TOWARD NONES
In which William has a very erudite conver?sation with Severinus the herbalist.

We walked again down the central nave and came out through the door by which we had entered. I could still hear Ubertino’s words, all of them, buzzing in my head. “That man is ... odd,” I dared say to William.
“He is, or has been, in many ways a great man. But for this very reason he is odd. It is only petty men who seem normal. Ubertino could have become one of the heretics he helped burn, or a cardinal of the holy Roman church. He came very close to both perversions. When I talk with Ubertino I have the impression that hell is heaven seen from the other side.”
I did not grasp his meaning. “From what side?” I asked.
“Ah, true,” William acknowledged the problem. “It is a matter of knowing whether there are sides and wheth?er there is a whole. But pay no attention to me. And stop looking at that doorway,” he said, striking me lightly on the nape as I was turning, attracted by the sculptures I had seen on entering. “They have fright?ened you enough for today. All of them.”
As I turned back to the exit, I saw in front of me another monk. He could have been William’s age. He smiled and greeted us cordially. He said he was Severinus of Sankt Wendel, and he was the brother herbalist, in charge of the balneary, the infirmary, the gardens, and he was ours to command if we would like to learn our way better around the abbey compound.
William thanked him and said he had already remarked, on coming in, the very fine vegetable garden, where it looked to him as if not only edible plants were grown, but also medicinal ones, from what he could tell, given the snow.
“In summer or spring, through the variety of its plants, each then adorned with its flowers, this garden sings better the praises of the Creator,” Severinus said, somewhat apologetically. “But even now, in winter, the herbalist’s eye sees through the dry branches the plants that will come, and he can tell you that this garden is richer than any herbal ever was, and more varicolored, beautiful as the illuminations are in those volumes. Furthermore, good herbs grow also in winter, and I preserve others gathered and ready in the pots in my laboratory. And so with the roots of the wood sorrel I treat catarrhs, and with the decoction of althea roots I make plasters for skin diseases; burrs cicatrize eczemas; by chopping and grinding the snakeroot rhizome I treat diarrheas and certain female complaints; pepper is a fine digestive; coltsfoot eases the cough; and we have good gentian also for the digestion, and I have glycyrrhiza, and juniper for making excellent infusions, and elder bark with which I make a decoction for the liver, soapwort, whose roots are macerated in cold water for catarrh, and valerian, whose properties you surely know.”
“You have widely varied herbs, and suited to differ?ent climates. How do you manage that?”
“On the one hand, I owe it to the mercy of the Lord, who set our high plain between a range that overlooks the sea to the south and receives its warm winds, and the higher mountain to the north whose sylvan balsams we receive. And on the other hand, I owe it to my art, which, unworthily, I learned at the wish of my masters. Certain plants will grow even in an adverse climate if you take care of the terrain around them, and their nourishment, and their growth.”
“But you also have plants that are good only to eat?” I asked.
“Ah, my hungry young colt, there are no plants good for food that are not good for treating the body, too, provided they are taken in the right quantity. Only excess makes them cause illness. Consider the pumpkin. It is cold and damp by nature and slakes thirst, but if you eat it when rotten it gives you diarrhea and you must bind your viscera with a paste of brine and mustard. And onions? Warm and damp, in small quan?tities they enhance coitus (for those who have not taken our vows, naturally), but too many bring on a heaviness of the head, to be combated with milk and vinegar. A good reason,” he added slyly, “why a young monk should always eat them sparingly. Eat garlic instead. Warm and dry, it is good against poisons. But do not use it to excess, for it causes too many humors to be expelled from the brain. Beans, on the contrary, pro?duce urine and are fattening, two very good things. But they induce bad dreams. Far less, however, than certain other herbs. There are some that actually provoke evil visions.”
“Which?” I asked.
“Aha, our novice wants to know too much. These are things that only the herbalist must know; otherwise any thoughtless person could go about distributing visions: in other words, lying with herbs.”
“But you need only a bit of nettle,” William said then, “or roybra or olieribus to be protected against such visions. I hope you have some of these good herbs.” Severinus gave my master a sidelong glance. “You are interested in herbalism?”
“Just a little,” William said modestly, “since I came upon the Theatrum Sanitatis of Ububchasym de Baldach …”
“Abul Asan al-Muchtar ibn-Botlan.”
“Or Ellucasim Elimittar: as you prefer. I wonder whether a copy is to be found here.”
“One of the most beautiful. With many rich illustra?tions.”
“Heaven be praised. And the De virtutibm herbarum of Platearius?”
“That, too. And the De plantis of Aristotle, translated by Alfred of Sareshel.”
“I have heard it said that Aristotle did not really write that work,” William remarked, “just as he was not the author of the De causis, it has been discovered.”
“In any event it is a great book,” Severinus observed, and my master agreed most readily, not asking whether the herbalist was speaking of the De plantis or of the De causu, both works that I did not know but which, from that conversation, I deduced must be very great.
“I shall be happy,” Severinus concluded, “to have some frank conversation with you about herbs.”
“I shall be still happier,” William said, “but would we not be breaking the rule of silence, which I believe obtains in your order?”
“The Rule,” Severinus said, “has been adapted over the centuries to the requirements of the different communities. The Rule prescribed the lectio divina but not study, and yet you know how much our order has developed inquiry into divine and human affairs. Also, the Rule prescribes a common dormitory, but at times it is right that the monks have, as we do here, chances to meditate also during the night, and so each of them is given his own cell. The Rule is very rigid on the question of silence, and here with us, not only the monk who performs manual labor but also those who write or read must not converse with their brothers. But the abbey is first and foremost a community of scholars, and often it is useful for monks to exchange the accumulated treasures of their learning. All conver?sation regarding our studies is considered legitimate and profitable, provided it does not take place in the refectory or during the hours of the holy offices.”
“Had you much occasion to talk with Adelmo of Otranto?” William asked abruptly.
Severinus did not seem surprised. “I see the abbot has already spoken with you,” he said. “No. I did not converse with him often. He spent his time illuminating. I did hear him on occasion talking with other monks, Venantius of Salvemec, or Jorge of Burgos, about the nature of his work. Besides, I don’t spend my day in the scriptorium, but in my laboratory.” And he nodded toward the infirmary building.
“I understand,” William said. “So you don’t know whether Adelmo had visions.”
“Visions?”
“Like the ones your herbs induce, for example.”
Severinus stiffened. “I told you: I store the danger?ous herbs with great care.”
“That is not what I meant,” William hastened to clarify. “I was speaking of visions in general.”
“I don’t understand,” Severinus insisted.
“I was thinking that a monk who wanders at night about the Aedificium, where, by the abbot’s admission ... terrible things can happen … to those who enter during forbidden hours—well, as I say, I was thinking he might have had diabolical visions that drove him to the precipice.”
“I told you: I don’t visit the scriptorium, except when I need a book; but as a rule I have my own herbaria, which I keep in the infirmary. As I said, Adelmo was very close to Jorge, Venantius, and ... naturally, Beren?gar.”
Even I sensed the slight hesitation in Severinus’s voice. Nor did it escape my master. “Berengar? And why ‘naturally’?”
“Berengar of Arundel, the assistant librarian. They were of an age, they had been novices together, it was normal for them to have things to talk about. That is what I meant.”
“Ah, that is what you meant,” William repeated. And to my surprise he did not pursue the matter. In fact, he promptly changed the subject. “But perhaps it is time for us to visit the Aedificium. Will you act as our guide?”
“Gladly,” Severinus said, with all-too-evident relief. He led us along the side of the garden and brought us to the west fa?ade of the Aedificium.
“Facing the garden is the door leading to the kitchen,” he said, “but the kitchen occupies only the western half of the ground floor; in the other half is the refectory. And at the south entrance, which you reach from behind the choir in the church, there are two other doors leading to the kitchen and the refectory. But we can go in here, because from the kitchen we can then go on through to the refectory.”
As I entered the vast kitchen, I realized that the entire height of the Aedificium enclosed an octagonal court; I understood later that this was a kind of huge well, without any access, onto which, at each floor, opened broad windows, like the ones on the exterior. The kitchen was a vast smoke-filled entrance hall, where many servants were already busy preparing the food for supper. On a great table two of them were making a pie of greens, barley, oats, and rye, chopping turnips, cress, radishes, and carrots. Nearby, another cook had just finished poaching some fish in a mixture of wine and water, and was covering them with a sauce of sage, parsley, thyme, garlic, pepper, and salt.
Beneath the west tower an enormous oven opened, for baking bread; it was already flashing with reddish flames. In the south tower there was an immense fireplace, where great pots were boiling and spits were turning. Through the door that opened onto the barn?yard behind the church, the swineherds were entering at that, moment, carrying the meat of the slaughtered pigs. We went out through that same door and found ourselves in the yard, at the far eastern end of the plain, against the walls, where there were many buildings. Severinus explained to me that the first was the series of barns, then there stood the horses’ stables, then those for the oxen, and then chicken coops, and the covered yard for the sheep. Outside the pigpens, swine?herds were stirring a great jarful of the blood of the freshly slaughtered pigs, to keep it from coagulating. If it was stirred properly and promptly, it would remain liquid for the next few days, thanks to the cold climate, and then they would make blood puddings from it.
We re-entered the Aedificium and cast a quick glance at the refectory as we crossed it, heading toward the east tower. Of the two towers between which the refecto?ry extended, the northern one housed a fireplace, the other a circular staircase that led to the scriptorium, on the floor above. By this staircase the monks went up to their work every day, or else they used the other two staircases, less comfortable but well heated, which rose in spirals inside the fireplace here and inside the oven in the kitchen.
William asked whether we would find anyone in the scriptorium, since it was Sunday. Severinus smiled and said that work, for the Benedictine monk, is prayer. On Sunday offices lasted longer, but the monks assigned to work on books still spent some hours up there, usually engaged in fruitful exchanges of learned observations, counsel, reflections on Holy Scripture.