from that day was the best of scholars. At first
Brother Dove thought this was an answer to his own
prayers to the Virgin, and took it for a great proof
of the love she bore him; but when many far more fervid
prayers had failed to add a single wheatsheaf to the
harvest, he began to think that the child was trafficking
with bards, or druids, or witches, and resolved to
follow and watch. He had told his thought to
the abbot, who bid him come to him the moment he hit
the truth; and the next day, which was a Sunday, he
stood in the path when the abbot and the Brothers
were coming from vespers, with their white habits
upon them, and took the abbot by the habit and said,
’The beggar is of the greatest of saints and
of the workers of miracle. I followed Olioll
but now, and by his slow steps and his bent head I
saw that the weariness of his stupidity was over him,
and when he came to the little wood by the quern-house
I knew by the path broken in the under-wood and by
the footmarks in the muddy places that he had gone
that way many times. I hid behind a bush where
the path doubled upon itself at a sloping place, and
understood by the tears in his eyes that his stupidity
was too old and his wisdom too new to save him from
terror of the rod. When he was in the quern-house
I went to the window and looked in, and the birds
came down and perched upon my head and my shoulders,
for they are not timid in that holy place; and a wolf
passed by, his right side shaking my habit, his left
the leaves of a bush. Olioll opened his book and
turned to the page I had told him to learn, and began
to cry, and the beggar sat beside him and comforted
him until he fell asleep. When his sleep was
of the deepest the beggar knelt down and prayed aloud,
and said, “O Thou Who dwellest beyond the stars,
show forth Thy power as at the beginning, and let
knowledge sent from Thee awaken in his mind, wherein
is nothing from the world, that the nine orders of
angels may glorify Thy name”; and then a light
broke out of the air and wrapped Aodh, and I smelt
the breath of roses. I stirred a little in my
wonder, and the beggar turned and saw me, and, bending
low, said, “O Brother Dove, if I have done wrong,
forgive me, and I will do penance. It was my
pity moved me”; but I was afraid and I ran away,
and did not stop running until I came here.’
Then all the Brothers began talking together, one
saying it was such and such a saint, and one that
it was not he but another; and one that it was none
of these, for they were still in their brotherhoods,
but that it was such and such a one; and the talk
was as near to quarreling as might be in that gentle
community, for each would claim so great a saint for
his native province. At last the abbot said, ’He
is none that you have named, for at Easter I had greeting
from all, and each was in his brotherhood; but he
is Aengus the Lover of God, and the first of those
who have gone to live in the wild places and among
the wild beasts. Ten years ago he felt the burden