forth
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|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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47
strings
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| n.弦 | |
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48
harp
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|
| n.竖琴；天琴座 | |
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49
glade
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|
| n.林间空地，一片表面有草的沼泽低地 | |
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50
brink
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|
| n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘，边沿 | |
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51
monasteries
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| 修道院( monastery的名词复数 ) | |
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52
commentator
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|
| n.注释者，解说者；实况广播评论员 | |
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53
luminous
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|
| adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的 | |
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54
tonsure
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|
| n.削发；v.剃 | |
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55
resonant
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|
| adj.(声音)洪亮的，共鸣的 | |
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56
bards
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| n.诗人( bard的名词复数 ) | |
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57
incessant
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|
| adj.不停的，连续的 | |
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58
secular
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|
| n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的 | |
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59
temperament
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| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
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60
delightful
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|
| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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61
frail
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|
| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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62
monks
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| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
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63
monk
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| n.和尚，僧侣，修道士 | |
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64
countenance
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|
| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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65
stratagems
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| n.诡计，计谋( stratagem的名词复数 )；花招 | |
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66
penance
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|
| n.（赎罪的）惩罪 | |
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67
nettles
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| n.荨麻( nettle的名词复数 ) | |
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68
nought
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|
| n.／adj.无，零 | |
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69
psalm
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| n.赞美诗，圣诗 | |
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70
psalms
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| n.赞美诗( psalm的名词复数 )；圣诗；圣歌；(中的) | |
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71
dexterous
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|
| adj.灵敏的；灵巧的 | |
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72
calf
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|
| n.小牛，犊，幼仔，小牛皮 | |
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73
unnaturally
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|
| adv.违反习俗地；不自然地；勉强地；不近人情地 | |
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74
decided
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|
| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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75
violation
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| n.违反(行为)，违背(行为)，侵犯 | |
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76
sanctuary
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| n.圣所，圣堂，寺庙；禁猎区，保护区 | |
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77
slew
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| v.（使）旋转；n.大量，许多 | |
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78
steward
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| n.乘务员，服务员；看管人；膳食管理员 | |
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79
lodging
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|
| n.寄宿，住所；(大学生的)校外宿舍 | |
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80
promptly
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|
| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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81
rim
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| n.(圆物的)边，轮缘；边界 | |
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82
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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83
enraged
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| 使暴怒( enrage的过去式和过去分词 )； 歜； 激愤 | |
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84
kinsmen
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|
| n.家属，亲属( kinsman的名词复数 ) | |
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85
avenge
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|
| v.为...复仇，为...报仇 | |
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86
determined
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|
| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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87
prow
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| n.(飞机)机头，船头 | |
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88
ravens
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|
| n.低质煤；渡鸦( raven的名词复数 ) | |
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89
stainless
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|
| adj.无瑕疵的，不锈的 | |
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90
plank
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|
| n.板条，木板，政策要点，政纲条目 | |
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91
isle
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|
| n.小岛，岛 | |
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92
benediction
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|
| n.祝福；恩赐 | |
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93
warding
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|
| 监护，守护（ward的现在分词形式） | |
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94
reverts
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|
| 恢复( revert的第三人称单数 )； 重提； 回到…上； 归还 | |
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95
strand
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|
| vt.使（船）搁浅，使（某人）困于（某地） | |
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96
blessing
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|
| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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97
bosom
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|
| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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98
bleak
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|
| adj.(天气)阴冷的；凄凉的；暗淡的 | |
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99
pious
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|
| adj.虔诚的；道貌岸然的 | |
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100
emigrants
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|
| n.（从本国移往他国的）移民( emigrant的名词复数 ) | |
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101
lighter
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| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
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102
longing
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|
| n.（for）渴望 | |
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103
patriot
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|
| n.爱国者，爱国主义者 | |
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104
bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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105
multiplication
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|
| n.增加，增多，倍增；增殖，繁殖；乘法 | |
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106
lasting
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|
| adj.永久的，永恒的；vbl.持续，维持 | |
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107
illuminated
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|
| adj.被照明的；受启迪的 | |
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108
hymn
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|
| n.赞美诗，圣歌，颂歌 | |
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109
beguiling
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|
| adj.欺骗的，诱人的v.欺骗( beguile的现在分词 )；使陶醉；使高兴；消磨（时间等） | |
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110
stanza
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| n.（诗）节，段 | |
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111
stanzas
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|
| 节，段( stanza的名词复数 ) | |
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112
hymns
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|
| n.赞美诗，圣歌，颂歌( hymn的名词复数 ) | |
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113
syllables
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|
| n.音节( syllable的名词复数 ) | |
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114
syllable
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| n.音节；vt.分音节 | |
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115
pros
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| abbr.prosecuting 起诉；prosecutor 起诉人；professionals 自由职业者；proscenium （舞台）前部n.赞成的意见( pro的名词复数 )；赞成的理由；抵偿物；交换物 | |
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116
insufficient
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|
| adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的 | |
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117
laud
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| n.颂歌；v.赞美 | |
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118
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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119
Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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120
derived
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| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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121
memoir
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| n.[pl.]回忆录，自传；记事录 | |
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122
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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123
embodied
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| v.表现( embody的过去式和过去分词 )；象征；包括；包含 | |
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124
conversing
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| v.交谈，谈话( converse的现在分词 ) | |
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125
dealing
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| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
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126
eulogy
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| n.颂词；颂扬 | |
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127
inter
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| v.埋葬 | |
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128
authenticity
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| n.真实性 | |
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129
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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130
exacting
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| adj.苛求的，要求严格的 | |
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131
fabulous
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| adj.极好的；极为巨大的；寓言中的，传说中的 | |
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132
rites
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| 仪式，典礼( rite的名词复数 ) | |
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133
professed
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| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
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134
impugning
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| v.非难，指谪( impugn的现在分词 )；对…有怀疑 | |
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135
archaic
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| adj.(语言、词汇等)古代的，已不通用的 | |
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136
antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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137
orthography
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| n.拼字法，拼字式 | |
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138
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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139
displeased
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| a.不快的 | |
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140
peculiar
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|
| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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141
specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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142
impugned
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| v.非难，指谪( impugn的过去式和过去分词 )；对…有怀疑 | |
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143
waggon
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| n.运货马车，运货车；敞篷车箱 | |
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144
laborious
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| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
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145
toil
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| vi.辛劳工作，艰难地行动；n.苦工，难事 | |
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146
scripture
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| n.经文，圣书，手稿；Scripture:(常用复数)《圣经》，《圣经》中的一段 | |
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147
deigns
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|
| v.屈尊，俯就( deign的第三人称单数 ) | |
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148
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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149
lament
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| n.悲叹，悔恨，恸哭；v.哀悼，悔恨，悲叹 | |
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150
brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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151
irrational
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| adj.无理性的，失去理性的 | |
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152
ascending
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|
| adj.上升的，向上的 | |
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153
mattress
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| n.床垫，床褥 | |
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154
mandates
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| 托管（mandate的第三人称单数形式） | |
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155
mutual
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|
| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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156
feigned
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| a.假装的，不真诚的 | |
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157
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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158
briefly
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|
| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
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159
narrated
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|
| v.故事( narrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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160
joyful
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| adj.欢乐的，令人欢欣的 | |
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161
resounded
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|
| v.（指声音等）回荡于某处( resound的过去式和过去分词 )；产生回响；（指某处）回荡着声音 | |
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162
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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163
behold
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| v.看，注视，看到 | |
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beholds
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| v.看，注视( behold的第三人称单数 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
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165
wondrous
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| adj.令人惊奇的，奇妙的；adv.惊人地；异乎寻常地；令人惊叹地 | |
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166
beholding
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| v.看，注视( behold的现在分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
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167
anonymous
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| adj.无名的；匿名的；无特色的 | |
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168
commissioners
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| n.专员( commissioner的名词复数 )；长官；委员；政府部门的长官 | |
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169
copious
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| adj.丰富的，大量的 | |
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170
compilation
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| n.编译，编辑 | |
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171
roe
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| n.鱼卵；獐鹿 | |
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172
dictated
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| v.大声讲或读( dictate的过去式和过去分词 )；口授；支配；摆布 | |
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173
expenditure
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| n.(时间、劳力、金钱等)支出；使用，消耗 | |
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174
devoutly
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| adv.虔诚地，虔敬地，衷心地 | |
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175
indited
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| v.写（文章，信等）创作，赋诗，创作( indite的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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176
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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177
interred
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| v.埋，葬( inter的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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178
prey
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| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
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defunct
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| adj.死亡的；已倒闭的 | |
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180
trench
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| n./v.(挖)沟，(挖)战壕 | |
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181
traitor
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| n.叛徒，卖国贼 | |
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182
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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183
rending
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| v.撕碎( rend的现在分词 )；分裂；（因愤怒、痛苦等而）揪扯（衣服或头发等）；（声音等）刺破 | |
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184
fetter
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| n./vt.脚镣，束缚 | |
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185
strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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186
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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187
literally
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| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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188
inflicted
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| 把…强加给，使承受，遭受( inflict的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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189
anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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190
tribulation
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| n.苦难，灾难 | |
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191
woe
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| n.悲哀，苦痛，不幸，困难；int.用来表达悲伤或惊慌 | |
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192
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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193
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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194
smitten
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| 猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去分词 ) | |
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195
decrepitude
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| n.衰老；破旧 | |
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196
famished
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| adj.饥饿的 | |
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197
twig
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| n.小树枝，嫩枝；v.理解 | |
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198
linguistic
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| adj.语言的，语言学的 | |
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199
ardent
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的 | |
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200
intelligible
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| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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201
joyous
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| adj.充满快乐的；令人高兴的 | |
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202
piety
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| n.虔诚，虔敬 | |
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203
custodians
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| n.看守人，保管人( custodian的名词复数 ) | |
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204
lawful
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| adj.法律许可的，守法的，合法的 | |
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205
asunder
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| adj.分离的，化为碎片 | |
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206
warriors
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| 武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 ) | |
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207
weir
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| n.堰堤，拦河坝 | |
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208
implicated
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| adj.密切关联的；牵涉其中的 | |
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209
planks
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| （厚）木板( plank的名词复数 )； 政纲条目，政策要点 | |
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210
persecution
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| n. 迫害,烦扰 | |
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211
skilfully
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| adv. (美skillfully)熟练地 | |
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212
paraphrase
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| vt.将…释义，改写；n.释义，意义 | |
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213
undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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214
painstaking
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| adj.苦干的；艰苦的，费力的，刻苦的 | |
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215
alluding
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| 提及，暗指( allude的现在分词 ) | |
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216
caustically
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| adv.刻薄地；挖苦地；尖刻地；讥刺地 | |
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217
pointedly
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| adv.尖地，明显地 | |
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218
missionaries
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| n.传教士( missionary的名词复数 ) | |
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219
biassed
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| （统计试验中）结果偏倚的，有偏的 | |
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220
forgery
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| n.伪造的文件等，赝品，伪造（行为） | |
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221
deficient
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| adj.不足的，不充份的，有缺陷的 | |
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222
previously
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| adv.以前，先前（地） | |
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223
clog
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| vt.塞满，阻塞；n.[常pl.]木屐 | |
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224
contemplated
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| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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225
lyrics
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| n.歌词 | |
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