of all things that were new, and one, Then, having made a load of them, moreover, never willing that aught and fastened them upon his back, he should be proposed or done in the once more returned to the island. And monastery but such things as he him- here he built himself a cell of loose self proposed or did. stones, roofing it over with scraws, Finding that all he could say availed which he cut from the turf. And there nothing, St. Fechin at last rose up sud- he abode for two years and seven denly in his place, and with a great months, even as his namesake, St. Feouth swore that he would no longer chin of Conmacne-Mara had abode in a remain in that monastery, nor yet set like cell upon the little island of Ard foot in it ever again till he died. Nev-Oilen, opposite the point called Renertheless, because of the trouble that vyle, living upon shellfish and stale he foresaw coming upon Corca Bas- bread, of which a bag was left at the cinn, he resolved that he would not foot of the cliff, seeking and finding a depart from it altogether. Therefore, desert in the ocean (quærere desertum he presently determined in his own in Oceano), as holy men and confessors mind that he would build himself a of Erinn have in all ages delighted small damliagh, or cell, upon one of the to do. waste islands which lay hard by in the midst of the sea, even as other saints and holy men had done before him. And of all the many islands in that sea none would he choose, and upon no other would he live, only upon the "Wicked" illaun, as it was still called, which lay opposite to the point of Foohagh.

In this way the time passed on until that black year came, the blackest and the most deadly amongst the many evil years of Erinn, when for the second time, and now with greater daring and ferocity and cruelty than before, the pagan ships once more visited its shores, being seen this time first off the headland of Cnoc Brandou in Ciarraige Luacra. And having entered Ciarraige Luacra by the Cashen River, they ravaged and destroyed it utterly, seeking out all its holy shrines, and churches, and monasteries, and destroying all that was found therein, save such things as they carried away with them to their ships.

Then there arose a great wailing, and a great trembling panic throughout the land. And from all directions the people who dwelt upon the seacoast and upou the banks of the rivers iled inland, and went to hide themselves in the innermost parts of the forests. And in the monasteries also there was great wailing and tribulation, especially in those that had made no provision for defence. And at the monastery of

Having got himself a wickerwork oracle, he embarked in it, therefore, alone. And having rowed himself across the space of sea which lies between the island and the shore, he reached its foot, and tied his coracle to the rocks, and began to climb. And the abbot Ferdomnach and all the brethren of the monastery assembled apon the seashore opposite, and they all trembled exceedingly, and prayed aloud, expecting to see him torn in pieces by the devils, or else of a surety o fall into the water, the sides of the island being so straight and precipitous that it seemed scarce possible for any man to scale them. Nevertheless St. Fechin reached the top safely, being aided as some maintain by two strong angels, who supported him on either Cluain-Duach in Corca Basciuu, the hand, while others declare that a great cord was let down to him from on high. And next day he returned to fetch away his books and his hammering tools, yet, because of his oath, he would not set foot in the monastery, but bade one of the monks bring them to him where he stood.

abbot Ferdomnach became like a man distraught, so filled was he with terror, by reason of the monastery standing close to the edge of the seashore, and the heathen being at that time so near, scarce half a day's sail distant, and sure therefore to come and ravage it, so soon as they had done ravaging and

destroying the monasteries of Ciarraige | great and so furious for a seaso

Luacra. And being utterly given over to fear, and to a craven love of life, he fled away secretly from the monastery by night, with two other monks, all three of them slipping off their sacred robes, and disguising themselves in lay ones, so that they might, as they hoped, the more readily escape.

Then, finding themselves left without any head or guidance, a great panic seized upon the other monks, and they likewise fled, carrying with them all that they could lay hold of, both of food and goods. Nevertheless a few of those that were left took shame to themselves thus to fly before the heathen, telling one another that it were better to suffer death than to live in like dishonor. And these put out in cots and whatsoever boats they could find, and betook themselves to St. Fechin upon his island. And having come to the foot of it they cried aloud to him, saying that they had come to stay with him to the end, and that they were ready to obey his commands, and to endure even Red martyrdom, so only it might redound to the glory of God and to the better ransom of their immortal souls.

And then was made manifest the re
son of that great voice of his, whic
was greater than the voice of any oth
man before or since in Erinn. F
such was the power of it that he cou
be heard by those that stood upon 11
shore, and that, too, despite of the rol
ing of the waves, and the grinding d
the rocks, and the loud cries of the se:
birds. And daily the number of thos
that came to listen to him increasec
for he filled their souls with awe, an
with confidence, and with a powe
above death, so that, forgetting for the
moment their fears, they seemed onl
to dread one thing- namely, to lose
single word of those that the saint
uttered. For he spake as one whe
stands upon his own grave, to whon
all things are known, and all secrets
revealed; for whom life and death are
as one, and everything is made cleat
and manifest. And he spake to then
of Heaven and of Hell, and of the
great Judgment to come, and of the
certain joys reserved for the Faithful
and the sure destruction, misery, ance
damnation of the Wicked.
And of
Erinn herself, moreover, he spoke, and
he prophesied many things, saying
that she must be persecuted, and must
be tormented many years, both at the

Then, having understood what they purposed and what they had come to do, St. Fechin let down a cord to them | hands of the heathen Gall and at the from the top of the island; and when they had reached him he fell upon their necks, and embraced them tenderly, and blessed them. And other monks also, who had at first fled, repented and came in like manner, till there were as many as the island could contain.

Then, while the heathen still tarried, certain of the men of the coast that had not been able to fly, especially of the very poor and the very starving, who cared not greatly, perchance, for their lives, gathered themselves together in a little band upon the seashore. And perceiving them there, St. Fechin spoke to them, telling them, and proclaiming aloud, that God was stronger even than the heathen, and would in the end surely overcome them, although the tribulation was so

hands of other strangers; and that her strength would never lie in her great wealth, nor yet in the abundance of her treasures, for that these things would never be hers in any great degree. Neither would she be a great or a powerful nation, as some other nations were, but would know defeat, and shame, and sorrow, so that her sons would oftentimes have to hang their heads in humiliation because of her. Nevertheless would a golden seed, he said, remain in her, and would swell and increase continually, so that by reason of those very tribulations, and of the evil things that would befall her, and of the many tears that she would have to shed, and of all the blood with which her fields would be bedewed for these very reasons, and because of the pity of her great beauty

sacrifice is made before God. And
further than this no man knoweth,
only God himself, who knoweth all
things; from whom no secrets are hid,
with whom is all power, might, maj-
esty, and dominion forever and ever.
Here endeth the life of St. Fechin of
Corca Bascinn.
EMILY LAWLESS.

which was to be so wasted and marred | great and a burning flame, such a flame by trouble and evil usage - her sons as may be seen upon an altar when a and her daughters would love her and would cherish her, as no other land in all the wide earth had ever been loved or been cherished. And that they would gather out of all lands, north and south, and east and west, men and women of diverse race, and of diverse creeds, and of diverse ways of thought. And this one thing alone, he said, Would unite them all. uamely, the love of that poor country of theirs, who was the nurse, and the mother, and the dear heart's beloved of them all.

TYROL.

From Temple Bar.

And many other things declared he, AMONG THE SNOW-MOUNTAINS OF THE and prophesied he, whereof I, who write down these words, have no strength to tell; nor did he ever cease until a day came when as he was still speaking to the people gathered together on the shore to hear him, lo! the black galleys of the heathen were seen advancing high above the water, and coming towards them, laden with all the spoil which they had collected in Ciarraige Luacra.

Then at that sight a great cry arose from those that stood upon the seashore, and, their courage once more failing them, they ran, and went to hide themselves in the woods and inland places, and St. Fechin and his little band of monks remained alone to see the end.

To the English tourist the by-ways of the Austrian Tyrol are as little known as its snow-mountains to the English climber. Whatever the cause, one may journey for a month amidst the peaks and valleys of the Ortler and Oetzthaler Alps, and never hear one's mother-tongue. Many, it is true, visit Méran, but only in the late autumn, and to reanimate their digestions with the grape-cure; others spend a week at Cortina; some rare mountaineers attack the Dolomites; and an occasional few pass a night at Innsbruck ou their way to the Engadine. But there the English invasion of the Tyrol ends; the rest of the country is hauded over as a playground to the German. Consequently, some account of an August expedition into these neglected parts may prove of interest to English readers. Our party, which consisted of three, as all well regulated parties should-two to quarrel and one to keep the peace was organized, in the main, for mountaineering purposes; but the weather was unpropitious at times, and so we travelled among the cedars and the pines as much as over the snowfields above them.

Of that end, and of what there befell, no mortal can tell, for none were there to see it, only the angels of God. Nevertheless one who stood afar off declared that he beheld the black ships of the heathen gathered about the island of St. Fechin, even as wolves in a forest gather about some prey that they have marked out to devour. And for a time it seemed that they were unable to ascend it, both because of the steepness of its sides, and because of the great rain of stones and rocks Our first destination was Gepatch, which the saint and his companions which lies on the north side of the ceased not to fling down continually Oetzthaler Alps and forms the most upon their accursed heads. Neverthe- convenient spot for exploring them. less in the end they succeeded in doing We travelled along the Vor-Arlberg so, being doubtless aided by Satan and Railway to Landeck, posted from there his hosts. And thereupon there went to Prutz, and then walked up the up from the whole top of that island a' twenty-four miles of the Kaunser Thal.

268

It was early August, and the valley | constructs admirable paths over the was carpeted with bilberries and Al- lower slopes, builds elaborate huts or pine flowers, the blue aconite and a glaciers and rocks, stretches wire ropes pale pink caruation, unknown to any along narrow ridges, and, as it were, ir of us, prevailing amongst the latter. spite of himself, works his way to the Wild strawberries, each one compress- tops of the peaks. That he signals his ing in its tiny shape the sweetness and return by making incredibly long color of a half-dozen of our home- speeches at the top of his voice is a grown, fringed the path; while on regrettable fact. But, after all, he each side the rocks rose steeply, broken atones for his noise by the sincerity of now and again by a cluster of trees or his enthusiasm. the channel of a waterfall, which here poured down in a solid cascade, there leaped into the air sideways, with a circular motion, like the opening of a fan.

Far above us, at the head of the valley, we could see the Gepatch glacier sparkling in the sun, and just beneath it, on a bluff of cedars, Gepatch itself, its pine roof showing red against the dark green of the trees.

The building, which goes by this name, needs the German language to define it. However, the language has risen to the occasion and describes it aptly, though with its usual preference of literal truth to grace of speech, in three words, as "a behotelled hut." The distinctive feature of a hotel in the Tyrol is the possession of bedrooms, and this quality Gepatch can claim. In other respects, as the definition suggests, the hut preponderates. We were received into a long, uncarpeted room, thick with a fog of Austrian tobacco. Down its entire length stretched a bare, pine-wood table; on cach side of this were kitchen chairs closely ranged, and as most of them were occupied by Germans, all heatedly arguing, shouting, and gesticulating at the same time, the scene seemed to us like the burlesque of a board-meeting. However, they were only discussing their "records."

Meanwhile, our landlord in his shirtsleeves, and with a "" Virginian between his teeth, served up our dinner. and we went to bed. The next morning we started early for the glacier. kept for some distance along its left bank, and then turned up at right angles towards the Hinter Oelgruben Spitze. A wearisome ascent over grass and snow brought us to the foot of a sharply defined arrête, which ran down eastwards from the mountain summit, and which, as far as we could gather from subsequent investigation, had not been previously climbed. Here we put on the rope and proceeded along the ridge. On the north side, the cliff fell in a sheer precipice of several hundreds of feet; on the south it sloped steeply in a succession of smooth slabs. The thin edge, besides, which we were traversing was insecure through the looseness of the rock; it broke and crumbled beneath the foot, and, where sound, was covered with a gritty débris like gravel; so that, altogether, considerable caution was necessary. About three hundred feet below the summit the line of our arrête was interrupted by a deep gap, and on the further side of this a gend'arme, or upstanding rock, curiously similar to Scafell Pinnacle in appearance, promised effectively to bar our way. Closer examination from its actual base, however, revealed a gully which could be climbed, and from its

The love of the German for the Alps is perhaps the most remarkable in-top the path was easy. stance that can be found of the peculiar The expedition was mainly underfascination which mountains exert. taken in order to reconnoitre the He is for some reason essentially a bad Weisssee Spitze, which is invisible climber. The mountaineering instinct may perhaps be occasionally acquired by him after long experience; but he is never born to it. None the less, he

from the valley. This mountain is usually ascended either from the east across the Weisssee, a snowfield which rises in a gentle slope for some monot

of one member of the party was, moreover, accentuated by the solid weight of a camera. This, by the way, was the camera's first and last mountain ascent, though the rest of us, who had not the carrying of it, loudly deplored its abandonment. For, indeed, it had its uses; when one was tired and needed a rest, one could stop to condole with its owner, or to readjust it more firmly on his back. The last device, however, through frequent repetition, aroused bad blood in the end, and was reluctantly discontinued. The sky was already paling in the northeast when we stopped, and each moment the outlines of the hills were growing sharper and blacker against it.

onous miles, or from the Weiss Joch on the south-west. Both ways are singularly uninteresting. To the north, however, it presents a steep face of ice and snow, varied with hanging glaciers and wall-like seracs. This side we now had full in view, and we scanned it eagerly in the hope of discovering a practicable way to the top. The ice which, with the sun full on it, wore a rich, smooth look as of white relvet, overhung the lower inclines, but on the west corner of this face we could see a long slope which, commencing about a third of the height up, seemed to lead directly to the summit. It was traversed by three bergschrunds, or chasms, at different elevations, but we trusted to find snow-bridges over A colorless light, bringing to mind these, and had little doubt that if we could once reach the bottom of this slope, we should be able to make a new route across the mountain. At any rate we determined to essay the attempt. Consequently we devoted the next day to preparations, that is to say, we lay on the grass under a cedar, with a copious supply of tobacco and three volumes of Tauchnitz. Late in the afternoon, however, we collected our energies and going down to the tongue of the Gepatch glacier, selected the point at which it would be most advisable to

cross.

Stevenson's description of "clean, essential daylight," began to pour over the gaps of the mountains. Opposite to us the planet Venus was drowning slowly in the increasing flood, and in a few minutes we saw the highest snowtops flush to a pale pink across the valley. The sight warned us to be moving, and by half past five we had gained the foot of the Weisssee glacier. There we halted for breakfast. Afterwards we proceeded up the lateral moraine, avoiding the first ice-fall, took to the glacier above it, found an easy path through the middle of the second, and finally set foot upon the actual snowslope of our mountain shortly after seven.

From here to the inn the way stretched over a plain of boulders and stones, and knowing how easy it would be for us to miss our direction in the dark, we marked out a path across this For some distance there was no need first mile by building a succession of to cut steps, and we were the more airns. To a party which dispenses gratified by this in that our way was with guides, this precaution is prac- here overhung by the fringe of the tically necessary, as the hours which One can least afford to waste are those preceding sunrise.

We left Gepatch at two o'clock on the following morning, and with the aid of a lantern, traversed the glacier and mounted by a rough path on to the grass slopes of the Kumgampfen Thal. Here we sat down to wait for the morning and recover our tempers. For few of the minor annoyances of life are so thoroughly and completely irritating as those consequent upon stumbling up a hillside in the dark. The indignation

hanging glacier. Masses of ice bulged out of the incline above us, and, worst sign of all, blocks which had broken away from it lay scattered about the snow over which we passed. We were unable to change our direction on account of a bergschrund which lay ahead, and which, widening out towards both of its ends, only afforded a passage in the direct line of our ascent. Once, however, that had been crossed, we bore off hurriedly to the right, and passing under some huge seracs which stood one behind the other like ruined