"For," said he, "if it had pleased our Lord to send me any other affliction, such as a continual pain or a consuming sickness, I would have borne it gladly, seeing it would have left me free to see these herbs, which I use for the benefit of the poor. But now the sick suffer through my blindness, and to this boy also I am a continual burden."
And when the boy called him at the hours of prayer, saying, "My Father, it is now time for the Nones office, for the marigold is closing," or, "The Vespers bell will soon sound from the valley, for the bindweed bells are folded," and the hermit recited the appointed prayers, he always added,
"I beseech Thee take away my blindness, as Thou didst heal Thy servant the son of Timeaus."
And as the boy and he sorted herbs, he cried,
And the boy answered, "The balm of Gilead grows six full paces from the gate, my Father."
But the hermit said, "I spoke in a figure, my Son. I meant not that herb. But, alas! Is there no remedy to heal the physician? No cure for the curer?"
And the boy's heart grew heavier and heavier day by day, because of the hermit's grief. For he loved him.
Now one morning as the boy came up from the village, the hermit met him, groping painfully with his hands, but with joy in his countenance, and he said, "Is that thy step my Son? Come in, for I have somewhat to tell thee."
And he said, "A vision has been vouchsafed to me, even a dream. Moreover, I believe that there shall be a cure for my blindness."