Soon as they neared his turrets strong, The maidens raised Saint Hilda's song, And with the sea-wave and the wind Their voices, sweetly shrill, combined, And made harmonious close;
Then, answering from the sandy shore,
Half-drowned amid the breakers' roar, 200
According chorus rose:
Down to the haven of the Isle
The monks and nuns in order file
From Cuthbert's cloisters grim;
Banner, and cross, and relics there,
To meet Saint Hilda's maids, they bare;
And, as they caught the sounds on air,
They echoed back the hymn.
The islanders in joyous mood
Rushed emulously through the flood
To hale the bark to land;
Conspicuous by her veil and hood,
Signing the cross, the Abbess stood,
And blessed them with her hand.
XII Suppose we now the welcome said, Suppose the convent banquet made:
All through the holy dome, Through cloister, aisle, and gallery, Wherever vestal maid might pry, Nor risk to meet unhallowed eye,
The stranger sisters roam;
Till fell the evening damp with dew,
And the sharp sea-breeze coldly blew,
For there even summer night is chill.
Then, having strayed and gazed their fill,
They closed around the fire;
And all, in turn, essayed to paint
The rival merits of their saint,
A theme that ne'er can tire
A holy maid, for be it known
That their saint's honor is their own.
Then Whitby's nuns exulting told How to their house three barons bold Must menial service do,
While horns blow out a note of shame,
And monks cry, Fie upon your name!
In wrath, for loss of sylvan game,
Saint Hilda's priest ye slew.'-
'This, on Ascension-day, each year
While laboring on our harbor-pier,
Must Herbert, Bruce, and Percy hear.'
They told how in their convent-cell
A Saxon princess once did dwell,
The lovely Edelfled;
And how, of thousand snakes, each one
Was changed into a coil of stone
When holy Hilda prayed; Themselves, within their holy bound, Their stony folds had often found. They told how sea-fowls' pinions fail, As over Whitby's towers they sail, And, sinking down, with flutterings faint, They do their homage to the saint.
Nor did Saint Cuthbert's daughters fail
To vie with these in holy tale;
His body's resting-place, of old,
How oft their patron changed, they told;
How, when the rude Dane burned their pile,
The monks fled forth from Holy Isle; 259
O'er northern mountain, marsh, and moor,
From sea to sea, from shore to shore,
Seven years Saint Cuthbert's corpse they
bore.
They rested them in fair Melrose;
But though, alive, he loved it well, Not there his relics might repose; For, wondrous tale to tell!
Old Colwulf built it, for his fault
In penitence to dwell,
When he for cowl and beads laid down
The Saxon battle-axe and crown.
This den, which, chilling every sense
Of feeling, hearing, sight,
Was called the Vault of Penitence,
Excluding air and light,
Was by the prelate Sexhelm made
A place of burial for such dead
As, having died in mortal sin,
Might not be laid the church within.
'T was now a place of punishment;
Whence if so loud a shriek were sent
As reached the upper air,
The hearers blessed themselves, and said The spirits of the sinful dead
Bemoaned their torments there.
But though, in the monastic pile,
Did of this penitential aisle
Some vague tradition go,
Few only, save the Abbot, knew
Where the place lay, and still more few
Were those who had from him the clew
To that dread vault to go.
Victim and executioner
Were blindfold when transported there.
In low dark rounds the arches hung,
From the rude rock the side-walls sprung;
The gravestones, rudely sculptured o'er,
Half sunk in earth, by time half wore,
Were all the pavement of the floor;
The mildew-drops fell one by one,
With tinkling plash, upon the stone.
A cresset, in an iron chain,
Which served to light this drear domain,
With damp and darkness seemed to strive,
As if it scarce might keep alive;
And yet it dimly served to show
The awful conclave met below.
There, met to doom in secrecy,
Were placed the heads of convents three,
All servants of Saint Benedict,
The statutes of whose order strict
On iron table lay;
In long black dress, on seats of stone,
Behind were these three judges shown
By the pale cresset's ray.
The Abbess of Saint Hilda's there
Sat for a space with visage bare,
Before them stood a guilty pair;
But, though an equal fate they share,
Yet one alone deserves our care.
Her sex a page's dress belied;
The cloak and doublet, loosely tied,
Obscured her charms, but could not hide.
Her cap down o'er her face she drew;
And, on her doublet breast,
She tried to hide the badge of blue,
Lord Marmion's falcon crest.
But, at the prioress' command,
A monk undid the silken band
That tied her tresses fair,
And raised the bonnet from her head, And down her slender form they spread
In ringlets rich and rare. Constance de Beverley they know, Sister professed of Fontevraud, Whom the Church numbered with the dead,
For broken vows and convent fled.
Her comrade was a sordid soul,
Such as does murder for a meed; Who, but of fear, knows no control, Because his conscience, seared and foul,
Feels not the import of his deed;
One whose brute-feeling ne'er aspires 420
Beyond his own more brute desires.
Such tools the Tempter ever needs
To do the savagest of deeds;
For them no visioned terrors daunt,
Their nights no fancied spectres haunt;
One fear with them, of all most base,
The fear of death, alone finds place.
'This wretch was clad in frock and cowl,
And shamed not loud to moan and howl,
His body on the floor to dash,
And crouch, like hound beneath the
lash;
While his mute partner, standing near,
Waited her doom without a tear.
Yet well the luckless wretch might shriek, Well might her paleness terror speak! For there were seen in that dark wall Two niches, narrow, deep, and tall;Who enters at such grisly door Shall ne'er, I ween, find exit more. In each a slender meal was laid, Of roots, of water, and of bread; By each, in Benedictine dress, Two haggard monks stood motionless, Who, holding high a blazing torch, Showed the grim entrance of the porch; Reflecting back the smoky beam, The dark-red walls and arches gleam. displayed, Hewn stones and cement were And building tools in order laid.
By strange device were they brought there,
They knew not how, and knew not where.
And now that blind old abbot rose,
To speak the Chapter's doom
On those the wall was to enclose
Alive within the tomb,
But stopped because that woful maid,
Gathering her powers, to speak essayed; 470
Twice she essayed, and twice in vain,
Her accents might no utterance gain;
Nought but imperfect murmurs slip
From her convulsed and quivering lip:
'Twixt each attempt all was so still,
You seemed to hear a distant rill
'Twas ocean's swells and falls;
For though this vault of sin and fear
Was to the sounding surge so near,
A tempest there you scarce could hear,
So massive were the walls.
And now my tongue the secret tells, Not that remorse my bosom swells, But to assure my soul that none Shall ever wed with Marmion. Had fortune my last hope betrayed, This packet, to the king conveyed, Had given him to the headsman's stroke, Although my heart that instant broke. Now, men of death, work forth your will, For I can suffer, and be still; And come he slow, or come he fast, It is but Death who comes at last.
The locks that wont her brow to shade
Stared up erectly from her head;
Her figure seemed to rise more high;
Her voice despair's wild energy
Had given a tone of prophecy.
Appalled the astonished conclave sate;
With stupid eyes, the men of fate
Gazed on the light inspired form,
And listened for the avenging storm;
The judges felt the victim's dread;
No hand was moved, no word was said,
Till thus the abbot's doom was given,
Raising his sightless balls to heaven:
"Sister, let thy sorrows cease;
!'
Sinful brother, part in peace
From that dire dungeon, place of doom,
Of execution too, and tomb,
Paced forth the judges three;
Sorrow it were and shame to tell The butcher-work that there befell, When they had glided from the cell Of sin and misery.
An hundred winding steps convey
That conclave to the upper day;
But ere they breathed the fresher air
They heard the shriekings of despair,
And many a stifled groan.
With speed their upward way they take,
Such speed as age and fear can make,
And crossed themselves for terror's sake,
As hurrying, tottering on,
Even in the vesper's heavenly tone
They seemed to hear a dying groan,
And bade the passing knell to toll
For welfare of a parting soul.
Slow o'er the midnight wave it swung,
Northumbrian rocks in answer rung;
To Warkworth cell the echoes rolled,
His beads the wakeful hermit told;
The Bamborough peasant raised his head,
But slept ere half a prayer he said;
So far was heard the mighty knell,
The stag sprung up on Cheviot Fell,
Spread his broad nostril to the wind,
Listed before, aside, behind,
Then couched him down beside the hind,
And quaked among the mountain fern,
To hear that sound so dull and stern.
Ashestiel, Ettrick Forest
LIKE April morning clouds, that pass
With varying shadow o'er the grass,
And imitate on field and furrow
Life's checkered scene of joy and sorrow;
Like streamlet of the mountain north,
Now in a torrent racing forth,
Now winding slow its silver train,
And almost slumbering on the plain;
Like breezes of the autumn day,
Whose voice inconstant dies away,
And ever swells again as fast
When the ear deems its murmur past;
Thus various, my romantic theme
Flits, winds, or sinks, a morning dream.
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