out some coals
from the blazing fire of logs, he set his saucepan over them, and
watched the barky water until it had boiled down very thick, much as one
boils down syrup for preserves.

Then he dipped out the thick liquid into little bags of parchment, which
he had spent days stitching up very tightly, so that nothing could leak
out. After the little bags were filled, he hung them out-of-doors in the
bright sunlight; and as the days grew warmer and warmer, the sun soon
dried their contents, so that if one of the little bags were opened it
would be found filled with a dark powder.

And then, last of all, when Brother Stephen wished some fresh ink for
his writing, or for the delicate lines about his initial letters or
borders, Gabriel would take a little of the dry powder from one of the
bags, and, putting it in a small saucepan over the fire, would melt it
with a little wine. And so at last it would be ready for use; a fine,
beautiful black ink that hundreds of years have found hard work to fade.

[Illustration: "_Dreaming of all the beautiful things he meant to
paint_"]

Then there was the gold to grind and prepare; that was the hardest of
all, and fairly made his arms ache. Many of the paints, too, had to be
worked over very carefully; and the blue especially, and other brilliant
colours made from vegetable dyes, must be kept in a very curious way.
Brother Stephen would prepare the dyes, as he preferred to do this
himself; and then Gabriel would take little pieces of linen cloth and
dip a few in each of the colours until the linen would be soaked; and
afterward, when they had dried in the sun, he would arrange these bits
in a little booklet of cotton paper, which every night Brother Stephen,
as was the custom with many of the monks, put under his pillow so that
it might keep very dry and warm; for this preserved the colours in all
their brightness. And then when he wanted to use some of them, he would
tell Gabriel to cut off a bit of the linen of whatever colour he wished,
and soak it in water, and in this way he would get a fine liquid
paint.

For holding this paint, as dishes were none too plenty in those days,
mussel shells were generally used; and one of Gabriel's tasks was to
gather numbers of these from the banks of the little river that ran
through one of the Abbey meadows. That was very pleasant work, though,
and sometimes, late in the afternoons of those lovely summer days,
Brother Stephen and Gabriel