Elizabeth Rundle Charles

“ And when the old nurse had left, Ethne said—
“Every bit of the world seems so close to the heavenly King, why should I wish to be anywhere but where we are; where all our beloved are; where our father and mother have the homage of all; where all would die for us; where all would follow us in life and death; where a word from our lips is law, and a wish of our hearts is understood and obeyed before we can speak it?”
“It is for these, it is just because of their love, I sometimes wish to go afar and learn,” replied Baithene. ”

“ Those were, moreover, to Ethne, months of much happy learning of many things. Still in many ways a child of the wilderness, it was a constant joy to her to learn through Marius the secrets of his ancient world. And above all, she delighted, with ever-increasing wonder and joy, in drinking with him of what to her, lover of all fountains, was the new and perennial fountain of “the Testaments of God.”
“Freedom, law, life: order, beauty, truth: everything is there,” she would say. “My own people at home cannot indeed taste of all the riches of your learning. ”

“ But the fortress is for us also a home; for we are children, inside. He makes me think often of the words they chant in church: ‘The Lord is my Rock and my Fortress,’ the sweet voices say; and the others answer, ‘He shall defend thee under His wings, and thou shalt be safe under His feathers.’ Stone buttresses of a fortress to the enemy outside; to those within, a warm nest with the soft feathers and downy breast of a mother-bird brooding over us. For the stronghold is not anything Bishop Leo builds, but God Himself, to Whom he leads us, and God is love. ”

“ Ethne returned to Miriam, but Baithene was swept on in the tide.
Close on the outskirts of the town they encountered the advance-guard of the host pressing on to the plunder of the city. The nimble brown men with the swift horses, which were as part of themselves, wheeled around them. Javelins were raised to hurl at them, spears were pointed, with the fierce howls and cries which seemed to have caught the tone of the wild beasts of the desert. Nor were these aimless, unmeaning menaces. Even while the procession advanced towards the enemy, Attila had given the order to cut them all down. ”

“ The year of the death of Attila brought two little sons to the palace on the Aventine and the house among the Sabine hills.
The joy was very great in both homes. If Ethne had been as a fountain of youth to Marius, these babes seemed to bring back youth to Damaris. She travelled backwards and forwards in a flutter of new possession and new hope from Rome to the mountains. North and south, the new world and the old seemed visibly blended in those two precious blossoms of new human life. ”

“ And Ethne had replied—
“Beloved, I am afraid the whole world is a land of divisions and dissolvings. What Patrick has brought us is the one universal Church of the One Living God, as he told the princesses of our race at the well—‘Our God is the God of all men.’ If our Ireland, if your Italy, can live in His life, we shall be one and at peace, and strong. And this is what we in our little way, what Patrick and Leo in their great way, are labouring for night and day, heart and soul, every day and for ever.” ”

“ Our vices have killed us. Yet she has fallen fighting to the last, not as a slave and captive, but as free and the mother of the free. The brave garrison of Aquileia could not save our Rome from ruin, but they have saved it from the worst dishonour; Digna stands for ever as a symbol of her great old glory. And Marius, thank God, our Marius was there! ”

“ Spain was in the hands of Arians; Gaul torn between contending races and beliefs; Britain had relapsed into heathenism. The one thing needful at the moment seemed to be Unity, and for this unity Leo sacrificed, strove, and toiled. And his own soul being a city at unity within itself, with primitive simplicity of character, Roman strength of will, Christian singleness of heart, this unity he succeeded in preserving through that distracted age. But always with him unity was a means and not an end, the essential condition of life, valued for the sake of the life it guarded ”

“ When she came back into the corridor, she and Damaris listened to the story of the terrible fortnight of the separation. For fourteen days the luxurious city had been given up to the plunder of the most practised and cruel plunderers in the world; Rome had been abandoned to her bitterest enemies.
The palaces, many of them like cities in themselves, each with its amphitheatre, its stadium, its baths, its garrison of slaves, had been rifled of every treasure they contained. Gold, gems, rich silks, costly furniture and raiment, embroideries, tapestries, carpets from every land under the sun ”

“ When these tidings reached them, for the first time Damaris uttered a cry of despair. “Alas! alas!” she said, “too surely our Marius is slain, or he would have saved her.”
But Fabricius shook his head.
“Fond mother’s thought! Against such a flood of furious savagery Marius would have been as powerless as when he lay a babe in thine arms;” and then, with a flash of the old patrician fire, he added, “It is not Digna only, it is our old Rome, who chose death rather than dishonour at Aquileia; our Rome has fallen, she is dead, but never could she have perished save by suicide. ”

“ If Attila were to fall as Alaric had fallen, some began dimly to feel, who would hold his unwieldy empire, his hordes of many divided tribes, together? Moreover, the inevitable curse of polygamy was in Attila’s own house. Which of all the sons of his many wives would win the allegiance of these disorganized hosts? The great defeat and slaughter of the previous year, the Hunnenschlacht, on the plains of Châlons, could not have been forgotten; and something stronger than defeat in battle was doubtless beginning to dissolve the terrific forces of dissolution from within. ”

“ He seems only to care for one thing besides—these sacred relics of our ancient glory. He also steals in here from time to time, and I have seen the tears on his wrinkled old face, making it look for the moment young again, as if the old days and the old life might come back yet.”
The family stayed all that winter on the Aventine, and more and more Ethne’s heart was drawn [270] to Fabricius and Damaris, with a deep and tender reverence for the old age which seemed creeping on them too soon, as if the dissolution and decay of the falling world around them were gathering them into its shadow. ”

“ Ethne and Damaris were alone together in the familiar rooms of the quiet home among the streams of the wooded hills, when the tidings of the tragic end of Maximus reached them. When it was quite sure that the Vandals were on the sea, on their way to Rome, the citizens went mad with terror and despair, and seized on the wretched old enthroned official, as the nearest object on which to wreak their rage. He had perhaps been harsh as well as weak; to be just requires courage as well as good-nature. ”

“ I am once more in the house of the lady Digna, the young matron who, in her beauty and truth, seems to belong rather to the grand simplicity of the Republic than to any people or any period since. Close to her house is a high tower rising above the river, flowing crystal clear as if fresh from the blue hills which you see from the top. We cannot despair of saving the city, the virgin city, that has kept off so many enemies. The traditions of the ancient heroism seem to inspire its men and its women to-day. ”

“ A necessity for fresh air and movement came over Ethne; child of the hills and woods, for her the companionship of the mountains and the streams was as that of familiar friends. At first she hesitated to leave Damaris alone, until persuaded by her entreaties.
“Go forth, my daughter,” she said, “among the hills and brooks; thine eyes are always opened to see the well-springs, as thou liftest up the thirsting.”
And Ethne went, usually accompanied by the two people of her own race in the household, Nurse Fedelm and Dewi, and by the great deer-hound. ”

“ And that, you know, is the greatest death, they say, that any Christian can die.”
“But that Paul wished to go to Rome to do good,” said Baithene, “to serve his people and God.”
“And so did you, darling,” she replied; “and God has heard.”
“I did not exactly wish to be a martyr,” he replied, “at least not quite yet. I do not feel fit for it. And I did want to learn Latin, and so many things, and to do so many things.”
“Ah,” she said, “I suppose we none of us quite know when we are fit to be martyrs. And, darling, do I want you to be a martyr? God has many good things to let us be besides that. ”

“ It was Friday evening when they arrived, and again the ritual of the Jewish Sabbath began in Eleazar’s home with the lighting of the seven-branched candlestick, and ended with the fragrance of the spices from the silver box, and the reading from the Hebrew manuscript. This Miriam had explained to Ethne. It was a thanksgiving to God for creating all sweet and pleasant things, a consecration of beauty, and a diffusion, symbolically, of the fragrance of the rest and worship of the Sabbath through the week. ”

“ For they were indeed in a land of fountains and brooks, which run among valleys and hills; the Aqua Marcia, and the Aqua Claudia, and the Fons Ceruleus of heavenly blue, the crystal springs which fed the waters of the great Claudian aqueduct, kept perennially full the magnificent fountains of Rome, and sparkled in Constantine’s porphyry basins in the great baptistery of the Lateran.
Many a gracious kindness they found means and opportunities of doing to the peasantry, and [235] the dull, cowed expression on many of the faces was for them transfigured into a trusting smile of welcome. ”

“ Joyful and solemn was the early Eucharist in the cathedral the next morning. Baithene met Ethne at the portal. Bishop Anianus and all the clergy were there. The church was full, and every prayer and anthem went up with the throb of a great multitude. But again in the moment of triumph, as in the moment of anguish, the Eucharistic hymns rose up beyond the moment. Deep in every heart was thanksgiving for rescue from ravage and ruin ”

“ Once she told him of her dream after the birth of the child—of the church crowning the mountains in place of the temple of the old gods; of the company of mountain-folk, instead of leading the lambs garlanded for sacrifice, bringing their children for baptism; of the white-robed band pouring forth thence hither and thither throughout the mountains, throughout the world, like streams making the land fair and green wherever their footsteps came, like angels bringing to men the glad tidings of great joy. ”

“ Beyond the sea are the Britains, where Patrick’s father lived. And beyond the Britains is Rome, the great Christian Empire of the world, and the great wonderful Christian city. We have been outside this Kingdom of God; but now we have come into it.”
“But if the Britons on the other side of the sea (whose coasts we can see sometimes from ours) are [13] Christians, why did they not tell us the glad tidings before?” said Baithene.
“Perhaps they tried, and could not make us listen,” said Ethne. “People do not seem always to attend at first; father does not quite listen yet.” ”

“ I also, father, was once a captive and in bondage. I think nothing teaches like suffering; and that kind of suffering I suppose Leo does not know.”
The hermit was silent a few moments, and then once more, as on that other evening, looking up at the rude weather-beaten cross, he said, with tears in his eyes—
“Lady, thou hast understood.” Then, seeing her worn, wearied look, he added, “Wilt thou come with thy people into my cave? I have bread and raisins, if thou wilt deign to partake of them; the peasants around are good to me and bring me food; and close beside is a spring of pure water.” ”

“ Afterwards Lucia said to Ethne—
“I would have expected that thy father and mother and thy close kindred should be like thee, princely and simple, royally regarding the wants and claims of all, and with sympathetic discrimination measuring the differences in place and character of each. But this charm goes through all your people; there is not one clown, one obtrusive, awkward person amongst them. Every one is as respectful to you as if you were their queen, and as much at home with you as if you were their sister. ”

“ And Marius said to Ethne—
“How can I leave thee, who hast made earth dear to me and heaven real? who hast given me back faith in God and hope in man?”
“Thou art not leaving me,” Ethne replied. “We are in one path, in the steps of the pitiful, [188] redeeming Lord. Thou wilt not despair of the slaves, however degraded, or of the Huns, however savage, for His sake.”
“For His sake and thine,” he replied, “for the sacred memory of thy captivity, and the dear first vision of thee beside the poor dying boy. Thou feelest then, beloved, that we are beginning our life together now?” ”

“ Blandina the slave maiden kept alive to the last, and, ‘as a noble mother animating her children, and sending them home to the Great King,’ after the torture from the tossing by the wild beasts, ‘going forth as to a marriage-feast to her death,’ with the simple confession of faith, ‘I am a Christian; no wickedness is done among us.’
“Ah, beloved, what a golden time that seems to look back on! None of these dividing names, these heresies and schisms, but one glorious name, ‘Christian.’ None of these degraded lives among His followers. ”

“ To weep over a dead friend is human; by a voice of command to raise him to life again is Divine. It belongs to our nature to hang on the wood of the Cross; and to another to make all the elements tremble when day had been darkened into night. It belongs to humanity to be transfixed with nails; it belongs to Deity to open the gates of Paradise to the faith of the robber. [5]
“Our Lord, the true Shepherd, Who laid down His life for the sheep, and Who came not to destroy men’s lives but to save them, wills us to imitate His own loving-kindness.” ”

“ For none but those who love the world can be at peace with it; and there is ‘no fellowship at any time between iniquity and righteousness,’ no concord between falsehood and truth, no agreement of darkness with light. It is safer for man to have earned the devil’s enmity than his friendship; therefore the wise souls who have learned to fear and love our Lord do not stoop either to dread their foes or to do them homage. For they prefer God’s will, ever, to themselves, and love themselves all the better, inasmuch as for the love of God they love themselves not. ”

“ But with Salvian, the venerable presbyter at Marseilles, whom Marius had so reverenced of old, “Magister Episcoporum,” teacher of bishops, though never himself more than a presbyter, Ethne felt at home at once. His dark views of the Church and the world did not at all depress her.
“It is as good as living in the house or tent of the old chieftain Job,” she said, “to be here. Of course we know the world is not right, nor, it seems, even the Church here on earth. And yet it is better than being with Job, because the venerable Salvian knows the Gospels, and is always sure of the victory of good.” ”

“ It was much thus to learn those unrivalled old human stories, those unique old Divine messages, not packed up in a lesson-book, nor crumbled down into texts, nor beaten thin into allegories, but real and fresh as the stories of Patrick or of Leo,—whilst always shining through and through with the Divine light, which those who most frankly recognize the human medium feel most vividly. ”

“ But it is worth while to be the son and daughter of an earthly king, for we may lead our whole people to the Heavenly King. Wonderful things have to be done, Ethne. Ireland has to be won for Him. The world has to be won for Him.”
“Is not the world His already?” said the maiden. “Beyond that sea are they not all Christians? Our Patrick was made a Christian there, like the rest, before he was taken captive and brought to our land to be a slave, that he might make our country free; just as the great Christ came to this world to suffer and to die like a slave, to set the world free. ”

“ Cruelty and lust and violence cannot create or unite; man remains human through all; and the avenging of such crimes must eventually grow out of the crimes themselves. No inspiring loyalty, no sacred memories or hopes, no great purpose of patriotism or even of conquest, held that vast horde together; nothing but only that one gigantic will. And if Attila hurled his life against Rome and conquered, and fell, like Alaric, what would become of his Huns? ”