Less scientific—or perhaps we had better say less prosaic—than the writings we have just been discussing but fully as replete with understanding of the ocean and its various moods, is the legend of the wanderings of St. Brandan. The style and spirit of this entire story shows that it must have been composed by men filled with a sense of the immensity and mystery of the Atlantic.[892] Probably the tale had its roots in the reports of actual voyagings of Irishmen blown far out to sea. Although there is much of the marvelous and supernatural borrowed from older tradition, the tone of the legend as a whole rings true to nature. Certainly it was not written by a landsman. At one time St. Brandan and his companions sailed north for three days, and the sea became “as it were coagulated through an excess of calmness.”[893] It has been suggested that this refers to the semi-solid “Liver Sea” of Germanic legend, itself perhaps an echo of the reports of Pytheas and other classical writers about clotted sea waters north of Thule and in the Western Ocean.[894] On another occasion the travelers came in sight of a high column of clearest crystal apparently not far away, though it took three days to reach it.[895] So great was its height that they could scarce discern the summit, and as they drew near they saw that it was covered by a silvery canopy of marvelously fine texture. They passed through a hole in the canopy and entered a sea whose waters were so clear that the base of the column could be seen resting on the earth at the bottom of the sea. For an entire day they sailed along one side of the column. If we discard from all this what is obviously fabulous or borrowed from the vision of Ezekiel[896] or from the description of the New Jerusalem in Revelation,[897] may we not be justified in supposing that the sight of a great iceberg flashing in the sun gave rise to the story of the crystalline column and that the canopy represented curtains of fog hanging about its flanks? St. Brandan and his crew also had other glimpses of the bottom of the sea[898] through waters of such remarkable transparency that they thought they could almost touch the beasts of various kinds lying there. When mass was said on board, these beasts rose and circled about the ship but did not molest the saint and his party. After seven days’ voyage with sails set they had scarcely crossed this stretch of translucent water. BOTTOM OF THE SEA