III.
The first thought that comes to the visitor as he views the Mount from the shore is, What could have induced anyone to choose so difficult a site for the foundation of a monastery? But here legend conveniently steps in and explains all. In the eighth century Aubert, the Bishop of Avranches, one of the most pious in an age of piety, was in the habit of retiring to the Mount for rest and meditation, and during one of his visits there the Archangel Saint Michael, the Prince of the Armies of the Lord, appeared to him and told him to build on the top of the Mount a sanctuary in his honour. From which it will be seen that even angels in those days were not above self-advertisement. But Aubert, though a bishop, was "even as you and I," and when he awoke in the morning he had some doubt as to whether he had been dreaming or had really entertained the Archangel; so he prolonged his stay in the hope of receiving another visit; nor was he disappointed. A few days later Saint Michael appeared to him once more, and rather sharply repeated his command. But even now Aubert was not convinced, and he determined to give Saint Michael a third chance, which the Saint was nothing loath to accept, repeating his instructions in a most peremptory manner. He also touched the bishop's head, leaving a hole in the skull "for a sign." We have heard of a surgical operation to introduce a joke, but this is the only case on record where a saint has found it necessary to perform a surgical operation for the introduction of a command into the head of a bishop, and Aubert, like a sensible man, concluding that one hole in his skull was sufficient, immediately set about the building of "the Palace of the Angels." Aubert's skull is still preserved in the Church of Saint Gervais at Avranches, and the startling effect of Saint Michael's touch may be seen to this day!
This is only one of the innumerable legends relating to the origin of the Abbey. Another is worthy of mention, illustrating, as it does, the advantages of co-operation with an angel when one is performing so difficult a task as Aubert took up. On the top of the Mount were two large rocks which interfered seriously with building, and could be moved by no human efforts. Saint Michael, therefore, appeared to a devout peasant who lived on the coast and bore the familiar name of Bain, telling him to take his sons to the Mount and move the rocks. Despite the Caledonian flavour of his name, Bain did not wait to have his skull perforated by the Archangel, but went forthwith together with eleven of his children and tried to move the rocks. They could not stir them one hair's-breadth, however; whereupon Aubert asked Bain if he had brought all his children, and the good man explained that they were all there except the baby, which was with its mother. The Bishop then instructed him to go at once and fetch the infant, "for God often chooses the weak to confound the strong." The child was brought, and at a touch of his little foot the rocks went tumbling down the Mount, in proof of which one of them may be seen to this day with a little chapel to Saint Aubert built on the top of it.
One more of the many miracles associated with the beginning of the great work should not be left unmentioned. Saint Aubert was naturally much exercised as to where he should rear his sanctuary, the pinnacle of a lonely rock being an unusual place to build on even in those unusual days, but here again the Archangel, who had manifested so much personal interest in the work, came to his rescue, and caused a heavy dew to fall on the Mount, leaving a dry space on the top. Upon this dry space was the church to be built.
In 709 Saint Aubert had practically completed the structure, and the church was dedicated to Saint Michael after two precious relics (namely, a piece of a scarlet veil, which the Archangel had left on the occasion of his famous appearance at Monte Gargano in Naples, together with a piece of the marble on which he had stood) had been placed in a casket on the altar. Not a vestige of the oratory built by Saint Aubert, nor of the church erected in 963 by Richard, remains. The oldest part of the buildings now existing represents a church founded in 1020 by Richard, second Duke of Normandy, and constructed under the direction of the Abbot Hildebert II. The transepts, the greater part of the nave, and the crypts date back to this period.