Thus far had he written, the God forsaken Brother Irenaeus. Here fell
the righteous judgment of Heaven upon him.
I, Aaron of Perusia, called by the grace of God to feed these lambs of
the holy Columban, had also the grace given to me to drive the diseased
sheep from the flock.
Long was I on the track of him and his worldly, heathenish, sinful,
ungodly, yea God-blaspheming doings; his guilty conscience had rightly
boded this. Step by step I had him watched by Italian brethren, full of
godly zeal, without his observing it. The most pious of them, Brother
Ignatius of Spoletum, succeeded in winning his confidence--for stupidly
unsuspicious are they--these barbarians--through often allowing him to
entertain him with harp playing, Irenaeus begged from him one day some
ink powder from his store, as he had used up his appointed portion, and
from the "Head of the Pharisees"--thus the shameless sinner termed his
abbot and chief shepherd--could not obtain fresh supplies, without
delivering over what he had written with the former supply.
Brother Ignatius at once, as was his pious obligation, told all to me,
his abbot. But the ink powder he gave to him, with that wisdom of the
serpent which is well pleasing to God in his priests.
Soon thereafter the sinner set out again upon one of those secret
expeditions which have ever been his wont, remaining out the whole
night when some errand had allowed him to escape from the monastery. I
never forbade him to go out, for I hoped through one of these secret
expeditions, most easily to discover his hidden doings. I sent, spies
after him every time; but every time he suddenly and mysteriously
disappeared among the wooded crags along the shore.
This time I myself sent him out, and as soon as he had left the
monastery court I at once made a most rigorous search through the whole
of his cell.
There at last I found, after much labour, these blasphemous pages,
written very small, in his accursed graceful handwriting, and artfully
hidden in a crevice between two stone slabs of the floor.
I took the devil's work with me, and read and read, with growing
horror. So much sin, so much worldliness, so much heathenish delight in
fighting and singing, in drinking and carnal love, so much, finally, of
doubt, of unbelief, of naked blasphemy, had, under the roof of the holy
Columban, under my pastoral staff, grown up, and been written out!
Abhorrence seized upon me, and holy indignation.
Forthwith I summoned the Italian brethren to special secret council and
judgment. I pointed out to them the deadly poison of these writings,
which indeed were full of the seven deadly sins; and the unanimous
sentence was pronounced. First, three hundred lashes with the scourge;
then immuring in the chastisement cell, with vinegar, water, and bread,
until repentant contrition and the fullest amendment were made
manifest.
Impatiently we awaited the return of the accursed sinner.
With the vesper bell he entered the door of the monastery court.
Immediately I placed myself before the door, shot the iron bolt,
and called forward the Italian brethren. The greater number, the
Anglo-Saxons, who were well disposed towards the blasphemer, on account
of his sinful harp playing, and lukewarm in zeal for the Lord, I had
before collected in the refectory, and locked up until the offender
should be secured.
Hastily the Italians came, and behind them several armed bondmen of the
monastery. Then, in place of all accusation, I held up these pages
before the miserable wretch, and pronounced the agreed upon sentence.
Then, ere we were aware, the God-detested criminal sprang with
lightning speed to the cistern in the court, and drew forth from behind
it a frightful horrible hammer.
"Dear hammer of Halfred, aid his son today," he cried in a threatening
voice.
And the next thing was--it seemed to me as though the Heavens fell upon
my head and neck--I sank upon the ground.
Only after a long while did I awake again.
Then I lay upon my bed, a man given up, and the brethren from Italy
lamented around my couch; and recounted that the furious Samson had,
with a second blow, shattered the bolt on the door, and made his
escape. The monastery servants, indeed, followed him, and several of
the brethren, led by brother Ignatius. But when the fugitive suddenly
turned, and slew the foremost of the pursuers, one of the monastery
servants, who would have seized him, with the frightful hammer, and
struck down brother Ignatius, severely wounded, the others gave up the
pursuit. At once he again disappeared, as always, among the cliffs and
woods.
Never have we seen him since, although from the very day of my
awakening I had him carefully searched for all along the coast. The
cavern of which these accursed pages speak could we not find. I would
have had the bones of the old heathen murderer thrown into the sea.
Probably the son concealed himself there, until he could leave the
island on some ship. I however, in consequence of the blow from his
hammer, which shattered my shoulder and collar bone, on one side, have
to suffer all my life long from a hideous twist of the neck, which is
exceedingly prejudicial to the dignity of an abbot.
This sinful book of abominations however, I sent to Rome, to the holy
Bishop, with the question, whether we should burn it, or preserve it,
to aid in tracing and convicting the escaped monk, should we succeed in
capturing him again?
For a long long time came no answer.
But after many many years the book came back from Rome, with the
command to keep it--only the blasphemous passages therein were
erased--and as a warning example to others, was the Abbot of St.
Columban to append to these pages an account from an accompanying
letter of the Archbishop Adaldag of Hamburg, of how dreadful a fate
had, through the righteous judgments of God, ended this apostate's
sinful life of the highest earthly enjoyment; which he--this may
console us--will doubtless have to expiate in the eternal torments of
hell.
From the Archbishop's letter it appeared there could be no doubt that
our perjured Brother, Irenaeus, is none other than one who, in all the
courts of the north, has been for many years celebrated as a warrior
and singer, and crowned with all earthly fame and happiness, Jarl
Sigurd Halfredson; who appeared suddenly at the court of King Harald of
Halogaland--none knew whence he came--with one of the skalds of the
King, and through hammer throwing, and harp playing, soon won for
himself such renown that King Harald gave him three castles, the
command of all his armies, and his daughter Gunnlodh in marriage.
But King Harald was the most furious Christian hater, and the bitterest
opposer of the Gospel in all the North.
And for long years Jarl Sigurd led the troops of King Harald, and
always led them to victory.
The Lord at that time tried his own with severe affliction. He had
turned his face from them, and the vassals of the Bishops, and of the
Christian princes of the North, could not stand before Jarl Sigurd, and
his dreaded hammer.
But the end of this man of blood was horrible, and therefore it has
been--by the command of the holy Father--copied from the letter of the
Archbishop, as a fearful warning to all who read these pages.
As he, that is to say, after once more in a great battle overthrowing
the Bishop's troops, was pursuing them in sinful joy, and shouting
"victory, victory!" he was mortally wounded by an arrow in the breast.
King Harald caused his heathen priests and the skalds to draw near to
the right side of the death bed, to console him with songs of Valhalla.
The wounded man waved them away with his hand.
Then drew near, on the other side of the dying, three Christian
priests, who had been made prisoners in the battle, and would have
given him the holy last Sacrament, if he acknowledged the Lord.
Indignantly the godless sinner repulsed them with his arm. And when
King Harald, astonished, asked him in whom then he believed, if not in
the heathen Gods, nor in the white Christ? he laughed and said--"I
believe in myself, and my strength. Kiss me once more, Gunnlodh, and
give me Greek wine in a golden cup."
And he kissed her, and drank, and said--
"Glorious it is to die in victory"--and died.
But he remained unhonoured and unburied by heathen priests and
Christians, since he had defiantly rejected both.
So then it is certain and set forth as a warning to all--but to us a
righteous consolation--that the God accursed soul of this most
blasphemous of all sinners must burn in hell for ever and ever--Amen.
POSTSCRIPT.
What I here wrote down, years since, as my belief concerning the fate,
after death, of this abandoned sinner, has been fully confirmed by a
delightful testimony.
That is to say, Brother Ignatius--who lately died--and certainly in
great sanctity--was before his death honoured by a wonderful vision.
Saint Columban, himself, in a dream, led him by the hand into hell, and
there he saw, in the deepest pit of sulpher, Brother Irenaeus, burning
whole and entire.
But upon his left shoulder blade, on the spot where he struck me, his
Abbot, sat an infernal raven, and hacked unceasingly through the
shoulder even to his blaspheming heart.
Of this has Brother Ignatius assured us before his death. And therefore
have I hereunto add this also, about the raven and the shoulder blade,
in order that all who read these pages, but especially the disciples of
the holy Columban in this monastery, may learn the chastisement which
awaits him who lifts heart and hand against his soul's shepherd, the
Abbot.
AMEN.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: "Oski," in reality one of the special forms of Odin, is,
in the Scandinavian mythology, the god who fulfils all the desires of
men.]
[Footnote 2: Here the parchment is pierced through, and with different
ink three crosses are signed over the burnt out part.]
[Footnote 3: Cup sacred to Bragi, the god of poetry. At the Yule feast
the heathen were wont, while the Bragi cup was passing round, to pledge
themselves by vows to the performance of deeds of special danger or
renown. They swore upon the Bragi cup, or upon the boar's head, which
was the principal dish of the feast.]
[Footnote 4: A poetical expression of the Edda for the beginning of
drunkenness.]
[Footnote 5: "Brisingamene," the necklace of Freya, the goddess of
love, was the symbol of female charm and attraction.]
[Footnote 6: _i.e._ Peacebringer.]
End of Project Gutenberg's Saga of Halfred the Sigskald, by Felix Dahn