Observe, then, the structures which he compares are altogether different; one being square, and the other round. Nor, in the whole compass of possible analogies, is there a single feature in which the two classes of edifices could be said to correspond, but that they both have their doors—which, by the way, are different in their form—at a distance from the ground. The Pyramids of Egypt bear the same correspondence,—their entrance being one-third of the height from the surface,—and why does not the Colonel bestow them also upon the monks? No; those poor, denuded, inoffensive, exemplary, unearthly victims of maceration were incapable of, either the masonic acme, or—at the era which Montmorency particularises—of the corporate influence and pecuniary or equivalent supplies indispensable for the erection of either “pyramid” or “tower”;—contenting themselves rather with their lowly cells, whence they issued out, at all seasons, to diffuse the word of “life,” than in raising maypoles of stone, within which to garrison their inexpressible treasures.
But to reconcile this discrepancy in exterior outfit, he has recourse to a miracle, which he thus conjures up. “Doubtless, in the beginning, when first those Cœnobites settled in the desert, the convent-tower was round;” then, by a single word, præsto,—or “doubtless,”—right-about face, takes place a metamorphosis, from round to square!—the more miraculous, in that the former round ones left behind them no vestiges! Upon which, again, a counter miracle is effected: “The square ones having subsequently fallen into disuse, the round tower, in after ages,” he says, “appears to have acquired a degree of increased celebrity, especially in Europe, during the preponderance of the feudal system, when every baronial castle in Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, France, etc., was furnished with one or more.” Now, has he not before told us, and told us truly, by chance, that the Pillar Tower scorns all kind of affinity with those “barbarians”; whereupon I shall merely observe with the poet, that
“If people contradict themselves, can I
Help contradicting them?”[54]
But, if intended as a place of shelter for either person or property, why build them of such an altitude? Above all things, why not build them of such internal capacity as to accommodate the whole number of inmates in each convent, in case of an attack,—as, in fact, those square towers in the desert used; whereas, “a dozen bulky persons” could not squeeze together into one of our Round Towers; and accordingly, with the inconsistency inseparable from error, our author himself proclaims that “it has frequently occurred that the barbarian, on finding that he had been foiled in his search after treasures, though he burned the abbey, and perpetrated all the mischief he was able, sooner than retire empty-handed, the pirate seized on the abbot, or most prominent member he found belonging to the community, and hurried away the unfortunate individual on board his ship, holding him in durance, till, overcome by ill-usage, he besought his brethren to come to his relief with a heavy ransom for his freedom.” “It has also often happened,” he adds, “that, unable to comply with the tyrant’s exorbitant demands, the monks resigned the captive to his fate.”
Surely, if they had those keeps to fly to, the “unfortunate” abbot need not allow himself to be seized at all; and surely, also, if they had all those treasures upon which the Colonel insists, they would not leave the father of their “community” unredeemed from so excruciating a degradation. And hence we may conclude with Dr. Lanigan, “What little credit is due to the stories of some hagiologists, who talk of great estates granted to our monasteries and churches in those and even earlier times.”[55] Indeed, for the two first centuries subsequent to the arrival of St. Patrick, such a thing was incompatible with the nature of the “political compact” in Ireland.
I do not deny, however, but that the ecclesiastics of this time did possess some articles of value appertaining to the altar, and that these were objects of unholy cupidity to the Danes: nay, further, I admit that, to escape from the insatiability of those virulent marauders, they used to fly to the belfries, which—from that mistaken regard attached to the edifices, as these receptacles of those sonorous organs to which superstition has ever clung[56]—they had hoped would prove an asylum from their pursuits,—but in vain—neither religion nor superstition opposed a barrier to the Northmen, while the frail materials whereof those belfries were constructed afforded a ready gratification to their appetite for destruction.
The Ulster Annals, year 949, furnish us with the following fact:—“Cloicteach Slane do loscadh do Gall Athacliath. Bacall ind Erlamha, 7 cloc badec do cloccaibh, Caenechair Ferleghinn, 7 sochaide mor inbi do loscadh.” That is, the belfry at Slane was set fire to by the foreigners (the Danes) of Dublin. The pastor’s staff or crozier, adorned with precious stones, besides the principal bells, and Canecar the lecturer, with a multitude of other persons were burned in the flames. The Annals of the Four Masters, noticing the same event, use nearly similar words: “Cloicteach Slaine do loscadh can a lan do mhionnaibh 7 deghdh aoninibh, im Chæinechair Fearleighinn Slaine, Bachall an Eramha 7 clocc ba deach do chloccaibh.” That is, The belfry at Slane was burned to the ground, along with several articles of value which were therein, and numbers of individuals, besides the Slane prælector, the patron’s staff, and all the bells, which were there of most worth.
Now take notice that within those “belfries” a “multitude of persons” used to have been collected, whereas the Round Towers could not accommodate above “a dozen” at one time. The belfries also are represented to have been reduced to ashes by the conflagration, which accords with the description given by both Ware and Colgan, of the wooden substance whereof they were composed; whereas the Round Towers are made of stone, and cemented by a bond of such indurated tenacity, that nothing short of lightning or earthquake has been known to disturb them:—and even though other violence may succeed in their overthrow, yet could it not be said with any accuracy that they were reduced by fire to cinders. But, above all, those very Annals which I have above quoted, when recording a greater and national calamity, place the belfries and the Round Towers in the same sentence, contradistinguished from one another,—the former characterised by their appropriate name of Cloicteach, as exhibited before, and the latter under the still more apposite denomination of Fidhnemeadh, as we shall explain elsewhere.
Again, if designed as fortresses for the monks, and receptacles for their riches, is it not strange that in the isle of Hy,—which was literally a nest of ecclesiastics, and which Columb Kill himself evangelised at the time when Montmorency was—in a dream—employing him and his coadjutors at the erection of the Round Towers,—is it not strange, I say, that this little isle, the most defenceless, as it is, and forlorn of all lands that ever projected above the bosom of the sea, should yet, in the allotment of monastic artillery, be left totally destitute of an aërial garrison?
And yet, notwithstanding the absence of such defences, the monks still continued to make it their favourite abode; of which we have but too cogent an evidence in the record of the Four Masters, under the year 985, stating that the abbot and fifteen of his brethren were slain by the Northmen on Christmas Day, just as they were preparing to celebrate the nativity of their Redeemer.