A MOUNTAIN MONASTERY

New Zealand Tablet, 29 August 1912, Page 11

A MOUNTAIN MONASTERY

VISIT TO THE GREAT ST. BERNARD On a Sunday morning of August of last year I found myself on the crest of a mountain range in the Middle Alps, 8120 feet above sea level (said the Very Rev. Canon Sheehy in the course of a lecture, as reported in the Glasgow Observer). In those high regions nature is dumb and terrifying. No sweet songster of the air was to be heard pouring forth its soul in melting melody. There was no vegetation, not a tree, nor a flower, not a blade of grass. All around me was wild, grim, sullen, desolate. Look where I would, jagged peaks or snow-capped mountains pierced or touched b the clouds which hung like a canopy over and about me. I felt some little difficulty in breathing, for the air in these altitudes is rarefied, and caused me —as it did others—headache. The open season on the Great St. Bernard so this mountain range has been named is short. It lasts from the close of June till about the middle of September. During the other nine months of the year these heights are the home of mist and fog, wind and cloud., hail and snow, storm and flood, blizzard and avalanche. To pass up their dangerous defiles in the wintry season is to carry one’s life in his hands.

Only the daring Alpine climber or poor pedlar forced out to sell his wares will face the danger. For the howling tempests, so common during these months .

Bender the Savage Wilderness v more wild, and the awful roar of the falling avalanche strikes terror into the bravest. The little shelters, scooped out of the hard rock, which I passed at intervals, are ominously suggestive. Falling boulders, tieacheious avalanches, hidden abysses kill more surely than the dagger of the assassin. During' the short summer months, however, this narrow mountain pass is over-run with tourists and pilgrims, who toil - their laborious way on foot, or are borne up the steep incline on the Italian side in motors, and on the Swiss side in four-wheelers. Singularly to state, the Swiss authorities permit no motors to ply between Orsieres (the railway terminus) and the various little mountain villages that here and there dot the wayside, unless a horse trots in front to prevent excessive speed. The path up to Mount St. Bernard is steep and winding. It took me ten hours in an open machine under a broiling sun to reach my goal. Tired and powdered with the dust of travel, -I found an immense crowd waiting in the Monastery corridors, whilst the guest-master; with • a sweet courtesy was endeavoring to find room for all. The Hospice stands on a little plateau or plain, almost on the ridge of the mountain. Hard by is the morgue or mortuary chamber, where lie the dead victims of the mountain pass awaiting identification, or buriaLr Ghastly picture postcards, to be had in the Monastery® showing groups of victims, are pathetic proof of. tin* need .of the Hospice, and the dangers of the pass,: Within recent years a statue of bronze has been raised opposite the Monastery to St. Bernard of Menthon,

Apostle of the Snow.

He it is who has given his name to the two well-known Alpine passes Great St. Bernard and the Little St. Bernard. For he it was who, a thousand years ago, conceived and realised the two famous Hospices which, crown their " summits—oases of charity in a desert of desolation. Bernard of Menthon—(not to be confounded with St. Bernard of Clairvaux) —scion of a noble house and Archdeacon of Aosta, in the year. 960, on the top of the Great St. Bernard, ’mid the horrors of the blizzard, the avalanche, and the piercing cold of an Arctic climate, founded a Hospice, and encamped a band of Christian heroes, whose chief aim in life was to play the part of.the good Samaritan. From that date till now these brave religions have never ceased to mount guard on this citadel of charity, to swoop down from their snowy ■ home, like eagles from an eyrie, despising danger in order to rescue some hapless victim of the storm or precipice, and nurse him back to life and health. r

A plain building, solid, not sumptuous,' bare even to ruggedness, is their Monastery. .Itis no hymn or poem set in stone. - There are no clustered columns, no gracefully shaped arches, no elegant mouldings,’ no architectural pretensions, no luxurious surroundings. Yet, simple and plain though it is, it held a charm for me such as the noblest piles elsewhere fail to reveal. Dr. Johnson on one occasion whilst in Scotian said to Boswell: ‘I never read of a hermit but in imagination 1 kiss his feet; never of a monastery, but I could fall on my knees and kiss the pavement.’ And ?urely few can enter the St. Bernard Hospice without a thrill of emotion. Few there must be who v-oull refuse to take off their hats and salute the devoted monks who, just for sweet charity’s sake, have made their home for close on a thousand years in almost perpetual snow, have borne unflinchingly the rigors of

A Long and Arctic Winter, v have cut themselves adrift from the ordinary pleasures and comforts of the world, have risked their lives, shortened their days, spent themselves and used their means in sheltering pilgrims and strangers by the tens of thousands. These monks don’t write themselves up. They are innocent of the modern mania for self-adver-tisement. Their motto would seem to be taken from 'he Imitation Love to be unknown and to be accounted as nothing—a rule of life strangely out of date in our

day. So when I asked for any records they might possess of their adventures and rescues they had none to offer. They had kept no such accounts. These they left to the recording angel to be emblazoned on the walls of Heaven.

• Ever since the days of the old Romans, down to 1870, when science tunnelled a passage of seven and a half miles through the hard, rocky sides of Mont Cenis, the pass of the Great St. Bernard served as the highway from France and Switzerland to Italy. Up its rugged, zig-zag ascent toiled the Roman legions'on their way to conquer the world. Over it swept hordes of barbarians to harry Italy. And in 1800 Napoleon crossed it with his army to reach Marengo.. In the early ages, after the conversion of the Roman Empire to Christianity, a steady stream of pilgrims en route to pray at the shrines of the martyrs, and to offer their homage to the Pope, began immediately to flow over it. In time a Hospice for the accommodation of .these pilgrims was erected on the ruins of an old Jupiter’s temple. Towards its maintenance Scotland, like many other nations, sent generous contributions. For Rome and Scotland were closely linked in those days, and many a Scottish pilgrim braved the dangers of a long and arduous journey to profess, in person, his loyalty to

The Common Father of Christendom.

For hundreds of years this Hospice remained. But in the early middle ages the clash of arms was heard all over Europe.' Those were the days of excursions and alarums, of wars and rumors of wars. Soon the North of Italy became ‘the cock-pit of Europe.’ The pass of the Great St. Bernard, and the Hospice on the Mount —then regarded as the key to the gates of Italy —fell into ..the hands of the Saracens, a motley crowd of desperadoes, brigands, cut-throats, and apostates, who attacked, robbed, and murdered almost everyone who ventured within their reach. On one occasion nine pilgrims appeared in Aosta. Their plight was pitiable. They had been stripped of everything, and had left behind one of their number, probably murdered.. The Archdeacon .of Bernard de Menthon—heard their sad tale. His pity soon expressed itself in action. Gathering round him a body of stout-hearted men, he boldly climbed the mountain top, swept the miscreants before him, overturned the statue of Jupiter which they had re-erected, and purified those heights for ever from the presence of these bloodthirsty savages.- It was a mighty deedmarvellously, if not miraculously, done. A mightier soon followed. The mountain tracks, partly through neglect, partly through the destructive action of the elements, and partly through the diabolical designs of the Saracens, had become practically impassable. Bernard set himself to relay them. Excelsior! He determined to consecrate to religion and charity the summits of the two passes, which still proudly bear his name, the Great and the Little St. Bernard. He remembered the words; ‘Praise the Lord . . . hail, snow, ice, stormy ,winds which fulfil His word. Mountains and all hills praise the name of the Lord.’ So with indomitable energy, and with a perseverance rooted only in his faith and trust in God, he began the great work of his lifethe erection, 8000 feet above the level of the sea, of an altar to God before which His praises were to be sung night and day, and the opening of the Hospice, where the poor traveller, fleeing before the storm, might be housed and fed gratuitously.

■ When one reflects on the difficulty of building at such a height, when it is remembered that all’the materials need to be taken up from the valleys down below, that the means of transport in those days were slow and cumbersome when compared with those of our day, and that the season for outdoor work is less than three months in the year, and that of these three months half is spoiled for building operations by sudden snowstorms or a downpour of rain, Bernard’s project might well appear a chimera. Yet he made it a reality. He did more. It was not enough to pull down the nest of inhuman vampires who had so long lived, on pillage and murder. He would plant up on those heights a nest of doves, tender as mothers, brave as soldiers, fearless of dangers, apostles of the snow. He ascended

the mountain followed by an intrepid band of heroes — some laymen, some young priests. They all lived in common. Rules were framed for them. Tradition has carefully preserved one. It is that the Superior, should there be no more than three pilgrims, must wash the feet of each. ' .

Theirs was a Life of Prayer and Privation, . of apostolic zeal ,in visiting the hamlets scattered throughout the valleys beneath, of boundless charity in hospitality entertaining the traveller who came to their door, of Christ-like love of humanity in seeking for the lost in the snow and the precipice. Such was the Glorious Work Bernard and his followers inaugurated. It has survived the stress and,. storm of a thousand years. Amid the changes and revolutions of that long period ho sacrilegious hand was stretched forth to undo it, no word uttered to depreciate it. No breath of calumny has ever dimmed the fair name of Bernard’s children, no one has ever asked for their expulsion, for all recognise their unselfishness, and no one has ever envied their hard lot or ambitioned their snowy home.. Never during those thousand years has there been a break in that long line of heroes who, for poor humanity’s sake, have bade farewell to friend and home, and have gone up that terrible mountain to live their lives on these melancholic and awe-inspiring heights in dense fog, pitiless rain, piercing cold, and a sea of snow. There are,about a dozen monks in the Hospice on the Great St. Bernard. Probably there is the same number in that on the Little St. Bernard. . All are comparatively young. For the intense cold and awful surroundings soon wreck even the strongest constitutions. So after a few years, with broken health and ailments they never can shake off, the monks feel obliged to change their mountain home for the valley, and yield their place to others younger and stronger. - Each morning during the long winter season a small party of .monks and dogs start from the Hospice for the shelter at the foot of the mountainon the Italian side, whilst a similar party descends to the shelter at the Swiss, end of the pass. Should any hapless victim of the avalanche or precipice or falling boulder be found, he is borne gently up to the monastery, whilst the dogs precede to show the way. A special breed is the St. Bernard dog. Heavy and powerful though he be, he often succumbs to the extreme rigour of the winter. Short coated, in order not to be hampered in the snow, his keen scent makes him a trusty guide for the monks. These sagacious animals have saved many lives. One I saw had saved eight, another was pointed out that had rescued twenty.

‘ At break of day, as heaven-ward A voice cried through the startled air The pious monks of St. Bernard - Uttered the oft-repeated prayer, ; Excelsior ! .- A traveller by the faithful hound, Half-buried in the snow was found.’ The door of the Hospice stands ever open. All are welcome. No questions are asked. Man or woman, Jew or Gentile, faithful or sceptic, Catholic or Protestant— All Are Kindly Received, All Are Treated Alike. You are not asked your name, your country, your creed. People go there from the ends of the earth. I told the Father Superior I came from Scotland. We have had visitors from Scotland, but not many,’ his answer. The day I arrived over one hundred guests sat down to dinner—amongst them a young Italian couple on their honeymoon. Your room is scantily furnished, but clean ; your food plain but plentiful. An open door, a free table, a room and bed £hat cost you nothing, are bound to attract. So the Monastery on the Great St. Bernard is a popular summer resort. Over twenty thousand visit it in the course of the year. Of these only about two thousand make an offering. The alms they give is on the average less than they would pay in a second-class hotel. The cost of erecting a public. Hospice 8120 feet up in the air, of furnishing it, of stocking it with a,

sufficiency of provisions from the valleys beneath, and of hiring servants for the special convenience of these 'summer visitors is a matter that does not in the smallest way effect or interest them. It is beneath their notice. So each year the monks not only sacrifice their health and their time, but their money, for sweet humanity’s sake, A small box hung up in the corridor and labelled alms is the only ‘' Reminder of One’s Financial Obligation to the Hospice. What is given is given in secret. But, as I have already stated, the offerings are small, while the expenses run from 50,000 to 60,000 francs—to £2500) —each year. Some time ago the monks, for the better accommodation of the visitors, added one storey to their plain and simple Hospice. It cost over £3OOO. Monastic hospitality ever was, and is yet, proverbial, Our own country was once studded with monasteries, where the poor were welcomed and their wants relieved. The monks’ lands, like Naboth’s vineyard, were, however, coveted by greedy, avaricious eyes. Soon they were seized, the inmates driven out with blackened characters, and the public hoodwinked into believing that a great work of God had been accomplished in the suppression of these monastic institutions. The whirligig of time brings great changes. People are now awakening to the good done by these old religious houses. We have now the Chancellor of the Exchequer taking the girdle of the monks to scourge the descendants of the men who despoiled them, telling them their * family trees are laden with the fruit of sacrilege,’ their ‘hands are dripping with the fat of stolen monastic property, and their sideboards groaning under the weight of plundered Church plate. But no one. thinks of restitution.

I descended Mount St. Bernard without regret. Hospitably entertained and pressed to remain, I nevertheless found life amid such awful surroundings too depressing. My heart, certainly, never could be in these Highlands. But my sympathies flowed out freely to the brave, self-sacrificing monks whom I left behind in those savage heights. Their comforts are few; their hardships countless; their life a constant sacrifice. From afar I salute them. They are the pride and boast of our common humanity, an honor to the Church, a glory to their religious brethren, a friend to the wanderer, an example to all.