Dunstan used it freely ; thus we are told of him "Sanctus quoque Spiritus . . . in oculorum rivulis elicuit."[1] "Of Alcuin, on the other hand, it is said that he poured out his sermon with many groans, but very seldom gave way to tears."[2]
Cuthberht's dress was ordinary and not remarkable either for neatness or slovenliness. It was the custom at Lindisfarne that none should wear varied or costly colours in their garments, but only use the natural colour of the wool.[3]
After passing several years in the monastery at Lindisfarne, probably as prior, he at length departed with the good wishes of the Abbot Eata and the brethren, and sought out what he had long craved for, namely, a life of secret solitude. It had been his practice when at Lindisfarne to withdraw at times into a certain place outside, where he was more secluded. The Irish monks used to call such a retreat "a disart." This absolute withdrawal from the duties of his position for purely personal reasons, and devoting himself meanwhile to the morbid dangers of secret introspection, was according to even such a man of sense as Bede a movement from one form of grace to another still greater (virtute in virtutem). When at the end he virtually deserted his see and retired to his cell, his anonymous biographer speaks of it as "a forsaking of secular honour."
Raine says that on the southern slope of a long ridge of hills near the village of Howburn there is
