The Birth and Upbringing of Colum-Cille

T HIS is our glen, Glen Colum-cille, and it would be hard to find in the rest of Donegal a glen as rugged and as dark. It is dark with the great clouds that are nearly always above it; it is gray with the stones that are scattered through it, and you would not have to go far from it before you come to the bare mountains and the brown empty bog.

Far away from this is the plain of Meath where the Kings of Ireland lived and looked from their height of Tara across wide and deep-grassed lands. Far away is Meath and long ago it is since the Pagan Kings lived there. Long was that line of Pagan Kings. And the noblest of them who gave worship to the Sun and the Wind was Cormac MacAirt. You will understand what a great King Cormac MacAirt was when I tell you that his Captain was Finn MacCool—Finn the pride of Pagan Ireland. He was noted for his insight and his foresight as well as for his bravery and his resourcefulness. His great wisdom had come to him in a way that only a few of his companions knew about. Once he had taken a salmon out of the River Boyne. It had fed on the Nuts of Knowledge that had fallen from the sacred hazel-tree. Finn had burned his thumb in cooking it and a bit of the flesh of the salmon had stuck to his thumb. Ever afterwards when he put his tooth to his thumb he could find out what was signified by strange happenings.

If Cormac MacAirt was the best King of Pagan times, and if Finn MacCool was the best Captain, the best of the animals was Finn's hound, Bran. So wise was Bran that people thought that she was a Fairy woman who had been changed into a hound. Cormac, Finn and Bran—the men of Pagan times had much to show when they had these three.

Finn went hunting with his companions, the Fianna, and many and far ways they went before they came to the Ancient Glen. Here they started a deer. It crossed the stream that divides our glen in two and they loosed a hound on it; only one hound they loosed and that hound was Bran. But lo and behold! when hound and quarry were at the other side of the stream, the hound stood still, letting the deer flee away. This seemed to be of bad omen for all the Fianna, for never before had Bran failed to hold her quarry. They crossed the stream, Bran standing stock-still, and Finn tried to rouse her to pursue the deer. But the swift and wise hound stayed motionless. Then Finn put his thumb into his mouth and put his tooth to his thumb. Thereupon the reason for Bran's unwillingness to hold the deer became known to him: in this glen would be born one who would cherish all creatures; this had been foreshown to the wise hound and she would not take the life of the deer in that place.

You may be sure that the Fianna talked about this happening when they were back in the King's halls in Tara and when they were in their own camp on Allen. They thought that the child would be born, if not in Finn's time, then in the time of Oisin, his son, and if not in Oisin's time, then in the time of Oscar, Finn's grandson. But the years went by and they heard nothing of such a birth. Cormac MacAirt died and was buried with his Pagan fathers, and with the death of that King the glory of Pagan Ireland departed. Cairbri, his son, had to strike at the Fianna: he battled with them and broke their power; and Oscar was slain, and those who were left of the Fianna hunted no more on the hills nor in the glens of Ireland.

Niall came to be King, and in his time Patrick was brought into Ireland, a captive from Britain. While Patrick was yet tending his Pagan master's swine on the hillside, Niall's son, Connal, went from Tara into the North to win a domain for himself. Here he came and took possession of the territory that came to be named Tir-connal. Now one day when Prince Connal was hunting here he raised a fawn in the Ancient Glen. Across the stream the fawn went, the hounds chasing it. But when Connal's huntsmen went to where the fawn and hounds were they found the hounds gamboling around it—playing in kindness with their quarry. The hounds even held the huntsmen off while the fawn fled away. Prince Connal marveled at this happening and he questioned a Druid about the significance of it; the Druid told him that in this glen would be born one who would love and cherish all creatures.

Time went by and a child was to be born to the wife of Connal's son—Eithne her name was. Now there was a woman in the place who bore Eithne great ill-will. She had a dream, this woman. She dreamed that a great bird took up the body of Prince Felim's wife and tore it into pieces and scattered the flesh over the lands of Eirin and Alba, of Ireland and Scotland. So great was her malice that she went to Eithne and told her the dream she had. But Felim's wife was not made fearful. She knew the true significance of the dream and she said to that ill-willed woman, "I shall have a son, and his words and his teaching shall be spread through Eirin and Alba."

Eithne's son was born in the Ancient Glen, and at baptism he was given a name which means "The Knowing One"—Crimhaun. But because his favorite place for play was around a church which stood here, his companions named him "Colum-cille" which means "The Dove of the Church"—those who write it in Latin make it "Columba." And because of his birth here our dark and rugged glen was named ever afterwards Glen Colum-cille. He was born here five hundred and twenty-one years after the birth of Our Lord, in the winter-month, and his life was in the same era as that of the great Roman Emperor Justinian.

Now you might think that being so directed toward holy ways, the lad would have little of boys' gamesomeness in him and would not be found in the playing or the sporting teams. But you would be wrong in thinking so. He was sturdy and high-mettled and he was as good at striking a ball with a hurley-stick as any lad of his age. Any of the feats his comrades did he could do as well. But he never went with them when they went birds-nesting; he never took the eggs or young out of a nest although he could climb to the hawk's eyrie on the high, overhanging cliffs of Tir-connal.

He came to have a full, rousing voice, and when he said the responses to prayers, or repeated verses of poetry, or sang songs, the words could be heard at a great distance. He was familiar with all kinds of people and was welcomed in all sorts of houses; he went to wakes and weddings and christenings. But wherever he went he brought a book with him and would read while going along. He had learned to read while very little: cakes were made for him in shapes of letters of the alphabet, and as he ate his cake he learned a letter.

Now his tutor, Crunichaun, had set his heart on making this spirited lad a leader of the people in war and statecraft, a prince who would be sound in judgment, quick in understanding, and firm of will. He never called him by the name "Colum-cille," deeming that to be but a childish name, but always by the name "Crimhaun."

His father was not sure what he wanted this young son of his to be: sometimes he called him "Colum-cille," but more often he called him "Crimhaun." His father had now made himself King of Ulster. He was always matching his son against the sons of his brother Fergus—the boys who were named Sedna and Loarn. These two had made up their minds to be Kings, if not in Eirin, then in Alba beyond the sea.

Once, toward the end of a day, he and his tutor were coming from the wake of a man of the parish. Colum-cille had his book in his hand, but his tutor did not give him a chance to recite his lesson, for he kept talking to him about his cousins and about the great figures they were likely to make in the world. Well, in the very middle of his discourse, Crunichaun fell down on the ground in a faint—he was an old and sickly man. And thinking that his tutor had wearied himself and had gone to sleep, Colum-cille took off his own mantle and folded it under the old man's head and went on reciting his lesson in a full and a clear voice. His voice reached to a convent that was some distance away. Crunichaun's three daughters were there: in their cells they heard the voice; they knew it was Colum-cille's, and they knew that where he was their father would be. They hastened out of the convent to greet their father. And lo! he was on the ground, and there was no sign of life in him.

The maidens knew of their father's disease and how mortal it was. They besought Colum-cille to lay his hands upon him and to bring him back to life. He did this, and when his hands were laid on him life came back to the old man. He raised himself up, and then and there declared that nothing else except the touch of these hands could have brought him back to life. And in the presence of the three nuns, his daughters, he renounced the thought of making his pupil a leader in the ways of the world and he urged him to retire from the world and to live the life of one of the saints of God.

The next day Crunichaun went into the hall of the King of Ulster and told him that he should leave aside all thought of worldly power for his son. And hearing this said, Eithne, his mother, rejoiced. She had just been told of a vision that a saintly man who lived in the middle of the country had had at the time this son of hers was born. He had seen a golden moon rise in the north, and Ireland and Scotland and the Western World were illumined by it. And he had seen a silver moon rise in the middle of Ireland, and the middle lands were illumined by it. And Eithne had the certainty that the golden moon that Fineen had seen meant her son, and that his purity, piety and wisdom would lighten the Northern and Western lands. Felim was moved by the words she said to him and agreed to let his younger son go from the ways of the world.

His parents were reverential about this and so was Fergus, his uncle. But not so were Fergus' elder sons. They mocked at their cousin's wish to leave the world, the world that they knew and longed to be masters of. Colum-cille kept silence under their mockery. But at last their father was put into a temper by it, and he said, "When I leave you your patrimony, I shall require that each of you give Colum-cille a portion of it to build a church and school." One of the youths at once offered a portion of his heritage. The other paused and considered and made the offer only after a while. Then Colum-cille said to him, "If you, Loarn, had spoken at once, offering me what you have offered, your descendants would be Kings in Ireland. They shall be Kings, but not in Ireland." This was a true prophecy: Loarn's descendants were the Kings of Scotland, but they had no kingship in Ireland.

Fergus had a third and younger son. He had been drawn toward the deeds and thoughts that his brothers favored. But now the radiance that was all around Colum-cille drew him to his cousin; he offered up a prayer that he might become like him rather than like his brothers. Thereafter he separated himself from his brothers and attached himself more and more to Colum-cille. The two were close companions throughout their school time and to the prime of their lives, so that any history that is told of Colum-cille in those days has his cousin's name in it. Bauheen was the youth's name.