(ABOUT A.D. 615.)
[Irish Kalendar. Two lives of this saint exist, but both are late,
collected from oral tradition, and full of fable.]
The lives of the Irish saints were, for the most part, written from
popular tradition, many centuries after their decease. They are
characterised by a love of the marvellous and the grotesque,
diminishing their historical value. The same quaint legends re-appear
in almost all, or with slender modifications. It seems that every
Irish saint yoked stags to his plough, and made bells come to him over
the water. If some of these fanciful stories are here inserted, it is
not that we desire a ready credence to be yielded to them, but rather
because it is all that there is to be told about these saints, and
some of them possess a strange beauty or are characteristically
grotesque.
Berach is said to have been the son of Nemnald, descendant of Brian,
Prince of Connaught, by his wife, Finmaith, who took him to be
baptized by his uncle, S. Froech. And here follows a strange tale.
When Berach was taken from the font, the mother wished to resume her
charge of him, but "No," said the bishop, "let me have the bringing up
of this little one; God will provide for his sustenance." So S. Froech
took him, and when the babe cried for the breast of his mother, his
uncle gave him the lobe of his ear to suck, and thence flowed a
copious supply of honey. Now, when the boy was grown up, guided by an
angel, he went to Glendalough, and there he settled, leading a
monastic life under S. Coemgen. One day a wolf fell on a calf,
belonging to the monks, and devoured it, then the cow ran lowing
painfully about, and Berach, pitying her, bade the wolf come and suck
her, and be to her in place of the calf he had eaten.
Now there was in the charge of S. Coemgen, a lad, the son of Duke
Colman, who was very ill, and consumed with fever. As the boy fretted
in his bed, and cried for apples and sorrel to quench his burning
thirst, S. Coemgen said to Berach, "Go forth, my son, taking my staff,
and bring me what the sick boy needs." So Berach went forth. And it
was midwinter. Then he prayed to God, with whom nothing is impossible,
for he was stirred with pity for the fevered child, and he went to a
willow, and blessed it; then it thrust forth its little silky flowers,
and these swelled and ripened into red apples, and beneath the willow
the snow dissolved, and green sorrel thrust up its shoots and spread
its delicate leaves; so he gathered of the apples a lap-full, and
picked a large bunch of sorrel, and came with them to his master.[43]
And after some time, Berach went forth and built a monastery in a
remote spot, Clon-cairpthe, in the desert of Kinel-dobhtha; but a
certain wealthy man interfered to pull it down, and to disturb him in
many ways. So Berach appealed for protection to the king; and when he
came to the court his adversary arrived also, and was admitted by the
porter, for he was well-dressed; but the door was shut against the
abbot in his tattered clothing. Now it was winter, and the ground was
white with snow, and rude boys, seeing the poor man, scantily clothed,
shivering outside the gate, began to pelt him with snow-balls, but
suddenly they were struck as by an icy blast, that they could not
stir. And Berach saw that the snow had been scraped from the
palace-door into a great heap. So he approached it, and blew upon it,
and a flame crackled in the snow heap, and leaped up, and he stood and
warmed himself at the flaming snow. Then, when the king heard what had
taken place, he was full of wonder, and went forth, and besought the
man of God; so he restored the boys to their usual activity, and
quenched the blazing snow-heap.