The Monk with the Ox and the Lion

“Well then, when I went into the nearest parts of the desert, about twelve miles from the Nile, with one of the brothers who knew the area well as my guide, we came to the home of an old monk who lived at the foot of a mountain. There was a well there, which is a very rare thing in those regions. The monk had one ox, whose whole work was drawing water by moving a machine worked with a wheel. This was the only way to get at the water, for the well was said to be a thousand feet deep or more. There was also a garden there, full of all kinds of vegetables. This too was the opposite of what one would expect in the desert, where everything is dry and scorched by the fierce rays of the sun and does not produce even the thinnest root of any plant. But the labor the monk shared with his ox, together with his own hard work, brought about this happy state of things for the holy man: his frequent watering made the sand so fertile that we saw the vegetables in his garden thriving and ripening in a wonderful way. On these, then, the ox lived as well as its master, and from this abundance the holy man gave us a dinner too. There I saw what you Gauls may perhaps not believe: a pot boiling without fire, with the vegetables that were being made ready for our dinner. Such is the power of the sun in that place that it is enough for any cooks, even for preparing the delicacies of the Gauls.

“Then after dinner, as evening was coming on, our host invited us to a palm tree about two miles away, whose fruit he used to eat. For that is the only kind of tree found in the desert, and even these are rare, though they do occur. I am not sure whether this is owing to the wise foresight of earlier ages, or whether the soil produces them naturally. It may indeed be that God, knowing beforehand that the desert would one day be inhabited by the saints, prepared these things for his servants. For those who settle in these solitudes live for the most part on the fruit of such trees, since no other kinds of plants thrive in those parts.

“Well, when we came up to the tree to which our host’s kindness had led us, we met a lion there. At the sight of it my guide and I both began to tremble; but the holy man went straight up to it, and we followed him, though in great terror. As if commanded by God, the beast quietly drew back and stood gazing at us, while our friend the monk picked some of the fruit hanging within easy reach on the lower branches. And when he held out his hand full of dates, the great beast ran up to him and took them as readily as any tame animal could have done; and when it had eaten them, it went away. As we watched these things, still shaking with fear, we could not help seeing how great the power of faith was in him, and how weak it was in ourselves.