44. Il Piccolo della Sera,   September 5, 1912


The Mirage of the Fisherman of Aran

ENGLAND'S SAFETY VALVE IN CASE OF WAR.

                                  Galway, 2 September
  The little ship carrying a small load of travellers moves away
from the quay under the watchful eyes of the Scottish agent
absorbed in a private fantasy of calculation. It leaves the
little port of Galway and enters open water, leaving behind on
its right the village of Claddagh, a cluster of huts outside the
walls of the city. A cluster of huts, and yet a kingdom. Up until
a few years ago the village elected its own king, had its own
mode of dress, passed its own laws, and lived to itself. The
wedding rings of the inhabitants are still decorated with the
king's crest: two joined hands supporting a crowned heart.
  We set out for Aranmor, the holy island that sleeps like a
great shark on the grey waters of the Atlantic Ocean, which the
islanders call the Old Sea. Beneath the waters of this bay and
along its coast lie the wrecks of a squadron of the unfortunate
Spanish Armada. After their defeat in the English Channel, the
ships set sail for the North, where the storms and the waves
scattered them. The citizens of Galway, remembering the long
friendship between Spain and Ireland, hid the fugitives from the
vengeance of the English garrison and gave the shipwrecked a
decent burial, wrapping their bodies in white linen cloth.
  The waters have repented. Every year on the day before the
Feast of the Assumption, when the herring fishing begins, the
waters of the bay are blessed. A flotilla of fishing boats
departs from Claddagh preceded by a flagship, on whose deck
stands a Dominican friar. When they reach an appropriate place
the flotilla stops, the fishermen kneel down and uncover
themselves, and the friar, muttering prayers of exorcism, shakes
his aspergill on the sea, and divides the dark air in the form of
a cross.
  A border of white sand on the right indicates the place where
the new transatlantic port is, perhaps, destined to rise. My
companion spreads out a large map on which the projected lines
curve, ramify, and cross each other from Galway to the great
Canadian ports. The voyage from Europe to America will take less
than three days, according to the figures. From Galway, the last
port in Europe, to Saint John, Newfoundland, a steamship will
take two days and sixteen hours, and from Galway to Halifax, the
first port in Canada, three days and ten hours. The text of the
booklet attached to the map bristles with figures, estimates of
cost, and oceanographic pictures. The writer makes a warm appeal
to the British admiralty, to the railway societies, to the
Chambers of Commerce, to the Irish population. The new port would
be a safety valve for England in case of war. From Canada, the
granary and warehouse of the United Kingdom, great cargos of
grain would enter the Irish port, thus avoiding the dangers of
navigation in Saint George's Channel and the enemy fleets. In
time of peace, the new line would be the shortest way between one
continent and the other. A large part of the goods and passengers
which are now landed at Liverpool would in the future land at
Galway, proceeding directly to London, via Dublin and Holyhead.
The old decadent city would rise again. From the new world,
wealth and vital energy would run through this new artery of an
Ireland drained of blood. Again, after about ten centuries, the
mirage which blinded the poor fisherman of Aran, follower and
emulator of St. Brendan, appears in the distance, vague and
tremulous on the mirror of the ocean.
  Christopher Columbus, as everyone knows, is honoured by
posterity because he was the last to discover America. A thousand
years before the Genoese navigator was derided at Salamanca,
Saint Brendan weighed anchor for the unknown world from the bare
shore which our ship is approaching; and, after crossing the
ocean, landed on the coast of Florida. The island at that time
was wooded and fertile. At the edge of the woods he found the
hermitage of Irish monks which had been established in the fourth
century after Christ by Enda, a saint of royal blood. From this
hermitage came Finnian, later Bishop of Lucca. Here lived and
dreamed the visionary Saint Fursa, described in the hagiographic
calendar of Ireland as the precursor of Dante Alighieri. A
medieval copy of the Visions of Fursa depicts the voyage of the
saint from hell to heaven, from the gloomy valley of the four
fires among the bands of devils up through the universe to the
divine light reflected from innumerable angels' wings. This
vision would have served as a model for the poet of the Divine
Comedy, who, like Columbus, is honoured by posterity because he
was the last to visit and describe the three regions of the soul.

               *       *       *        *

  On the shore of the bay fragile little boats of stretched
canvas are drawn up to dry. Four islanders come nimbly down to
the sea over rocks covered with purple and rust-coloured seaweed,
like that seen in the shops of herb-sellers in Galway. The
fisherman of Aran has sure feet. He wears a rough sandal of
untanned cowhide, without heels, open at the arch, and tied with
rawhide laces.l He dresses in wool as thick as felt and wears a
big black hat with a wide brim.
  We stop in one of the steep little streets, uncertain. An
islander, who speaks an English all his own, says good morning,
adding that it has been a horrible summer, praise be to God. The
phrase, which at first seems one of the usual Irish blunders,
rather comes from the innermost depths of human resignation. The
man who said it bears a princely name, that of the O'Flaherties,
a name which the young Oscar Wilde proudly had printed on the
title page of his first book. But time and the wind have razed to
the ground the bygone civilization to which he belongs--the
sacred druids of his island, the territory ruled by his
ancestors, the language, and perhaps even the name, of that
hermit of Aran who was called the dove of the church. Around the
stunted shrubs which grow on the hills of the island his
imagination has woven legends and tales which reveal the depths
of his psyche. And under his apparent simplicity he retains a
slight trace of scepticism, and of humour. He looks away when he
has spoken and lets the eager enthusiast jot down in his notebook
the astounding fact that yonder hawthorn tree was the little tree
from which Joseph of Arimathea cut his walking stick.
  An old lady comes toward us and invites us to enter her house.
She places on the table an enormous tea pot, a small loaf of
bread, and some salted butter. The islander, who is her son, sits
near the fireplace and answers the questions of my companion in
an embarrassed and humble manner. He doesn't know how old he is,
but he says that he will soon be old. He doesn't know why he
hasn't taken a wife, perhaps because there are no women for him.
My companion goes on to ask why there are no women for him, and
the islander, removing his hat from his head, sinks his face in
the soft wool, confused and smiling. Aran, it is said, is the
strangest place in the world. A poor place, but no matter how
poor it is, when my companion tries to pay, the old lady rejects
the money almost angrily and asks us if we are trying to
dishonour her house.

                 *       *        *        *

  A fine and steady drizzle falls from the grey clouds. The rainy
mist comes in from the West, while the little ship calls
desperately for the laggards. The island disappears little by
little, wrapped in a smoky veil. Three Danish sailors sitting
stationary on the ridge of the slope also disappear. They were
out in the ocean for the summer fishing and made a stop at Aran.
Silent and melancholy, they seem to be thinking of the Danish
hordes who burned the city of Galway in the eighth century, of
the Irish lands which are included in the dowries of the girls of
Denmark, according to legend, and which they dream of
reconquering. On the islands and on the sea falls the rain. It
rains as it can rain only in Ireland. Under the forecastle, where
a girl is noisily making love to one of the crew, holding him on
her knees, we again open the map. In the twilight the names of
the ports cannot be distinguished, but the line that leaves
Galway and ramifies and spreads out recalls the motto placed near
the crest of his native city by a mystic and perhaps even
prophetic head of a monastery:

       Quasi lilium germinans germinabit,
       et quasi terebinthus extendans ramos suos.