“Ah! my heart will never find rest,
There’s a tear in my soft grey eye;
Give Eri once more to my breast,
And then I am ready to die.
I stand on the deck of my bark,
And gaze o’er the southern sea;
But alas! and alas! my Eri
For ever is hidden from me.
How bright are the eyes of my Eri,
Like the gleam of an angel’s wing;
And sweet is the breath of my Eri—
Her voice is the music of Spring.
Oh! deep is my burden of sorrow;
I pine like the mateless dove—
Will this heart from the years never borrow
A balm for the loss of my love?”
Supposing that Columba and his twelve companions sailed straight for the Western Isles of Scotland, one day’s prosperous breeze would carry them past the Rhynns of Islay, and bring them in sight of Colonsay. It is said that Columba and his companions landed on the southern extremity of Colonsay, now called Oronsay, and mounting the cliffs looked along the verge of the southern horizon. Dimly in the distance like a cloud, he saw the hills of Inishowen, and once more he bade his companions embark—for he might not stay where he could see the distant hills of Erin. So they re-embarked and sailed further north, until they landed on Iona, which is about twenty miles north-and-by-west of Colonsay.
“To oars again; we may not stay,
For ah! on ocean’s rim I see,
Where sunbeams pierce the cloudy day,
From these rude hills of Oronsay,
The isle so dear to me.
But when once more we set our feet
On wild sea-crag or islet fair,
There shall we make our calm retreat,
And spend our lives as it is meet,
In penance and in prayer.”[257]
On the southern shore of Iona there is a small sandy cove, bounded on both sides by steep and ragged cliffs rising from the waves. A patch of green sward runs down to the sandy margin of this little bay, and outside it is sheltered from the fury of the south and south-west winds by several rocky islets, through which, however, a currach might easily glide even in broken weather, and reach the little sandy beach in safety. This cove is still called Port a Churraich, and it is the unfailing tradition of Iona that it was in this cove Columba and his companions first landed, and that the cove takes its name from his currach. “The length of the curachan or ship is obvious to anyone who goes to the place, it being marked up at the head of the harbour upon the grass between two little pillars of stone, set up to show forth the same, between which pillars there is three score of foots in length, which was the exact length of the curachan or ship.”[258] We must now devote a separate chapter to Iona and its scholars, for, during six hundred years, it was an Irish island in Scottish seas.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE COLUMBIAN SCHOOL IN ALBA.
| “Saint of the seas—— Whose days were passed in teacher’s toil— Whose evening song still filled the aisle— Whose poet’s heart fed the wild bird’s brood— Whose fervent arm upbore the rood— Still from thy roofless rock so gray, Thou preachest to all, who pass that way.” —M‘Gee. |
I.—Iona.