The revelation at the end of the sixth day had unsettled the order they believed they understood, and even the quiet routines of the vineyard showed the break in their thoughts. Eden had been kept from them until its purpose stood beyond question, and the knowledge had struck deeply.

The day opened upon a land that bore fresh scars. The great beasts raised on the fifth day lay broken across valley and plain. Traditions keep reports of stone falling from the heights, of earth riven, of seas lifting walls against the shore.

The fifth day marks the first quiet turning in the labour of creation. Scripture speaks of the waters bringing forth living creatures and of birds rising in the firmament.

The merchants who walk between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic carry stories stranger than Scripture records. They speak of beasts that moved upon creation before man was made, yet were not made during those six days.

The spring emerged at a point where the land changed character. South of the water lay red sandstone country, the soil heavy with iron. North of the spring stretched limestone uplands, white stone country where sheep found good grazing.

The account that follows gathers what the Church teaches concerning the first five days of the world's making, together with such explanations as may help the understanding of how that work was ordered.