ds. The Scotichronicon contains
long and elaborate details of several of them. When, in 1412, the Earl
of Douglas thrice essayed to sail out to sea, and was thrice driven back
by adverse gales, he at last made a pilgrimage to the holy isle of
Aemonia, presented an offering to Columba, and forthwith the Saint sped
him with fair winds to Flanders and home again.[27] When, towards the
winter of 1421, a boat was sent on a Sunday (die Dominica) to bring off
to the monastery from the mainland some house provisions and barrels of
beer brewed at Bernhill (in barellis cerevisiam apud Bernhill
brasiatam), and the crew, exhilarated with liquor (alacres et potosi),
hoisted, on their return, a sail, and upset the barge, Sir Peter the
Canon,--who, with five others, was thrown into the water,--fervently and
unceasingly invoked the aid of Columba, and the Saint appeared in person
to him, and kept Sir Peter afloat for an hour and a half by the help of
a truss of tow (adminiculo cujusdam stupae), till the boat of Portevin
picked up him and two others.[28] When, in 1385, the crew of an English
vessel (quidam filii Belial) sacrilegiously robbed the island, and tried
to burn the church, St. Columba, in answer to the earnest prayers of
those who, on the neighbouring shore, saw the danger of the sacred
edifice, suddenly shifted round the wind and quenched the flames, while
the chief of the incendiaries was, within a few hours afterwards, struck
with madness, and forty of his comrades drowned.[29] When, in 1335, an
English fleet ravaged the shores of the Forth, and one of their largest
ships was carrying off from Inchcolm an image of Columba[30] and a store
of ecclesiastical plunder, there sprung up such a furious tempest around
the vessel immediately after she set sail, that she drifted helplessly
and hopelessly towards the neighbouring island of Inchkeith, and was
threatened with destruction on the rocks there till the crew implored
pardon of Columba, vowed to him restitution of their spoils, and a
suitable offering of gold and silver, and then they instantly and
unexpectedly were lodged safe in port (et statim in tranquillo portu
insperate ducebantur).[31] When, in 1336, some English pirates robbed
the church at Dollar--which had been some time previously repaired and
richly decorated by an Abbot of Aemonia--and while they were, with their
sacrilegious booty, sailing triumphantly, and with music on board, down
the Forth, under a favouring and