When a man is working on an important and difficult task, it means much to
have a helper tending the fires or grinding the paints, who regards the
work as the most important thing in the world and gives his whole mind to
his occupation. Such a helper may ask as many questions as he likes, and
his master will be glad to give him all the instruction he can possibly
want.

Most of the people of the Abbey, in fact, liked Padraig. He knew so little
that the monks and lay brothers and even the novices knew, and learned so
quickly, and was so ready to put his own knowledge at their disposal, that
it gave them the very comfortable feeling of being superior persons,
whenever he was about. But there was one person who did not like him. This
was Simon, a clerk attached to the house of the Irish prince who had given
the land for the Abbey. Simon was of the opinion that vagabond urchins
from no one knew where were not proper pupils for monastic schools even in
Ireland, which was on the extreme western edge of Christendom. But Brother
Basil paid no attention to Simon's opinion. In fact, it is doubtful
whether he ever knew that Simon had one.

The most serious trouble Brother Basil had in his work was that many of
the materials he needed could not be had in Ireland, nor could the Abbey
afford to send for them except in very small quantities. The monks were
rich compared with most other folk about them. They had food and drink and
warm clothing and well-built houses, and productive land. But as yet they
could not sell much of their produce at a profit which would make them
rich in money. Brother Basil therefore manufactured all the colors he
could, from the resources at hand. To make blue, he pounded up a piece of
an old stone he had brought from Canterbury. Gilding was done by making
gold-leaf out of real gold. The Tyrian purple was made from a gastropod of
the seas near Byzantium, and a little snail-like mollusk of Ireland would