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LI- :^ARY ^
UNJyEf^lTY OF
CALIFORNIA
SAN DIC&O
THE POETICAL WORKS OF AUBREY
BE VERE.
Gldhc Svo. 5s. per voluine.
I. THE SEARCH AFTER PROSERPINE, and other Poems,
Classical and Meditative.
II. THE LEGENDS OP ST. PATRICK, and LEGENDS OP
IRELAND'S HEROIC AGE.
III. ALEXANDER THE GREAT, SAINT THOMAS OP
CANTERBURY, and othee Poems.
IV. MAY CAROLS, or ANCILLA DOMINI, and LEGENDS
OP THE SAXON SAINTS.
V. INISFAIL, MISCELLANEOUS and EARLY POEMS, etc.
MAY CAROLS, or ANCILLA DOMINI. New Edition.
MACMILLAN & CO., LONDON.
ST. PETER'S CHAINS. (Burns and Oates.)
BV THE LATE SIR AUBREY BE FERE, BART.
MARY TUDOR: an Historical Drama. (G. Bell & Son.)
JULIAN THE APOSTATE, and THE DUKE OF MBRCIA.
(Pickering.)
SONNETS. (Pickering.)
THE POETICAL WORKS OF
AUBREY BE VERE
VOL. IV.
MAY CAEOLS
OR
ANCILLA DOMINI
LEGENDS OF THE SAXON SAINTS
BY
AUBREY DE VERE
NEW EDITION
11 n ti n
MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1897
CONTENTS.
Preface ...
PROLOGUE
MAY CAROLS (Part I.)
I. — Who feels not, when the Spring once
II.— Upon Thy Face, C4od, Thy world
III. — All but unutterable Name !
IV.^ — How came there Sin to world so fair
V. — Sancta Maria
VL— Fest. Nativitatis B. V. M,
VII. — Ab Angelo Salutata
VIII. — Nihil respondit
IX.— St. Joseph's Doubt
X. — Fe.st. Visitationis
XL — Amor Innocentium
XII. — Fest. Nativitatis
XIII. — Prote vangelion . . .
XIV.— Dei Genitrix
XV. — ^Adolescentulaj amaverunt te niinis
XVI.— The infant year with infant freak
X VII.— Fest. Epiphania3
XVIIL— Fest. Epiphanice
XIX.— Mater Dei
XX. — Gaudium Angelorum
XXL— Legenda ...
XXII. — Fest. Presentationis ...
XXIII. —The First Dolour
XXIV. — The golden rains are dashed against
XXV. — Legenda ...
XXVL— The Second Dolour ...
XXVIL— Saint Joseph ...
XXVIII. — 'Joseph, her Husband '
XXIX. — Saint Joseph's Patronage
XXX. — Mater Christi
more
PAGE
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30
31
32
33
VI
CONTENTS.
XXXI.— Mater Christi
XXXII. —Mater Creatoris ...
XXXIII.— Mater Sal vatoris
XXXIV.— Her Foundations are on the Holy Hills
XXXV. —Mater Admiralnlis
XXXVI.— Mater Amabilis ...
XXXVII.— The Third Dolour
XXXVIII. —Mater Filii
XXXIX. — When April's sudden sunset cold
XL.— Not yet, not yet ! the Season sings
XLI. — The moon, ascending o'er a mass
XLII. — Nazareth ...
XLIII. — Foi'deris Area
XLIV. — Spiritus Sponsa
XLV.— Orante
XLVI. — Respexit Humilitatem
XLVIL— Mulier Fortis
MAY CAROLS (Part IL)
I. — Agios Athanatos
II. — Pastor Eternus
III. — Jesum Ostende
IV. — Turris Ebiirnea
V. — Conservabat in Corde ...
VI. — The Kindly Transience
VII. — Stronger and steadier every hour
VIIL— Marine Cliens
IX. — In morte Tutamen
X. — Speculum Justiti*
XL — Auxilium Christianorum
XII. — Cowslips sweetening lawn and vale
XIII. — Ab Eterno Ordinata
XIV. — Three worlds there are — the first of Sense
XV. — Alas ! not only loveliest eyes
XVI. — -Idolatria ...
XVII. — ' In Him we have our being'
XVIII. — Tota Pulchra
XIX.— 'AdNives' ...
XX.— Fest. Puritatis
XXI. — The night through yonder cloudy cleft
XXII. —Stella Matutina ...
XXIII. —The Flesh and the Spirit
XXIV.—' Made subject to Vanity ' ...
XXV. —Mater Di vinai Gratias ...
XXVI. — Mater Divina; (iratiaj
XX VII.— Detachment ...
XXVIIL— The Beginning of Miracles ...
XXIX.— Filia Maris
CONTENTS, VU
PAfiE
XXX.— Expectatio ... ... ... ... 77
XXXI. — Whitens the green field, daisy-strewn 78
XXXII.—' Jesus and His Mother were there ' ... 79
XXXIII. — Lumen Nuptiaruni ... ... 80
XXXIV. — The golden day is dead at last ... ... 81
XXXV. — If God for each fair action wrought 81
XXXVI.—' When Thou hast set my heart at liberty ' 82
XXXVIL— Gratis Plena ... ... ... 83
XXXVIII. Vas Insigne Devotionis ... ... 84
XXXIX.— The Letter and the Spirit ... ... 85
XL.— The 'Single Eye' ... ... ... 86
XLL— Mystica ... ... ... ... 87
XLII. — Beati qui audiunt verbuni Dei ... ... 88
XLIIL— Authentic Theism ... ... ... 89
XLIV. — ' Teste David cum Sibylla ' ... ... 90
XLV. — ' Teste David cum Sibvlla ' ... 91
XLVI. — ' Teste David cum Sibylla ' ... ... 92
XLVIL— Deus Absconditus ... ... 93
XLVIIL— The Veil ... ... 94
XLIX. — ' The Secret of God is with them that fear
Him' ... ... ... ... 95
L. — Janua Cadi ... ... ... ... 95
LI. — If sense of Man's imworthiness ... ... 96
LII. — Causa Nostrte Lietitiaj ... ... 97
LIIL— Stella Maris ... ... 98
LIV. — Aaronis Virga ... ... ... 99
LV.— Unica ... ... ... ... 99
LVI. — Regina Prophetarum ... ... 100
LVII. — Still on the gracious work proceeds ... 101
LVIIL— Turris Davidica ... 102
LIX. — ' Tu sola interemisti omnes HaBreses ' ... 103
LX.— Ut Acies Ordinata ... ... 104
LXI. — As children when, with heavy tread ... 104
LXII. — Sedes Sapientiae ... ... ... 105
LXIIL— Truth ... ... ... ... 106
LXIV.— Implicit Faith ... ... ... 107
LXV.— Mater Viventium ... ... ... 108
LXVI. — Geus non Sancta ... ... ... 109
LXVIL— Mater Venerabilis ... 110
LXVIII. — The sunless day is sweeter yet ... Ill
LXIX.— The Fourth Dolour ... ... ... 112
LXX. — Refugium Peccatorum ... ... 113
LXXL— The Fifth Dolour ... ... ... 114
LXXIL—Stabat Mater ... ... ... 115
LXXIIL— Regina Mart yrum ... ... ... 115
LXXIV.— The Sixth Dolour ... ... ... 116
LXXV.— The Seventh Dolour ... ... ... 117
LXXVL— Mater Dolorosa ... ... ... 118
VIU CONTENTS.
PAGE
MAY CAROLS (Part III.)
I.— The 'Unknown God' ... ... ... 121
II. — Ascensio Domini ... ... ... 122
III. — Ascensio Domini ... ... ... 123
IV. — A sudden sun-burst in the woods ... 124
V. — Dominica Pentecostes ... ... ... 125
VI. — Dominica Pentecostes ... ... 126
VII. — Here, in this paradise of light ... ... 127
VIIL— Regina Cs' WITH THEM
THAT FEAR HIM:
XLIX.
Flower of the darkness tliat unseen
With fragrance fUl'st the vernal grove
Where hid'st thou ? 'Mid the grasses green,
Or boughs that bar the blue above ]
Thou bird that, darkling, sing'st a song
That shook the bowers of Paradise
Thou too ai"t hid thy leaves among ;
Thou sing'st unseen of moi'tal eyes.
Of her thou sing'st whose every breath
Sweetens a world too base to heed ;
Of Him, Death's Conqueror, who from Death
Alone wovild take the crown decreed.
Thou sing'st that secret gifts are best ;
That only like to God are they
Who keep God's Secret in their breast
And hide, as stars are hid by day.
JANUA CCELL
L.
They seek not ; or amiss they seek ;
The coward soul, the captious brain :
To Love alone those instincts speak
Whose challenge nevei' yet was vain.
96 MAY CAROLS.
True Gate of Heaven ! As light through glass,
That God who might — not born of thee —
Have come, was pleased to earth to pass
Through thine unstained Virginity :
Lo ! thus aright to know thy Son
Through knowledge comes of thee in part.
Interior Vision, Spirit-won,
High wisdom of the virgin heart.
Summed up in thee our hearts behold
The glory of created things :
From His, thy Son's, corporeal mould
Looks forth the eternal King of kings !
LI.
If sense of Man's unworthiness
With Nature's blameless looks at strife.
Should wake with wakening May, and press
New-born contentment out of life ;
If thoughts of breed unblest and blind
Should stamp upon the spi^inging flower,
Or blacker memories haunt the mind
As ravens haunt the ruined tower ;
then how sweet in heart to breathe
Those pure Judean gales once more ;
From Bethlehem's crib to Nazareth
In heart to tread that Syrian shore !
MAY CAROLS. 97
To watch that star-like Infant brin^
To one of soul as clear and white
May-lilies, fresh from Siloa's spring
Or Passion-flower with May- dews bright ;
To follow, earlier yet, the feet
Of her the ' hilly land ' who trod
With true love's haste, intent to greet
That aged saint beloved of God :
Before her like a stream let loose
The long vale's flowerage, winding, ran :
Nature resumed her Eden use ;
And Earth was reconciled with Man !
CAUSA NOSTRyE L/ETITIM.
LII.
Whate'er is floral on the earth
To thee, O Elower, of right belongs,
Whate'er is musical in mirth,
Whate'er is jubilant in songs.
Childhood and springtide never cease
For him thy freshness keeps from stain :
Dew-drenched for him, like Gideon's fleece,
The dusty paths of life remain.
For all high thoughts thou bring'st to mind,
We love thee : — love thee better yet
For all that taint on human kind
Thy brightness helps us to forget !
IV. H
98 MAY CAROLS.
Hope, Hope is Strength ! That smile of thine
To us is Glory's earliest i*ay !
Through Faith's dim air, O star benign,
Look down, and light our onward way !
STELLA MARIS.
LHI.
I LEFT at morn that blissful shore
O'er which the fruit-bloom fluttered free ;
And sailed the wildering waters o'er,
Till sunset streaked with blood the sea.
My sleep the hoarse sea-thunders broke —
Death-visaged cliffs, with feet foam-hid
Leaned foi'th their brows through vapour-smoke
Like tower, and tomb, and pyramid.
In death-black shadow, ghostly white,
The breaker raced o'er foaming shoals :
From caverns cold as death all night
Came wailings as of suffering Souls,
At morn, through clearing mist the star
Of ocean o'er the billow rose :
Down dropped the elemental war ;
Tormented chaos found repose.
Star of the ocean ! dear art thou,
Ah ! not to sea-worn men alone :
The suffering Church, when shines thy brow
Upon her penance, stays her moan :
MAY CAROLS. 99
The Holy Souls draw in their breath :
The sea of anguish rests in peace :
And from beyond the gates of death
Up swell the anthems of release.
AAllONIS VIRGA.
Liy.
Blossom for ever, blossoming Rod !
Thou didst not blossom once to die :
That Life which, issuing forth from God
Thy life enkindled runs not dry.
"Without a root in sin-stained earth
'Twas thine to bud Salvation's flower :
No single soul the Church brinafs forth
But blooms from thee and is thy dower !
Rejoice, Eve ! thy promise waned ;
Transgression nipt thy flower with frost :
But, lo ! a Mother man hath gained
Holier than she in Eden lost.
UNIGA.
LY.
While all the breathless woods aloof
Lie hushed in noontide's deep repose,
That dove, sun-warmed on yonder roof,
Ah what a grave content she knows !
100 MAY CAROLS.
One note for her ! Deep streams run smooth
The ecstatic song of transience tells :
What depth on depth of loving truth
In that divine content there dwells !
All day with down-dropt lids I sat
In trance ; the present scene forgone :
When Hesper rose, on Ararat,
Methought, not English hills, he shone.
Back to the ark the waters o'er
That primal dove pursued her flight :
A branch of that blest tree she bore
Which feeds God's Church with holy light.
I heard her rustling through the air
With sliding plume — no sound beside
Save the sea-sobbings everywhere,
And sighs of that subsiding tide.
BEGIN A PROPHETARmi.
LYI.
She took the timbrel, as the tide
Rushed, refluent, down the Red Sea shore
* The Lord hath triumphed,' she cried :
Her song rang out above the roar
Of lustral waves that wall to wall
Fell back upon that host abhorred :
Above the gloomy watery pall
As eagles soar her anthem soared.
MAY CAROLS. 101
Miriam, rejoice ! a mightier far
Than thou one day shall sing with thee !
Who rises, brightening like a star
Above yon bright baptismal sea 1
That harp which David touched who rears
Heaven-high above those waters wide 1
The Prophet-Queen ! Throughout all years
8he sings the Triumph of the Bride !
LYII.
Still on the gracious work proceeds,
The good, great tidings preached anew
Y&arly to green enfranchised meads
And fire-topped woodlands flushed with dew.
Yon cavern's moiith we scarce can see ;
Yon rock in gathering bloom lies meshed ;
And all the wood-anatomy
In thickening leaves is over-fleshed.
That hermit oak, which frowned so long
Upon the spring with barren spleen,
Yields to the sinless Siren's song.
And bends above her goblet green.
Young maples, late with gold embossed
Lucidities of sun-pierced limes
No more surprise us merged and lost
Like prelude notes in deepening chimes.
102 MAY CAROLS.
Disordered beavities and detached
Demand no more a separate place :
The abrupt, the startling, the unmatched,
Submit to graduated grace ;
While upward from the ocean's marge
The year ascends with statelier tread
To where the sun his golden targe
Finds, setting, on yon mountain's head.
TUBBIS DAVIDICA.
LVIII.
The towered City loves thee well,
Strong Tower of David's House ! In thee
She hails the unvanquished citadel
That frowns o'er Error's subject sea.
With magic might that Tower repels
A host that breaks where foe is none,
No foe but statued Saints in cells
High-ranged and smiling in the sun.
There stands Augustin ; Leo there ;
And Bernard Avith a maiden face
Like John's ; and, strong at once and fair,
That Spirit-Pythian, Athanase.
MAY CAROLS.
103
Upon thy stai'-surrounded height
God's Angel keepeth watch and ward ;
And sunrise flashes thence ere night
Hath left dark street and dewy sward.
' TU SOLA INTEREMISTI OMNES
HuERESES. '
LIX.
What tenderest hand uprears on high
The standard of Incarnate God 1
Successive portents that deny
Her Son, who tramples? She who trol
Long since on Satan ! Who were those
That, age by age, their Lord denied 1
Their seats they set with Mary's foes :
They mocked the Mother as the Bride.
Of such was Arius ; and of such
* He whom the Ephesian Sentence fellel :
t Her Title triumphed. At the touch
Of Truth the insurgent rout was quelled :
Back, back the hosts of Hell were driven
As forth that sevenfold thunder rolle 1 :
And in the Church's mystic Heaven
There was great silence as of old.
* Nestorius. t Deipara.
104 MAY CAROLS.
UT ACIES OBDINATA.
LX.
The watchman watched along the walls :
And lo ! an hour or more ere light
Loud rang his trumpet. From their halls
The revellers rushed into the night.
There hung a terror on the air ;
There moved a terror under ground ;
The hostile hosts, heard everywhere,
Within, without, were nowhere found.
* The Christians to the lions ! Ho ! '
Alas ! self-tortured crowds, let be !
Let go your wrath ; your fears let go :
Ye gnaw the net, bvit cannot flee.
Ye drank from out Orestes' cup ;
Orestes' Furies drave you wild.
Who conquers from on high ? Look up !
A Woman, holding forth a Child !
LXI.
As children when, with heavy tread,
Men sad of face, unseen before.
Have borne away their mother dead,
So stand the nations thine no more.
MAY CAROLS. 105
From room to room tliose children roam,
Heart-stricken by the unwonted black :
Their house no longer seems their home :
They search ; yet know not what they lack :
Years pass : Self -Will and Passion strike
Their roots more deeply day by day ;
Old kinsmen sigh ; and ' how unlike '
Is all the tender neighbours say :
And yet at moments, like a dream
A mother's image o'er them flits :
Like hers their eyes a moment beam ;
The voice grows soft : the brow unkuits :
Such, Mary, are the realms once thine
That know no more thy golden reign :
Hold forth from heaven thy Babe divine !
O make thine'orphans thine again !
SEDES SAFIENTIjE.
LXII.
THAT the wordy war might cease !
Self-sentenced Babel's strife of tongues :
Lovid rings the arena. Athletes, peace !
Nor drown the wild-dove's Song of Songs.
Alas, the wanderers feel their loss :
With tears they seek — ah, seldom found —
That peace whose Volume is the Cross ;
That peace which leaves not holy ground.
106 MAY CAROLS.
Mary, the peaceful soul loves thee !
A happy child not taught of Scribes
He stands beside the Church's knee ;
From hei- the lore of Christ imbibes.
Hourly he drinks it from her face :
For there his eyes, he knows not how,
The face of Him she loves can trace,
And crowned with thorns the sovereign brow.
* Behold ! all colours blend in white !
Behold ! all Truths have root in Love ! '
So sings, half lost in light of light,
Her Song of Songs the mystic Dove,
, TRUTH.
LXIII.
Propane are they, and without ruth.
Unclean, unholy, and unjust,
Who, loving knowledge, love not Truth :
Such love is intellectual lust.
He loves not Truth who over-runs
Like hunting-ground her harvest store
Trampling the birthright of his sons ;
Truth's gambler, staking ' all' on ' more.'
Who Truth from Error scorns to sift ;
Contemns that Truth enthroned in state,
God's Vestal keeping her sweet gift
In fruitf ulness inviolate ;
MAY CAROLS. 107
Who thirsts for truths of lesser place,
Discovered Fact, or Natural Law,
Yet spurns the supernatural base
Of Truth's whole kingdom without flaw :
For on the adamantine Rock
Of Truth, Revealed, and Spirit-proved
Stands Faith, and meets the warring shock
Of world on world with face vinmoved.
Thrice blest because not ' Flesh and Blood '
That knowledge certain and serene
To Peter taught of old, but God
Sole Teacher of the things unseen.
IMPLIGIT FAITH.
'multum non multa.'
LXIV.
Of all great Nature's tones that sweep
Earth's resonant bosom, far or near.
Low-breathed or loudest shrill or deep
How few are grasped by mortal ear !
Ten octaves close our scale of sound :
Its myriad grades, distinct or twined,
Transcend our hearing's petty bound
To us as colours to the blind.
In Sound's unmeasured empire thus
The heights, the depths alike we miss
Ah, but in measured sound to us
A compensating spell there is !
108 MAY CAROLS.
In holy music's golden speech
Remotest notes to notes respond :
Each octave is a world ; yet each
Yibi'ates to worlds its own beyond.
Our narrow pale the vast resumes ;
Our sea-shell whispers of the sea :
Echoes are ours of angel plumes
That winnow far infinity.
Clasp thou of Truth the central core !
Hold fast that Centre's central sense !
An atom there shall fill thee more
Than realms on Truth's circumference.
That cradled Saviour, mute and small,
Was God — is God while worlds endure !
Who holds Truth truly holds it all
In essence, or in miniature.
Know what thou know'st ! He knoweth much
Who knows not many things : and he
Knows most whose knowledge hath a touch
Of God's divine simplicity.
MATUE VIVENTIUM.
LXY.
In vain thine altars do they heap
With blooms of violated May
Who fail the words of Christ to keep ;
Thy Son who love not nor obey.
MAY CAROLS. 109
Their songs are as a serpent's hiss ;
Their praise a poniard's poisoned edge ;
Their offering taints, like Judas' kiss,
The shrine ; their vows are sacrilege.
Sadly from such thy countenance turns :
Tliou canst not stretch thy Babe to such
Albeit for all thy pity yearns
As greet Him with a leper's touch.
Who loveth thee must love thy Son :
Weak Love grows strong thy smile beneath ;
But nothing comes from nothing ; none
Can reap Love's harvest out of Death.
GEUS NON SANCTA.
LXVL
I TOILED along the public path :
Loud rang the booths with knave and clown ;
Now laughter peals, now cries of wrath
Assailed the suburb from the town.
Pleasure, the kennel Circe, brimmed
Her cup for him that passed. Hard by
Sabbathless labour, dust-begrimmed
Alternated the curse and sigh.
' Alas,' I said, ' no God is here !
The World, the Flesh, rule here confest : '
I heard a voice; an Angel near
On sailed ; an altar touched his breast.
110 MAY CAROLS.
He placed it by me, and I knelt ;
Clamour and shout and dust were gone :
I prayed, and in my prayer I felt
The peace of God, and heard, ' walk on ;
' "Walk on : the Lands this hour that sleep
A sleep of storm, shall wake to pray
And, praying, rest ; her Feasts shall keep ;
Their long, sad years thenceforth a May !
MATER VENERABILIS.
LXVII.
Come from the midnight mountain tops.
The mountains where the panthers play :
Descend ! the cowl of darkness drops ;
Come fair and fairer than the day !
Our hearts are wounded with thine eyes :
They stamp thereon in words of light
The mystery of the starry skies ;
The ' Name o'er every name ' they write.
Come from thy Lebanonian peaks
Whose sacerdotal cedars nod
Above the world when morning breaks ;
The Mountain of the House of God.
Weakness and Dream have passed like night ;
Religion claims her ancient bound
On-borne in venerable might
By lions haled and turret-crowned.
MAY CAROLS. 1 1 1
LXVIII.
The sunless day is sweeter yet
Than when the golden sun-showers danced
On bower new-glazed or invulet ;
And Spring her banners first advanced.
By wind unshaken hang in dream
The wind-flowers o'er their dark green lair ;
And those ensanguined cups that seem
Not bodied forms but woven of air.
Nor bird is heard nor insect flits :
A tear-drop glittering on her cheek
Composed but shadowed, Nature sits
Yon primrose not more staid and meek.
The light of pensive hope unquenched
On those pathetic brows and eyes,
She sits, by silver dew-showers drenched
Through which the chill spring odours rise.
Was e'er on human countenance shed
So sweet a sadness 1 Once : no more ;
Then when his charge the Patriarch led
Dream-Avarned to Egypt's distant shore :
Down on her Infant Mary gazed ;
Her face the angels marked with awe ;
Yet 'neath its dimness, undisplaced,
Looked forth that smile the Magians saw.
112 MAY CAROLS.
THE FOURTH DOLOUR.
(The Meeting on Calvary. )
LXIX.
She stands before Him on the Road :
He bears the Cross ; He climbs the Steep :
Three times He sinks beneath His load :
He sinks to earth : she does not weep.
She may not touch that Cross whose weight
Against His will a stranger bears :
In heart to bear it, and to wait,
His upward footsteps, this is hers.
She may not prop that thorn-crowned Head :
The waves of men between them break :
Another's hand the veil mvist spread
Against that forehead and that cheek.
Her eyes on His are fastened. Lo !
There stand they, met on Calvary's height,
Twin mirrors of a single woe
Made by reflection infinite.
The sons of Sion round them rave :
The Roman trumpet storms the wind :
They goad him on with spear and stave :
He passes by : she drops behind.
ilAY CAROLS. 113
BEFUGIUM PECGATOUUM.
LXX.
Say, who are those that beat with brands
Like bandits on our palace-gate ?
That storm our keep like rebel-bands 1
That come like Judgment or like Fate 1
Say, who ai'e those that spurn by night
Our svimptuous floors with brazen shoon
And banquet halls whose latest light
Is lightning, or a dying moon 'I
Say, who are those that by our bed
Like giants tower in iron mail ;
That press against the prosti-ate head
Their foot, and wind through heaven the flail ?
The Sins are these ! Sin-pasturing Past !
How in thy darkness they have grown
That seemed to die ! How we at last
To pigmy size have shrunk, self-known !
Help, sinless Mother ! Bid Him spare !
He loves vis more — that Judge benign —
Than thou. 'Tis He that wills thy prayer :
From Him it comes, that love of thine !
IV.
114 MAY CAROLS.
THE FIFTH DOLOUB.
(Beside the Cross.)
LXXI.
She stood in silence. Slowly passed
The hours whose moments dropped in blood
Its frown the Darkness further cast :
She moved not : silently she stood.
No human sympathy she sought :
Her help was God, and God alone ;
Not even the instinctive respite caught
Prom passionate gesture, sigh or moan.
Her silence listened. On the air
Like death-bells tolled that prime Decree
Which bade the Eternal Victim bear
Man's Sin primeval. Let it be !
The Women round her heard all day
The clash of arms, the scoffing tongue :
She heard the breaking of that spray
Whereon the fruit of Knowledge hung.
Behold the Babe of Bethlehem ! Ay !
The Infant slumbered on thy breast;
And thou that heard'st His earliest cry
Must hear His ' Consummatum est.'
MAY CAROLS. 115
STAB AT MATER.
LXXII.
She stood : she sank not. Slowly fell
Aclown the Cross the atoning blood :
In agony ineffable
She offered still His own to God.
No pang of His her bosom spared ;
She felt in Him its several power :
But she in heart His Priesthood shared :
She offered Sacrifice that hour.
* Behold thy Son ! ' Ah, last bequest !
It breathed His last farewell ! The sword
Predicted pierced that hour her breast :
She stood : she answered not a word.
His own in John He gave. She Avore
Thenceforth the Mother-crown of Earth.
Eve ! thy sentence too she bore ;
That hour in sorrow she brought forth.
REGINA MARTYBUM.
LXXIIL
That tie, the closest ever twined.
That linked a Creature with her God
All ties of man in one combined
When by His Cross that Creature stood.
116 MAY CAROLS.
In both, one Will all wishes quelled :
On one great Sii^e were fixed their eyes :
From sister hearts the death-stream welled :
Twins of a single Sacrifice.
In death her Spouse, her Son in life,
Her wedding-garment was His blood :
It clasped her close enough a wife
To wear the crown of Widowhood.
Love ! alone thy topmost height
They tread who stand — thy clouds above-
Where all the rock-hewn paths unite
That branch from God, and lead to love !
THE SIXTH DOLOUE.
(Taken down from the Cross. )
LXXIV.
Thk Saviour from the Cross they took :
Across His Mother's knee He lies :
She wept not but a little shook
As with dead hand she closed dead eyes.
The surface wave of grief we know :
By us its depths are unexplored :
She treads the still abyss below
Following the footsteps of her Lord.
Above her head the great floods roll :
Before her still He moves — her Hope :
And calm in heart of storm her Soul,
Calm as the whirlpool's central drop.
MAY CAROLS. 117
The Saviour from the Cross they took :
Across His Mother's knee He lay :
O passers by ! be still and look !
That Twain compose one Cross for aye.
THE SEVENTH DOLOUR. .
(Before the Tomb.)
LXXV.
Before the Tomb the Mother sate
Amid the new-delved garden ground :
Her eyes upon its stony gate
AVere fixed, while darkness closed around.
A wind above the olives crept :
It seemed the world's collected sigh :
That Mother's eyes their vigil kept :
She felt but this ; her Lord was nigh.
Behind her leaning each on each
The Holy Women waited near :
Nor any spake of comfort : speech
Was slain by sorrow and by fear.
From realm to realm of night He passed,
That Soul which smote the dark to-day :
That Mother's eyes were settled fast
Upon the Tomb where Jesus lay.
118 MAY CAROLS,
MATER DOLOBOSA.
LXXVI.
From lier He passed ; yet still with her
The endless thought of Him found rest,
A sad but sacred branch of myrrh
For ever folded in her breast.
A Boreal wiiater void of light —
Such seemed her widowed days forlorn :
She slept ; but in her breast all night
Her heart lay waking till the morn.
Sad flowers on Calvary that grew ;
Sad fruits that ripened from the Cross ;
These were the only joys she knew :
Yet all but these she counted loss.
Love strong as Death ! She lived through thee
That mystic life whose every breath
From Life's low harpstring amorously
Draws out the sweetened name of Death.
Love stronger far than Death or Life !
Thy martyrdom was o'er at last :
Her eyelids dropped ; and without strife
To Him she loved her spirit passed.
MAY CAROLS.
PART III.
marije in ccelis.
' And a great sign appeared in lieaveu : a woman clothed
M'ith the snn, and the moon under lier feet, and on her head a
crown of twelve stars.
'And she brought forth a man-child, who was to rule all
nations with an iron rod : and her son was taken up to God,
and to His throne.' — Apocalypse xii. 1, 5.
THE ' UNKNOWN GODJ
Behind this vast and wondrous frame
Of worlds whereof we nothing know
Except their aspect and their name,
Beneatii this blind, bewildering show
Of shapes that on the darkness trace
Transitions fair and fugitive
Lies hid that Power upon whose Face
No child of man shall gaze and live.
Like one on purple heights that stands
While mountain echoes round him roll
Screening his forehead with his hands
And following far through gulfs of soul
Some thought that still before him flies —
Thus, Power eternal and unknown,
We muse on Thine immensities
Yet find Thee in Thy Son alone.
Emanuel, God with us, in Him
We see the Unmeasured, and the Vast
Like mountain outlines, large and dim,
On lifted mists at sunrise cast.
122 MAY CAROLS.
' The "Word made Flesh ! ' Power Divine
Through Him alone we guess at Thee,
And deepliest feel that He is Thine
When throned upon His Mother's knee.
ASCENSIO DOMINI.
II.
Rejoice, O Earth, thy crown is won !
liejoice, rejoice, ye heavenly host !
And thou, the Mother of the Son,
Rejoice the first ; rejoice the most !
Who captive led captivity,
From Hades' void circumference
Who raised the Patriarch Band on high.
There rules, and sends us graces thence.
Rejoice, glad Earth, o'er winter's grave
With altars wreathed and clarions blown ;
And thou, the Race Redeemed, out-brave
The rites of Nature with thine own !
Rejoice, O Mary ! thou that long
Didst lean thy bi^east upon the Sword —
Sad nightingale, the Spirit's song
That sang'st all night ! He reigns, restored !
Rejoice ! He goes, the Paraclete
To send ! Rejoice ! He reigns on high !
That Sword lies broken at thy feet 1
His triumph is thy victory.
MAY CAROLS.
123
ASGENSIO DOMINI.
III.
I TAKE this reed — I know the hand
That wields it must ere long be dust —
And write upon the ileeting sand
Each tide o'er-sweeps, the words ' I trust.'
And if that sand one day was stone
And stood in courses near the sky
For towers by earthquake overthrown
Or mouldering piecemeal, what care 1 1
Things earthly perish : life to death
And death to life in turn succeeds :
The Spirit never perisheth :
The chrysalis its Psyche breeds.
True life alone is that which soars
To Him who triumphed o'er the grave :
With Him on life's eternal shores
I trust one day a part to have.
Ah, hark ! above the springing corn
That chime ! in every breeze it sw^ells !
Ye bells that wake the Ascension morn.
Ye give us back our Paschal bells !
124 MAY CAROLS.
lY.
A SUDDEN sim-burst in the woods
But late sad Winter's palace dim !
O'er quickening boughs and bursting buds
Pacific glories shoot and swim.
As when some heart, grief -darkened long
Conclusive joy by force invades,
So swift the new-born splendours throng ;
Such lustre swallows up the shades.
The sun we see not ; but his fires
From stem to stem obliquely smite
Till all the forest aisle respires
The golden-tongued and myriad light :
The caverns blacken as their brows
With floral fire are fringed : but all
Yon sombre vault of meeting boughs
Turns to a golden fleece its pall
As o'er it breeze-like music rolls :
O Spring, thy limit-line is crossed !
Earth, some orb of singing Souls
Brings down to thee tJiy Pentecost !
MAY CAROLS. 125
DOMINICA FENTEGOSTES.
V.
Clear as those silver trumps of old
That woke Judea's jubilee ;
Strong as the breeze of morning, rolled
O'er answering woodlands from the sea
That Evangelic anthem vast
Which winds, like sunrise, round the globe,
Following that sunrise, far and fast
And trampling on his fiery robe.
Once more the Pentecostal torch
Lights on the courses of the year :
The ' Upper Chamber ' of the Church
Is thrilled once more with joy and fear.
Who rears her bi-ow from out the dust?
Who fixes on a world restored
A gaze like Eve's, but more august 1
Who lifts it heaven-ward on her Lord 1
It is the Birthday of the Bride !
The new begins ; the ancient ends :
From all the gates of Heaven flung wide
The promised Paraclete descends.
He who o'ershadowed Mary once
O'ershades Humanity to-day ;
And bids her fruitful prove in sons
Co-heritors with Christ for aye.
126 MAY CAROLS.
DOMINICA PENTEG0HTE8.
VI.
The Form decreed of tree and flower
The Shape susceptible of life
Without the infused, vivific Power
Were but a slumber or a strife.
He whom the plastic Hand of God
Himself created out of earth
Remained a statue and a clod
Till (Spirit infused to life gave birth.
So till that hour the Church, In Christ
Her awful structure, nerve and bone,
Though founded, shaped, and organized
Existed but in skeleton
Till down on that predestined frame,
Complete through all its sacred mould
That Pentecostal Spirit came,
The self-same Spirit Who of old
Creative o'er the waters moved :
Thencefoi'th the Church, made One and Whole,
Arose in Him, and lived, and loved ;
His Temple she, and He her Soul.
MAY CAROLS. 127
VII.
Here, in this paradise of light,
Superfluous were both tree and grass :
Enough to watch the sunbeams smite
Yon white flower sole in the morass !
From his cold nest the skylark springs ■
Soars, pauses, sings ; shoots up anew ;
Attains his topmost height, then sings
Quiescent in his vault of blue.
"With eyes half -closed I watch that lake
Flashed from whose plane the sun-sparks fly
Like Souls new-born that shoot and break
From thy deep sea, Eternity !
Ripplings of sunlight from the wave
Ascend the white rock high and higher ;
Soft gurglings fill the satiate cave ;
Soft airs amid the reeds expire.
All round the lone and luminous meer
The dark world stretches far and free
That skylark's song alone I hear ;
That flashing wave alone I see.
myriad Earth ! Where'er a Word
Of thine makes way into the soul
An echo million-fold is stirred :
Of thee the part is as the whole !
128 MAY CAROLS.
REGINA CCELI. \
VIII.
In some celestial realm we know
The God-man keeps His coui't sublime
As Adam ruled the sphere below
In that first Eden's sinless prime.
He too, that second Adam, hears
Those rivers four engird His bovmd ;
Serene advance of sleepless years
With God's accomplished Counsels crowned.
Around Him, close as Eden leaves.
The Souls consummate hang in trance :
Like wind the Spirit among them weaves
Eternal song, or through the expanse
On- wafts, like snowy clouds high-piled
Those pilgrims of God's trackless Will,
The white hosts of the Undefiled
Whom love divine alone could fill.
The lustral mist for aye ascends :
All creatures mix secure from strife :
At last the Tree of Knowledge blends
Its branches with the Tree of Life.
An Eve partakes that Eden. She
Who decked His cradle shares His throne :-
The Solitudes of Deity
These, these are His, and His alone.
MAY CAROLS. 129
FEST. SS. T BIN I TAT IS.
IX.
Fall back, all worlds, into the abyss
That man may contemplate once more
That which He ever was Who is ;
The Eternal Essence we adore.
Angelic hierarchies ! recede
Beyond extinct Ci'eation's shade —
What were ye at the first 1 Decreed :
Decreed, not fashioned ! thought, not made !
Like wind the untold Millenniums passed :
Sole-throned He sat ; yet not alone :
Godhead in Godhead still was classed ;
The Spirit was breathed from Sire and Son.
Prime Vii"gin, separate and sealed ;
Nor less of social Love the root !
Dimly in lowliest shapes revealed ;
Entire in every Attribute :
Thou liv'st in all things and around ;
To Thee external is there nous:ht ;
Thou of the boundless art the bound ;
And still Creation is Thy Thought.
In vain, God, our wings we spread ;
So distant art Thou— yet so nigh.
Remains but this when all is said
For Thee to live ; in Thee to die.
IV. K
130 MAY CAROLS.
FESTUM SS. TBINITATIS.
X.
Like some broad flood whose conquering course
Shakes the dim forests night and day
On sweeps the prime Creative Force,
And re-creates the worlds alway.
The eternal' Mind, the sole-born Thought
Shape-entering mattei*'s stamp and mould,
Through all the spaces wonder -fraught
Speaks Law and Order as of old.
That Love which, ere it overflowed
And beat on lone Creation's shore
Issuing from Both with Both abode
Proceeds, abides, for evermore.
Yet man who — not in brow or breast
But soiil, and reason, and free-will — •
Imaged his Maker and expressed
Ignored that Triune Mystery still !
Here failed his science, failed as sight
V Earth's motion fails to mark ! Ah me !
Our eye can track the swallow's flight ;
The circling sphere it cannot see !
And yet as Sense, abashed, down kneels
And wins from Science lore sublime
To kneeling science Faith reveals
Mysteries transcending space and time.
The Infinite remains unknown
Too vast for man to understand :
In Him, the ' Woman's Seed,' alone
We trace God's footprint in the sand.
MAY CAROLS. 131
THRONUS TRINITATIS.
XI.
Each several Saint the Church reveres,
What is he but an altar whence
Some separate V^irtue ministers
To God a sepai'ate frankincense 1
Each beyond each, not made of hands
They rise, a ladder angel-trod :
Star-bright the last and loftiest stands :
That altar is the Throne of God.
Lost in the uncreated light
A Form all Human rests thereon :
His shade from that surpassing height
Beyond Creation's verge is thrown.
Him * Lord of lords, and King of kings,'
The chorus of all worlds proclaim :
' He took from her,' one angel sings
At intervals, ' His human frame.'
BEGIN A SANCTORUM OMNIUM.
XII.
He seemed to linger with them yet :
But late ascended to the skies
They saw — ah, how could they forget 1 —
The form they loved, the hands, the eyes.
132 MAY CAROLS.
From anchored boat, in lane or field
He taught ; He blessed, and brake the bread ;
The hungry filled ; the afflicted healed ;
And wept, ere yet He raised, the dead.
But when, like some supreme of hills
Whose feet shut out its summit's snow
That, hid no longer, heavenward swells
As further from its base we go,
Abroad His perfect Godhead shone
Each hour more plainly kenned on high
And clothed His Manhood with the sun
And, lifting, cleansed the adoring eye 3
Then fixed His Church a deepening gaze
Upon His Saints. With Him they sate
And, burning in that Godhead's blaze,
They seemed that Manhood to dilate.
His were they : of His likeness each
Had grace some fragment to present
And nearer brought to mortal reach
Some imitable lineament.
ADVOCATA,
XIII.
I SAW, in visions of the night
Creation like a sea outspread
With surf of stars and storm of light
And movements manifold and dread.
MAY CAROLS. 133
Then lo, within a Human Hand
A Sceptre moved that storm above :
Thereon, as on the golden wand
Of kings new-crowned, there sat a Dove.
Beneath her gracious weight inclined
That Sceptre drooped. The waves had rest :
And Sceptre, Hand, and Dove were shrined
Within a glassy ocean's breast.
His Will it was that placed her there !
He at whose word the tempests cease
Upon that Sceptre planted fair
That peace-bestowing type of Peace I
EXALTAVIT HUMTLES.
xiy.
The Chief of Creatures lived unknown
Sharing her Maker's sacred cloud
Like some fair headland flower-bestrewn
That sleeps Avithin its sea-born shroud.
The Brethren sought precedence : Christ
To them gave titles. He, their God,
For Him ' the Son of IMan ' sufficed :
The hidden way with Him she trod.
She died : the idols sank, and they
Those four great Heresies, whose pride
Successive blurred the fount of day
Her Son's Divinity denied ;
134 - MAY CAROLS.
As God, as Man, secure He reigned :
Then came her hour : then shone her crown
And theirs, that Saintly Court unstained
While guests of earth, by earth's renown.
Humility was crowned though late :
That boastful, pagan greatness fell :
And on their thrones the Meek ones sate
' Judging the tribes of Israel.'
XY.
Where is the crocus now that first
When earth was dark and heaven was grey
A prothalamion flash, up burst '?
Ah, then we thought not of the May !
The clear stream stagnates in its course ;
Narcissus droops in pallid gloom ;
Far off the hills of golden gorse ;
A dusk Saturnian face assume.
The seeded dandelion dim
Casts loose its air-globe on the breeze ;
Along the grass the swallows skim ;
The cattle couch among the trees.
Yet ever lordlier loveliness
Succeeds the charm that cheats our hold :
The thorn assvimes her snowy dress ;
Laburnum bowers their robes of gold.
Down waves successive of the year
The season slides ; but sinks to rise
With ampler view, as on we steer.
Of lovelier lights and loftier skies.
MAY CAROLS. 135
XYI.
A LOW ground-mist, the hills between
Measuring their intervals, distends
Ridge beyond ridge, the sylvan scene ;
Far off the reddening river bends
From bridge to town. On hueless air
The moon suspends her pearly shell
Above the eastern ledges bare ;
But sunset throngs yon western dell
That pants through amethystine mist
And gleams as though the Sons of God
Through golden ether stooped, and kissed
Some Syrian vale the Saviour trod !
The beatific Splendours wane :
The hills, of all that sweetness gone,
A roseate memory still retain :
Thou compline chime, peal on, peal on !
Of Him thou sing'st whose Blood erased
Earth's ancient stain by powder divine ;
Of them, that second Pair, who paced
That second Eden, Palestine.
136 MAY CAROLS.
IN GiriTATE SANCTIFIGATA
EEQUIEVI.
XVII.
In silence, like a ridge of snows
Slow reared in lands for ever calm,
On Sion's brow the Temple rose ;
In stillness grew as grows the palm.
Far off, on ridges vapour-draped,
Was hewn and carved each destined stone
Far off the axe the cedars shaped
Upon their native Lebanon.
So rose that Temple holier far
Incarnate Godhead's sacred shrine :
Ptound her there swelled no din of war :
The peace that girt her was divine.
The deep foundations of that fane
Were laid ere lived the hills and seas
In many a dread, unquarried vein
Of God's deep Will, and fixed Decrees.
High Queen of Peace ! Her God possessed,
Her heart could feel no earthly want :
His kingdom, 'stablished in her breast,
Triumphant was, not militant :
And day by day more amply played
His love about its raptured thrall
Like some eternal sunset stayed
On cliff rich-veined, or mountain wall.
MAY CAROLS. 137
QUABI CEDBUS EX ALT AT A SUM
IN LIBANO.*
XVIII.
Behold ! I sought in all things rest :
My Maker called me : I obeyed :
On me He laid His great behest :
In me His tabernacle made.
The world's Creator thus bespake
' My Salem be thy heritage :
Thy rest within mine Israel make :
In Sion root thee, age by age.'
Within the City well-beloved
Thenceforth I grew from flower to fruit :
And in an ancient race approved
Behold thenceforth I struck my root.
Like Carmel's cedar, or the palm
That gladdens 'mid Engaddi's dew
Or Plane-tree set by waters calm
I stood, and round my fragrance threw.
Behold ! I live where dwells not sin :
I breathe in climes no foulness taints :
I reign in God's fair Court, and in
The full assembly of His Saints.
* Ecclesiasticus xxiv.
138 MAY CAROLS.
SAPIENT I A.""
XIX.
My flowers are flowers of gladness : mine
The boughs of honour and of grace :
Pure as the first bud of the vine
My fragrance freshens all the place.
The Mother of fair Love am I :
With me is Wisdom's name and praise :
With me are Hope, and Knowledge high,
And sacred Fear, and peaceful days.
Through garden plots my course I took
To bathe the bed« of herb and tree :
Then to a river swelled my brook :
Anon that river was a sea.
More high that sea shall rise and shine
Far off, a prophet-beam of morn ;
Because my doctrine is not mine
But light of God for Seers unborn.
'»*
BE AT I MITES.
XX.
Thy song is not the song of morn
O thrush, but calmer and more strong ;
While sunset woods around thee burn
And echoing stems thy strain prolong.
* Ecclesiasticus xxiv.
MAY CAROLS. 139
songstress of the thorn whereon
As yet the white but streaks the green
Sing on ! sing on ! Thou sing'st as one
That sings of what his eyes have seen !
In thee some Seraph's rapture tells
Of joys we guess not ! Heaven draws near :
1 hear the immortal City's bells :
The triumph of the Blest I hear.
The whole wide earth, to God heart-bare
Basks like some happy Umbrian vale
By Francis trodden and by Clare
When anthems sweetened every gale
When Greatness thirsted to be good
When faith was meek and love was brave
When hope by every cradle stood
And rainbows spanned each new-made grave.
SINE LABE ORIGINALI CONGEPTA.
XX r.
Her foot is on the Lord of Night :
On Heaven, not him, are fixed her eyes :
That foot is, as a lily, light ;
Not less that Serpent writhes and dies !
Eve, he dies, that tempter fell !
O Earth, that pest whose poison-spume
Exasperate with the fires of hell
Thy blood envenomed, meets his doom !
140 MAY CAROLS.
But whence the conquering puissance 1 Lo !
That Woman clasps the ' AVoman's Seed : '
That Infant quells the infernal foe :
Messiah triumphs : His the deed !
The weight she feels not she transmits :
The weight of worlds her arms sustain :
Who made the worlds — in heaven Who sits —
Through her that foe hath touched and slain !
SIA'E LABE ORIGINALI CONCFFTA.
XXII.
Could she, that Destined One, could she
On whom His gaze was stayed for aye
Transgress like Eve, partake that Tree
Become, like her, the Dragon's prey 1
Had He no Pythian shaft that hour
Her Son — her God — to pierce that Foe
Which strove her greatness to devour,
Eclipse her glories 1 Deem not so !
He saw her in that First Decree :
He saw the Assailant ; sent the aid : —
Filial it Avas, His love for thee
Ere thou wert born ; ere worlds were made.
MAY CAROLS. 141
SINU LABE OEIGINALI CONCEPTA.
XXIII.
When man gives up the ghost, behold,
Honouring his God's Decree august
His body melts : the mortal mould
Eevisiteth its native dust.
The bulwarks of the breast give way :
Those eyes that glorying watched the sun :
Each atom-speck of mortal clay
Foregoes its nature — all save one.
A something — germ or power — survives,
That seed which linked, from birth to death,
The structure's myriad cyclic lives
That remnant never perisheth !
That seed reserved, too fine, too small
For eye to scan, for chance to mar
Shall soar to meet God's trumpet-call.
Re-clad, and glittering like a star.
With Man so fared it at the Fall :
The Race lay dead : She did not die :
One seed survived — the hope of all —
Thy pledge. Redeemed Humanity !
142 MAY CAROLS.
SINE LABE OBIGINALI CONGEPTA.
XXIV.
Met in a point* the circles twain
Of temporal and eternal things
Embrace, close linked. Redemption's chain
Drops thence to earth its myriad rings.
In either circle, from of old
That point of meeting stood decreed ;
Twin mysteries cast in one deep mould
' The Woman,' and 'the Woman's Seed.'
Mary, long ages ere thy birth
Eesplendent with Salvation's Sign
In thee a stainless hand the earth
Put forth, to meet the Hand Divine !
The Word made Flesh ; the Way ; the Door ;
The link that dust with Godhead blends !
Through Him the worlds their God adore :
Through thee that God to man descends.
SINE LABE OBIGINALI CONGEPTA.
XXY.
A SOUL-LIKE sound, subdued yet strong,
A whispered music, mystery-rife,
A sound like Eden airs among
The branches of the Tree of Life —
* The Incarnation.
MAY CAROLS. 143
At first no more than this ; at last
The voice of every land and clime
It swept o'er Earth a clarion blast :
Earth heard, and shook with joy sublime.
Mary ! thy triumph was Earth's own !
In thee she saw her prime restored :
She saw ascend a spotless Throne
For Him, her Saviour, and her Lord.
First trophy of all-conquering Grace
First victory of that Blood all pure
Of man's once fair, but fallen Race,
Thou stood'st, the monument secvire.
The Church had spoken. She that dwells
Sun-clad with beatific light,
From Truth's uncounted citadels
From Sion's Apostolic height
Had stretched her sceptred hands, and pressed
The seal of Faith, defined and known,
Upon that Truth till then confessed
By Love's instinctive sense alone.
FBEMUERUNT GENTE8.
XXVL
The sordid World, insane through pride
Masking her sin in virtue's name
Bejects, usvirps, self-deified.
The Immaculate Mother's sacred claim;
144 MAY CAROLS.
' The Earth is mine, and Earth's desires :
My Science reigns from zone to zone :
I warm my hands o'er Nature's fires ;
I reap the fields those hands have sown :
' From depths unknown I crept unseen
Through worm and beast to Man's estate :
Up hands are clean : / rule, a Queen
Immortal and Immaculate.'
Thus boasteth Pride with brazen brow ;
That Pride which still ' believes a lie ' : —
The counter-boast of Grace art thou.
Immaculate Humility !
Therefore, like Western hill that flings
O'er sunset vales its gradual shade
Thy power shall wax while sensuous things
Dissolve, and earthly grandeurs fade.
In the world's eve thy Star shall flash
Through reddening skies that cease to weep
While kings to earth their sceptres dash
And angel bands the harvest reap.
THU RAINBOW.
XXVII.
All-glorious shape that fleet' st wind-swept
AtliAvart the empurpled pine-girt steep.
That, sinless, from thy birth hast wept.
All-gladdening, till thy death must weep ;
MAY CAROLS. 145
That in eterne ablution still
Thine innocence in shame dost shroud
And, washed where stain was none, dost fill
With light thy penitential cloud ;
Illume with peace our glooming glen
O'er-arch with hope yon distant sea
To angels Avhispering and to men
Of her whose lowlier sanctity
In God's all-cleansing freshness shrined
Renounced all pureness of her own,
And aye her lucent brow inclined
God's ' Handmaid ' meek, before His throne.
ANCILLA DOMINI.
XXVIII.
The crown of Creatures, first in place.
Was, of all creatures, creature most :
By nature nothing ; all by grace ;
Kedemption's first and loftiest boast.
Handmaid of God in heart and will
Without His life she seemed a death
A void that He alone could fill
A word suspended on His breath.
Yet — void and nothing — she in Him
The Creature's sole perfection found ;
She was the great Rock's shadow dim ;
She was the silence not the sound.
IV.
146 MAY CAROLS.
On golden airs, by Him upheld,
She knelt, a soft Subjection mute
A hushed Dependance, tranced and spelled,
Still yearning towards the Absolute.
She was a sea-shell from the deep
Of God ; her function this alone
Of Him to whisper as in sleep.
In everlasting vmdertone.
This hour on Him her eyes are set !
And those who tread the earth she trod
Like her themselves in her forget
And her remember but in God.
XXIX.
Brow-bound with myrtle and with gold
Spring, sacred now from blasts and blights,
Lifts high in firm, untrembling hold
Her chalice of fulfilled delight;
t>'
s.
Confirmed around her queenly lip
The smile late wavering, on she moves ;
And seems through deepening tides to step
Of steadier joys and larger loves.
The stony Ash itself relents.
Into the blue embrace of May
Sinking, like old impenitents
Heart-touched at last ; and, far away.
The long wave yearns along the coast
With sob svippressed, like that which thrills.
Whilst o'er the altar mounts the Host,
Some chapel on the Irish hills.
MAY CAROLS. 147
CORPUS OHBISTI.
XXX.
Rejoice, thou Clinrch of God ! be glad,
This day triumphant here below !
He Cometh, in lowliest emblems clad ;
Himself He cometh to bestow !
That Body which thou gav'st, O Earth
He gives thee back — that Flesh, that Blood —
Born of the Altar's mystic birth ;
At once thy Worship and thy Food.
He who of old on Calvary bled
On all thine altars lies to-day
A bloodless Sacrifice, but dread
The Lamb in heaven adored for aye.
His Godhead on the Cross He veiled ;
His Manhood here He veileth too :
But Faith has eagle eyes unsealed,
And Love to Him she loves is true.
' I will not leave you orphans, Lo !
While lasts the world with you am L'
Saviour ! we see Thee not ; but know
With burning hearts that Thou art niirh !
^&^
He cometh ! Blue Heaven, thine incense breathe
O'er all the consecrated sod ;
And thou, Earth, with flowers enwreathe
The steps of thine advancing God !
148 MAY CAROLS.
COBPUS CHEISTI.
XXXI.
What music swells on every gale ?
"What heavenly Herald speedeth past ?
Vale sings to vale, ' He comes ; all hail ! '
Sea sobs to sea, ' He comes at last.'
The Earth bursts forth in choral song ;
Aloft her ' Lauda Sion ' soars ;
Her myrtle boughs at once are flung
Before a thousand Minster doors.
Far on the white processions wind
Through wood and plain and street and court
The kings and prelates pace behind
The King of kings in seemly sort.
The incense floats on Grecian air
Old Carmel echoes Calpo's chant,
In every breeze the torches flare
That curls the waves of the Levant,
On Ramah's plain in Bethlehem's bound
Is heard to-day a gladsome voice :
* Rejoice,' it cries, * the Lost is found !
With Mary's joy, Earth, rejoice ! '
MAY CAROLS. 149
THE TWO LAST GIFTS.
XXXII.
' Behold thy Mother ! ' From the Cross
He gave her — not to one alone :
We are His Brethren ; unto us
He gave a Mother as to John.
Behold the greatest gift of Christ
Save that wherein Himself He gives,
The wonder-working Eucharist,
Sole life of each that truly lives :
Mysterious Bread not joined and knit
With him that eats, like mortal food,
But, fire-like, joining him with It
And blending with the Church of God !
Mary ! from thee the Saviour took
That Flesh He gives ! The mercies twain
Like streams of a divided brook
But separate to meet again.
DOMUS AUBEA.
XXXIII.
* Wisdom hath built herself a House,
And hewn her out her pillars seven : ' "^
Her wine is mixed : her guests are those
Who share the harvest-home of heaven.
* Tro verbs ix. 1.
150 MAY CAROLS.
The fruits upon her table piled
Are gathered from the Tree of l^ife :
Around are ranged the undefiled,
And those that conquered in the strife.
Who tends the guests ? Who smiles away-
Sad memories 1 bids misgiving cease ?
A crowned one countenanced like the day
The Mother of the Prince of Peace !
XXXIV.
Pleasant the swarm about the bough ;
The meadow-whisper round the woods ;
And for their coolness pleasant now
The murmur of the fallinir floods.
Pleasant beneath the thorn to lie
And let a summer fancy loose ;
To hear the cvickoo's double cry ;
To make the noontide sloth's excuse.
Panting, but pleased, the cattle stand
Knee-deep in water-weed and ?edge
And scarcely crop that greener band
Of osiers round the river's edge.
But hark ! Far off the south wind sweeps
The golden-foliaged groves among
Renewed or lulled, with rests and leaps —
Ah ! how it makes the spirit long
To drop its earthly weight and drift
Like yon white cloud, on pinions free
Beyond that Mountain's purple lift
And o'er that scintillating sea !
MAY CAROLS. 151
FEST. ASSUMPTIONIS.
XXXV.
The mother of the heavenly Child
Who made the workls, and who redeemed,
The maid and mother undefiled
She died : or else to die she seemed.
Once more above the hxte-entombed
They bent. What found they 1 Vacant space
To heaven had Mary been assumed
And only flowers were in the place.
O happy earth ! Elected sphere !
Hope of that starry host above !
Thou too thy Maker's voice shalt hear ;
Thou too thy great Assumption prove !
The earth shall be renewed : the skies
Shall bloom with glories unrevealed :
Each season new but typifies
The wonders then to be unsealed.
Revives, each spring, a world that died :
A world by summer's store increased
Shall hear ere long that mandate wide
' Prepare the glad Assumption Feast ! '
152 MAY CAROLS.
ELIAS AND ENOCH.
XXXVI.
O THOU that rodest up the skies,
Assumed ere deatli, on steeds of fire
That, rapt from earth in mortal guise
Some air immortal dost respire ;
That, ambushed in the enshrouding sheen,
In quiet lulled of soul and flesh,
With one great thought of Him, the Unseen,
Thy ceaseless vigil dost refresh ;
Old lion of Carmelian steeps !
Upon God's mountain, where, O where,
Or couchant by His unknown deeps,
Mak'st thou thine everlasting lair 1
Hast thou, that earlier Seer beside
Who ' walked with God, and was not,' him
By contemplation glorified
When faith, in shallower hearts, grew dim,
Hast thou — despite corj^oreal bars —
A place among those Hierarchies,
Who fix on Mary's Throne, like stars,
The light of never-closing eyes 1,
Behold, there is a debt to pay !
With Enoch hid thou art on hifrh :
Yet both shall back return one day,
To gaze once more on earth, and die.
MAY CAROLS.
153
FEST. DE MONTE CABMELO.
xxxvir.
Carmel, with Alp and Apennine
Low whispers in the wind that blows
Beneath the Eastern stars, ere shine
The lights of morning on their snows.
Of thee, Elias, Carmel speaks,
And that white cloud so small at first
Her Type, that neared the mountain peaks
To quench a dying nation's thirst.
On Carmel like a sheathed sword
Thy monks abode till Jesus came ;
On Carmel then they served their Lord ;
Then Carmel rang with Mary's name.
Blow over all the garden ; blow
O'er all God's garden of the West
Balm-breathing Orient ! Whisper low
The secret of thy spicy nest !
' Who from the Desert upward moves
Like cloud of incense onward borne ]
Who movini;, i-ests on Him she loves ?
Who mounts from regions of the Morn 1
' Behold ! The apple-tree beneath—
There where of old thy Mother fell,
I raised thee vip. More strong than Death
Is Love ; more strong than Death or Hell.' *
* Cant. viii. 5, iii. 6.
154 MAY CAROLS.
VAS SPIRITUALE.
XXXYIII.
High, winged Heart, and crowned with fire !
O winged with pinions of the morn
O crowned Avith flames whose every spire
Bears witness to that crown of thorn !
Fair Dove of God, that, still at rest.
On speed' st in never wavering flight
Winging the illimitable Breast —
The Omnipresent Infinite ;
We stagnate as in seas of lead,
Ice-cold, or warmed with earthly fires :
O that like thine our souls were fed
With sun-like yet serene desires !
A vase of quenchless love thou art
Drawn from that boundless Breast divine
O that in thee, on-rushing Heart,
Might rest, one hour, this heart of mine !
XXXIX.
Sing on, wide winds, your anthem vast !
Man's ear is richer than his eye :
Upon the eye no shape can cast
Such impress of Infinity.
And thou, my Soul, thy wings of might
Put forth : thou too, one day shalt soar
And, onward borne in heavenward flight,
The starry universe explore ;
MAY CAROLS.
155
Breasting that breeze wliich \v:ivos the bowers
Of Heaven's bright forest never mute
AVhereof perchance this earth of ours
Is but the feeblest forest-fruit.
Of all those worlds vinnumbered none
There lives but from that Blood all pure
Ablution, or its crown, hath won ;
Its state redeemed, or state secure.
' The Spirit bloweth where He wills ' —
O Effluence of that Life Divine
Which wakes the Universe, and stills,
In Thy strong refluence make us Thine !
GCELI ENABBANT.
XL.
Sole Maker of the Worlds ! They lay
A barren blank a void a nought
Beyond the ken of solar ray
Or reach of archangelic thought.
Thou spak'st ; and they were made ! Forth sprang
From every region of the abyss
Whose deeps, fire-clov'n, with anthems rang,
The spheres new-born and numberless.
Thou spak'st : upon the winds were found
The astonished Eagles. Awed and hushed
Subsiding seas revered their bound ;
And the strong forests upward rushed.
156 MAY CAROLS.
Before that Vision angels fell
As though the Face of God they saw ;
And all the panting Miracle
Found rest within the arms of Law,
Perfect, O God, Thy primal plan,
That scheme frost-bound by Adam's sin :
Create, within the heart of Man,
Worlds meet for Thee ; and dwell therein.
From Thy bright realm of Sense and Nature
Which flowers enwreathe and stars begem,
Shape Thou Thy Church ; the crowned Creature ;
The Bride ; the New Jerusalem !
CABO FAGTUS EST.
XLI.
When from beneath the Almighty Hand
The suns and systems rushed abroad
Like coursers which have burst their band
Or torrents when the ice is thawed ;
When round in luminous orbits flung
The great stars gloried in their might ;
Still, still a bridgeless gulf there hung
'Twixt Finite things and Infinite.
That crown of light Creation wore
Was girdled by the abysmal black ;
And all of natural good she bore
Confessed her supernatural lack.
MAY CAROLS. 157
For what is Nature at the best 1
An arch suspended in its spring ;
An altar step without a priest ;
A throne whereon there sits no king.
As one stone-blind that fronts the morn
The World before her Maker stood
Uplifting suppliant hands forlorn,
God's creature yet how far from God !
O Shepherd Good ! The trackless deep
He pierced, that Lost One to restore !
His Universe, a wildered sheep,
Upon His shoulder home He bore !
That Universe His Priestly robe,
The Kingly Pontiif raised on high
The worship of the starry globe : —
The gulf was bridged, and God was nigh.
CONDESGENSIO.
XLIL
When was it that in act began
That Condescension from on high
Consummated in God made Man,
Its shrine for all eternity ?
'Twas when the Eternal Father spake,
The Eternal Son in act replied :
When sudden forth from darkness brake
The new-shaped worlds on every side.
158 MAY CAROLS.
Instant that All-Creative Power
A meek, sustaining Power became,
A Ministration hour by hour
From death preserving Nature's frame.
Instant into Creation's breast
Nor merged nor mixed He passed, and gave
Continuance to the quivering guest
That else had found at birth its grave.
In finite mansions He, the Immense,
In service reigning, made abode,
Bore up — a Law, a Providence — ■
The weight of worlds, ' His people's load.'
He came once more — not then to reign ;
In servant's form to serve, and die
The ' Lamb before the ages slain,'
' The Woman's 8eed ' of prophecy.
THE CREATED WISDOM*
XLIII.
Created Wisdom at tlie gate
Of Heaven's eternal House, I played :
The Eternal Wisdom Uncreate
Beheld me ere the worlds were made.
I danced the void abyss above :
Of lore unwrit the characters
I traced with winged feet, and wove
The orbits of the unshaped stars.
* Proveiljs viii. 27—34.
MAY CAROLS. 159
I flashed^a Thought in light arrayed —
Beneath the Eternal Wisdom's ken :
When came mine hour I lived, and played
Among the peopled fields of men.
Blessed is he that keeps my ways,
That stands in reverence on my iloor,
That seeks my praise, my word oheys.
That waits and watches by my door.
BEGIN A ANGELORUM,
(Evangelism in Ccela. )
XLIY.
Ere yet mankind was made ; ere yet
The sun and she that rules the night
Were in their heavenly stations set,
God's Sons were playing in His sight.
Age after age those armies vast
In winding line had upward flown
Yet ne'er their shadows higher cast
Than on the first step of the Throne
And downward through the unsounded space
If those had sunk who soared above
They ne'er had found the buried base
Of Godhead's Condescending Love.
Then He, the God Who made them, proved :
For, high and higher as they soared
Hymning the Eternal Son beloved
The Godirom God, and Lord from Lord,
160 MAY CAROLS.
He showed tliem, in that Form decreed,
Their God made man — man's hope and trust-
' The Woman,' and ' The Woman's Seed,'
He showed ; the Unbounded bound in dust.
As when from some world-conquering height
The shepherd sees, ere risen the sun,
His advent clothe the cloud with light
Before them thus that Vision shone :
And while, in wonder half half fear,
That Child, that Mother fixed their eye,
He bade those heavenward hosts revere
Their God in His Humility.
Set was that Infant as a sign : —
In endless bliss confirmed were they
Who hailed that hour the Babe Divine ;
Self -sentenced those who turned away.
BEGIN A ANGELOBUM.
(Spes Ccelestis.)
XLV.
Their Trial past, more near the Throne,
And rapt thenceforth to holier skies.
Still on that Maid and Babe foreshown
The Elect of Angels fixed their eyes.
A Spirit-galaxy they hung ;
A Cross unmeasured, limned in fire
And instinct-shaped, that swayed and swung
On winds of unfulfilled desire.
MAY CAHOLS. 16i
They worshipped Him, that God made Man ;
To Him they spread their hands in power :
Unmarked the exhausted centuries ran :
That trance millennial seemed an hour.
'Twixt Finite things and Infinite
They saw the Patriarch's Ladder thrown ;
Saw One Who o'er it moved in lijrht :
They saw, and knelt with foreheads prone.
Make answer, sinless Angels, say
Ye who that hour your God adored
Less strong, less dear, is she this day.
That Mother of your destined Lord ]
BEGIN A ANGEL0RU2L
(In Coclo Coronata.)
XLVL
Angelic City in the skies
Not built of stones but Spirits pure
Irradiate by the Eternal Eyes,
And in the Etei*nal Love secure ;
Angelic City, selfless chaste
By Him thou watch'st upholden still,
That neither Future know'st, nor Past
Tranced in thy God's all-present Will ;
Thy mind a mirror sphered of gold
Wherein alone His splendours shine ;
Thy heart a vase His Hand doth hold
That yields to Him alone its wine ;
IV. M
162 MAY CAKOLS.
For one brief moment proved and tried ;
Thenceforth man's help in trial's stress ;
Bright Sister of the Cliurch — the Bride —
The elder Sister, yet the less :
like, unlike ! O crowned Twain !
Celestial both, yet one terrene ;
Behold, ye sing the same glad strain ;
Ye glory in the self-same Queen !
MULIEB AM IOTA SOLE.
XLYII.
A Woman ' clothed with the sun,' *
Yet fleeing from the Dragon's rage !
The strife in Eden-bowers begun
Swells upward to the latest age.
That Woman's Son is throned on high ; f
The angelic hosts before Him bend :
The sceptre of His empery
Subdues the worlds from end to end.
Yet still the sword goes through her heart
For still on earth His Church survives :
In her that Woman holds a part :
In her she suffers, and she strives.
Aroiuid her head the stars are set ;
A dying moon beneath her wanes :
By Death hath Death been slain : and yet
The Power accurst awhile remains.
* Eev. xii. 1.
+ ' And her Child was caught up 'unto God, and to Hia
Throne ' (Apoc. xiv. 5).
MAY CAROLS, 163
Break up, strong Earth, thy stony floors
And snatch to penal caverns dun
That Dragon from tlie pit that wars
Against the Woman and her Son !
XLVIII.
Regent of Change, thou waning Moon
Whom they, the sons of night, adore
Her foot is on thee ! Late or soon
Heap up upon the expectant shoi-e
The tides of Man's Intelligence ;
Or backward to the blackening deep
Remit them ! Knowledge won from Sense
But sleeps to wake and wakes to sleep.
Where are the hands that reared on hiirh
Heaven-threat'ning Babel 1 where the might
Of them, that giant progeny
The Deluge dealt with 1 Lost in night.
The child who knows his creed doth stretch
A sceptred hand o'er Space and hold
The end of all those threads that catch
In wisdom's net the starry fold.
The Sabbath comes : the work-days six
Go by. Meantime, of things to be
Salutary Crucifix
We clasp the burning heart in thee :
We clasp the end that knows no end ;
The Love that fears no lessening moon •
The Truth wherein all mysteries blend ;
His Truth, His word— the One Triune.
164 MAY CAROLS.
OTHER SHEEP I HAVE.
XLIX.
Fire-breathing concourse of the Stars
That tremble as with Love's delight
How dungeon-girt by custom's bars
How wrapped and swathed in error's night
His soul mvist be who nightly lifts
On you his wide and wandering eyes
Yet doubts that ye partake the gifts
Bequeathed by Calvary's Sacrifice !
Lift up your heads, Eternal Gates
Of God's great Temple in the sky !
That Blood your lintels consecrates : —
The Avenging Angel passes by !
The King of Glory issues forth :
The King of Glory enters in :
That Blood which cleansed from sin our earth
Or cleansed your spheres, or kept from sin.
Is this, indeed, our ancient earth 1
Or have we died in sleep and risen 1
Has earth, like man, her second birth ]
Rises the palace from the prison 1
Hills beyond hills ascend the skies ;
O'er winding valleys heaven-suspended,
Hvige forests rich as sunset's dyes
With rainbow-braided clouds are blended.
MAY CAROLS. 165
What means it ^ Glory, sweetness, might 1
Not these but something holier far ;
Shadows of Him, that Light of Light
AVhose priestly vestment all things are.
The veil of sense transparent grows :
God's Face shines out that veil behind
Like yonder sea-reflected snows —
Here man must worship, or be blind.
LI.
No ray of all their silken sheen
The leaves first fledged have lost as yet
Unfaded, near the advancing queen
Of flowers, abides the violet.
The rose succeeds ; her month is come ;
The flower with sacred passion red :
She sings the praise of martyrdom
And Him for whom His martyrs bled.
The perfect work of May is done :
Hard by, a new perfection waits :
The twain, a sister and a nun,
A moment parley at the grates.
The whiter Spirit turns in peace
To hide her in the cloistral shade :
'Tis time that you should also cease,
Slight carols in her honour made.
EPILOGUE.
THE SON OF MAN.
I GAZED — it was the Paschal night —
In vision on the starry sphere :
Like suns the stars made broad their light :
Then knew I Earth to Heaven drew near.
The Thrones of Darkness down were hurled ;
The veil was rent ; the bond was riven :
Then knew I that Man's little world
Had reached its home — the heart of heaven.
Made strong by God, mine eyes with awe
Still roved from star-changed sun to sun
That ringed the earth in ranks, and saw
A Spirit o'er each, that stood thereon.
And, clasped by every Spirit, stood
More high, the Venerable Sign :
Then knew I that the Atoning Blood
Had reached that sphere ; the Blood Divine.
From orb to orb an anthem passed ;
' The Blessing of the Lord of All
Hath reached us from the least and last
Of stars that light the Heavenly Hall ;
' For He, that Greatest, loves the Least ;
Puts down the mighty ; lifts the low :
On Earth began His Bridal Feast :
Our Triumph is its overflow ! '
MAY CAROLS.
167
Then Earth, that great ' New Earth ' * foretold,
Assumed those glories long her due :
Or were they hers indeed of old
Though veiled till then from mortal view 1
•&'
While — with her changing — far and wide
Those worlds around her, blent in one,
Became that ' City of the Bride '
Which needs no light of moon or sun.
Their splendour had not suffered change
As, kenned through myriad senses new,
Self-radiant street, and columned range
To one unmeasured Temple greAV.
Ere long through all that throbbing frame
Of things beheld and things unseen
Kolled forth that Name which none can name
Save those that breathe not clime terrene.
And down that luminous Infinite
I saw an Altar and a Throne ;
And, near to each, a Form, all light
That, resting, moved, and moved Alone :
But if He filled that Throne or knelt
That Altar nigh, or Lamb-like lay,
I saw not. This I saw and felt
That Son of Man was God for aye.
That Son of God was Man and stood,
And from His Yest, more white than snow,
Slowly there dawned a Cross of Blood
That through the glory seemed to grow :
* ' There shall be New Heavens, and a New Earth,'
168 MAY CAROLS.
Above the heavens His Hands He raised
To bless those Worlds whose race was run ;
And lo ! in either palm there blazed
The blood-red sign of Victory won ;
That Blood the Bethlehem Shepherds eyed
Warming His cheek Who slept apart :
That Blood He drew — the Crucified —
Far-fountained from His Mother's Heart.
LEGENDS
OF
THE SAXON SAINTS.
TO THE
VENEBABLE BEDE
'Mid quiet vale or city lulled by night
AVell-j)leased the wanderer, wakeful on his bed,
Hears from far Alps on fitful breeze the sound
Of torrents murmuring down their rocky glens,
Strange voice from distant regions, alien climes :
Should these far echoes from thy legend-roll
Delight of loftier years, these echoes faint,
Thus waken, thus make calm, one restless heart
In our distempered day, to thee the praise
Voice of past times Venerable Bede !
PREFACE.
Many years ago my friend Miss Fenwick re-
marked to me on the strange circumstance that the
chief event in a nation's history, its conversion to
Christianity, largely as it is often recorded in
national legends, has never been selected as a theme
for poetry. That event may indeed not supply the
materials necessary for an Epic or a Drama, yet it
can hardly fail to abound in details significant and
pathetic, which especially invite poetic illustration.
With the primary interest of that great crisis many
others, philosophical, social, and political, generally
connect themselves. Antecedent to a nation's con-
version the events of centuries have commonly either
conduced to it, or thrown obstacles in its way ; while
the history as well as the character of that nation in
the subsequent ages is certain to have been in a
principal measure modified by that event. Looking
back consequently on that period in which the moral
influences of ages, early and late, are imaged, a people
recognises its own features as in a mirror, but sees
them svich as they Avere when their expression was
still undetermined ; and it may well be struck by the
resemblance at once to what now exists, and also by
the dissimilitude. Many countries have vinhappily
172 PREFACE.
lost almost all authentic records connected with their
conversion. Such would have been the fate of
England also, had it not been for a single book, Bede's
Ecclesiastical History. In the following poems my
aspiration was to walk humbly in the footsteps of that
great master. Their scope will best be indicated by
some remarks upon the character of that wonderful
age which he records.
St. Augustine landed in the Isle of Thanet A. D.
597, and Bede died A. d. 735. The intervening
period, that of his chronicle, is the golden age of
Anglo-Saxon sanctity. Notwithstanding some twenty
or thirty years of pagan reaction, it was a time of
rapid though not uninterrupted progress, and one of
an interest the more touching when contrasted with
the calamities which followed so soon. Between the
death of Bede and the first Danish invasion, were
eighty years, largely years of decline, moral and
religioug. Then followed eighty years of retribution, -
those of the earlier Danish wars, till, with the
triumph of Alfred, England's greatest king, came the
Christian restoration. Once more periods of relaxed
morals and sacrilegious princes alternated with inter-
vals of reform ; for again and again the Northmen
over-swept the land. The 460 years of Anglo-Saxon
Christianity constituted a period of memorable
achievements and sad vicissitudes ; but that period
included more than, a hundred years of high sanctity,
belonging for the most part to the seventh century, a
century to England as glorious as was the thirteenth
to Medieval Europe.
Within that century the kingdoms of the Heptarchy
[Successively became Christian, and those among them
PREFACE. 173
which had relapsed returned to the Faith. Sovereigns,
many of whom had boasted a descent from Odin
himself, stood as interpreters beside the missionaries
when they preached, and rivalled each other in the
zeal with which they built churches, some of which
were founded on the sites of ancient temples, though,
in other cases, with a charitable prudence, the existing
fanes were spared, purified, and adapted to Christian
worship. At Canterbui-y and York, cathedrals rose,
and on many a site besides ; and Avhen the earlier
had been destroyed by fire, or had fallen through
decay, fabrics on a vaster scale rose above their ruins,
and maintained a succession which lasts to this day.
Monasteries unnumbered lifted their towers above
the forests of a land in which the streams still ran
unstained and the air of which had not yet been
dimmed by smoke — impar-ting a dignity to fen and flat
morass. Bound them ere long cities gathered, as at
St. Albans, Malmesbury, Sherborne, and Wimborne ;
the most memorable of those monasteries being that
at Canterbury, and that at Westminster, dedicated
to St. Peter, as the cathedral church near it had been
dedicated to St. Paul. In the North they were at
least as numerous. The University of Oxford is also
associated with that early age. It was beside the Isis
that St. Frideswida raised her convent, occupied at a
later date by canons regular, and ultimately trans-
formed into Christ Church by Cardinal Wolsey —
becoming thus the chief, as it had been the earliest,
among the schools in that great seat of learning
which within our own days has exercised a religious
influence over England not less remarkable than that
which belonged to its most palmy preceding period.
During that century England produced most of
174 I'RfiFACi;.
those saintly kings and queens whose names still
enrich the calendar of the Anglo-Saxon Church,
sovereigns who ruled their kingdoms with justice,
lived in mortification, went on pilgrimages, died in
cloisters. The great missionary work had also begun.
Within a century from the death of St. Augustine,
apostles from England had converted multitudes in
Germany, and St. Wilfrid had preached to the inhabit-
ants of Friesland. Something, moreover, had been
done to retrieve the past. The Saxon kings made
amends for the wrongs inflicted by their ancestors
upon the British Celts, endowing with English lands
the churches and convents founded by them in
Brittany. King Ken walk of Wessex showed thus
also a royal munificence to the Celtic monastery of
Glastonbury, only stipvilating in return that the
British monks there, condoning past injuries, should
offer a prayer for him when they knelt at the tomb
of King Arthur.
The England of the seventh century had been very
gradually prepared for that drama of many ages
which had then its first rehearsal. In it three races
had a pai't. They were those of the native Britons,
the Saxons who had over-run the land, and the Irish
missionaries. Home, the last and greatest of the old-
world empires, had exercised more of an enfeebling
and less of an elevating influence among the British
than among her other subject i-aces ; but her great
military roads still remained the witnesses of her
military genius ; and many a city, some in ruin, were
records of her wealth and her arts. The Teutonic
I'ace in England, Avhich for centuries had maintained
its independence against Rome, could not forgive the
Britons for having submitted to their hated foe, and
iniEFACE. 1 75
trampled on them the more ruthlessly becavise they
despised them. Yet they at least might well have
learned to respect that race. It has been well
remarked that if the Britons submitted easily to
Rome, yet of all her subject races they made far the
most memorable fight against that barbaric irruption
which swept over the ruins of her empire. For two
centuries that race had fought on. It still retained
the whole of Western Britain, Cornwall, Wales, and
Strathclyde ; while in other parts of England it
possessed large settlements. On the other hand, in
matters of spiritual concern the British race con-
trasted unfavourably Avith the other races subjected
by the barbarians. In France, Spain, and Italy, the
conquered had avenged a military defeat by a spiritual
victory, bringing over their conquerors to Christian-
ity ; and, as a consequence, they had often risen
to equality Avith them. In those parts of England,
on the contrary, where the British had submitted to
the Pagan conquerors, they by degrees abandoned
their Christian faith ; * and where they retained their
independence, they hated the Saxon conquerors too
mvxch to share their Christianity with them. Far
from desiring their conversion, they resisted all the
overtures made to them by the Roman missionaries
who ardently desired their aid ; and as a consequence
of that refusal, they eventually lost their country.
The chief cause of that refusal was hatred of the
invader. The Irish as well as the British had a
* See Montalembert's Moines dc V Occident, vol. iii. p. 84.3 ;
and also Burke : ' On the Continent tlie Christian religion, after
tlie northern irruptions, not only remained but flourished. . . .
In England it was so entirely extinguished that when Augustine
undertook his mission, it does not appear that among all the
Saxons there was a single person professing Christianity.'
176 PREFACE.
passionate devotion to their own local traditions in a
few matters not connected with doctrine ; but they
notwithstanding worked cordially with the Bene-
dictines from St. Gregory's convent for the spread of
the Christian Faith. Had the Britons converted the
Anglo-Saxon race they would probably have blended
with them, as at a later time that race blended with
their Norman conquerors. Three successive waves of
the Teuton-Scandinavian race swept over their ancient
land, the Anglo-Saxon, the Danish, and the Norman :
against them all the British Celts fought on. They
fell back toward their country's western coasts, like
the Irish of a later day ; and within their Cambrian
mountains they maintained their independence for
eight centuries.
Yet the Anglo-Saxons' victory was not an unmixed
one. Everywhere throughout England they main-
tained during the seventh century two different
battles, a material and a spiritual one, and with
opposite results. Year by year that race pushed further
its military dominion ; but yearly the Christian Faith
effected new triumphs over that of Odin. For this
there were traceable causes. The character of the
Teutonic invader included two very different ele-
ments, and the nobler of these had its affinities Avith
Christianity. If, on the one hand, that character was
fierce, reckless, and remorseless, and so far in natural
sympathy with a religion which mocked at suffering
and till the ninth century offered up human sacrifices,
it was marked no less by robustness, simplicity,
honesty, sincerity, an unexcitable energy and an
invincible endurance. It possessed also that cha-
racteristic which essentially contradistinguishes the
ordo equestris from the ordo i^^destris in human
PREFACE. 177
character, viz., the spirit of reverence. It had
aspirations ; and, as a background to all its musings
and all its hopes there remained ever the idea of the
Infinite. As a consequence, it retained a large
measure of self-respect, purity, and that veneration
for household ties attributed to it by the Eoman
historian * at a time when that virtue was no longer
a Roman one. Such a character could not but have
its leanings toward Christianity ; and, when brought
under its influences, it put forth at once new quali-
ties, like a wild flower which, on cultivation, acquires
for the first time a perfume. Its spirit of reverence
developed into humility, and its natural fortitude
into a saintly patience ; while its fierceness changed
into a loyal fervour ; and the crimes to which its
passions still occasionally hurried it were voluntarily
expiated by penances as terrible. Even King Penda,
the hater of Christianity, hated an insincere faith
more. ' Of all men,' he said, ' he that I have ever
most despised is the man who professes belief in some
God and yet does not obey his laws.' Such was that
character destined to produce under the influences of
faith such noble specimens of Christian honour and
spiritual heroism. From the beginning its greatness
was one
True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home ;
and in later ages it became yet more eminently
domestic, combining household ties with the pursuit
of letters and science in colleges which still preserved
a family life. Its monks had no vocation to the life
of the desert ; in this unlike the Irish saints, who,
* Tacitus. The German's wife might well be called his
' helpmate.' His wedding gift to his bride consisted of a horse,
a yoke of oxen, a Lance and a sword.
IV. N
178 PREFACE.
like those of Eastern lands, delighted in the forest
hermitage and the sea-beat rock.
The Anglo-Saxon race was but a branch of that great
Teuton-Scandinavian race, generically one whether it
remained in the German forests or wandered on to
the remoter coasts of Denmark, Sweden and Norway.
It was the race which the Romans called ' the Bar-
barians,' bvit which they could never conquer. A
stern history had trained it for a wonderful destiny.
Christianity in mastering the Greek had possessed
itself of the intellect of the world, and in mastering
Rome had found access to all those vast regions con-
quered by Roman' arms, opened out by Roman roads,
governed by Roman law, and by it helped to the
conception of a higher law. But the Greek and the
Roman civilisations had, each of them, corrupted its
way, and yielded to the seductions of pride, sense,
and material prospei'ity ; and, as a consequence, both
had become incapable of rendering full justice to much
that is highest in Christianity. That which they
lacked the ' Barbaric ' race alone was capable of
supplying. In its wanderings under darkened skies
and amid pitiless climates it had preserved an in-
nocence and simplicity elsewhere lost. Enriched by
the union of the new element, thus introduced, with
what it had previously derived from Greek thought
and Roman law, that authentic Religion which had
been prospectively sown within the narrow precinct
of Judea extended its branches over the world. Had
the Barbaric race shared in the Greek sciences and
arts, and clothed itself in the Roman civilisation, it
must have learned their corruptions. The larger
destiny of man could thus, humanly speaking, never
have been accomplished, and neither the mediteval
PREFACE. 179
world, the modern world, nor that yet higher order
of human society which doubtless lies beyond both,
could have existed. It was necessary that in some
region, exacting, yet beneficent, civilisation should
be retarded, that a remedy might be found for the
abuses of civilisation ; and races whose present back-
ward condition we are accustomed to deplore may
likewise be intended for a similar pui^pose. Plants
are thus kept in the dark in order to reserve their
fruitage for a fitter season.
But what had been the earlier history of a race
before which such destinies lay 1 What ti-aining had
prepared it for its work — the last that might have
been expected from it 1 On this subject there remains
a tradition, the profoundly significant character of
which ought to have made it more widely known.
Mallet, in his Xorthern Antiquities, translated by
Bishop Percy, to Avhom our ballad literature is so
deeply indebted, records it thus : — ' A celebrated
tradition, confirmed by the poems of all the northern
nations, by their chronicles, by institutions and
customs, some of which subsist to this day, informs
us that an extraordinary person named Odin formerly
reigned in the north. . . . All their testimonies are
comprised in that of Snorri, the ancient historian of
Norway, and in the commentaries and explications
which Torphiieus added to his narrative. The Eoman
Commonwealth was arrived at the highest pitch of
power, and saw all the then known world subject to
its laws, when an unforeseen event raised up enemies
against it from the very bosom of the forests of
Scythia and on the banks of the Tanais. Mithridates
by flying had drawn Pompey after him into those
deserts. The King of Pontus sought there for refuge
180 PREFACE.
and new means of vengeance. He hoped to arm
against the ambition of Rome all the barbarous
nations his neighbours, whose liberty she threatened.
He succeeded in this at first, but all those peoples,
ill united as allies, ill armed as soldiers, and still
worse disciplined, were forced to yield to the superior
genius of Pompey. Odin is said to have been of
their number, . . . Odin commanded the ^sir,
whose country must have been situated between the
Pontus Euxinus and the Caspian Sea. Their principal
city was Asgard. The worship there paid to their
supreme God was famous throughout the circumjacent
countries. Odin, having united under his banners
the youth of the neighbouring nations, marched
towards the north and west of Europe, subduing, as
we are told, all the races he found in his passage,
and giving them to one or other of his sons for sub-
jects. Many sovereign families of the North are said
to be descended from these princes. Thus Horsa and
Hengist, the chiefs of those Saxons who conquered
Britain in the fifth century, counted Odin or Wodin
in the number of their ancestors ; it was the same
with the other Anglo-Saxon princes as well as the
greatest part of those of lower Germany and the
North.' *
Gibbon refers to this ancient tradition, though not
as accepting it for a part of ascertained history, yet
in a spirit less sceptical than was usual to him. He
writes thus : ' It is supposed that Odin was chief of
a tribe of barbarians which dwelt on the banks of the
lake Mceotis, till the fall of Mithridates and the arms
* Mallet's Nortliern Antiquities, pp. 79, 80. (Bell and Dalily,
1873.) Burke records this tradition with an entire credence.
See note in p. 288.
PEEFACE. 181
of Pompey menaced tlie north with servitude. That
Odin, yielding with indignant fury to a power which
he was unal)le to resist, conducted his tribe from the
frontiers of the Asiatic Saruiatia into Sweden, with
the great design of forming, in that inaccessible
retreat of freedom, a religion and a people which, in
some remote age, might be subservient to his im-
mortal revenge ; Avhen his invincible Goths, armed
Avith martial fanaticism, should issue in numerous
swarms from the neighbourhood of the Polar circle
to chastise the oppressors of mankind. . . . Not-
withstanding the mysterious obscurity of the Edda,
we can easily distinguish two persons confounded
under the name of Odin ; the god of war, and the
great legislator of Scandinavia. The latter, the
Mahomet of the north, instituted a religion adapted
to the climate and to the people. Numerous tribes
on either side of the Baltic were subdued by the
invincible valour of Odin, by his persuasive elo-
quence, and by the fame wdiich he acquired of a most
skilful magician. The faith that he had propagated
during a long and prosperous life he confirmed by a
voluntary death. Apprehensive of the ignominious
approach of disease and infirmity, he resolved to ex-
pire as became a warrior. In a solemn assembly of
the Swedes and Goths he wounded himself in nine
mortal places, hastening away (as he asserted with
his dying voice) to prepare the feast of heroes in the
palace of the great god of war.' *
In a note Gibbon adds, referring to the Homan and
Oriental part of the legend : ' This wonderful ex-
pedition of Odin, which, by deducing the enmity of
the Goths and Romans from so memorable a cause,
* Decline and Fall of tlic Roman Empire, cliap. x.
1 82 PREFACE,
might .supply the noble groundwork of an epic poem,
cannot safely be received as authentic history. Ac-
cording to the obvious sense of the Edda, and the
interpretation of the most skilful critics, Asgard,
instead of denoting a real city of the Asiatic 8armatia,
is the fictitious appellation of the mystic al)ode of
the gods, the Olympus of Scandinavia.' Whether the
emigration of the 'Barbaric race from the East be or
be not historical, certainly the grounds upon which
Gibbon bases his distrust of it are slender. He
forgot that there might well have been both an
earthly Asgard and also, according to the religion of
the north, an Asgard in heaven, the destined abode
of warriors faithful to Odin. Those who after his
death changed their king into a god would, by
necessity, have provided him with a celestial mansion;
nor could they have assigned to it a name more
acceptable to a race which blended so closely their
religion with their patriotic love than that of their
ancient capital, from which their great deliverer and
prophet had led them forth in pilgrimage. Let us
hope that Gibbon's remai-k as to the fitness of this
grand legend for the purposes of epic poetry may yet
prove prophecy. It has had one chance already : for
we learn from the first book of The Prelude that the
theme was one of those on which the imagination of
Wordsworth rested in youth, when he was seeking
a fit subject for epic song.
It is difficult to imagine a historical lesfend invested
with a greater moral weight or dignity than belongs
to this one. The mighty Republic was soon to pass
into an Empire mightier and more ruthless still, the
heir of all those ancient empires which from the
earliest had represented a dominion founded on the
PREFACE. 183
pride of this world, and had trampled upon human
right. A race is selected to work the retribution.
It is qualitied for its work by centuries of adversity,
only to be paralleled by the prqsperity of its rival.
Yet when at last that retribution comes, it descends
more in mercy than in judgment ! Great changes
had prepared the woi'ld for a new order of things.
The centre of empire had moved eastward from Rome
to ConstantinojDle : the spiritual centre had moved
westward from Jerusalem to Rome. The empire had
herself become Christian, and was allowed after that
event nearly a century more of gradual decline. The
judgment was not thus averted ; but it was ennobled.
Her children were enabled to become the spiritual
instrvxctors of those wild races by which the ' State
Universal ' had been overwhelmed. That emnire
indeed, was not so much destroyed as transformed
and extended, a grace rendered possible by her having
submitted to the yoke of Christ ; the new kingdoms
which constituted the Christian ' Orb is Terrarum'
being, for the most part, fi*agments of it, while its
laws made way into regions wider far, and exercised
over them a vast though modified aiithority not yet
extinct. Here, if anywhere, we catch glimpses of
a hand flashing forth between the clouds, pointing
their way to the nations, and conducting Humanity
forward along its arduous and ascending road. There
is a Providence or there could be no Progress.
For the fulfilment of that part assigned to the
' Barbarians ' in this marvellous drama of the ages,
it was necessary that many things should combine ; an
exemption from the temptations which had material-
ised the races of the south ; the severe life that
perfects strength ; a race endowed with the physical
184 PREFACE,
strength needed to render sucli sufferings endurable ;
and lastly, an original spiritual elevation inherent in
that race, and capable of making them understand
the lesson, and accept their high destiny. The last
and greatest of these qualifications had not been
wanting. Much as the religion of the Barbaric race
had degenerated by the time when it deified its great
deliverer, it had inherited the highest traditions of
the early world. Mallet thus describes their religion
in its purity : ' It taught the being of a " Supreme
God, master of the universe, to whom all things are
submissive and obedient." Such, according to Tacitus,
was the supreme God of the Germans. The ancient
Icelandic mythology calls him "the Author of every-
thing that existeth ; the eternal, the ancient, the
living and awful Being, the searcher into concealed
things, the Being that never changeth." This religion
attributed to the Supreme Deity "an infinite power,
a boundless knowledge, an incorruptible justice," and
forbade its followers to represent Him under any
corporeal form. They were not even to think of
confining Him within the enclosure of walls, but
were taught that it was within woods and conseci^ated
forests that they could serve Him properly. There
He seemed to reign in silence, and to make Himself
felt by the respect which He inspired.* . . . From
this Supreme God were sprung (as it were emanations
from His divinity) an infinite number of sul)altern
deities and genii, of which every part of the visible
world was the seat and the temple. ... To serve
this divinity with sacrifices and prayers, to do no
wrong to others, and to be brave and intrepid in
themselves, were all the moral consequences they
* ^Mallet's Northern Antiquities, pp. 88, 89.
PREFACE. 185
derived from these doctrines. Lastly, the belief of
a future state cemented and completed the whole
building.* . . . Pei'haps no religion ever attributed
so much to a Divine Providence as that of the northern
nations. ' f
It was not among the Scandinavians only that the
religion of the North retained long these vestiges of
its original purity, and elevation. ' All the Teutonic
nations held the same opinions, and it was upon
these that they founded the obligation of serving the
gods, and of being valiant in battle. . . . One ought
to regard in this respect the Icelandic mythology as
a precious monument, without which we can know
but very imperfectly this important part of the
religion of our fathers.^ %
The earlier and purer doctrine seems to have
long survived the incrustations of later times in the
case of a select few. Harold Harfraga, the first
king of all Norway, thus addressed an assembly of
his people : * I swear and protest in the most sacred
manner that I will never offer sacrifice to any of the
gods adored by the people, but to Him only who
hath formed this world, and everything we behold in
it.' A belief in the divine Love, as well as the divine
power, knowledge and justice, though probably not
held by the many at a later day, is yet distinctly
expressed, as well as the kindred belief in an endless
reign of peace, by the earliest and most sacred
document of the Northern religion, viz. the ' Yoluspii
Prophecy.' That prophecy, after foretelling the
destruction of all tilings, including the Odin gods
themselves, by the Supreme God and His ministers,
* Mallet's Northern Antiquities, p. 89.
t P. 100. % P. 103.
186 PREFACE.
proceeds : ' There will arise out of the sea, another
earth most lovely and verdant with pleasant fields
where the grain shall grow unsown. Yidar and Vali,
shall survive ; neither the flood nor Surtur's fire shall
harm them. ; they shall dwell on the plain of Ida
where Asgard formerly stood. . . . Baldur and Hcidnr
shall also rejmir thither from the abode of death.
There they shall sit and converse together, and call
to mind their former knowledge and the perils they
underwent.' *
The similarity between the higher doctrines of
the northern faith and the religion of ancient Persia
is at once accounted for by the tradition of the
Odin migration from the East. A writer the reverse
of credulous expresses himself thus on that subject :
' We know that the Scandinavians came from some
country of Asia. . . This doctrine was in many
respects the same with that of the Magi. Zoroaster
had taught that the conflict between Ormuzd and
Ahriman {i. e. light and darkness, the Good and
Evil Principle) should continue to the last day ; and
that then the Good Principle should be reunited to
the Supreme God, from whom it had first issued; the
Evil should be overcome and subdued ; darkness
should be destroyed ; and the world, purified l)y a
universal conflagration, should become a luminous
and shining abode, into which evil should never
be jDcrmitted to enter.' f The same writer continues
thus : ' Odin and the ^sir may be compared to
Ormuzd and the Amshaspands ; Loki and his evil
progeny, the Wolf Fenrir and the Midgard Serpent,
together with the giants and monsters of Jotunheim
* The Prose Edda.
t Northern A )d.iqiutics : the Editor, T. A. Blackwell,
PREFACE. 187
and Hvergelmir, to Ahriman and the Devs.* . . .
We will not deny that some of these doctrines may
have been handed down by oral tradition to the
pontiff-chieftains of the Scandinavian tribes, and that
the Skalds who composed the mystic poems of the
Edda may have had an obscure and imperfect know-
ledge of them. Be this as it may, we must not
forget that the higher doctrines of the Scandinavian
svstem were confined to the few, whereas those of
the Zendavesta were the religious belief of the whole
nation.! . . , The Persian system was calcvilated to
form an energetic, intellectual and highly moral
people ; the Scandinavian a semi-barbarous troop of
crafty and remorseless warriors. . . . Yet, such as
they were, these Scandinavians seemed to have been
destined by the inscrutable designs of Providence to
invigorate at least one of the nations of which they
were for centuries the scourge, in order, as we
previously had occasion to observe, that the genial
blending of cognate tribes might form a people the
most capable of carrying on the great work of
civilisation, which in some far distant age may
finally render this world that abode of peace and
intellectual enjoyment dimly shadowed forth in
ancient myths as only to be found in a renovated
and fresh emerging universe.' X
The inferiority of the later Scandinavian to the
earlier Persian religion may be sufliciently accounted
for by the common process of gradi;al degenera-
tion. That dea^eneration was not confined to the
great emigrant race. Centuries before Odin had left
the East, the Persian religion had degenerated upon
* T. A. Blackwell. See Mallet's Northern Antiquities, p. 474.
t P. 475. X V. 476.
188 PREFACE,
its native soil. Its Magi retained a pure doctrine,
which led them later to the Bethlehem crib ; but
its vulgar liad in part yielded to the seduction of
Greek poets, and worshipped in temples like theirs.
It is remarkable that that ' one of the nations ' with
which the hopes of the fviture are so singularly con-
nected is that one upon which the discipline of
adversity had fallen with double force. When the
ancient enemy of the ' Barbaric races,' Rome, had
passed away, a new enemy, and one to it more for-
midable, rose up against England in her own kinsfolk,
the Scandinavian branch of the same stock. The
Danish invaders expected to set kingdom against
kingdom throughout the Heptarchy, and subject
them all to the sceptre of Odin. On the contrary,
it iniited them in one ; and that union was facilitated
by the bond of a common Christianity.*
That the belief of the Anglo-Saxons, though
less developed by poetry and romance, was sub-
stantially the same as that recorded in the Scandi-
navian Edda, appears to be certain. It is thus that
Mr. Kemble speaks :
' On the Continent as well as in England, it is
only by the collection of minute and isolated facts
— often preserved to us in popular superstitions,
legends and even nursery tales — that we can render
probable the prevalence of a religious belief iden-
tical in its most characteristic features with that
which we know to have been entertained in
Scandinavia. Yet whatsoever we can thus recover
proves that, in all main points, the faith of the Island
* ' This (Christianity), as it introduced great mildness into
the tempers of the people, made them less warlike, and con-
sequently prepared the way to their forming one body.' — Burke,
An Abridgment of English Histoi-ij, book ii. chap. iii.
PREFACE. 18!)
Saxons was that of their Continental brethren.'
' The early period at which Christianity triumphed
in England, adds to the difficulties which natvxrally
beset the subject. Norway, Sweden, and Denmai^k,
had entered into public relations with the rest of
Europe long before the downfall of their ancient
creed ; here the fall of heathendom, and the com-
mencement of history were contemporaneous. We
too had no Iceland to offer a refuge to those who
fled from the violent course of a conversion.' *
Among the proofs of identity between the Anglo-
Saxon and the Scandinavian religion, Mr. Kemble
refers to the fact that ' genealogies of the Anglo-
Saxon kings contain a multitude of the ancient gods,
reduced indeed into the family relations, but still
capable of identification Avith the deities of the
North, and of Germany. In this relation we find
Odin, BtL'Idoeg, Ge-at, Wig, and Frea. The days
of the week, also dedicated to gods, supply us further
with the names of Tiw, Dunor, Friege, and Scetere ;
and the names of places in all parts of England
attest the wide dispersion of the worship.' f
Mr. Kemble shows also that among the Anglo-
Saxons and the Scandinavians there existed a common
belief respecting monsters, especially the wolf Fenrir,
the Midgard snake, evil spirits and giants ; respecting
Loki, the accursed spirit, and Hela, the queen of
Hades. To the same effect Mr. Sharon Turner
speaks : ' The Yolusp4 and the Edda are the two
great repositories of the oldest and most venerated
traditions of pagan Scandinavia. The Yoluspa opens
abruptly, and most probably represents many of the
* Saxons in England, vol. i. p. 330.
t Ibid. p. 335.
190 PREFACE.
ancient Saxon traditions or imaginations.' * The
authority of these eminent writers accounts for and
justifies the frequent references to the Scandinavian
mythology in the following ' Saxon Legends.'
We have thus seen that in the religion of the
' Barl)aric ' race there were blended two different
elements : a higher one derived from its eastern
origin, and a lower one the result of gradual de-
generation. AVe had previously seen that a remark-
able duality was to be found in the character of
that race ; and without understanding this duality
and its root in their religion, no just conception
can be formed of the relations of that race with
Christianity. Had the ' Barbarians ' possessed nothing
deeper than is indicated by their fiercer traits, the
history of the seventh century in England must
have been very different. It was characterised by
rapid conversions to Christianity on a large scale,
and often, after the lapse of a few years, by sanguinary
revolts against the Faith. The chief reason of such
fluctuation seems to have been this, viz. because
all that was profound, and of venerable antiquity
in the Northern religion, was in sympathy with
Christianity, as the religion of sanctity and self-
sacrifice ; while all that was savage in it opposed
itself to a religion of humility and of charity. The
Northern religion was an endless warfare, and so
was that early Persian religion from which its
higher element was derived ; but by degrees that
warfare had, for the many, ceased to be the warfare
between light and darkness, between Good and
Evil. To the speculative it had become a conflict
between all the wild and illimitable forces of Nature
* History of the Anglo-Saxons, vol. i. p. 241.
PREFACE. 191
and some unknown higher Law ; but to the common
herd it meant only an endless feud between race and
I'ace. Thus understood it could have no affinities
with Christianity, either in her militant character, or
as the religion of peace.
In explanation of the frequent outbreaks against
Christianity on the part of the Anglo-Saxons, after
their conversion, Montalembert assigns another cause,
viz. that the Eoman missionaries had sometimes
relied too much upon the converted kings, and their
authority over their subjects. The work had in such
cases to be done again ; and it was largely done by
Irish missionaries, who had left lona only to seek
as lonely a retreat in Lindisfarne. They shunned
cities, drew the people to them, and worked upwards
tlu'ough that people to the great.
The Irish mission in England during the seventh
century was one among the great things of history,
and has met with an inadequate appreciation. The
ancient name of the Irish, ' Scoti,' commemorative of
their supposed Scythian origin, the name by which
Bede always designates them, had been frequently
translated ' Scottish ' by modern historians ; and
those who did not know that an Irish immigrant
body had entered Scotland, then called Alba, about
the close of the second century, had conqviered its
earlier inhabitants, the Picts, after a war of centuries,
and had eventually given to that heroic land, never
since subdued, its own name and its royal house,
naturally remained ignorant that those ' Scottish '
missionaries were Irish. A glance at Bede,* or such
* ' In process of time, Britain, besides the Britons and Picts,
received a third nation, the Scots, who niigr-ating from Ireland,
under their leader Reuda, either by fair means or by force of
192 PREFACE.
well-known recent works as Sir W. Scott's History
of Scotland,"^ makes this matter plain ; yet the amount
of work done in England by those Irish missioiaaries
is still known to few.
They came from a country the fortunes, the
character, and the institutions of which Avere singu-
larly unlike those of England ; one in which ancient
Rome had had no part ; which, in the form of clan-life,
retained as its social type the patriarchal customs of
its native East, all authority being an expansion
of domestic authority, and the idea of a family, rather
than that of a state, ruling over the hearts of men.
About two centuries previously, Ireland had become
Christian ; and an image of its immemorial clan-
arms secured to themselves those settlements among the Picts
■which they still possess.' — Bede's Ecclesiastical Hist. book. i.
cap. i.
* ' In the fifth century there appear in North Britain two
powerful and distinct tribes, who are not before named in
history. These are the Picts and the Scots. . . . The Scots,
on the other hand, were of Irish origin ; for, to the great con-
fusion of ancient history, the inhabitants of Ireland, those at
least of the conquering and predominating caste, were called
Scots. A colony of these Irish Scots distinguished by the name
of Dalriads, or Dalreudini, natives of Ulster, had early attempted
a settlement on the coast of Argyleshire ; they finally established
themselves there under Fergus, the son of Eric, about the year
503, and, recruited by colonies from Ulster, continued to
multiply and increase until they formed a nation which occupied
the western side of Scotland.' — Sir Walter Scott's History of
Scotland, vol. i. p. 7. Scott proceeds to record the eventual
triumph of the Irish or Seotic race over the Pictish in the ninth
century. 'So complete must have been the revolution that the
very language of the Picts is lost. . . The country united
under his sway (that of Kenneth Mac Alpine) was then called
for the first time Scotland.' The same statement is made by
Burke : ' The principal of these were the Scots, a people of
ancient settlement in Ireland, and who had thence been trans-
planted into the nortliern part of Britain, which afterwards
derived its name fi'onr that colony.' — Burke, Ahridgmcnt of
English History, book i. cap. iv.
PREFACE. 193
system was reproduced in the vast convents which
ere long covered the land, and sent forth their
missionaries over a large part of Europe. It might
well have been thought doubtful whether these were
likely to work successfully among a race so dissimilar
as the Anglo-Saxon ; but the event proved that
in this instance dissimilar qualities meant qualities
complemental to each other, and that sympathy was
attracted by unlikeness.
The Irish mission in England began at a critical
time, just when the reaction against the earlier
successes of the Roman mission had set in. At
York, under Paulinus, Christianity had triumphed ;
but eight years after that event Edwin, the Christian
king of Deira, perished in battle, and northern
England was forced back by king Penda into pagan-
ism. Southern England, with the exception of
Canterbury and a considerable part of Kent, had
also lost the Gospel, after possessing it for thirty
years. Nearly at the same time East Anglia and
Essex, at the command of pagan-kings, had dis-
carded it likewise. It was then that Oswald, on
recovering his kingdom of Northumbria, besought the
Irish monks of lona to reconvert it, or rather to com-
plete a conversion which had been but begun. Their
work prospered ; by degrees the largest kingdom of
the Heptarchy became solidly and permanently
Christian, its See being fixed in the Island of Lindis-
farne, whence the huge diocese of the north was ruled
successively by three of St. Columba's order, Aidan,
Finan, and Colman. But the labours of St. Columba's
sons were not confined to the north. In East Anglia
an Irish monk, St. Fursey, founded on the coast of
Sviifolk the monastei*y of Burghcastle, in which King
IV. o
194 PEEFACE.
Sigebert became a monk. An Irish priest, INIaidul-
phus, built that of Malmesbury in Wessex. Glaston-
bury was an older Celtic monastery inhabited partly
by Irish monks, and partly by British. Peada, king
of Mercia, son of the terrible Penda, was baptized
by St. Finan close to the Roman Wall, as was also
Sigebert, king of the East Saxons. Diama, an Irish
monk, was first bishop of all Mercia, its second,
Ceoloch, being Irish also, and also its fourth.
Montalembert, in his Moines d' Occident, has given
us the most delightful history that exists of the con-
version of Anglo-Saxon England, a work combining
the depth of a Christian philosopher with the sagacity
of a statesman, and a dramatist's appreciation of
character, Avhile in it we miss nothing of that pic-
turesqvie vividness and engaging simplicity Avhich
belong to our early chroniclers ; thus conferring
upon England a boon if possible greater than that
bestowed vipon Ireland in his lives of St. Columba,
St. Columbanus and other saints. It is thus that he
apportions the share which the Irish missionaries and
the Roman had in that great enterprise.
'En resumant riiistoire des efforts tentes pendant
les soixante ans ecoules depuis le debarquement
d'Augustin jusqu'a la mort de Penda, pour introduire
le Christianisme en Angleterre, on constate les
resultats que voici. Des huit royaumes de la con-
federation Anglo-Saxonne, celui de Kent fut seul
exclusivement conquis et conserve par les moines
romains, dont les premieres tentatives, chez les Est-
Saxons et les Northumbriens, se terminerent par un
echec. En Wessex et en Est-Anglie les Saxons a
I'ouest et les Angles a Test furent convertis par
Taction combinee de missionnaires continentaux et de
PREFACE. 195
moines celtiques. Quant aux deux royaumes Nortli-
umbriens ' (Deira and Bernicia), ' a I'Essex et a la
Mercie, comprenant a eux seuls plus de deux tiers dvi
territoire occupe par les conquerants germains, ces
quatre pays dui^ent leur conversion definitive exclu-
sivement a I'invasion pacifique des moines celtiques,
qui n'avaient pas seulement rivalise de zele avec les
moines remains, mais qui, une fois les premiers
obstacles surmontes, avaient montre bien plus de per-
severance et obtenu bien plus de sueces.'* The only
effort made at tbat early period to introduce
Christianity into the kingdom of the South-Saxons
was that of an Irish monk, Dicul, who founded a
small monastery at Bosham. It did not however
prove successful.
There is something profoundly touching in the
religious ties which subsisted between England and
Ireland during the seventh century, when compared
with the troubled relations of those two countries
during many a later age. If the memory of benefits
received produces a kindly feeling on the part of the
recipient, that of benefits conferred should exert the
same influence on the heart of the bestower. To
remember the past, however disastrous or convulsed,
is a nation's instinct, and its duty no less, since a
tribute justly due is thus paid to great actions and
to great sufferings in times gone by ; nor among the
wise and the generous can the discharge of that
patriotic duty ever engender an enmity against the
living : but there is a special satisfaction in turning to
those recollections with which no human infirmity can
connect any feeling save that of good will ; and it is
* Moines d'Occident, vol. iv. pp. 127-8. Par le Comte de
Montaleiubert.
196 PREFACE.
scarcely possible to recall tliem in this instance Avithout
a hope that the sacred bonds which united those two
countries at that remote period may be a pledge for
reciprocated benefits in the ages yet before us. For
both countries that early time was a time of wonderful
spiritual greatness. In noble rivalry with Ireland
Enerland also sent her missionaries to far lands :
and a child of Wessex, St. Boniface, brought the
Faith to Germany, by which it was eventually
diffused over Scandinavia, thus, by anticipation,
bestowing the highest of all gifts on that terrible race
the Northmen, in later centuries the scourge of his
native land.
At home both islands were filled with saints
whose names have ever since resounded throus;hout
Christendom. Both islands, as a great writer * has
told us, ' had been the refuge of Christianity, for a
time almost exterminated in Christendom, and the
centres of its propagation in counti-ies still heathen.
Secluded from the rest of Europe by the stormy waters
in which they lay, they were converted just in time to
be put in charge with the sacred treasures of Revela-
tion, and with the learning of the old world, in that
dreary time which intervened between Gregory and
Charlemagne. They formed schools, collected libraries,
and supplied the Continent with preachers and
teachers.' He i-emarks also that ' There was a
fitness in the course of things that the two peoples
who had rejoiced in one prosperity should drink
together the same cup of suffering : Amahiles, et
decori in vita sud, in morte non divisi ; ' and he
proceeds to remind us that, immediately after their
* Cardinal Newman's Historical Sketches, vol. i. p. 226 : The
Nbrthmcn and Nor7nans in England and Ireland.
PREFACE. 197
participation in that common religious greatness,
they partook also a tragic inheritance. In England
for two centuries and a half, in Ireland for a longer
period, the Northmen were repulsed but to reappeai".
Again and again the sons of Odin blackened the
river-mouths of each land with their fleets ; whenever
they marched they left behind them the ashes of
burned churches and monasteries, till, in large parts
of both, Chi'istianity and learning had well-nigh
perished, and barbarism had all but returned. In
both countries domestic dissensions had favoured the
invader ; eventually in both the Danish powder broke
down; but in both and in each case claiming a
spiritual sanction — another branch of the same
Scandinavian stock succeeded to the Dane, viz. the
only one then Christianised, the Norman. In that
seventh century how little could Saxon convert or
Irish missionary have foreseen that the destinies of
their respective countries should be at once so unlike
yet so like, so antagonistic yet so interwoven !
The aim of the ' Legends of Saxon Saints,' as the
reader will perhaps have inferred from the preceding
remarks, is to illustrate England, her different races
and predominant characteristics, during the century
of her conversion to Christianity, and in doing this
to indicate what circumstances had proved favourable
or unfavourable to the reception of the Eaith. It
became desirable thus to revert to the early emigra-
tion of that 'Barbaric' i-ace of which the Anglo-Saxon
was a scion, making the shadow of Odin pass in suc-
cession over the background of the several pictures
presented (the Heroic being thus the unconscious
precursor of the Spiritual), and to show how the religion
198 PREFACE.
which bore his name was fitted at once to predispose its
nobler votaries to Christianity and to infuriate against
it those who but valued their faith for what it con-
tained of degenerate. It seemed also expedient to
select for treatment not only those records most
abounding in the picturesque and poetic, but likewise
others useful as illustrating the chief representatives
of a many-sided society ; the pagan king and the
British warrior, the bard of Odin and the prophetess
of Odin, the Gaelic missionary and the Roman
missionary, the poet and the historian of Anglo-Saxon
Christianity. In a few instances, as in the tales of
Oswald and of Oswy, where the early chronicle was
copious in detail, it has been followed somewhat
closely ; but more often, where the original record
was brief, all except the fundamental facts had to be
supplied. On these occasions I found encouragement
in the remark of a writer at once deep and refined.
' Stories to be versified should not be already nearly
complete, having the beauty in themselves, and gain-
ing from the poet but a garb. They shovild be rough,
and with but a latent beauty. The poet should have
to supply the features and limbs as well as the dress.' *
Bede has been my guide. His records are, indeed,
often ' rough,' as rough as the crab-tree, but, at the
same time, as fresh as its blossom. Their brief
touches reveal all the passions of the Barbaric races ;
but the chief human affections, things far deeper than
the passions, are yet more abundantly illustrated by
them.f It was a time when those affections were not
* Sara Coleridge.
t As the iUustration of an Age, Bede's Eistorij has been well
compared by Cardinal Manning with the Fiordti di S. Francesco,
that exquisite illustration of the thirteenth century.
PREFACE. 199
frozen by conventionalities and forced to conceal
themselves until tliey forgot to exist. In the narra-
tive of Bede we find also invaluable illustrations of a
higher but not less real range of human affections,
viz. the affections of ' Christianised Humanity,'
affections grounded on divine truths and heavenly
hopes, and yet in entire harmony with affections of a
merely human order, which lie beneath them in a
parallel plane. Occasionally the two classes enter
into conflict, as in the case of the monks of Bardeney
who found it so difficult to reconcile their reverence
for a Saint with their patriotic hatred of a foreign
invader; but almost invariably the earthly and the
heavenly emotions are mutually supplemental, as in
those tender friendships of monk with monk, of king
and bishop, grounded upon religious sympathy and
co-operation ; so tliat the lower sentiment without the
higher would present, compared with the pictures now
bequeathed to us, but an unfinished and truncated
image of Humanity. Here, again, the semi-barbaric
age described by Bede rendered the delineation more
vivid. In aafes of effeminate civilisation the Christian
emotions, even more than those inherent in unassisted
human nature, lose that ardour which belongs to them
when in a healthy condition — an ardour which especi-
ally reveals itself during that great crisis, a nation's
conversion, when beside a thi-ong of new feelings and
new hopes, a host of new Trutlis has descended upon
the intelligence of a whole people, and when a sense
of new knowledge and endless progress is thus com-
municated to it, far exceeding that which is the boast
of nations devoted chiefly to physical science. The
sense of progress, indeed, when such a period reaches
its highest, is a rapture. It is as though the motion
200 PREFACE.
of the planet which carries us through space, a motion
of which we ai'e cognisant but which we yet cannot
feel, could suddenly become, like the speed of a race-
horse, a thing brought home to our consciousness.
Such ardours are scarcely imaginable in the later
ages of a nation ; but in Bede's day a people accept-
ing the ' glad tidings ' was glad ; and, unambitious
as his style is of the ornamental or the figvirative,
it is brightened by that which it so faithfully
describes. His chronicle is often poetry, little as
he intended it to be such ; nay, it is poetry in
her ' humanities ' yet more than in her distinctively
spiritual province, and better poetry than is to be
found in the professed poetry of a materialistic age,
when the poet is tempted to take refuge from the
monotony of routine life, either amid the sensational
accidents to be found on the byeways, not the high-
ways, of life, or in some sickly dreamland that does
not dare to deal with life, and belongs neither to the
real nor to the ideal. In nothing is Bede's history
of that great age, to which our own owes all that it
possesses of real greatness, more striking than in
that spirit of unconscious elevation and joyousness
which belongs to the Christian life it records, a
joyousness often so strikingly contrasted with the
sadness — sometimes a heroic sadness — to be found in
portions of his work describing pagan manners.
With all its violences and inconsistencies, the seventh
century was a noble age — an age of strong hearts
which were gentle as well as strong, of a childhood
that survived in manhood, of natures that had not
lost their moral unity, of holy lives and of happy
deaths. Bede's picture of it is a true one ; and for
that reason it comes home to us.
PREFACE. 201
To some it may seem a profaneness to turn those
old legends into verse. I should not have attempted
the enterprise if they were mvich read in prose. The
verse may at least help to direct the attention of a
few readers to them. From them the thoughtful
will learn how to complete a ' half-truth ' often
reiterated. Those who have declared that ' the wars
of the Heptarchy are as dull as the battles of kites
and crows/ have not always known that the true
interest of her turbulent days belonged to peace, not
to war, and that it is to be found in the spiritual
development of the Anglo-Saxon race.
PEOLOGUE.
ODIN THE MAN.
Odin, a Prince who reigned near the Caspian Sea, after a vain
resistance to the Roman arms, leads forth his people to the
forests north of the Danube, that, serving God in freedom on
the limits of the Roman Empire, and being strengthened by an
adverse climate, they may one day descend npon that empire
in just revenge ; which destiny was fulfilled by the sack of
Rome, under Alaric, Christian King of the Goths, a race
derived, like the Saxon, from that Eastern people.
Forth with those missives, Chiron, to the Invader !
Hence, and make speed : they scathe mine eyes like
fire :
Pompeins, thou hast conquered ! What remains 1
Vengeance ! Man's race has never dreamed of such ;
So slow, so sure. Pompeius, I depart :
I might have held these mountains yet four days :
The fifth had seen them thine —
I look beyond the limit of this night :
Four centuries I need ; then comes mine hour.
What saith the Accursed One of the Western
World ?
I hear even now her trumpet ! Thus she saith :
* I have enlarged my borders : iron reaped
Earth's field all golden. Strenuous fight we fought :
204 ODIN THE MAN.
I left some sweat drops on that Carthage shore,
Some blood on Gallic javelins. That is past !
My pleasant days are come : my covich is spread
Beside all waters of the Midland Sea ;
By whispers lulled of nations kneeling rovmd ;
Illumed by light of balmiest climes • refx'eshed
By winds from Atlas and the Olympian snows :
Henceforth my foot is in delicious ways ;
Bathe it, ye Persian fovintains ! Syrian vales,
All roses, make me sleepy with perfumes !
Caucasian cliffs, with martial echoes faint
Flatter light slumbers ; charm a Roman dream !
I send you my Pompeius ; let him lead
Odin in chains to Rome ! ' Odin in chains !
Were Odin chained, or dead, that God he serves
Could raise a thousand Odins —
Rome's Founder-King beside his Augur standing
Noted twelve ravens borne in sequent flight
O'er Alba's crags. They emblem'd centuries twelve,
The term to Rome conceded. Eight are flown ;
Remain but four. Hail, sacred brood of night !
Hencefore my standards bear the Raven Sign,
The bird that hoarsely haunts the ruined tower ;
The bird sagacious of the field of blood
Albeit far off. Four centuries I need :
Then comes my day. My i-ace and I are one.
O Race beloved and holy ! From my youth
Where'er a hungry heart impelled my feet,
Whate'er I found of glorious, have I not
Claimed it for thee, deep-musing ? Ignorant, first,
For thee I wished the golden ingots piled
In Susa and Ecbatana : — ah fool !
At Athens next, treading where Plato trod.
For thee all triumphs of the mind of man,
ODIN THE MAN. 205
And Phidian hand inspii-ed ! Ah fool, that hour
Athens lay bound, a slave ! Later to Rome
In secrecy by Mithridates sent
To search the inmost of his hated foe,
For thee I claimed that discipline of Law
Which made her State one camp. Fool, fool once
more !
Soon learned I what a heart-pollution lurked
Beneath that mask of Law. As Persia fell,
By softness sapped, so Rome. Behold, this day,
Following the Pole Star of my just revenge,
I lead my people forth to clearer fates
Through cloudier fortunes. They are brave and
strong :
'Tis but the rose-breath of their vale that rots
Their destiny's bud unblown. I lead them forth,
A race war-vanquished, not a race of slaves ;
Lead them, not southward to Euphrates' bank,
Not Eastward to the realms of rising suns.
Nor West to Rome, and bondage. Hail, thou North !
Hail, boundless woods, by nameless oceans girt,
And snow -robed mountain islets, founts of fire !
Four hundred years ! I know that awful North :
I sought it when the one flower of my life
Fell to my foot. That anguish set me free :
It dashed me on the iron side of life :
I woke, a man. My people too shall wake :
They shall have icy crags for myrtle banks,
Shai-p rocks for couches. Strength ! I must have
strength ;
Not splenetic sallies of a woman's courage.
But hearts to which self-pity is unknown :
Hard life to them must be as mighty wine
Gladdening the strong : the death on battle-fields
206 ODIN THE MAN,
Must seem the natural, honest close of life ;
Their fear must be to die without a wound
And miss Life's after-banquet. Wooden shield
Whole winter nights shall lie their covering sole :
Thereon the boy shall stem the ocean wave ;
Thereon the youth shall slide with speed of winds
Loud-laughing down the snowy mountain-slope :
To him the Sire shall whisper as he bleeds,
' Remember the revenge ! Thy son must prove
More strong, more hard than thou ! '
Four hundred years !
Increase is tardy in that icy clime,
For Death is there the awful nurse of Life :
Death rocks the cot. Why meet we there no wolf
Save those huge-limbed 1 Because weak wolf-cubs die.
'Tis thus with man ; 'tis thus with all things strong : —
Rise higher on thy northern hills, my Pine !
That Southern Palm shall dwindle.
House stone-walled —
Ye shall not have it ! Temples cedar-roofed —
Ye shall not build them ! Where the Temple stands
The City gathers. Cities ye shall spurn :
Live in the woods ; live singly, winning each.
Hunter or fisher by blue lakes, his prey :
Abhor the gilded shrine : the God Unknown
In such abides not. On the mountain's top
Great Persia sought Him in her day of strength :'
With her ye share the kingly breed of Truths,
The noblest inspirations man hath known.
Or can know — ay, unless the Lord of all
Should come, Man's Teacher. Pray as Persia pi-ayed ;
And see ye pray for Vengeance ! Leave till then
To Rome her Idol fanes and pilfered Gods.
ODIN THE MAN. 207
I see you, O my People, year by year
Strengthened by sufferings ; pains that crush the Aveak,
Your helpers. Men have been that, poison-fed,
Grew poison-proof : on pain and wrong feed ye !
The wild-beast rage against you ! frost and fire
Rack you in turn ! I'll have no gold among you ;
With gold come wants ; and wants mean servitude.
Edge, each, his spear with fish-bone or with flint.
Leaning for prop on none. I want no Nations !
A Race I fashion, playing not at States :
I take the race of Man, the breed that lifts
Alone its brow to heaven : I change that race
From clay to stone, from stone to adamant
Through slow abrasion, such as leaves sea-shelves
Liistrous at last and smooth. To he, not have,
A man to be ; no heritage to clasp
Save that which simple manhood, at its will.
Or conquers or re-conquers, held meanwhile
In trust for Virtue ; this alone is greatness.
Remain ye Tribes, not Nations ; led by Kings,
Great onward-striding Kings, above the rest
High towering, like the keel-compelling sail
That takes the topmost tempest. Let them die,
Each for his people ! I will die for mine
Then when my work is finished ; not before.
That Bandit King who founded Rome, the Accursed,
Vanished in storm. My sons shall see me die,
Die, strong to lead them till my latest breath.
Which shall not be a sigh ; shall see and say,
' This Man far-marching through the mountainous
world,
No God, but yet God's Prophet of the North,
Gave many crowns to others : for himself
His people were his crown.'
208 ODIN THE MAN.
Four hundred years^
Ye shall find savage i-aces in your path :
Be ye barbaric, ay, but savage not :
Hew down the baser lest they drag you down ;
Ye cannot raise them : they fulfil their fates :
Be terrible to foes, be kind to friend :
Be just ; be true. Revere the Household Hearth ;
This knowing, that beside it dwells a God :
Revere the Priest, the King, the Bard, the Maid,
The Mother of the heroic race — five strings
Sounding God's Lyre. Drive out with lance for goad
That idiot God by Rome called Terminus,
Who standing sleeps, and holds his reign o'er fools.
The eartli is God's, not Man's : that Man from Him
Holds it whose valour earns it. Time shall come,
It may be, when the warfare shall be past,
The reign triumphant of the brave and just
In peace consolidated. Time may come
When that long Avinter of the Northern Land
Shall find its spring. Where spreads the black morass
Harvest all gold may glitter ; cities rise
Where roamed the elk ; and nations set their thrones ;
Nations not like those empires known till now,
But wise and pure. Let such their temples build
And worship Truth, if Truth should e'er to Man
Show her full face. Let such ordain them laws
If Justice e'er should mate with laws of men.
Above the mountain summits of Man's hope
There spreads, I know, a land illimitable,
The table land of Virtue trial-proved,
Whereon one day the nations of the world
Shall race like emulous Gods. A greater God
Served by our sires, a God unknown to Rome,
Above that shining level sits, liigh-towei"ed :
ODIN THE MAN. 209
Millions of Spirits wing His flaming light,
And fiery winds among His tresses play :
When comes tliat hour which judges Clods and men
That God shall plague the Gods that filched His name
And cleanse the Peoples.
When ye hear, my sons,
That God uprising in His judgment robes
And see their dreadful crimson in the West,
Then know ye that the knell of Rome is nigh
Then stand, and listen ! When His Trumpet sounds
Forth from your forests and your snows, my sons,
Forth over Ister, E,henus, Rhodonus,
To Moesia forth, to Thrace, Illyricum,
Iberia, Gaul ; but, most of all, to Rome !
Who leads you tliither leads you not for sjioil :
A mission hath he, fair though terrible ;
He makes a pure hand purer, washed in blood :
On, Scourge of God ! the Vengeance Hour is come.
I know that hour, and wait it. Odin's work
Stands then consummate. Odin's name thenceforth
Goes down to darkness.
Farewell, Ararat !
How many an evening, still and bright as this.
In childhood, youth, or manhood's sorrowing years,
Have I not watched the sunset hanging red
Upon thy hoary brow ! Farewell for ever !
A legend haunts thee that the race of man
In earliest days, a sad and storm-tossed few,
From thy wan heights descended making way
Into a ruined world. A storm-tossed race,
But not self -pitying, once again thou seest
Into a world all ruin making way
Whither they know not, yet without a fear.
This hour — lo, there, they pass yon valley's verge !—
IV. p
210 OWN THE MAN,
In sable weeds that pilgrimage moves on,
Moves slowly like thy shadow, Ararat,
That eastward creeps. Phantom of glory dead !
Image of greatness that disdains to die
Move Northward thou ! Whate'er thy fates decreed
At least that shadow shall be shadow of Man,
And not of beast gold-weighted ! On, thon Night
Cast by my heart ! Thou too shalt meet thy morn !
LEGENDS.
KING ETHELBERT OF KENT AND
SAINT AUGUSTINE.
Ethelbert, King of Kent, converses first witli liis Pagan
Thanes, and next witli Saint Angnstine, newly landed on the
shores of Tlianet Island. The Saint, coming in sight of Canter-
hnry, rejoices greatly, and predicts the future greatness of that
city.
Far through the forest depths of Thanet Isle
That never yet had heard the woodman's axe,
Rang the glad clarion on the May-day morn
Blent with the cry of hounds. The rising sun
Flamed on the forest's dewy jewelry,
"While, under rising mists, a host with plumes
Rode down a broad oak alley t' wards the sea.
King Ethelbert rode first : he reigned in Kent
Least kingdom of the Seven yet Head of all
Througli his desert. That morn the royal train,
"While sang the invisible lark her song in heaven,
Pursued the flying stag. At times the creature
As though he too had pleasure in the sport,
Yavilted at ease through sunshine and through shade.
Then changed his mood, and left the best behind him.
Five hours they chased him ; last, upon a rock
High up in scorn he held his antlered front,
Then took the wave and vanished.
Many a frown
Darkened that hour on many a heated brow ;
And many a spur afflicted that poor flank
214 KING ETHELBERT OP KENT
Which panted hard and smoked. The King alone
Laughed at mischance. ' The stag, with God to aid,
Has left our labour fruitless ! Give him joy !
He lives to yield us sport some later morn :
So be it ! Waits our feast, and not far off :
On to the left 'twixt yonder ash and birch ! '
He spake, and anger passed : they praised their
sport ;
And many an outblown nostril seemed to snuff
That pi-omised feast. They rode through golden furze
So high the horsemen only were descried ;
And glades whose centuried oaks their branches laid
O'er violet banks ; and fruit trees, some snow- veiled
Like bridesmaid, others like the bride herself
Behind her white veil blushing. Glad, the thrush
Carolled ; more glad, the wood-dove moaned ; close by
A warbling runnel led them to the bay :
Two chestnuts stood beside it snowy-coned :
The banquet lay beneath them.
Feasting o'er
The song succeeded. Boastful was the strain
Each Thane his deeds extolling, or his sire's ;
But one, an aged man, among them scoffed :
' When I was young ; when Sigbert on my right
To battle rode, and Sefred on my left ;
That time men stood not worsted by a stag !
Not then our horses swerved from azure strait
Scared by the ridged sea-wave ! ' Next spake a chief,
Pirate from Denmark late returned : ' Our skies.
Good friends, are all too soft to build the man !
We fight for fame : the Northman fights for sport ;
Their annals boast they fled but once : — 'twas thus : "
In days of old, when Rome was in her pride,
AND SAINT AUGUSTINE. 215
Huge hosts of hers had fallen on theirs, surprised,
And way-worn : long they fought : a remnant spent,
Fled to their camp. Upon its walls their wives
Stood up, black-garbed, with axes heaved aloft,
And fell upon the fugitives and slew them ;
Slew next their little ones ; slew last themselves.
Cheating the Roman Triumph. Never since then
Hath Northman fled the foemen.'
Egfrid rose :
* Who saith our kinsfolk of the frozen North
One stock with vis, one faith, one ancient tongue
Pass us in valour 1 Three days since I saw
Crossing the East Saxon's border and our own
Two boys that strove. The Kentish wounded fell ;
The East Saxon on him knelt ; then made demand :
" My victim art thou by the laws of war !
Yonder my dagger lies ; — till I return
Wilt thou abide 1 " The vanquished answered, " Yea ! "
A minute more, and o'er that dagger's edge
His life-blood rushed.' The pirate chief demurred ;
* A gallant boy ! Not less I wager this,
The glitter of that dagger ere it smote
Made his eye blink. Attend ! Three years gone by,
Sailing with Hakon on Norwegian fiords
We fought the Jomsburg Rovers, at their head
Sidroc, oath-pledged to marry Hakon' s child
Despite her father's best. In mist we met :
Instant each navy at the other dashed
Like wild beast, instinct-taught, that knows its foe ;
Chained ship to ship, and clashed their clubs all day,
Till sank the sun : then laughed the white peaks forth,
And reeled, metho light, above the reeling waves !
The victory was with us. Hakon, next morn,
Bade slay his prisoners. Thirty on one bench
216 KING ETHELBERT OF KENT
Waited their doom : their leader died the first ;
He winked not as the sword iipon him closed !
No, nor the second ! Hakon asked the third
"What think'st thou, friend, of Death'? " He tossed
his head :
" My Father perished ; I fulfil my turn."
The fourth, " Strike quickly, Chief ! An hour this
morn
We held contention if, when heads are off
The hand can hold its dagger : I would learn."
The dagger and the head together fell.
The fifth, " One fear is mine — lest yonder slave
Finger a Prince's hair ! Command some chief
Thy best beloved, to lift it in his hands ;
Then strike and spare not ! " Hakon struck. That
yovith,
Sigurd by name, his forehead forward twitched,
Laughing, so deftly that the downward sword
Shore off those luckless hands that raised his hair.
All laughed ; and Hakon's son besought his sire
To loosen Sigvird's bonds : but Sigurd cried,
" Unless the rest be loosed I will not live ! "
Thus all escaped save four.'
In graver mood
That chief resumed : ' A Norland King dies well !
His bier is raised upon his stateliest ship ;
Piled with his arms ; his lovers and his friends
Rush to their monarch's pyre, resolved with him
To share in death, and with becoming pomp
Attend his footsteps to Valhalla's Hall.
The torch is lit : forth sails the ship, black-winged.
Facing the midnight seas. From beach and clift'
Men watch all night that slowly lessening flame :
Yet no man sheds a tear,'
AND SAINT AUGUSTINE. 217
Earconwakl,
An aged chief, made answer, ' Tears there be
Of divers sorts : a wise and valiant king
Deserves that tear which praises, not bewails
Greatness gone by.' The pirate shouted loud
* A land it is of laughter, not of tears !
Know ye the tale of Harald '? He had sailed
Round southern coasts and eastern ; sacked or burned
A hundred Christian cities. One he found
So girt with giant walls and brazen gates
His sea-kings vainly dashed their ships against them ;
And died beneath them, frustrate. Harald sent
A herald to that city proffering terms :
" Harald is dead : Christian was he in youth ;
He sends you spoils from many a city biirnt
And craves interment in your chief est church."
Next day the masked procession wovind in black
Through streets defenceless. "When the church was
reached
They laid their chief before the altar-lights :
Anon to heaven rang out the priestly dirge,
And incense-smoke upcurled. Forth from its cloud
Sudden upleaped the dead man, club in hand,
Spiu^ning his coffin's gilded walls, and smote
The hoary pontiff down, and brake his neck ;
And all those maskers doffed their weeds of woe
And showed the mail beneath, and raised their swords
And drowned that pavement in a sea of blood.
While raging rushed their mates through portals wide.
And, since that city seemed but scant of spoil
Fired it and sailed. Ofttimes old Harald laughed
That tale recounting,'
Many a Kentish chief
Re-echoed Harald's laugh ; — not Ethelbert :
218 KING ETHELBERT OP KENT
The war-ecar reddening on his hrow he rose
And spake : ' My Thanes, ye laugh at deeds accurst !
An old King I, and make my prophecy
One day that northern race which smites and laughs,
Our kith and kin albeit, shall smite our coasts :
That day ye will not laugh ! ' Earconwald
Not rising, likewise answer made, heart-gi-ieved :
' Six sons had I : all these are slain in war ;
Yet I, an unrejoicing man forlorn,
Find solace ofttimes thinking of their deeds :
They laughed not when they smote. No God, be sure,
Smiles on the jest red-handed.' Egfrid rose.
And three times cried with lifted sword unsheathed,
' Behold mj God ! No God save him I serve ! '
While thus they held discovirse,where blue waves danced
Not far from land, behold, there hove in sight
Seen 'twixt a great beech silky yet with Spring
And pine broad -crested, round whose head old storms
Had wov'n a garland of his own green boughs,
A bark both fair and large ; and hymn was heard.
Then laughed the King, ' The stag-hunt and our songs
So drugged my memory, I had nigh forgotten
Why for our feast I chose this heaven-roofed hall :
Missives I late received from friends in France ;
They make report of strangers from the South
Who, tarrying in their coasts have learned our tongue
And northward wend with tidings strange and new
Of some celestial Kingdom by their God
Fovinded for men of Faith. Nor churl am I
To frown on kind intent, nor child to trust
This sceptre of Seven Ptealms to magic snare
That puissance hath — who knows not 1 — greater thrice
In house than open field. I therefore chose
AND SAINT AUCxUSTINE, 219
For audience hall this precinct.'
Muttered low
3Iurdark, the scoffer with the cave-like mouth
And sidelong eyes, ' Queen Bertha's voice was that !
A woman's man ! Since first from Gallic shores
That dainty daughter of King Charibert
Pressed her small foot on England's honest shore
The whole land dwindles ! '
Mid seraphic hymns
Ere long that serpent hiss was lost : for soon
In raiment white, circling a rocky point
O'er sands still glistening with a tide far-ebbed,
On drew, preceded by a silver Cross,
A long Procession. Music as it moved
Floated on sea-winds inland, deadened now
By thickets, echoed now from cliif or cave :
Ere long before them that Procession stood.
The King addressed them : ' Welcome, Heralds sage !
If sent from God I welcome you the more.
Since great is God, and therefore great His gifts :
God grant He send them daily, heaped and huge !
Speak without fear, for him alone I hate
Who brings ill news, or makes inept demand
Unmeet for Kings. I know the Cross ye bear ;
And in my palace sits a Christian wife,
Bertha, the sweetest lady in this land ;
Most gracious in her ways, in heart most leal.
I knew her yet a child : she knelt whene'er
The Queen, her mother, entered : then I said,
A maid so reverent will be reverent wife.
And wedded her betimes. Morning and eve
She in her wood-girt chapel sings her prayer,
Which wins us kindlier harvest, and, some think.
Success in war. She strives not with our Gods :
220 KING ETHELBERT OF KENT
Confusion never wrought she in my house,
Nor minished Hengist's glory. Had her voice,
Clangorous or strident, drawn upon my throne
Deserved opprobrium ' — here the monarch's brows
Flushed at the thought, and fire was in his eyes —
' The hand that clasps this sceptre had not spared
To hunt her forth an outcast in the woods.
Thenceforth with beasts to herd ! More lief were I
To take the lioness to my bed and board
Than house a rebel wife.' Remembering then
The mildness of his Queen, King Ethelbert
Resumed, appeased, for placable his heart ;
' But she no rebel is, and this I deem
Fair auspice for her Faith.'
A little breeze
Warm from the sea that moment softly waved
The standard from its staff, and showed thereon
The Child Divine. Upon His mother's knee
Sublime He stood. His left hand clasped a globe
Crowned with a golden Cross ; and with His right
Two fingers heavenward raised, o'er all the earth
He sent His blessing.
Of that band snow-stoled
One taller by the head than all the rest
Obeisance made ; then, pointing to the Cross,
And forward moving t'ward the monarch's seat,
Opened the great commission of the Faith :
' Behold the Eternal Maker of the worlds !
That hand which shaped the earth and blesses earth
Must rule the race of man ! '
Majestic then
As when, far winding from its mountain springs.
City and palm-grove far behind it left,
Some Indian river rolls while mists dissolved
AND SAINT AUGUSTINE. 221
Leave it in native brightness unobscured,
And kingly navies share its sea-ward sweep,
Forward on-flowed in Apostolic might
Augustine's strong discourse. With God beginning
He showed the Almighty all-compassionate
Down drawn from distance infinite to man
By the Infinite of Love. Lo, Bethlehem's crib !
There lay the Illimitable in narrow bou^ud :
Thence rose that triumph of a world redeemed !
Last, to the standard pointing, thus he spake :
' Yon standard tells the tale ! 8is hundred years
Westward it speeds from subject realm to realm ;
First from the bosom of God's Race Elect,
His people, till they slew Him, mild it soared :
Rejected, it returned. Above their walls
While ruin rocked them, and the Roman fire,
Dreadful it hung. When Rome had shared that guilt
Mocking that Saviour's Brethren and His Bride,
Above the conquered conqueror of all lands
In turn this Standard flew. Who raised it high t
A son of this your island, Constantine !
In these, thine English oakwoods, Helena,
'Twas thine to nurse thy warrior. He had seen
Star-writ in heaven the words this Standard bears,
" Through Me is victory." Victory won, he raised
High as his empire's queenly head, and higher,
This Standard of the Eternal Dove thenceforth
To fly where eagle standard never flew,
God's glory in its track, goodwill to man.
Advance for aye, great Emblem ! Light as now
Famed Asian headlands, and Hellenic isles !
O'er snow-crowned Alp and citied Apennine
Send forth a breeze of healing ! Keep thy throne
For ever on those westei^n peaks that watch
222 KING ETHELBERT OF KENT
The setting sun descend the Hesperean wave,
Atlas and Calpe ! These, the old Roman bound,
Build but the gateway of the Rome to be —
Till Christ returns thou Standard, hold them fast :
But never till the North, that, age by age.
Dashed back the Pagan Rome, with Christian Rome
Partakes the spiritual crown of m.an restored
From thy strong flight above the world surcease.
And fold thy wings in rest ! '
Upon the sod
He knelt, and on that standard gazed, and spake,
Calm-voiced, with hand to heaven : ' I promise thee,
Thou Sign, another victory, and thy best —
This island shall be thine ! '
Augustine rose
And took the right hand of King Ethelbert,
And placed therein the Standard's staff, and laid
His own above the monarch's, speaking thus :
' King of this land, I bid thee know from God
That kings have higher privilege than they know,
The standard-bearers of the King of kings.'
Long time he clasped that royal hand ; long time
The King, that patriarch's hand at last withdrawn,
His own withdrew not from that Standard's staff
Committed to his charge. His hand he deemed
Thenceforth its servant vowed. With large, meek eyes
Pixed on that Maid and Babe, he stood as child
That, gazing on some reverent stranger's face
Nor loosening from that stranger's hold his palm,
Listens his words attent.
The Man of God
Meantime as silent gazed on Thanet's shore
Gold-tinged, with sunset spray to crimson turned
In league-long crescent. Love was in his face.
AND SAINT AUGUSTINE. 223'
That love which rests on Faith, He spake : ' Fair
land,
I know thee what thou art, and what thou lack'st !
The Master saith, " I give to him that hath : "
Thy harvest shall be great.' Again he mused.
And shadow o'er him crept. Again he spake :
' That harvest won, when centuries have gone by.
What countenance wilt thou wear] How oft on
brows
Brightened by Baptism's splendour, sin more late
Drags down its cloud ! The time may come when thou
This day, though darkling, yet so innocent,
Barbaric, not depraved, on greater heights
May'st sin in malice — sin the great oli'ence.
Changing thy light to darkness, knowing God,
Yet honouring God no more : that time may come
When, rich as Carthage, great in arms as Rome,
Keen-eyed as Greece, this isle, to sensuous gaze
A sun all gold, to angels may present
Aspect no nobler than a desert waste.
Some blind and blinding waste of sun-scorched sands^
Trod by a race of pigmies not of men.
Pigmies by passions ruled ! '
Once more he mused ;
Then o'er his countenance passed a second change ;
And from it flashed the light of one who sees,
Some hill-top gained, beyond the incumbent night
The instant foot of morn. With regal step.
Martial yet measured, to the King he strode,
And laid a strong hand on him, speaking thus :
' Rejoice, my son, for God hath sent thy Land
This day Good Tidings of exceeding joy,
And planted in her Breast a Tree divine
Whose leaves shall heal far nations. Know besides
' 224 KING ETHELBERT OF KENT •
Should sickness blight that Tree, or tempest mar it,
The strong root shall survive : the winter past,
Heavenward once more shall rush both branch and
bough,
And over- vault the stars.'
He spake, and took
The sacred Standard from that monarch's hand,
And held it in his own, and fixed its point
Deep in the earth, and by it stood. Tlien lo !
Like one disburthened of some ponderous charge,
King Ethelbert became himself again,
And round him gazed well pleased. Throughout his
train
Sudden a movement thrilled : remembrance had
Of those around, his warriors and his thanes.
That ever on his wisdom waiting hung,
Thus he replied discreet : ' Stranger and friend.
Thou bear'st good tidings ! That thou earnest thus far
To fool VIS, knave and witling may believe :
I walk not with their sort ; yet, guest revered,
Kings are not as the common race of men ;
Counsel they take, lest honour heaped on one
Dishonour others. Odin holds on us
Prescriptive right, and special claims on me,
Of Hengist's race — thence Odin's. Preach your Faith !
The man who wills I suffer to believe :
The man who wills not, let him moor his skiff
Where anchorage likes him best. The day declines :
This night with us you harbour, and our Queen
Shall lovingly receive you.'
Staid and slow
The King rode homewards, while behind him paced
Augustine and his Monks. The ebb had left
'Twixt Tlianet and the mainland narrow space
AND SAINT AUGUSTINE. 225
Marsli-land more late ; beyond the ford there wound
A path through flowery meads ; and, as they passed,
Not herdsmen only, but the broad-browed kine
Fixed on them long their meditative gaze ;
And oft some blue-eyed boy with flaxen locks
Ran, fearless, forth, and plucked them by the sleeve.
Some boy clear-browed as those Saint Gregory
marked,
Poor slaves, new-landed from the quays of Rome,
That drew from him that saying, ' " Angli " !— nay,
Call them henceforward " Ansrels " ! '
From a wood
Issuing, before them lustrous they beheld
King Ethelbert's chief city Canterbury,
Strong-walled, with winding street, and airy roofs,
And high o'er all the monarch's palace pile
Thick-set with towers. Then fire from God there fell
Upon Augustine's heart : and thus he sang
Advancing ; and the bi'ethren sang ' Amen ' :
' Hail, City loved of God, for on thy brow
Great Fates are writ. Thou cumberest not His earth
For petty trafiic reared, or petty sway ;
I see a heavenly choir descend, thy crown
Henceforth to bind thy brow. Forever hail !
< I see the basis of a kingly throne
In thee ascending ! High it soars and higher,
Like some great pyramid o'er Nilus kenned
When vapours melt — the Apostolic Chair !
Doctrine and Discipline thence shall hold their course,
Like Tigris and Euphrates, through all lands
That face the Northern Star. Forever hail !
' Where stands yon royal keep, a church shall rise
IV. Q
226 KING ETHELBERT OF KENT
Like Incorrnption clothing tlio Corrupt
On the resiu'i'ection morn ! Strong House of God,
To him exalt thy walls, and nothing doubt
For lo ! from thee like lions from their lair
Abroad shall pace the Primates of this land :
They shall not lick the hand that gives and smites
Doglike, nor snakelike on their bellies creep
In indii-ectness base. They shall not fear
The people's madness nor the rage of kings
E-eddening the temple's pavement. They shall lift
The strong brow mitred, and the crosiered hand
Before their presence sending Love and Fear
To pave their steps with greatness. From their
fronts
Stubborned with marble from Saint Peter's Eock
The sunrise of far centuries forth shall flame :
He that hath eyes shall see it, and shall say,
*' Blessed who cometh in the name of God ! " '
Thus sang the Saint, advancing ; and, behold,
At every pause the brethren sang ' Amen ! '
While down from window and from roof the throng
Eyed them in silence. As their anthem ceased
Before them stood the palace clustered round
By many a stalwart form. Midway the gate
On the first step, like angel newly lit
Queen Bertha stood. Back from her forehead meek
The meeker for its crown, a veil descended,
"While streamed the red robe to the foot snow-white
Sandalled in gold. The morn was- on her face.
The star of morn within those eyes vipraised
That flashed all dewy with the grateful light
Of many a granted prayer. O'er that sweet shape
Augustine signed the Venerable sign ;
AND SAINT AUGUSTINE. 227
The lovely vision sinking, hand to breast,
Eeeeived it ; while, by sympathy surprised
Or taught of God, the monarch and his thanes
Knelt as she knelt, and bent like her their heads,
Sharing her blessing. Like a palm the Faith
Thenceforth o'er England rose, those saintly men
Preaching by life severe, not words alone.
The doctrine of the Ci-oss. Some Power divine
Stronger than patriot love, more sweet than Spring,
Made way from heart to heart, and daily God
Joined to His Church the souls that should be saved.
Thousands, where Med way mingles with the Thames,
Pushing to Baptism. In his palace cell
High-nested on that Yaticanian Hill
Which o'er the Martyr-gardens kens the world
Gregory, that news receiving, or from men
Or haply from that God with whom he walked
The Spirit's whisper ever in his ear,
Rejoiced that hour, and cried aloud, * Rejoice,
Thou Earth ! that North which from its cloud but
flung
The wild beasts' cry of anger or of pain
Redeemed from wrath, its Hallekijahs sings ;
Its waves by Roman galleys feared, this day
Kiss the bare feet of Christ's Evangelists ;
That race whose oak-clubs brake our Roman swords
Glories now first in bonds — the bond of Truth :
At last it fears ; but fears alone to sin.
Striving through Faith for Virtue's heavenly crown.'
228 THE CONSECRATION OF
THE CONSECRATION OF WESTMINSTER
ABBEY.
Scbert, King of the East Saxons, having built the great church
of Saint Peter at Westminster, Mellitus the l^ishop prepares to
consecrate it, but is warned in a vision that it has already beeu
consecrated by one greater than he.
As morning brake, Sebert, East Saxon king,
Stood on the winding shores of Thames alone,
And fixed a sparkling eye upon Saint Paul's :
The sun new-risen had touched its roofs that laughed
Their answer back. Beyond it London spread ;
But all between the river and that church
Was slope of grass and blossoming orchard copse
Glittering with dews dawn-reddened. Bertha here,
That church begun had thus besought her Lord
* Spare me this bank which God has made so fair !
Here let the little birds have leave to sing
The bud to blossom ! Here, the vespers o'er,
Lovers shall sit ; and here, in later days.
Children shall question, " Who was he — Saint Paul]
What taught, what wrought he that his name should
shine
Thus like the stars in heaven 1'"
As Sebert stood
The sweetness of the morning more and more
Made way into his heart. The pale blue smoke
Bising from hearths by woodland branches fed.
Dimmed not the crystal matin air ; not yet
WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 229
From clammy couch had risen the mist sun-warmed :
All things distinctly showed ; the rushing tide
The barge, the trees, the long bridge many-arched,
And countless huddled gables, far away,
Lessening, yet still descried.
A voice benign
Dispersed the Prince's trance : ' I marked, my King,
Your face in yonder church ; you took, I saw,
A blessing thence ; and Natui-e's here you find :
The same God sends them both.' The man who spake
Though silver-tressed, was countenanced like a child ;
Smooth-browed, clear-eyed. That still and luminous
mien
Predicted realms where Time shall be no more ;
Where gladness, like some honey-dew divine,
Freshens an endless present. Mellitus,
From Rome late missioned and the Coelian Hill
Made thus his greeting.
Westward by the Thames
The King and Bishop paced, and held discourse
Of him whose name that huge Cathedral bore,
Israel's great son, the man of mighty heart,
The man for her redemption zealous more
Than for his proper crown. Not task for her
God gave him : to the Gentiles still he preached
And won them to the Cross. 'That Faith once
spui'ned,'
Thus cried the Bishop with a kindling eye,
' Lo, how it i-aised him as on eagle's wings
And past the starry gates ; The Spirit's Sword
He wielded well ! Save him who bears the Keys,
Save him who made confession, " Thovi art Christ,"
Saint Paul had equal none ! Hail, Brethren crowned !
Hail, happy Rome, that guard'st their mingled dust!'
230 THE CONSECRATION OF
Next spake tlie Roman of those churches twain
By Constantino beside the Tyber built
To glorify their names. With sudden turn
Sebert, the crimson mounting to his brow,
Made question, ' Is your Tyber of the South
Ampler than this, our Thames?' The old man smiled;
' Tyber to Thames is as that willow-stock
To yonder oak.' The Saxon cried with joy :
* How true thy judgment is ! how just thy tongue !
What hinders, O my Father, but that Thames,
Huge river from the forests rolled by God,
Should image, like that Tyber, churches twain.
Honouring those Princes of the Apostles' Band 1
King Ethelbert, my vincle, built Saint Paul's ;
Saint Peter's Church be mine ! '
An hour's advance
Left them in thickets tangled. Low the ground,
W^ell-nigh by waters dipt, a savage haunt
With briar and bramble thick, and ' Thorny Isle '
For that cause named. Sebert around him gazed,
A maiden blush upon him thus he spake :
' I know this spot ; I stood here once, a boy :
'Twas winter then : the swoll'n and turbid flood
Pustled the sallows. Far I fled from men :
A youth had done me wrong, and vengeful thoughts
Burned in my heart : I warred with them in vain :
I prayed against them ; yet they still returned :
O'erspent at last, I cast me on my knees
And cried, " Just God, if Thou despise my prayer.
Faithless, thence weak, not less remember well
How many a man in this East Saxon land
Stands up this hour, in wood, or held, or farm,
Like me sore tempted, but with loftier heart :
To these be helpful — yea, to one of these ! "
WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 231
And lo, the wrathful thoughts, like routed fiends,
Left me, and came no more ! '
Discoursing thus,
The friends a moment halted in a space
Where stood a flowering thorn. Adown it trailed
In zigzag curves erratic here and there
Long lines of milky bloom, like rills of foam
Fvirrowing the green back of some huge sea wave
Refluent from cliffs. Ecstatic minstrelsy
Swelled from its branches. Birds as thick as leaves
Thronged them; and whether joy w^as theirs that hour
Because the May had come, or joy of love,
Or tenderer gladness for their young new-fledged,
So piercing was that harmony, the place
Eden to Sebert looked, while brake and bower
Shone like the Tree of Life. ' What minster choir,'
The Bishop cried, ' could better chant God's praise 1
Here shall your church ascend : — its altar rise
Where yonder thorn tree stands ! ' The old man
spake ;
Yet in him lived a thought unbreathed : ' How oft
Have trophies risen to blazon deeds accursed !
Angels this church o'er-winging, age on age
Shall see that boy at prayer ! '
In peace, in war,
Daily the work advanced. The youthful King
Kneeling, himself had raised the earliest sod,
Made firm the corner stone. AVhate'er of gold
Sun-ripened harvests of the royal lands
Yielded from Thames to Stour, or tax and toll
From quays mast-thronged to loud-resounding sea,
Save what his realm required by famine vexed
At times, or ravage of the Mercian sword,
Went to the work. His Queen her jewels brought,
232 THE CONSECKATION OF
Smiling, huge gift in slenderest hands up-piled ;
His thanes their store ; the poor their labour free.
Some clave the quarry's ledges : from its depths
Some haled the blocks ; from distant forests some
Dragged home the oak-beam on the creaking wain :
Alas, that arms in noble tasks so strong
Should e'er have sunk in dust ! Ere ten years passed
Saint Peter's towers above the high-roofed streets
Smiled on Saint Paul's. That earlier church had risen
Where stood, in Roman days, Apollo's fane :
Upon a site to Dian dedicate
Now rose its sister. Erring Faith had reached
In those twin Powers that ruled the Day and Night,
To Wisdom witnessing and Chastity,
Her loftiest height, and perished. Phosnix-like,
From ashes of dead rites and Truth abused
Now soared unstained Religion.
What remained '?
The Consecration. On its eve, the King
Held revel in its honour, solemn feast.
And wisely-woven dance, where beauty and youth,
Through loveliest measures moving, music-winged.
And winged not less by gladness, interwreathed
Brightness with brightness, glance turned back on
glance,
And smile on smile — a courtseying graciousness
Of stateliest forms that, winding, sank or rose
As if on heaving seas. In groups apart
Old warriors clustered. Eadbald discussed
And Snorr, that truce with Wessex signed, and said,
' Fear nought : it cannot last ! ' A shadow sat
That joyous night upon one brow alone,
Redwald's East Anglia's King. In generous youth
He, guest that time with royal Ethel bert,
WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 233
Had gladly bowed to Christ. Fi'om shallowest soil
Faith springs apace, but springs to die. Returned
To plains of Ely, all that sweetness past
Seemed but a dream while scornfvd spake his wife,
Upon whose brow beauty from love divorced
Made beauty's self unbeauteous : ' Lose — why not 1 —
Thwarting your liegeful subjects, lose at Avill
Your Kingdom ; you that might have reigned ere now
Bretwalda of the Seven ! ' In hour accursed
The Aveak man with his Faith equivocated :
Fraudful, beneath the self -same roofs he raised
Altars to Christ and idols. By degrees
That Truth he mocked forsook him. Year by year
His face grew dark, and barbed his tongue thovigh
smooth,
Manner and mind like grass-fields after thaw,
Silk-soft above, yet iron-hard below :
Spleenful that night at Sebert's blithe discourse
He answered thus, with seeming-careless eye
Wandering from wall to roof :
'I like your Church :
Would it had rested upon firmer ground.
Adorned some airier height : its towers are good.
Though dark the stone : three quarries white have I ;
You might have used them gratis had you willed :
At Ely, Elmham, and beside the Cam
Where Felix rears even now his cloisti-al Schools,
I trust to build three churches soon : my Queen,
That seconds still my wishes, says, " Beware
Lest overhaste, your people still averse.
Frustrate your high intent." A woman's wit —
Yet here my wife is wiser than her wont.
I miss your Bishop : grandly countenanced he,
Save for that mole. He shuns our revel : — ay !
234 THE CONSECKATION OF
Monastic virtue never feels secure
Save when it skulks in corners ! ' As lie spake,
Despite that varnish on his brow cleai'-cut,
Stung by remembrance, from the tutored eye
Forth flashed the fire barbaric : race and heart
A moment stood confessed.
Old Mellitus,
That night how fared he 1 In a fragile tent
Facing that church expectant, low he knelt
On the damp ground. More late, like youthful knight
In chapel small watching his arms untried,
He kept his consecration vigil still.
With hoary hands screening a hoary head,
And thus made prayer : ' Thou God to Whom all
worlds
Form one vast temple : Thou Who with Thyself,
Ritual eterne, dost consecrate that Church,
For aye creating, hallowing it forever ;
Thou Who in narrowest heart of man or child
Makest not less Thy dwelling, turn Thine eyes
To-mori'ow on our rite. The work we work
Work it Thyself ! Thy storm shall try it well ;
Consummate first its strength in righteovxsness ;
So shall beginning just, whate'er befall,
Or guard it, or restore.'
So prayed the man,
Nor ever raised his head — saw nought — heard
nought —
Nor knew that on the night had come a change,
111 Sjiirits, belike, Avhose empire is the air.
Grudging its glories to that pile new raised,
And, while they might, assailing. Through the
clouds
A panic-stricken moon stumbled and fled,
WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 235
And wildly on the waters blast on blast
Eidged their dark floor. A spring-tide from the sea
Breasted the flood descending. Woods of Shene
And Hampton's groves had heard that flood all day,
No more a whisperer soft ; and meadow banks
Not yet o'er-gazed by Windsor's crested steep
Or Reading's tower, had yielded to its wave
Blossom and bud. More high, near Oxenford,
Isis and Cherwell with precipitate stream
Had swelled the current. Gathering thus its strength
Far off and near, allies and tributaries
That night by London onward rolled the Thames
Beauteous and threatening both.
Its southern bank
Fronting the church had borne a hamlet long
Where fishers dwelt. Upon its vei-ge that night
Perplexed the eldest stood : his hand was laid
Upon the gunwale of a stranded boat ;
His knee was crooked against it. Shrinking still
And sad, his eye pursued that racing flood,
Here black like night, dazzled with eddies there,
Eddies by moonshine glazed. In doubt he mused :
Sudden a Stranger by him stood and spake :
* Launch forth, and have no fear.' The fisher gazed
Once on his face ; and launched. Beside the helm
That Stranger sat. Then lo ! a watery lane
Before them opening, through the billows curved.
Level, like meadow-path. As when a weed
Drifts with the tide, so softly o'er that lane
Oarless the boat advanced, and instant reached
The northern shore, dark with that minster's shade ; —
Before them close it frowned.
' Whei'e now thou stand' st
Abide thou : ' thus the Stranger spake ; anon
236 THE CONSECRATION OF
Befoi'e the clivirch's southern gate he stood : —
Then lo ! a mai^vel. Inward as he passed,
Its threshold crossed, a splendour as of God
Forth from the bosom of that dusky pile
Through all its kindling windows streamed, and blazed
From wave to wave, and spanned that downward tide
With many a fiery bridge. The moon was quenched ;
But all the edges of the headlong clouds
Caught up the splendour till the midnight vault
Shone like the noon. The fisher knew, that hour,
That with vast concourse of the Sons of God
That church was thronged ; for in it many a head
Sun-bright, and hands lifted like hands in prayer,
High up he saw : meantime harmonic strain.
As though whatever moves in earth or skies.
Winds, waters, stars, had joined in one their song.
Above him floated like a breeze from God
And heaven-born incense. Louder swelled that
strain ;
And still the Bride of God, that chvirch late dark,
Glad of her saintly spousals, lavighed and shone
In radiance ever freshening. By degrees
That vision waned. At last the fisher turned :
The matin star shook on the umbered wave ;
Along the East there lay a pallid streak,
That streak which preludes dawn.
Beside the man
Once'more that Stranger stood : — ' Seest thou yon tent 1
My Brother kneels within it. Thither speed
And bid him know I sent thee, speaking thus,
" He whom the Christians name ' the Rock ' am I :
My Master heard thy prayer : I sought thy church,
And sang myself her Consecration rite :
Close thou that service with thanksgiving psalm," '
WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 237
Thus spake the Stranger, and was seen no more :
But whether o'er the waters, as of old
Footing that Galilean Sea, with faith
Not now infirm he reached the southern shore,
Or passed from sight as one whom crowds conceal
The fisher knew not. At the tent arrived,
Before its little door he bent, and lo !
Within, there knelt a venerable man
With hoary hands screening a hoary head.
Who prayed, and prayed. His tale the fisher told :
With countenance unamazed, yet well content
That kneeler answered, ' Son, thy speech is true !
Hence, and announce thy tidings to the King,
Who leaves his couch but now.'
' How beautiful ' —
That old man sang, as down the Thames at morn'
In multitudinous pomp the barges dropped.
Following those twain that side by side advanced.
One royal, one pontific, bearing each
The Cross in silver blazoned or in gold—
' How beautiful, O Sion, are thy courts !
Lo, on thy brow thy Maker's name is writ :
Fair is this place and awful ; porch of heaven :
Behold, God's Chui-ch is founded on a rock :
It stands, and shall not fall : the gates of Hell
Shall not prevail against it.'
From the barge
Of Sebert and his Queen, antiphonal
Rapturous response was wafted : ' I beheld
Jei'usalem, the City sage and blest ;
From heaven I saw it to the earth descending
In sanctity gold- vested, as a Bride
Decked for her Lord. I heard a voice which sang.
Behold the House where God will dwell with men :
238 THE CONSECRATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
And God shall wipe the tears from off theii' face ;
And death shall be no more.'
Old Thames that day
Briffhtened with banners of a thousand boats
Winnowed by winds flower-scented. Countless hands
Tossed on the brimming river chaplets wov'n
On mead or hill, or branches lopped in woods
With fruit-bloom red, or white with clustering
cone,
Changing clear stream to garden. Mile on mile
Now song was heard, now bugle horn tllat died
Gradual 'mid sedge and reed. Alone the swan
High on the western waters kept aloof ;
Remote she eyed the scene with neck thrown back.
Her ancient calm preferring, and her haunt
Crystalline still. Alone the Julian Tower
Far down the eastern stream, though tap'stries waved
From every window, every roof o'er-swarmed
With anthem-echoing throngs, maintained, unmoved,
Roman and Stoic, her Ctesarean pi"ide :
On Saxon feasts she fixed a cold, grey gaze ;
'Mid Christian hymns heard but the old acclaim —
' Consul Romanus.'
When the sun had reached
Its noonday height, a people and its king
Around their minster pressed. With measured tread
And Introit chanted, up the pillared nave
Reverent they moved : then knelt. Between their
ranks
Their Bishop last advanced with mitred brow
And in his hand the Cross, at every step
Signing the benediction of his Lord.
The altar steps he mounted. Turning then
Westward his face to that innumerous host,
THE PENANCE OP SAINT LAURENCE. 239
Thus spake he unastonished : ' Sh's, ere now
This Church's Consecration rite Avas sung : —
Be ours to sing thanksgiving to our God,
«' Ter-Sanctus," and " Te Deum." '
THE FENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
Eadliald, King of Kent, persecuting the Church, Laurence
the Bisliop deems himself the chief of sinners because he lias
consented, like the neighbouring bishops, to depart ; but, being
consoled by a wonderful reprimand, faces the King, and otters
himself up to death. The King reproves them that gave him
evil counsel.
The day was dying on the Kentish downs
And in the oakwoods by the Stour was dead,
While sadly shone o'er snowy plains of March
Her comfortless, cold star. The daffodil
That year was past its time. The leaden stream
Had waited long that lamp of river-beds
Which, when the lights of Candlemas are quenched,
Looks forth through February mists. A film
Of ice lay brittle on the shallows : dark
And swift the central current rushed ; the wind
Sighed through the tawny sedge.
' So fleets our life — ■
Like yonder gloomy stream ; so sighs our age —
Like yonder sapless sedge ! ' Thus Laurence mused
Standing on that sad margin all alone.
His twenty years of gladsome English toil
Ending at last abortive. ' Stream well-loved.
Here on thy margin standing saw I first,
My head by chance uplifting from my book,
240 THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
Kino- Etlielbert's strong countenance ; he is dead ;
And, next him, riding through the April gleams,
Bertha, his Queen, with face so lit by love
Its lustre smote the beggar as she passed
And changed his sigh to song. She too is dead ;
And half their thanes that chased the stag that day.
Like echoes of their own glad bugle-horn,
Have passed and are not. Why must I abide 1
And why must age, querulous and coward both,
Past days lamenting, fear not less that stroke
Which makes an end of grief 1 Base life of man !
How sinks thy slow infection through our bones ;
Then when you fawned upon us, high-souled youth
Heroic in its gladness, spurned your gifts.
Yearning for noble death. In age, in age
We kiss the hand that nothing holds but dust,
Murmviring, " Not yet ! " '
A tear, ere long ice-glazed,
Hung on the old man's cheek. ' What now remains 1'
Some minutes passed ; then, lifting high his head.
He answered, ' God remains.' His faith, his heart.
Were unsubverted. 'Twas the weight of grief,
The exhausted nerve, the warmthless blood of age.
That pressed him down like sin, where sin was none —
Not sin, but weakness only. Long he mused,
Then slowly walked, and feebly, through the woods
Towards his house monastic. Vast it loomed
Through grovmd-fog seen ; and vaster, close beside,
That convent's church by great Augustine reared
Where once old woodlands clasped a temple old,
Yaunt of false Gods, To Peter and to Paul
That church was dedicate, albeit so long
High o'er the cloudy rack of fleeting years
It bore, and bears, its founder's name, not theirs.
THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE. 241
Therein that holy founcler slept in Christ,
And ELhelbert, and Bertha. All was changed :
King Eadbald, new-crowned and bad of life
Who still, whate'er was named of great or good.
Made answer, ' Dreams ! I say the flesh rules all ! '
Hated the Cross. His Queen, that portent crowned,
She that with name of wife was yet no wife.
Abhorred that Cross and feared, A Baptist new
In that Herodian court had Laurence stood,
Commanding, ' Put the evil thing away ! '
Since then the woman's to the monarch's hate
Had added strength — the serpent's poison-bag
Venoming the serpent's fang. ' Depart the realm ! '
With voice scarce human thus the tyrant cried,
' Depart or die ! ' and gave the Church's goods
To clown and boor.
Upon the bank of Thames
Settled like ruin. Holy Sebei"t dead.
In that East Saxon kingdom monarch long,
Three sons unrighteous now their riot held.
Frowning upon the Christian Church they strode,
Full-armed, and each, with far-stretched foot firm set
Watching the Christian rite. ' Give us,' they cried,
While knelt God's children at their Paschal Feast,
' Give lis those circlets of your sacred bread :
Ye feed therewith your beggars ; kings are we ! '
The Bishop answered, ' Be, like them, baptized.
Sons of God's Church, His Sacrament with man,
For that cause Mother of Christ's Sacraments,
So shall ye share her Feast,' With lightning speed
Their swords leaped forth ; contemptuous next they
cried,
' For once we spare to sweep a witless head
From worthless shoulders. Ere to-morrow's dawn
IV. B
242 THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
Hence, nor return ! ' He sped to Rochester :
Her bisLop, like himself, was under ban :
The twain to Canterbury passed, and there
Resolved to let the tempest waste its wrath,
And crossed the seas. By urgency outworn,
'Gainst that high judgment of his holier will
Laurence to theirs deferred, but tarried yet
For one day more to cast a last regard
On regions loved so long.
As compline ceased
He reached the abbey gates, and entered in :
Sadly the brethren looked him in the face,
Yet no one said, ' Take comfort ! ' Sad and sole
He passed to the Scriptorium : round he gazed.
And thought of happy days, when Gregory,
One time their Abbot, next their Pope, would send
Some precious volume to his exiled sons.
While they in reverence knelt, and kissed its edge.
And, kissing, heard once more, as if in dream,
Gregorian chants through Roman palm trees borne
With echoes from the Coliseum's wall
Adown that Ccelian Hill ; and saw God's poor
At feast around that humble board which graced
That palace senatorial once. He stood :
He raised a casket from an open chest.
And from that casket drew a blazoned scroll,
And placed it on the window-sill up-sloped
Breast-high, and faintly warmed by sinking sun ;
Then o'er it bent a space.
With sudden hands
The old man i-aised that scroll ; aloud he read :
* I, Ethelbert the King, and all my Thanes,
Honouring the Apostle Peter, cede to God
This Abbey and its lands. If heir of mine
THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE. 243
Cancel that gift, when Christ with angels girt
Makes way to judge the Nations of this world,
His name be cancelled from the Book of Life.'
The old man paused ; then read the signatui-es,
' I, Ethelbert, of Kent the King.' Who next 1
' I, Eadbald, his son ; ' to these succeeding,
' I, Hemiigisil, Duke j ' ' I, Hocca, Earl.' —
' Can such things be 1 ' Around the old man's brow
The veins swelled out ; dilated nostril, mouth
Working as mouth of him that tasteth death,
With Avhat beside is wiselier unrevealed,
Witnessed that agony which spake no more ;
He dashed the charter on the pavement down ;
Then on it gazed a space.
Remembering soon
Whose name stood first on that dishonoured list,
Contrite he raised that charter to his breast,
And pressed it there in silence. Hours went by ;
Then dark was all that room, and dark around
The windy corridors and courts stone-paved ;
And bitter blew the blast : his unlooped cloak
Fell loose : the cold he noted not. At last
A brother passed the door Avith lamp in hand :
Dazzled, he started fii'st : then meekly spake,
' Beseech the brethren that they strew my bed
Within the church. Until the second watch
There must I fast, and pray,'
The brethren heard^
And strewed his couch within the vast, void nave,
A mat and deer-skin, and, more high, that stone
The old head's nightly pillow. Echoes faint
Ere long of their receding footsteps died
While from the dark fringe of a rainy cloud
An ice-cold moon, ascending, streaked the cluu'ch
244 THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
With gleam and gloom alternate. On his knees
Meantime that aged priest was creeping slow
From stone to stone, as when on battle-plain,
The battle lost, some warrior wounded sore
By all forsaken, or some war-horse maimed
Drags a blind bulk along the fields in search
Of thirst-assuaging spring. Glittered serene
That light before the Sacrament of Love :
Thither he bent his way, and long time prayed :
Thence onward crept to where King Ethelbert
Slept, marble-shrined — his ashes, not the King,
Yet ashes kingly since God's temple once,
And waiting God's great day. Before that tomb.
Himself as rigid, with lean arms outspread,
Thus made the man his moan :
' King Ethelbert !
Hear'st thou in glory 1 Of ttimes on thy knees
Thou mad'st confession of thine earthly sins
To me, a wounded worm this day on earth :
Now comforted art thou, and I brought low :
Yet, though I see no more that beaming front
And haply for my sins may see it never
Yet inwardly I gladden, knowing this
That thou art glad. Perchance thou hear'st me not
For thou wert still a heedless man of mirth,
Though sage as strong at need. If this were so.
Not less thy God would hear my prayer to thee
And grant it in thy reverence. Ethelbert !
Thou had'st thy trial time, since, many a year
All shepherdless thy well-loved people strayed
What time thyself, their shepherd, knew'st not Christ,
Sole shepherd of man's race. King Ethelbert !
Bememberest thou that day in Thanet Isle 1
That day the Bride of God on English shores
THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE. 245
Set her piu'e foot ; and thou didst kneel to kiss it :
Thou gav'st her meat and drink in kingly wise ;
Gav'st her thy palace for her bridal bower ;
This Abbey build'dst — her fortress ! O those days
Crowned with such glories, with such sweetness winged !
Thou saw'st thy realm made onei with Christ's : thou
saw'st
Thy race like angels ranging courts of Heaven :
This day, behold, thou seest the things thou seest !
If there be any hope, King Ethelbert
Help us this day with God ! '
Upon his knees
Then crept that exile old to Bertha's tomb,
And there made moan : ' Thou tenderest Queen and
sweetest.
Whom no man ever gazed on save Avith joy
Or spake of, dead, save weeping ! Well I know
That on thee in thy cradle Mary flung
A lily whiter from her hand, a rose
^Varm from her breath and breast, for all thy life
Was made of Chastities and Charities :
This hour thine eyes are on that Vision bent
Whereof the radiance, ere by thee beheld,
Gave thee thine earthly brightness. Mirrored there,
Seest thou, like moat in sunbeam well-nigh lost.
Our world of temporal anguish 1 See it not !
For He alone, the essential Peace Eterne
Could see it unperturbed. In Him i-ejoice !
Yet, 'mid thy heavenly triumph, plead, O plead
For hearts that break below ! '
Upon the ground
Awhile that man sore tried his forehead bowed ;
Then raised it till the frore and foggy beam
Mixed with his winti-y hair. Once more he crept
246 THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
Upon his knees through shadow ; reached at length
His toilsome travel's last and dearest bourn,
The grave of Saint Augustine. O'er it lay
The Patriarch's statued semblance as in sleep :
He knew it well, and found it, though to him
In darkness lost and veil beside of tears,
With level hands grazing those upward feet
Oft kissed, yet ne'er as now.
' Farewell forever !
Farewell, my Master, and farewell, my friend !
Since ever thou in heaven abid'st — and I
Gregory the Pontiif from that Roman Hill
Sent thee to work a man's work far away,
And manlike didst thou work it. Prince, yet child,
Men saw thee, and obeyed thee. O'er the earth
Thy step was regal, meekness of thy Christ
Weighted with weight of conquerors and of kings :
Men saw a man who toiled not for himself
Yet never ceased from toil ; who warred on Sin ;
Had peace with all beside. In happy hour
God laid his holy hand upon thine eyes :
I knelt beside thy bed : I leaned mine ear
Down to thy lips to catch their last ; in vain :
Yet thou perchance wert murmuring in thy heart
" I leave my staff Avithin no hireling's hand ;
Therefore my work shall last." Ah me ! Ah me !
There was a Laurence once on Afric's shore :
He with his Cyprian died. I too, methinks,
Had shared — how gladly shared — my Bishop's doom.
Father, with Gregory pray this night ! That God
Who promised, " for my servant David's sake,"
Even yet may hear thy pi-ayer.'
Thus wept the man,
Till o'er him fell half slumber. Soon he woke
THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE. 247
And, from between that statue's marble feet
Lifting a marble face, in silence crept
To where far off his bed was strewn, and drew
The deer-skin covering o'er him. With its warmth
Deep sleep, that solace of lamenting hearts
AVhich makes the waking bitterer, o'er him sank,
Nor wholly left him, though in sleep he moaned
When from the neighbouring farm, an hour ere dawn,
The second time rang out that clarion voice
Which bids the Christian watch.
As thus he lay
T' wards him there moved in visions of the Lord
A Venei'able Shape, compact of light.
And loftier than our mortal. Near arrived,
That mild, compassionate Splendour shrank his beam,
Or healed with strengthening touch the gazer's eyes
Made worthier of such grace ; and Laurence saw
Princedom not less than his, the Apostles' Chief,
To whom the Saviour answered, ' Rock art thou,'
And later — crowning Love, not less than Faith —
' Feed thou My Sheep, My Lambs ! ' He knew that
shape
For oft, a child 'mid catacombs of Rome
And winding ways girt by the martyred dead
His eyes had seen it. Pictured on those vaults
Stood Peter, Moses of the Christian Law,
Figured in one that by the Bvu-ning Bush
TJnsandalled knelt, or drew with lifted hand
The torrent from the rock, yet wore not less
In aureole round his head the Apostle's name
'^Petros/ and in his hand sustained the Keys :
Such shape once more he saw.
' And comest thou then
Long-waited, or with scepti-e-wielding hand
248 THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
Earthward to smite the unworthiest head on earth,
Or with the darker of those Keys thou bearest
Him from the synod of the Saints to shut
Who fled as flies the hireling 1 Let it be !
Not less in that bright City by whose gate
Warder thou sitt'st, my Master thou shalt see
Pacing the diamond terraces of God
And bastions jacinth- veined, my great Augustine,
When all who wi-ought the ill have passed to doom,
And all who missed the good. Nor walks he sole :
By him forever and forever pace
My Ethelbert, my Bertha ! Who can tell
But in the on-sweeping centuries thrice or twice
These three may name my name 1 ' He spake and wept.
To whom the Apostolic Splendour thus :
* Live, and be strong : for those thou lovest in Christ
Not only in far years shall name thy name ;
This day be sure that name they name in Christ :
Else wherefore am I here 1 Not thou alone
Much more in grief's bewilderment than fear
Hast from the right way swerved. Was I not strong 1
I, from the first Elect and named anew 1
I who received at first divine command
The Brother-band to strengthen ; last to rule ?
I who to Hebrew and to Gentile both
Flung wide the portals of the heavenly realm 1
Was I not strong 1 Behold, thou know'st my fall !
A second fall was near. At Rome the sword
Against me raged. Forth by the Appian Way
I fled ; and, past the gateway, face to face,
Him met Who up the steep of Calvary bare
For man's behoof the Cross. "Where goest Thou,
Lordl"
I spake j then He : " I go to Rome, once more
TnE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE. 249
To die for him who fears for Me to die."
To Rome returned I ; and my end was peace.
Return thou too. Thy bretln-en have not sinned :
They fled, consentient with the Will Supreme :
Their names are written in the Book of Life :
Enough that He Who gives to each his part
Hath sealed thy sons and thee to loftier fates
Therefore more sternly tries. Be strong ; be glad :
For strength from joyance comes.'
The A^ision passed :
The old man, seated on his narrow bed,
Rolled thrice his eyes around the vast, dim church,
Desiring to retain it. Vain the quest !
Yet still within his heart that Radiance lived :
The sweetness of that countenance fresh from God
Would not be dispossessed, but kindled there
Memorial dawn of brightness, more and more
Growing to perfect day : inviolate peace,
Such peace as heavenly visitants bequeath,
O'er-spread his spirit, gradvial, like a sea :
Forth from the bosom of that peace upsoared
Hope, starry-crowned, and winged, that liberates oft
Faith, unextinct, thovigh bound by Powers accursed
That o'er her plant the foot, and hold the chain —
Terror and Sloth. To noble spirits set free
Delight means gratitude. Thus Laurence joyed :
But soon, remembering that unworthy past.
Remorse succeeded, sorrow born of love.
Consoled by love alone. ' Ah ! slave,' he cried,
' That, serving such a God, could'st dream of flight :
How many a babe too weak to lift his head
Is stronjr enough to die ! ' While thus he mused
The day-dawn reaching to his pallet showed
That Discipline, wire-woven, in ancient days
250 THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
Guest of monastic bed. He snatched it thence :
Around his bending neck and shoulders lean
In dire revenge he hurled it. Spent at last,
Though late, those bleeding hands down dropped : the
cheek
Sank on the stony pillow. Little birds,
Low-chirping ere their songs began, attuned
Slumber unbroken. In a single hour
He slept a long night's sleep.
The rising sun
Woke him : but in his heart another sun,
New-risen serene with healing on its wings,
Outshone that sun in brightness. 'Mid the choir
His voice was loudest while they chanted lauds :
Brother to brother whispered, issuing forth,
' He walks in stature higher by a head
Than in the month gone by ! '
That day at noon
King Eadwald, intent to whiten theft
And sacrilege with sanctitudes of law,
Girt by his warriors and his Witena,
Enthroned sat. ' What boots it 1 ' laughed a thane ;
' Laurence has fled ! we battle with dead men ! '
' Ay, ay,' the King replied, ' I told you oft
Sages can brag ; your dreamer weaves his dream :
But honest flesh rules all ! ' While thus they spake
Confusion filled the hall : through guarded gates
A priest advanced with mitre and with Cross,
A monk that seemed not monk, but prince disguised :
It was Saint Laui-ence. As he neared the throne
The fashion of the tyrant's face was changed :
' Dar'st thou'?' he cried, 'I deemed thee fled the realm —
What seek'st thou here 1 ' The Saint made answer,
' Death.'
Tire PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE. 251
Calmly he told his tale ; then ended thus :
' To me that sinful past is sin of one
Buried in years gone by. All else is dream
8ave that last look the Apostle on me bent
Ere from my sight he ceased. I saw therein
The reflex of that wondrous last Regard
Cast by the sentenced Saviour of mankind
On one who had denied Him, standing cold
Beside the High Priest's gate. Like him, I wept ;
His countenance wrought my penance, not his hand :
I scarcely felt the scourge.'
King Eadbald
Drave back the sword half drawn, and round him stared;
Then sat as one amazed. He rose ; he cried,
' Ulf ! Kathnar ! Strip his shoulders bare 1 If true
His tale, the brand remains ! '
Two chiefs stepped forth :
They dragged with trembling hand, and many a pause,
The external garb pontific first removed,
Dark, blood-stained garment from the bleeding flesh,
The old man kneeling. Once, and only once.
The monarch gazed on that disastrous sight,
Muttering, ' and yet he lives ! ' A time it was
Of swift transitions. Hearts, how proud soe'ei;,
Made not that boast — consistency in sin.
Though dark and rough accessible to Grace
As earth to vernal showers. With hands hard-
clenched
The King upstarted : thus his voice rang out :
' Beware, who gave ill counsel to their King !
The royal countenance is against them set,
111 merchants traflicking with his lesser moods !
Does any say the King wrought well of late.
Warring on Christ, and chasing hence His priests 1
252 THE PENANCE OF SAINT LAURENCE.
The man that lies shall die ! This clay, once more
I ratify my Father's oath, and mine,
To keep the Church in peace : and though I sware
To push God's monks from yonder monastery
And lodge therein the horses of the Queen,
Those horses, and the ill-persuading Queen,
Shall flee my kingdom, and the monks abide !
Brave work ye worked, my loose-kneed Witena,
This day, Christ's portion yielding to my wrath !
See how I prize your labours ! ' With his sword
He clave the red seal from the statute scroll
And stamped it under foot. Once more he spake.
Gazing with lion gaze from man to man :
' The man that, since my Father, Ethelbert,
Though monarch, stooped to common doom of men,
Hath filched from Holy Church fee-farm, or grange,
Sepulchral brass, gold chalice, bell or book.
See he restore it ere the sun goes down ;
If not, he dies ! Not always winter reigns ;
May-breeze returns, and bud-releasing breath.
When hoped the least : — 'tis thus with royal minds ! '
He spake : from that day forth in Canterbury
Till i-eigned the Noi-man, crowned on Hastings' field,
God's Church had rest. In many a Saxon realm
Convulsion rocked her cradle : altars raised
By earlier kings by later were o'erthrown :
One half the mighty Roman work, and more,
Fell to the ground : Columba's Irish monks
The ruin raised. From Canterbury's towers,
' Eome of the North ' long named, from them alone
Above sea-surge still shone that vestal fire
By tempest fanned, not queiiched ; and at her breast
For centuries six were nursed that Ccelian race.
The Benedictine Primates of the Land.
KING SlGEBERT OF EAST ANGLIA. 253
KING SIGEBEBT OF EAST ANGLIA,
AND IIEIDA THE BBOBHETESS.
Sigeliert, King of East Anglia, moved by what lie lias heard
from a Christiaii priest, consults the Prophetess Heida. In the
doctrine ho reports Heida recognises certain sacred traditions
from the East, originally included in the Northern religion,
and affirms that the new Faith is the fulfilment of the great
Yoluspa prophecy, the earliest record of that religion, which
foretold the destruction both of the Odin -Gods and the Giant
race, the restoration of all things, and the reign of Love.
Long time upon the late-closed door the King
Kept his eyes fixed. The wondrous guest was gone ;
Yet, seeing that his words were great and sage
Compassionate for the sorrowful state of man
Yet sparing not man's sin, their echoes lived
Thrilling large chambers in the monarch's breast
Silent for many a year. Exiled in France
The mystery of the Faith had reached his ear
In word but not in power. The westering sun
Lengthened upon the palace floor its beam
Yet the strong hand which propped that thoughtful
head
Sank not, nor moved. Sudden, King Sigebert
Arose and spake : ' I go to Heida' s Tower :
Await ye my return.'
The woods ere long
Around him closed. Upon the wintry boughs
An iron shadow pressed ; and as the wind
Increased beneath their roofs an iron sound
254 KING SIGEBERT OF EAST ANGLIA, AND
Clangoured funereal. Down their gloomiest aisle
With snow flakes white, the monarch strode till now
Before him, and not distant, Heida's Tower,
The Prophetess by all men feared yet loved
Smit by a cold beam from the yellowing west.
Shone like a tower of brass. Her ravens twain
Crested the turrets of its frowning gate
Unwatched by warder. Sigebert passed in :
Beneath the stony vault the queenly Seer
Sat on her ebon tlu-one.
With pallid lips
The King rehearsed his tale ; how one with brow
Lordlier than man's, and visionary eyes
Which, wander where they might, saw Spirits still
Had told him many marvels of some God
ISIightier than Odin thrice. He paused awhile :
A warning shadow came to Heida's brow :
Nathless she nothing spake. The King resumed :
' He spake — that stranger — of the things he saw :
For he, his body tranced, it may be dead.
In spirit oft hath walked the Spirit-Land :
Thence, downward gazing, once he saw our earth
A little vale obscure ; above it hung.
Those four great Fires that desolate mankind :
The Fire of Falsehood first ; the Fire of Lust,
Ravening for weeds and scum ; the Fire of Hate,
Hurling on war-fields brother-man 'gainst man ;
The Fire of tyrannous Pride. While yet he gazed.
Behold, those Fires, widening, commixed, then soared
Thx-eatening the skies. A Spirit near him cried
" Fear nought ; for breeze-like pass the flames o'er him
In whom they won no mastery there below :
But woe to those who, charioted therein
Rode forth triumphant o'er the necks of men,
HEIDA THE PROPHETESS. 256
And had their day on earth. Proportioned flames
Of other edge shall try their work and them ! "
Thus spake my guest : the frost wind smote his brows,
While on that moonlit ci'ag we sat ice-cold
Yet down them, like the reaper's sweat at noon,
The drops of anguish streamed. Till then, methinks,
That thing 8in is I knew not.
Calm of voice
Again he spake. He told me of his God :
That God, like Odin, is a God of War :
Who serve Him wear His armour day and night :
The maiden, nay, the child, must wield the sword ;
Yet none may hate his neighbour. Thus he spake
That Prophet from far regions : " Wherefore wreck
Thy brother man ? upon his innocent babes
Drag down the ruinous roof 1 Seek manlier tasks !
The death in battle is the easiest death :
Be yours the daily dying ; lifelong death ;
Death of the body that the soul may live.
War on the Spirits unnumbered and accurst
Which, rulers of the darkness of this world.
Drive, hour by hour, their lances through man's soul
That wits not of the wounding ! " '
Heida turned
A keen eye on the King : ' Whence came your guest?
Not from those sun-bright southern shores, I ween ? '
He answered, ' Nay, from western isle remote
That Prophet came.' Then Heida' s countenance fell :
' The West 1 the West ! it should have been the East !
Conclude your tale : what saith your guest of God ? '
The King replied : ' His God so loved mankind
That, God remaining, He became a man ;
So hated sin that, sin to slay, He died.
One tear of His had paid the dreadful debt : —
256 KING SIGEBERT OF EAST ANGLIA, AND
Not SO He willed it : thus He willed, to wake
In man, His lost one, quenchless hate of sin
Proportioned to the death-pang of a God ;
Nor chose He lonely majesty of death :
^Twixt Sinners paired He died.'
In Heida's eye
Trembled a tear. ' A dream was mine in youth,
When first the rose of girlhood Avarmed my cheek,
A dream of some great Sacrifice that claimed
Not praise — not praise — it only yearned to die
Helping the Loved, A maid alone, I thought.
Such sacrifice could offer.' As she spake,
She pressed upon the pale cheek, warmed once more,
Her cold, thin hand a moment.
' Maiden-born
Was He, my guest revealed,' the King replied :
' Then from that Angel's " Hail," and her response,
" So be it unto me," when sinless doubt
Vanished in world-renewing, free consent,
He told the tale ; — the Infant in the crib ;
The shepherds o'er Him bowed ' — with widening eyes
Heida, bent forward, saw like them that Child —
* The Star that lead the Magians from the East : '
' The East, the East ! It should have been the East ! '
Once more she cried ; ' our race is from the East :
The Persian worshipped t'ward the rising sun :
You said, but now, the AVest.' The King resumed :
' God's priest was from the West ; but in the East
The great Deliverer sprang.' Next, step by step,
Like herald panting forth in leaguered town
Tidings unhoped for of deliverance strange
Throvigh victory on some battle-field remote,
The King rehearsed his theme, from that first Word,
* The Woman's Seed shall bruise the Serpent's head,'
HEIDA THE PROPHETESS, 257
Prime Gospel, ne'er forgotten in the East,
To Calvary's Cross, the Resurrection morn,
Lastly the great Ascension into heaven :
And ever as he spake on Heida's cheek
The red spot, deepening, spread ; within her eyes
An unastonished gladness waxed more large :
Back to the marble Avoman came her youth :
Once more within her heaving breast it lived.
Once more upon her forehead shone, as when
The after-glow returns to Alpine snows
Left death-like by dead day. Question at times
She made, yet seemed the answer to foreknow.
That tale complete, low-toned at last she spake :
* Unhappy they to whom these things are hard ! '
Then silent sat, and by degrees became
Once more that dreaded prophet, stern and cold.
The silence deeper grew : the sun, not set.
Had sunk beneath the forest's western ridge ;
And jagged shadows tinged that stony floor
Whereon the monarch knelt. Slowly therefrom
He raised his head ; then slowly made demand :
' Is he Apostate who discards old Faith 1 '
Long time in musings Heida sat, then spake :
' Yea, if that Faith discarded be the Truth :
Not so, if it be falsehood. God is Truth ;
God-taught, true hearts discern that Truth, and
guard it ;
Whom God forsakes forsake it. O thou North,
That beat'st thy brand so loud against thy shield
Hearing nought else, what Truth one day was thine !
Behold within corruption's charnel vaults
It sleeps this day. What God shall lift its head 1
We came from regions of the rising sun :
IV. s
258 KING SIGEBERT OF EAST ANGLIA, AND
Scorning the temples built by mortal hand,
We worshipp'd God — one God — the Immense, All-
Jnst :
That worship was the worship of great hearts :
Duty was worship then : that God received it :
I know not if benignly He received it ;
If God be Love I know not. This I know,
God loves not priest that under roofs of gold
Lifts, in his right hand held, the Sacrifice ;
The left, behind him, fingering for the dole.
King of East Anglia's realm, the primal Truths
Are vanished from our Faith : the ensangviined rite,
The insane carouse survive ! '
Thus Heida spake,
Heida, the strong one by the strong ones feared ;
Heida the sad one by the mourners loved,
Heida, the brooder on the sacred Past,
The nursling of a Prophet House, the child
Of old traditions sage !
She paused, and then
Milder, resumed : ' What moved thee to believe 1 '
And Sigebert made answer thus : ' The Sword :
For as a sword that Truth the stranger preached
Ran down into my heart.' Heida to him,
' Well saidst thou " as a Sword : " a Sword is Truth ; —
As sharp a sword is Love : and many a time
In youth, but not the earliest, happiest youth.
When first I found that grief was in the world
Had learned how deep its root, an infant's wail
Went through me like a sword. Man's cry it seemed
The blindfold, crowned creature's cry for Truth
His spirit's sole deliverer.'
Once again
She mused and then continued, ' Truth and Love
HEIDA THE PROPHETESS. 259
Are gifts too great to give themselves foi* nought,
Exacting Gods. Within man's bleeding heart,
If e'er to man conceded, botli shall lie
Crossed, like two swords —
Behold thine image, crowned Humanity !
Better such dower than life exempt from woe :
Our Fathers knew to suffei- ; joyed in pain ;
They knew not this — how deep its root ! '
Once more
The Prophetess was mute : again she spake :
* How named thy guest his God ? ' The King replied :
' The Warrior God Who comes to judge the world ;
The Lord of Love ; the God Who wars on Sin,
And ceases not to war.' ' Ay, militant '
Heida rejoined, with eyes that shone like stars :
' The Persian knew Him. Ormuzd was His name :
Unpitying Light against the darkness warred ;
Against the Light the Darkness. Could the Light
Remit, one moment's length, to pierce that gloom.
Himself in gloom were swallowed.'
Yet again
In silence Heida sat ; then cried aloud
' Odin, and all his radiant ^sir Gods
Forth thronging daily from the golden gates
Of Asgard City, their supernal house
War on that giant brood of Jcitunheim,
Lodged 'mid their mountains of eternal ice
Which circles still that sea surrounding earth
INIan's narrow home. I know that mystery now !
That warfare means the war of Good on 111 :
"We shared that warfare once ! This day, depraved,
Warring, we war alone for rage and hate ;
Men fight as fight the lion and the pard :
For them the sanctity of war is lost
260 KING SIGEBERT OF EAST ANGLIA, AND
Lost like that kindred sanctity of Love,
Our houseliokl boast of okk The Father-God
Vowed us to battle but as Virtue's proof,
High test of softness scorned. His warrior knew
'Twas Odin o'er the battle field who sent
Pure-handed maiden Goddesses, the Norns,
Not vulture-like, but dove-like, mild as dawn,
To seal the foreheads of his sons elect
Seal them to death, the bravest with a kiss :
His warrior, arming, cried aloud, " This day
I speed five Heroes to Valhalla's Hall :
To-morrow night in love I share their Feast ! "
He honoured whom he slew.'
To her the King :
' That Stranger with severer speech than thine.
Sharp flail and stigma, charged the world with sin,
The vast, wide world, and not one race alone :
Each nation, he proclaimed, from Man's great stem
Issuing, had with it borne one Word divine
Rapt from God's starry volume in the skies,
Each word a separate Truth, that, angel-like.
Before them winging, on their faces flung
Splendour of destined morn, and led man's race
Triumphant long on virtue's road. Themselves
Had changed that True to False. The Judge had come ;
That Power Who both beginning is and end
Had stooped to earth to judge the earth with fire ;
A fire of Love, He came to cleanse the just ;
A fire of Vengeance, to consume the impure :
His fan is in His hand : the chaff shall burn ;
The grain be garnered. " Fall, high palace roofs "
He cried, "for ye have sheltered dens of sin :
Fall, he that, impious, scorned the First and Last ;
Fall, he that bowed not to the hoaiy head 3
HEIDA THE PROPHETESS. 261
Fall, he that loosed by fraud the maiden zone ;
Fall, he that lusted for the poor man's field ;
Fall, rebel Peoples ; fall, disloyal Kings ;
And fall " dread Mother, is the word offence 1 —
" False Gods, long served ; for God Himself is nigh." '
The monarch ceased : on Heida's face that hour
He feared to look ; but when she spake, her voice
Betrayed no passion of a soul perturbed :
Austere it was ; not wrathful ; these her words :
' Son, as I hearkened to thy tale this day
Memory I'eturned to me of visions three
That lighted three great junctures of my life :
And thrice thy words were echoes strange of words
That shook my tender childhood slumbering half
Half-waked by matin beams — " The Gods must die."
Three times that awful sound was in mine ear :
Later I learned that voice was nothing new.
My Son, the earliest record of our Faith,
So sacred that on Runic stave or stone
None dared to grave it, lore from age to age
Transmitted by white lips of trembling seers
Spared not to wing, like arrow sped from God
That word to man, " Valhalla's Gods must die ! "
The Gods and Giant Race that strove so long,
Met in their last and mightiest battle-field,
INIust die, and die one death. That prophet- voice
The Gods have heard. Therefore they daily swell
Valhalla's Hall with heroes rapt from earth
To aid them in that fisjht.'
On Heida's face
At last the King, his head uplifting, gazed.
There where the inviolate calm had dwelt alone
A million thoughts, each following each, on swept.
262 KING SIGEBERT OF EAST ANGLIA, AND
That calm beneath them still, as when some grove
O'er-run by sudden gust of summer storm
With inly-working panic thrills at first,
Then springs to meet the gale while o'er it rush
Shadows with splendours mixed. Upon her breast
Came down the fire divine. With lifted hands
She stood : she sang a death-song centuries old
The dirge prophetic both of Gods and men :
' The iron age shall make an iron end :
The men who lived in hate, or impious love,
Shall meet in one red battle-field. That day
The forests of the earth, blackening, shall die ;
The stars down-fall ; the Winged Hound of Heaven
That chased the Sun from age to age shall close
O'er it at last ; the Ash Tree, Ygdrasil
Whose boughs o'er-roof the skies, whose roots descend
To Hell, whose leaves are lives of men, whose boughs
Are destined empires that o'er-awe the world.
Shall drop its fruit luaripe. The Midgard Snake
Circling that sea which girds the orb of earth,
Shall wake, and turn, and ocean in one wave
O'er-sweep all lands. Thereon shall Naglfar ride,
The skeleton ship all ribbed with bones of men,
Whose sails are woven of night, and by whose helm
Stand the Three Fates. When heaves that ship in
sight
Then know the end draws nigh.'
She ceased ; then spake :
' If any doubt, the Voluspa tells all,
The song the mystic maiden, Yola, sang,
Our first of prophets she, as I the last :
She sang that song no Prophet dared to write.'
But'Sigebert made answer where he knelt,
HEIDA THE PROPHETESS. 263
Old Faith back rushing blindly on his heart :
' Though man's last nation lay a wreath of dust,
Thoufrh earth Avere sea, not less in heaven the Gods
Would hold their revels still ; Valhalla's Halls
Resound the Heroes' trivimph ! '
Once again
Heida arose : once more her pallid face
Shone lightning-like, wan cheeks and flashing eyes ;
Once more she sang : ' The Warder of the Gods,
Soundeth the Gjallar Trumpet, never heard
Before by Gods or mortals : from their feast
The everlasting synod of the Gods
Rush forth, gold-armed, with chariot and with horse :
First rides the Father of the flock divine,
Odin, our King, and, at his right hand, Thor
"Whose thunder hammer splits the mountain crags
And level lays the summits of the world ;
Heimdall and Bragi, Uller, Njord, and Tyr,
Behind them throng ; with these the concourse huge
Of lesser Gods, and Heroes snatched from earth
Since man's first battle, part to bear with Gods
In this their greatest. From their halls of ice
To meet them stride the mighty Giant-Brood
The moving mountains of old Jotunheim,
Strong with all strengths of Nature, flood or fire,
Glacier, or stream volcanic from red hills
Cutting its way through billows ; — on they throng
Topping the clouds, and, leagues before them, flinging
Huge shade, like shade of mountains cast o'er wastes
When sets the sun.' A little time she ceased ;
Then fiercelier sang : ' Flanking that Giant-Brood
I see two Portents terrible as Sin : —
The INIidgard Snake primeval at the right
With demon-crest as havightily upheaved
264 KING SIGEBERT OP EAST ANGLIA, AND
As though all ocean curled into one wave,
A million rainbows braid that glooming arch ;
And Death therein is mirrored. At the left,
On moves that brother Ten-or, wolf in shape.
Which, bound till now by craft of prescient Gods,
Weltered in Hell's abyss. Till came the hour
A single hair inwoven by heavenly hand
Sufficed to chain that monster to his rock ;
His fast is over now ; his dusky jaws
At last the Eternal Hunger lifts distent
As far as heaven from earth.'
The Prophetess
One moment pressed her palms upon her eyes
Then flung them wide. * The Father of the Gods
Our Odin, at that Portent hurls his lance ;
And Thor, though bleeding fast, with hammer raised
Deals with that Serpent's scales,'
' The Gods shall win,'
Shouted the King, forgetting at that hour
All save the strife, while on his brow there burned
Hue of the battle at the battle's height
When no man staunches wound. With voice serene
(The storm had left her) Heida made reply :
* If any doubt, the Yoluspci tells all.
Ere yet Valhalla's lower heaven was shaped
Muspell, the great Third Heaven immeasurable.
Above it towered, throne of that God Supreme
Who knew beginning none and knows no end :
High on its southern cliff that dread One sits,
Nor ever from the South withdraws His gaze.
Nor ever drops that bright, sky-pointing Sword
Whose splendour dims the noontide sun. That God —
He, and the Spirit-Host that wing His liglit
When shines the Judgment Sign, shall stand on earth
HEIDA THE PROPHETESS. 265
And judge the earth with fire. Nor men nor Gods
Shall face that fire and live.'
As Heida spake
The broad full moon above the forest soared
And changed her form to light. With hands out-
stretched
She sang her last of songs : ' The Hour is come :
Bifrost, the rainbow-bridge 'twixt heaven and earth
Shatters ; the crystal walls of heaven roll in :
Above the ruins i-ide the Sons of Light.
That dread One first —
Forth from His helm the intolerable beam
Strikes to the battle-field ; the Giant-Brood
Die in that flame ; and Odin, and his Gods :
Valhalla falls, and with it Jutunheim,
Its ice-piled mountains melting into waves :
In fire are all things lost ! '
Then wept the King :
' Alas for Odin and his brethren Gods
That in their great hands stayed the Northern Land !
Alas for man ! ' But Heida, with fixed face
Whereon there sat its ancient calm, replied :
* Nothing that lived but shall again have life,
Such life as Virtue claims. Ill-working men
With Loki and with Hela, evil Gods,
Shall dwell far down in Nastrund's death-black pile
Compact of serpent scales, whose thousand gates
Face to the North, blinded by endless storm ;
But from the sea shall rise a happier earth,
Holier and happier. There the good and true
Secure shall gladden, and the fiery flame
Harm them no more. Another Asgard there
Where stood that earlier, ere our fathers left
Their native East, shall lift sublimer towers
266 KING SIGEBERT OF EAST ANGLIA.
Dawn-lighted by a loftier Ararat :
Just men and pure shall pace its palmy steeps
With him of race divine yet human heart,
Baldur upon whose beaming front the Gods
Gazing, exulted ; from whose lips mankind
Shall gather counsel. Hand in hand with him
Shall stand the blind God, Hodur, now not blind.
That, witless, slew him with the mistletoe.
Yet loved him well. Others, both men and Gods
That dread Third Heaven attained, shall make abode
With Him Who ever is, and ever was,
Enthroned like Him upon its southern cliff.
Drinking the light immortal. From beneath
Like winds from flowery wildernesses borne.
The breath of all good deeds and virtuous thoughts
Their own, or others', since the worlds were made
All generous sufferings, o'er their hearts shall hang.
Fragrance perpetual ; and, where'er they gaze
The Vision of their God shall on them shine.'
Thus Heida spake, and ceased ; then added, ' Son,
Our Faith shall never suffer wreck : fear nought !
Fulfilment, not Destriiction, is its end.
But thou return, and bid thy herald guest
Who sought thee, wandering from his westward Isle
Approach my gates at dawn, and in mine ear
Divulge his message to this land. Farewell ! '
Then from his knees the monarch rose, and took
Through the huge moonlit woods his homeward way.
KING SIGEBEBT OF ESSEX. 267
KING SIGEBEBT OF ESSEX, OB A FBIEND
AT NEED.
Sigebert, King of Essex, labours with Cedcl the Bishop for the
conversion of his people ; but he feasts with a certain impious
kinsman ; and it is foretold to him that for that sin, though
pardoned, he shall die by that kinsman's hand. This prophecy
having been accomplished, Cedd betakes himself to Lastingham,
there to pray with his three brothers for the King's soul. His
prayer is heard, and in a few days he dies. Thirty of Cedd's
monks, issuing from Essex to pray at his grave, die also, and
are buried in a circle round it.
' At last, resolve, my bi-other, and my friend !
Fling from you, as I fling this cloak, your Gods
And cleave to Him the Eternal, One and Sole,
The All- Wise, All-Righteous and Illimitable,
Who made us, and will judge.' Thus Oswy spake
To Sigebert, his friend, of Essex King
Essex once Christian. Eoyal Sebert dead,
The church of God had sorrow by the Thames :
Three Pagan brothers in his place held sway :
They warred upon God's people ; for which cause
God warred on them and by the Wessex sword
In one day hewed them down. King Sigebert
Throned in their place, to Oswy thus replied :
' O friend, I saw the Truth, yet saw it not !
'Twas like the light forth flashed from oar remote,
Now vivid, vanished now. Not less, methinks
Thy Christ ere now had won me save for this ;
I feared that in my bosom love for thee
Not Truth alone, prevailed. I left thy court ;
268 KING SIGEBERT OF ESSEX, OR
I counselled with my wisest ; by degrees,
Though grieving thns to outrage loyal hearts
Reached my resolve : henceforth I serve thy God :
My kingdom may renounce me if it will.'
Then came the Bishop old, and nigh that Wall
Which spans the northern land from sea to sea
Baptized him to the God Triune. At night
The King addressed him thus : ' My task is hard ;
Yield me four priests of thine from Holy Isle
To shape my courses.' Finan gazed around
And made election — Cedd and others three ;
He consecrated Cedd with staff and ring ;
And by the morning's sunrise Sigebert
Rode with them, face to south.
The Spring, long checked,
Fell, like God's Grace, or fire, or flood, at once
O'er all the land : it swathed the hills in green ;
It fringed with violets cleft and rock ; illumed
The stream with primrose tufts : but mightier far
That Spring which triumphed in the monarch's breast.
All doubt dispelled. That smile which knew not
cause
Looked like his angel's mirrored on his face :
At times he seemed with utter gladness dazed ;
At times he laughed aloud. ' Father,' he cried,
' That darkness from my spirit is raised at last :
Ah fool ! ah fool ! to wait for proof so long !
Unseal thine eyes, and all things speak of God :
The snows on yonder thorn His pureness show ;
Yon golden iris bank His love. But now
I marked a child that by its father ran :
Some mystery they seemed of love in heaven
Imaged in earthly love.' With sad, sweet smile
The old man answered : ' Pain there is on earth —
A FRIEND AT NEED, 269
Bereavement, sickness, death.' The King replied :
' It was by suffering, not by deed, or word
God's Son redeemed mankind.' Then answered Cedd:
' God hath thee in His net ; and well art thou !
That Truth thou seest this day and feelest, live !
So shall it live within thee. If, more late,
Rebuke should come, or age, remember then
This day-spring of thy strength and answer thus,
" With me God feasted in my day of youth :
So feast He now with others I" '
Years went by.
And Cedd in work and word was mighty still
And throve with God. The strong East Saxon race
Grew gentle in his presence : they were brave
And faith is courage in the things divine,
Courage with meekness blent. The heroic heart
Beats to the spiritual cognate, paltering not
Fraudulent with Truth once known. Like winds from
God
God's message on them fell. Old bonds of sin
Snapt by the vastness of the growing soul
Burst of themselves ; and in the heart late bound
Virtue had room to breathe. As when that Voice
Primeval o'er the formless chaos rolled.
And, straight, confusions ceased, the greater orb
Ruling the day, the lesser, night ; even so.
Born of that Bethlehem Mystery, Order lived :
Divine commandments fixed a firmament
Betwixt man's lower instincts and his mind :
From unsuspected summits of his Spirit
The morning shone. The nation with the man
Partook the joy : from duty freedom flowed ;
And there where tribes had roved a People lived.
A pathos of strange beauty hung thenceforth
270 KING SIGEBERT OF ESSEX, OK
O'er humblest hamlet : he who passed it prayed
' May never sword come here ! ' Bishop and King
Together laboured : well that Bishop's love
Repaid that royal zeal. If random speech
Censured the King, though justly, sudden red
Circling the old man's silver-tressed brow
Showed, though he spake not, that in saintly breast
The human heart lived on.
In Ithancester
He dwelt, and toiled : not less to Lindisfarne,
His ancient home in spirit oft he yearned
Longing for converse with his God alone ;
And made retreat there often, not to shun
Labour allotted, but to draw from heaven
Strength for his task. One year, returning thence,
Deira's King addressed him as they rode :
' My father, choose the richest of my lands
And build thereon a holy monastery ;
So shall my realm be blessed, and I, and mine.'
He answered : ' Son, no wealthy lands for us !
Spake not the prophet': "There where dragons roamed.
In later days the grass shall grow- — the reed " 1
I choose those rocky hills that, on our left
Drag down the skiey waters to the woods :
Such loved I from my youth ; to me they said,
" Bandits this hour visurp our heights, and beasts
Cumber our caves : expel the seed accurst.
And yield us back to God \" '
The King gave ear ;
And Cedd within those mountains passed his Lent,
Driving with prayer and fast the Spirits Accurst
With ignominy forth. Foundations next
He laid with sacred pomp. Fair rose the walls :
All day the March sea blew its thunder blasts
A FRIEND AT NEED, 271
Throngli wide-mouthed trumpets of ravine or rift
On winding far to where in Avooden cell
The old man prayed, while o'er him rushed the cloud
Storm borne from crag to crag. Serener breeze,
With alternation soft in Nature's course,
Following ere long, great Easter's harbinger,
Thus spake he ; 'I must keep the Feast at home ;
My chiklren there expect me.' Parting thence.
He left his brothers three to consummate
His work begun, Celin, and Cynabil,
And Chad at Lichfield Bishop ere he died.
Thus Lastingham had birth.
Beside the Thames
Meantime dark deeds were done. There dwelt two
thanes.
The kinsmen of the King, his friends in youth.
Of meanest friend unworthy. Far and wide
They ravined, and the laws of God and man
Despised alike. Three times, in days gone by,
A warning hand their Bishop o'er them raised ;
The fourth like bolt from heaven on them it fell.
And clave them fi-om God's Church. They heeded
not :
And now the elder kept his birthday feast,
Summoning his friends around him, first the King.
Doubtful and sad, the o'er-gentle monarch mused :
' To feast with sinners is to sanction sin,
A deed abhorred ; the alternative is hard :
Must then their sovereign shame with open scorn
Kinsman and friend 1 I think they mourn the past,
And, were our Bishop here, would pardon sue.'
Boding, yet self -deceived, he joined that feast :
Thereat he saw scant sign of penitence :
Ere long he bade farewell.
272 KING SIGEBERT OF ESSEX, OR
That self-same hour
Cedd from his northern pilgrimage returned ;
The monarch met him at the offenders' gate,
And, instant when he saw that reverend face,
His sin before him stood. Down from his horse
Leaping, he told him all, and penance prayed.
Long time the old man on that royal front
Fixed a sad eye. ' Thy sin was great, my son.
Shaming thy God to spare a sinner's shame:
That sin thy God forgives and I I'emit :
But those whom God forgives He chastens oft :
My son, I see a sign upon thy brow !
Ere yonder lessening moon completes her wane
Behold, the blood-stained hand late clasped in thine
Shall drag thee to thy death.' The King replied :
* A Sigebert there lived. East Anglia's King,
Whose death was glorious to his realm. May mine,
Dark and inglorious, strengthen hearts infirm,
And profit thus my land.'
A time it was
When Christian mercy judged by Pagan hearts
Not virtue seemed but sin. That sin's reproach
The King had long sustained. Ere long it chanced
That, near the stronghold of that impious feast,
A vanquished rebel, long in forests hid
Drew near, and knelt to Sigebert for grace
And won his suit. The monarch's kinsmen twain,
Those men of blood, forth-gazing from a tower
Saw all ; heard all. Upon them fury fell,
As when through cloudless skies there comes a blast
From site unknown, that, instant, finds its prey,
Circling some white-sailed bark or towering tree
And, with a touch, down-wrenching ; all things
else
A FRIEND AT NEED. 273
Unharmecl, though near. They snatched their daggers
up,
And ruslied upon ilieir prey, and, shouting thus
' White-livered slave, that mak'st thy throne a jest
And mock'st great Odin's self, and us thy kin,
To please thy shaveling ' struck him through the heart;
Then, spurring through the woodlands to the sea,
Were never heard of more.
Throughout the land
Lament was made ; lament in every house,
As though in each its eldest-born lay dead ;
Lament far off and near. The others wept :
Cedd, in long vigils of the lonely night,
Not wept alone, but lifted strength of prayer
And, morn by morn, that Sacrifice Eterne,
Mightier tenfold in impetrative power
Than prayers of all man's race, from Adam's first
To his who latest on the Judgment Day
Shall raise his hands to God. Four years went by :
That mourner's wound they staunched not. Oft in
sleep
He murmured low, ' Would I had died for thee ! '
And once, half- waked by rvish of morning rains,
' Why saw I on his brow that fatal sign ? —
He might have lived till now ! ' Within his heart
At last there rose a cry, ' To Lastingham !
Pray with thy brothers three, for saints are they :
So shall thy friend, who resteth in the Lord
With perfect will submiss, the waiting passed,
Gaze on God's Vision with an eye unsealed,
In glory everlasting.' At that thought
Peace on the old man settled. Staff in hand
Forth on his way he fared. Nor horse he rode
Nor sandals wore. He walked with feet that bled,
IV. T
274 KING SIGEBERT OF ESSEX, OR
Paying, well pleased, that penance for his King ;
And mnrnnu'ed ofttimes, ' Not my blood alone !
Kay, but my life, my life ! '
Yet penance pain
Like pain of suffering Souls at peace with God,
Qvielled not that gladness which, from secret source
Ptisinsf, o'erflowed his heart. Old times returned :
Once more beside him rode his King in youth
Southward to where his realm — his duty — lay.
Exulting captive of the Saviour Lord,
With face love-lit. As then, the vernal prime
Hourly with ampler respiration drew
Delight of purer green from balmier airs :
As then the sunshine glittered. By their path
Now hung the woodbine ; now the hare-bell waved ;
Rivulets new-swollen by melted snows, and birds
'Mid echoing boughs with rival rapture sang :
At times the monks forgat their Christian hymns,
By humbler anthems charmed. They gladdened more
Beholding oft in cottage doors cross-crowned
Angelic faces, or in lonely ways ;
Once as they passed there stood a little maid,
Some ten years old, alone 'mid lonely pines.
With violet crowned and primrose. Wlio were those,
The forest's white-robed guests, she nothing knew ;
Not less she knelt. With hand uplifted Cedd
Signed her his blessing. Hand she kissed in turn ;
Then waved, yet ceased not from her song, ' Alone
Two lovers sat at sunset.'
Every eve
Some village gave the wanderers food and rest,
Or half -built convent with its church thick-walled
And polished shafts, great names in after times
Ely, and Croyland, Southwell, Medeshamstede,
A FRIEND AT NEED. 275
Adding to sylvan sweetness holier grace
Or rising lonely o'er morass and mere
With bowery thickets isled where dogwood brake
Retained, though late, its red. To Boston near
Whei'e Ouse, and Aire, and Derwent join with Trent,
And salt sea waters mingle with the fresh
They met a band of youths that o'er the sands
Advanced with psalm, cross-led. The monks rejoiced.
Save one from Ireland — Dicul. He, quick-eared
Had caught that morn a war-cry on the wind
And, sideway glancing from his Office-book,
Descried the cause. From Mercia's realm a host
Had crossed Northumbria's bound. His thin, worn
face
O'er-flamed with sudden anger, thus he cried :
' In this, your land, men say, "Who worketh prayeth,"
In mine we say, " Well prays who fighteth well : "
A Pagan race treads down your homesteads ! Slaves,
That close not with their throats ! '
Advancing thus,
On the tenth eve they came to Lastingham :
Forth rushed the brethren, w^atching long far off
To meet them, first the brothers three of Cedd
Who kissed him, cheek and mouth. Gladly that night
Those foot-worn travellers laid them down and slept
Save one alone. Old Cedd his vigil made
And, kneeling by the tabernacle's lamp
Prayed for the man he mourned for, ending thus :
' Thou Lord of Souls, to Thee the Souls are dear !
Thou yearn' st toward them as they yearn to Thee ;
Behold, not prayer alone for him I raise :
I offer Thee my life.' When morning's light
In that great church commingled with its gloom.
The monks, slow-pacing, by that kneeler knelt,
276 KING SIGEBERT OF ESSEX, OR
And prayed for Sigebert, beloved of God ;
And lastly offered Mass : and it befell
That when, the Offering offered, and the Dead
Rightly remembered, he who sang that Mass
Had reached the ' Nobis quoque famulis,'
There came to Cedd an answer from the Lord
Heard in his heart ; and he beheld his King
Throned 'mid the Saints Elect of God who keep
Perpetual triumph, and who see that Face
Which to its likeness hourly more compels
Those faces t'ward It turned. That function o'er,
Thus spake the Bishop : ' Brethren, sing "Te Deum;" '
They sang it ; while within him he replied,
' Lord, let Thy servant now depart in peace.'
A week passed by with gladness winged and prayer.
In wonder Cedd beheld those structures new
From small beginnings reared, though many a gift
Sent for that work's behoof, had fed the poor
111 famine time laid low. Moorlands he saw
By cornfields vanquished ; mai-ked the all-beauteous
siege
Of pastvu'e yearly threatening loftier crags
Loud with the bleat of lambs. Their shepherd once
Had roved a bandit, next had toiled a slave.
Now with both hands he poured his weekly wage
Down on his young wife's lap, his pretty babes
Gambolling around for joy. A hospital
Stood by the convent's gate. With moistened eye
Musing on Him Who suffers in His sick.
The Bishop paced it. There he found his death :
That year a plague had wasted all the land :
It reached him. Late that night he said, ' 'Tis well ! '
In three days more he lay with hands death-cold
A FRIEND AT NEED. 277
Crossed on a peaceful breast.
Like winter cloud
Borne through dark air, that portent feared of man
111 tidings, making way with mystic speed,
Shadowed ere long the troubled bank of Thames,
And spread a wailing round its Minsters twain
Saint Peter's and Saint PaiTl's. Saint Alban's caught
That cry, and northward echoed. Southward soon
Forlorn it rang 'mid towers of Rochester ;
Then seaward died. But in that convent pile
Wherein so long the Saint had made abode
A different grief there lived, a deeper grief.
That grief which part hath none in sobs or tears —
Which needs must act. There thirty monks arose
And, taking each his staff, made vow thenceforth
To serve God's altar where their father died
Or share his grave. Through Ithancester's gate
As forth they paced between two kneeling crowds,
A little homeless boy, who heard their dirge
(Late orphaned, at its grief he marvelled not).
So loved them that he followed, shorter steps
Doubling 'gainst theirs. At first the orphan wept :
That mood relaxed : before them now he ran
To pluck a flower ; as oft he lagged behind
The wild bird's song so aptly imitating
That, by his music drawn, or by his looks,
That bird at times forgat her fears, and perched
Pleased on his arm. As flower and bird to him
Such as those monks the child. Better each day
He loved them ; yet, revering, still he mocked.
And though he mocked, he kissed. The westering sun
On the eighth eve from towers of Lastingham
*o*
Welcomed those strangers. In another hour,
Well-nigh arrived, they saw that grave they sought
278 KING SIGEBERT OF ESSEX.
Sole on the church's northern slope. As when,
Some father, absent long, returns at last,
His children rush loud-voiced from field to house.
And cling about his knees ; and they that mark —
Old reaper, bent no more, with hook in hand,
Or ploughman leaning 'gainst the old blind horse
Beholding wonder not ; so to that grave
Eushed they ; so clung. Around that grave ere long
Their own were ranged. That plague which smote
the sire
Spared not his sons. With ministering hand
From pallet still to pallet passed the boy.
Now from the dark spring wafting colder draught
Now moistening fevered lips, or on the brow
Spreading the new-bathed cincture. Him alone
The infection reached not. When the last was gone
He felt as though the earth, man's race — yea, God
Himself — were dead. Around he gazed and spake
' Why then do I remain ? '
From hill to hill,
The monks on reverend offices intent,
All solitary oft that boy repaired.
From each in turn forth gazing, fain to learn
If friend were t' wards him nighing. Many a hearth
More late, bereavement's earlier anguish healed,
Welcomed the creature : many a mother held
The milk-bowl to his mouth in both hands stayed,
With smile the deeper for the draught prolonged,
And lodged, as he departed, in his hand
Her latest crust. With children of his age
Seldom he played. That convent gave him rest ;
Nor lost he aught surviving thus his friends,
Since childhood's sacred innocence he kept
While life remained, unspotted. When mature
KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA. 270
Five years he lived there monk, and reverence drew
To that high convent through liis saintly ways ;
Then died. Within that cirque of thii»ty graves
They laid him, close to Cedd. In later years,
Because they ne'er could learn his name or race,
Nor yet forget his gentle looks, the name
Of Deodatus graved they on his tomb.
KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA,
OR THE BRITON'S REVENGE.
Northumbria having been subdued by Pagan Mercia, Oswald
raises there again the Christian standard. Peuda wages war
against him, iu alliance with Cadwallon, a Cambrian prince who
hates the Saxon con(|uerors the more bitterly when become
Christians. Encouraged by St. Columba in a vision, Oswald
Avith a small force vanquishes the hosts of Cadwallon, who is
slain. He sends to lona for monks of St. Columl>a's order,
converts his country to the Faith, and dies for her. The earlier
British race expiates its evil revenge.
The agony was over which but late
Had shook to death Northumbria' s realm new-raised
By Edwin, dear to God. The agony
At last was over ; but the tear flowed on :
The Faith of Christ had fallen once more to dust
That Faith which spoused with golden marriage ring
The land to God, when Coiffi, horsed and mailed.
Chief Priest himself, hurled at the Temple's wall
His lance, and quivering left it lodged therein.
The agony had ceased ; yet Eachael's cry
Still pierced the childless region. Penda's sword
Had swept it, Mercia's Christian-hating King ;
280 KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA, OR
Fiercelier Cadwallon's, Cambria's Christian Prince,
Christian in vain. The British wrong: like fire
Burned in his heart. Well-nigh two hundred years
That British race, they only of the tribes
By Rome subdued, sustained unceasing war
'Gainst those barbaric hordes that, nursed long since
'Mid Teuton woods, when Rome her death-wound felt,
And ' Ilabet ' shrilled from every trampled realm,
Rushed forth in ruin o'er her old domain : —
That race against the Saxon still made head ;
Large remnant yet survived. The Western coast
Was theirs ; old sea-beat Cornw^all's granite cliffs,
And purple hills of Cambria ; northward thence
Strathclyde, from towered Carnegia's winding Dee
To Morecambe's shining sands, and those fair vales
Since loved by every muse, where silver meres
Slept in the embrace of yew-clad mountain walls ;
With tracts of midland Britain and the East.
Remained the memory of the greatness lost-;
The Druid circles of the olden age ;
The ash-strewn cities radiant late with arts
Extinct this day ; bath, circus, theatre
Mosaic-paved ; the Roman halls defaced ;
The Christian altars crushed. That last of wrongs
The vanquished punished with malign revenge :
Never had British priest to Saxon preached ;
And when that cry was heard, ' The Saxon King
Edwin hath bowed to Christ,' on Cambrian hills
Nor man nor woman smiled.
They had not lacked
The timely warning. From his Kentish shores
Augustine stretched to them paternal hands :
Later, he sought them out in synod met,
Their custom, under open roof of heaven.
THE briton's revenge. 281
' The Mother of the Churches,' thus he spake
' Commands — implores you ! Seek from her, and win
The Saci'ament of Unity Divine !
Thus strengthened, be her strength ! With her con-
joined
Subdue your foe to Christ ! ' He sued in vain.
The British bishops hurled defiance stern
Against his head, while Cambrian peaks far off
Darkened, and thunder muttered. From his seat,
Slowly and sadly as the sun declined
At last, though late, that Roman rose and stretched
A lean hand t'ward that circle, speaking thus :
' Hear then the sentence of your God on sin !
Because ye willed not peace, behold the sword !
Because ye grudged your foe the Faith of Christ
Nor h'olp to lead him on the ways of life.
For that cause from you by the Saxon hand
Your country shall be taken ! '
Edwin slain,
Far off in exile dwelt his nephews long
Oswald and Oswy. Alba gave them rest.
Alba, not yet called Scotland. Ireland's sons.
Then Scoti named, had warred on Alba's Picts :
Columba's Gospel vanquished either race ;
Won both to God. It won not less those youths
In boyhood Oswald, Oswy still a child.
That child was wild and hot, and had his moods,
Despotic now, now mirthful. Mild as Spring
Was Oswald's soul, majestic and benign ;
Thoughtful his azure eyes, serene his front ;
He of his ravished sceptre little recked ;
The shepherds were his friends : the mountain deer
Would pluck the ivy fearless from his hand :
In gladness walked he till Northumbria's cry
282 KING OSWALD OF NOKTHUMBRIA, OR
Smote on his heart. ' Why rest I here in peace,'
Thus mused he, ' wliile my brethren groan afar 1 '
By night he fled with twelve companion youths
Christians like him and reached his native land.
Too fallen it seemed to aid him. On he passed ;
The ways were desolate, yet evermore
A slender band around his footsteps drew
Less seeking victory than an honest death.
Oft gazed their King upon them ; murmured oft,
* Few hands — true hearts ! ' Sudden aloud he cried
' Plant here the royal Standard, friends, and hence
Let sound the royal trumpet.'
Stern response
Reached him ere long : not Mercia's realm alone ;
Cambria that heard the challenge joined the war :
Cambria, upon whose heart the ancesti'al woe
For ever with the years, like letters graved
On growing pines, grew larger and more large ; —
To Penda forth she stretched a hand blood-red ;
Christian with Pagan joined, an unblest bond,
A league accvirsed. The indomitable hate
Compelled that league. Still from his cave the Seer
Admonished, * Set the foe against the foe ;
Slay last the conqueror ! ' and from rock and hill
The Bard cried, ' Vengeance ! ' In the bardic clan
That hatred of their country's ancient bane
Lived like a faith. One night it chanced a tarn
Secreted high 'mid cold and moonless hills
Bursting its bank down burst. That valley's Bard
Clomb to the chui'ch-roof from his buried house :
Thence rang his song, — 'twas 'Vengeance! — Ven-
geance ' still !
That torrent reached the roof : he clomb the tower :
The torrent mounted : on the bleak hill-side
THE Briton's revenge. 283
All night the dalesmen, wailing o'er their drowned
Amid the roar of winds and downward rocks
Still heard that war-song, 'Vengeance! Blood for
blood ! '
At last the tower fell flat, and winter morn
Shone on the waters only.
Three short weeks
Dinned with alarums passed ; in Mercia still
Lay Penda, sickness-struck, when, face to face
The Cambrian host and Oswald's little band
Exulting met at sunset near a height
Then 'Heaven-Field' named, but later 'Oswald's Field,'
Backed by that "Wall the Boman built of old
His fence from sea to sea. There Oswald stood :
There raised with hands outstretched a mighty Cross,
Strong-based, and deep in earth : his comrades twelve
Around it heaped the soil, while priests white-stoled
Chanted ' Vexilla Begis.' Work and rite
Complete, the King knelt down and made his prayer,
' True God Eternal, look upon this Cross,
The sole now standing on Northumbria's breast
And help Thine own, though few, who trust in Thee ! '
That night before his tent the wanderer sate
Listening the circling sentinel, or bay
Of wakeful hound remote, or downward course
Of streams from moorland hills. Before his view
His whole life rose : his father's angry brow ;
The eyes all-wondrous, and all-tender hand
Of her, his mother, striving evermore
To keep betwixt her husband and her sire
Unbroken bond : his exiled days returned.
The kind that pitied them, the rude that jeered ;
Lastly, that monk whose boast was evermore
284 KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA, OR
Columba of lona, Columkille ;
That monk who made him Christian. ' Come what
may,'
Thus Oswald mused, ' I have not lived in vain :
Lose I or win, a kingdom there remains ;
Though not on earth ! ' A tear the vision dimmed
As thus he closed, ' My mother will be there ! '
Then sank his lids in slumber.
On his sleep
Was this indeed but dream 1 — a glory brake :
Cokimba, dear to Oswald from his youth
Columba, clad in glory as the sun
Beside him stood and spake : ' Be strong ! On earth
There lives not who can guess the might of prayer :
What then is prayer on high 1 ' The saintly Shape
Heavenward his hands upraised while rose to heaven
His statui-e, towering ever high and higher.
Warlike and priestly both. As morning cloud
Blown by a mighty wind his robe ran forth,
Then stood, a golden wall that severance made
'Twixt Oswald's band and that unnumbered host.
Again he spake, ' Put on thee heart of man
And fight : though few, thy warriors shall not die
In darkness of an unbelieving land
But live, and live to God.' The vision passed :
By Oswald's seat his warriors stood and cried
' The Bull-horn ! Hark ! ' The monarch told them all :
They answered, ' Let thy God sustain thy throne :
Thenceforth our God is He.'
The sun uprose :
Ere long the battle joined. Three dreadful hours
Doubtful the issue hung. Fierce Cambria's sons
With chief and clan, with harper and with harp,
Though terrible yet mirthful in their mood,
THE Briton's revenge. 285
Rushed to their sport. Who mocked their hope that
day?
Did Angels help the just "? Their falling blood,
Say, leaped it up once more, each drop a man
Their phalanx to replenish ? Backward driven,
Asrain that multitudinous foe returned
With clangour dire ; futile, again fell back
Down dashed, like hailstone showers from palace halls
Where princes feast secure. Astonishment
Smote them at last. Through all those serried ranks,
Compact so late, svidden confusions ran
Like lines divergent through a film of ice
Stamped on by armM heel, or rifts on plains
Prescient of earthquake underground. Their chiefs
Sounded the charge ; — -in vain : Distrust, Dismay,
111 Gods, the darkness lorded of that hour :
Panic to madness turned. Cadwallon sole
From squadron on to squadron speeding still
As on a winged steed — his snow-white hair
Behind him blown — a mace in either hand,
Stayed while he might the inevitable rout ;
Then sought his death, and found. Some fated Power
Mightier than man's that hour di'agged back his hosts
Against their will and his : as when the moon
Shrouded herself, drags back the great sea-tides
That needs must follow her receding wheels
Though wind and wave gainsay them, breakers wan
Thundering indignant down nocturnal shores,
And city-brimming floods against their will
Down drawn to river-mouths.
In after days
Who scaped made oath that in the midmost fight
The green earth sickened with a brazen glare
While darkness held the skies. They saw besides
286 KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA, OR
On Heaven-Field height a Cross, and, at its foot,
A sworded warrior vested like a priest
Who still in stature high and higher towered
As raged the battle. Higher far that Cross
Above him rose, barring with black the stars
That bickered through the eclipse's noonday night,
And ever from its bleeding arms sent forth
Thick- volleyed lightnings, azure foi"k and flame,
Through all that headlong host.
At eventide,
Where thickest fight had mingled, Oswald stood
With raiment red as his who treads alone
The wine-vat when the grapes are all pressed out.
Yet scathless and untouched. His mother's smile
Was radiant on his pvire and youthful face.
Joyous, but not exulting. At his foot
Cadwallon lay, with four-score winters white,
A threatening corse : not death itself could shake
The mace from either rigid hand close-clenched.
Or smooth his brow. Above him Oswald bent.
Then spake : ' He also loved his native land :
Bear him with honour hence to hills of Wales,
And lay him with his Fathers.'
Thus was raised
In righteousness King Oswald's throne. But he,
Mindful in victory of Columba's word,
Thus mused, ' The Master is as he that serves :
How shall I serve this peoiile 1 ' O'er the waves
Then sent he of his Twelve the eldest three :
They to lona sailed, and standing there
In full assembly of lona's Saints
Addressed them : ' To Columba Oswald thus :
Let him that propped the King on Heaven-Field's
height.
THE Briton's revenge. 287
That held the battle-balance high that day,
Unite my realm to Christ ! ' The monks replied,
' Such mission should be Aidan's.' Aidan went.
With gladness Oswald met him, and with gifts :
But Aidan said, ' Entreat me not to dwell
There where Paulinus dwelt, the man of God,
In thy chief city, York. Thy race is fierce ;
And meekness only can subdue the proud :
Thy people first I want ; through them the great.
Grant me some island 'mid the raging main
Humble and low, not cheered by smiling meads,
"Where with my brethren I may watch with God,
Henceforth my only aid.' Oswald replied
' Let Lindisfarne be thine. That rock-based keep
Built by my grandsire Ida o'er it peers :
I shall be near thee though I see thee not.'
Then Aidan on the Isle of Lindisfarne
Upreared that monastery which ruled in Christ
So long the Northern realm. A plain rock-girt
Level it lies and low : nor flower nor fruit
Gladdens its margin : thin its sod, and bleak :
Twice, day by day, the salt sea hems it round :
And twice a day the melancholy sands,
O'er-wailed by sea-bird, and with sea-weed strewn,
Pteplace the lonely ocean. Sacred Isles
That westward, eastward, guard the imperial realm,
lona ! Lindisfarne ! With you compared
How poor that lilied Delos of old Greece
For all its laurel bowers and nightingales !
England's great hands were ye to God forth stretched
Through adverse climes, beneath the Boreal star.
That took His Stigmata. In sanctity
Were her foundations laid. Her later ci-owns
288 KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA, OR
Of Freedom first, of Science, and of Song
She owes them all to you !
In Lindisfarne
Aidan, and his, rejoicing dwelt with God :
Amid the winter storm their anthems rose ;
And from their sanctuary lamp the gleam
Far shone from wave to wave. On starless nights
From Bamborough's turret Oswald watched it long,
Before his casement kneeling— first alone,
Companioned later. Kineburga there
Beside him knelt ere long, his tender bride.
Young, beauteous, modest, noble. ' Not for them,'
Thus spake the newly wedded, ' not for them.
For man's sake severed from the world of men,
In ceaseless vigil warring upon sin.
Ah, not for them the flower of life, the harp,
High feast, or bridal torch ! ' Purer perchance
Their bridal torch burned on because from far
That sacred lamp had met its earliest beam !
There Aidan lived, and wafted issuing tlience
O'er wilds Bernician and fierce battle-fields
The strength majestic of liis still retreat,
The puissance of a soul Avhose home was God.
* What man is this,' the warriors asked, ' that moves
Unarmed among us ; lifts his crucifix.
And says, " Ye swords, lie prone " 1 ' The revelling
crew
Hose from their cups : ' He preaches abstinence :
Behold, the man is mortified himself :
The moonlight of his watchings and his fasts
He carries on his face.' When Princes forced
Largess upon him, he replied, ' I want
Not yours but you ; ' and with their gifts redeemed
THE Briton's revenge. 289
The orphan slave. The poor were as his children :
He to the beggar stinted not his hand
JSTor, giving, said ' Be brief.' Such seed bare fruit :
God in the dark, primeval woods had reai-ed
A race whose fierceness had its touch of ruth
Brave, cordial, chaste, and simple. Reverence
That race preserved : Reverence advanced to Love :
The ties of life it honoured : lit from heaven
They wore a meaning new. The Faith of Christ
Banished the bestial from the heart of man ;
Restored the Hope divine.
In all his toils
Oswald with Aidan walked. Impartial law
Not licence, not despotic favour, stands
To Truth auxiliar true. Such laws were his :
Yet not through such alone he worked for Truth ;
Function he claimed more high. When Aidan
preached ;
In forest depths when thousands girt him round ;
When countless eyes, a clinging weight, Avere bent
Upon his lips — all knew they spake from God, —
The King, with monks fi'om Ireland knit of old
Beside the Bishop stood ; each word he spake
Changed to the Saxon tongue.
Earth were not earth,
If reign like Oswald's lasted. Penda lived ;
Nor e'er from Oswald turned for eight long years
An eye like some swart planet feared of man,
Omen of wars or plague. Cadwallon's fate,
Ally ill-starred, that fought without his aid
O'er-flushed old hatred with a fiery shame :
Cadwallon nightly frowned above his dreams.
The tyrant watched his time. At Maserfield
The armies met. There on Northumbiia's day
IV. u
290 KING OSVi'ALD OF NOKTIIUMBRIA, OR
Settled what seemed, yet was not, endless niglit ;
There Faith and Virtue, deathless seemed to die :
There holy Oswald fell. For God he fought,
Fought for his country. Walled with lances round,
A sheaf of arrows quivering in his breast,
One moment yet he stood. ' Preserve,' he cried,
' My country, God ! ' then added, gazing round,
' And these my soldiers : make their spirits Thine ! '
Thus perished good King Oswald, King and Saint ;
Saint by acclaim of nations canonised
Ere yet the Church had spoken. Year by year
The Hexham monks to Heaven- Field, where of old
Had stood that ' Ci'oss which conquered,' made repair,
With chanted psalm ; and pilgrims daily prayed
Where died the just and true. ISTot vain their vows :
In righteousness foundations had been laid :
The earthquake reached them not. The Dane passed
by;
High lip the Norman glittered : but beneath.
On Faith profounder based and gentler Law
The Saxon realm lived on.
But never more
From Heaven-Field's wreck the Briton raised his head ;
Britain thenceforth was England. His the right ;
The land was his of old ; and in God's House
His of the island races stood first-born :
Not less he sinned through hate, esteeming more
Memories of wrong than forward-looking hopes
And triumphs of the Truth. For that cavise God
His face in blessing to the younger turned,
More honouring Pagans who in ignorance erred
Than those who, taught of God, concealed their gift
Divorcing Faith from Love. Natheless they clung,
That remnant spared, to rocky hills of Wales
THE Briton's revenge. 291
With eagle clutch, whoe'er in England ruled
From Horsa's day to Edward's. Centuries eight
In gorge or vale sea-lulled they held their own,
By native monarchs swayed, while native harps
Eang ovit from native cliffs defiant song
Wild as their singing pines. Heroic Land !
Freedom was thine ; the torrent's plunge ; the peak 3
The pale mist past it borne ! Heroic Race !
Caractacus was thine, and Galgacus,
And Boadicea greater by her wrongs
Than by her lineage. Battle-axe of thine
Rang loud and long on Roman helms ere yet
Hengist had trod the island. Thine that King
World-famed, who led to fifty war-fields forth
'Gainst Saxon hosts his sinewy, long-haired race
Unmailed, yet victory-crowned ; that King who left
Tintagel, Camelot, and Lyonnesse,
Immortal names, though wild as elfin notes
From phantom rocks echoed in fairy land —
Great Arthur ! Year by year his deeds were sung
While he in Glastonbury's cloister slept,
First by the race he died for, next by those
Their children, exiles in Armoric Gaul,
By Europe's minstrels then, from age to age ;
But ne'er by ampler voice, or richlier toned
Than England lists to-day. Race once of Saints !
Thine were they, Ninian thine and Kentigern,
Iltud and Beino, yea and David's self,
Thy crown of Saints, and Winifred, their flower
Who fills her well with healing virtue still.
Cadoc was thine, who to his Cambrian throne
Preferred that western convent at Lismore,
Yet taught the British Princes thus to sing :
' None loveth Song that loves not Light and Truth :
292 CEADMON THE COWHERD,
None lovetli Light and Truth that loves not Justice
None loveth Justice if he loves not God :
None loveth God that lives not blest and great.'
OEADMON THE COWHERD, THE FIRST
ENGLISH POET.
Ceadmon, a cowliercl, being at a feast, tieclares when the harp
reaches him, that he cannot sing. As lie sleeps, a divine Voice
commands him to sing. He obeys, and tlie gift of song is im-
parted to him. Hilda, Abljess of Whitliy, eiuolls him among
lier monks ; and in later years he sings the revolt of the Fallen
Angels, and many Christian mysteries, thus becoming the iirst
English poet.
Alone upon the pleasant bank of Esk
Ceadmon the Cowherd stood. The sinking sun
Reddened the bay, and fired the river-bank,
And flamed upon the ruddy herds that sti'ayed
Along the marge, clear-imaged. None was nigh :
For that cause spake the Cowherd, ' Praise to God !
He made the worlds ; and now, by Hilda's hand
Planteth a crown on Whitby's holy crest :
Daily her convent towers more high aspire :
Daily ascend her Vespers. Hark that strain ! '
He stood and listened. Soon the flame-touched herds
Sent forth their lowings, and the clifi^s replied.
And Ceadmon thus resumed : ' The music note
Rings throvigh their lowings dull, though heard by
few !
Poor kine, ye do your best ! Ye know not God,
Yet man, His likeness, unto you is God,
THE FIRST ENGLISH POET, 293
And him ye worship with obedience sage,
A grateful, sober, much-enduring race
That o'er the vernal clover sigh for joy.
With winter snows contend not. Patient kine,
What thought is yours, deep-musing 1 Haply this,
" God's help ! how narrow are our thoughts, and few
Not so the thoughts of that slight human child
Who daily drives us with her blossomed rod
From lowland valleys to the pails long-ranged ! "
Take comfort, kine ! God also made your race !
If praise from man surceased, from your broad chests
That God would perfect pi-aise, and, when ye died
Ee sound it from yon rocks that gird the bay :
God knoweth all things. Let that thought suffice ! '
Thus spake the ruler of the deep-mouthed kine :
They were not his ; the man and they alike
A neighbour's wealth. He was contented thvis :
Humble he was in station, meek of soul.
Unlettered, yet heart-wise. His face was pale ;
Stately his frame, though slightly bent by age :
Slow were his eyes, and slow his speech, and slow
His musing step ; and slow his hand to wrath ;
A massive hand, but soft, that many a time
Had succoured man and woman, child and beast
And yet could fiercely grasp the sword. At times
As mightily it clutched his ashen goad
When like an eagle on him swooped some thought :
Then stood he as in dream, his pallid front
Brightening like eastern sea-cliffs when a moon
Unrisen is near its rising.
Round the bay
Meantime, as twilight deepened, many a fire
Up-sprang, and horns were heard. Around the steep
294 CEADMON THE COWHERD,
With bannered pomp and many a tossing plume
Advancing slow a cavalcade made way.
Oswy, Northumbria's king, the foremost rode,
Oswy trimnphant o'er the Mercian host,
Invoking favour on his sceptre new ;
With him an Anglian prince, student long time
In Bangor of the Irish, and a monk
Of Frankish race far wandering from the INIarne :
They came to look on Hilda, hear her words
Of far-famed wisdom on the Interior Life ;
For Hilda thus discoursed : ' True life of man
Is life within : inward immeasurably
The being winds of all who walk the earth ;
But he whom sense hath blinded nothing knows
Of that wide greatness : like a boy is he,
A boy that clambers round some castle's wall
In search of nests, the outward wall of seven,
Yet nothing knows of those great courts within,
The hall where princes banquet, or the bower
Where royal maids discourse with lyre and lute,
Much less its central church, and sacred shrine
Wherein God dwells alone.' Thus Hilda spake ;
And they that gazed upon her widening eyes
Low whispered, each to each, ' She speaks of things
Which she hath seen and known.'
On Whitby's height
The royal feast was holden : far below,
A noisier revel dinned the shore ; therein
The humbler guests made banquet. Many a tent
Gleamed on the yellow sands by ripples kissed ;
And many a savoury dish sent up its steam ;
The farmer from the field had brought his calf ;
Fishers that increase scaled which green-gulfed seas
From womb crystalline, teeming, yield to man ;
THE FIRST ENGLISH POET. 295
And Jock, the woodsman, from his oaken glades
The tall stag, arrow-pierced. In gay attire
Now green, now crimson, matron sat and maid :
Each had her due : the elder, reverence most.
The lovelier that and love. Beside the board
The beggar lacked not place.
When hunger's rage.
Sharpened by fresh sea-air, was quelled, the jest
Succeeded, and the tale of foreign lands ;
Yet, boast who might of distant chief renowned,
His battle-axe, or fist that felled an ox,
The Anglian's answer was ' our Hilda ' still :
* Is not her prayer trenchant as sworded hosts 1
Her insight more than wisdom of the seers 1
What birth like hers illustrious 1 Edwin's self,
Deira's exile, next Northumbria's king,
Her kinsman was. Together bowed they not
When he of holy hand, missioned from Rome,
Paulinus, o'er them poured the absolving wave
And joined to Christ 1 Kingliest was she, that maid
Who spurned earth-crowns ! ' More late the miller
rose —
He ruled the feast, the miller old, yet blithe —
And cried, ' A song ! ' So song succeeded song,
For each man knew that time to chant his stave,
But no man yet sang nobly. Last the harp
Made way to Ceadmon, lowest at the board :
He pushed it back, answering, ' I cannot sing : '
The rest around him flocked with clamour, ' Sing ! *
And one among them, voluble and small,
Shot out a splenetic speech : ' This lord of kine,
Our herdsman, grows to ox ! Behold, his eyes
Move slow, like eyes of oxen ! '
Slowly rose
296 CEADMON THE COWHERD,
Ceadmon, and spake : ' I note full oft young men
Quick-eyed, but small-eyed, dai-ting glances round
Now here, now there, like glance of some poor bird,
That light on all things and can rest on none :
As ready are they with their tongues as eyes ;
But all their songs are chirpings backward blown
On winds that sing God's song by them unheard :
My oxen wait my service : I depart.'
Then strode he to his cow-house in the mead,
Displeased though meek, and muttered, ' Slow of eye !
My kine are slow : if rapid I, my hand
Might tend them worse.' Hearing his step, the kine
Turned round their horned fronts ; and angry thoughts
Went from him as a vapour. Straw he brought.
And strewed their beds ; and they, contented well
Laid down ere long their great bulks, breathing
deep
Amid the glimmering moonlight. He, with head
Propped on a favourite heifer's snowy flank,
Rested, his deer-skin o'er him drawn. Hard days
Bring slumber soon. His latest thought Avas this :
' Though witless things we are, my kine and I,
Yet God it was who made us.'
As he slept
Beside him stood a Man Divine, and spake :
'Ceadmon, arise, and sing,' Ceadmon replied,
' My Lord, I cannot sing, and for that cause
Forth from the revel came I. Once, in youth,
I willed to sing the bright face of a maid,
And failed, and once a gold-faced harvest-field,
And failed, and once the flame-eyed face of war,
And failed again.' To him the Man Divine,
' Those themes were earthly. Sing ! ' And Ceadmon
said.
THE FIRST ENGLISH POET. 297
* What shall I sing, my Lord 1 ' Then answer came,
' Ceadmon, stand up, and sing thy song of God.'
At once obedient, Ceadmon rose, and sang ;
And help was with him from great thoughts of old
Yearly within his silent nature stored,
That swelled, collecting like a flood which bursts
In spring its icy bar. The Lord of all
He sang ; that God l)eneath whose hand eterne,
Then when He willed forth-stretched athwart the
abyss.
Creation like a fiery chariot ran,
Forth-borne on wheels of ever-living stars :
Him first he sang. The builder, here below,
From fair foundations rears at last the roof ;
But Song, a child of heaven, begins with heaven.
The archetype divine, and end of all ;
More late descends to earth. He sang that hymn
* Let there be light, and there was light ; ' and lo !
On the void deep came down the seal of God
And stamped immortal form. Clear laughed the
skies ;
From circumambient deeps the strong earth l)rake,
Both continent and isle ; while downward rolled
The sea-surge summoned to his home remote.
Then came a second vision to the man
There standing 'mid his oxen. Darkness sweet,
He sang, of pleasant frondage clothed the vales.
And purple glooms ambrosial cast from hills
Now by the sun deserted, which the moon,
A glory new-created in her place,
Silvered with virgin beam, while sang the bird
Her first of love-songs on the branch first-flower'd —
Not yet the lion stalked. And Ceadmon sang
298 CEADMON THE COWHERD,
O'er-awed, the Father of all humankind
Standing in garden planted by God's hand,
And girt by murmurs of the rivers four,
Between the trees of Knowledge and of Life,
With eastward face. In worship mute of God
Eden's Contemplative he stood that hour.
Not her Ascetic, since, where sin is none,
No need for spirit severe. .
And Ceadmon sang
God's Daughter, Adam's Sister, Child, and Bride,
Our Mother Eve. Lit by the matin star
That nearer drew to earth and brighter flashed
To meet her gaze, that snowy Innocence
Stood up with queenly port : she turned ; she saw
Earth's King, mankind's great Father : taught by
God,
Immaculate, unastonished, undismayed.
In love and reverence to her Lord she drew
And, kneeling, kissed his hand : and Adam laid
That hand, made holier, on that kneeler's head.
And spake ; ' For this shall man his parents leave
And to his wife cleave fast.'
"When Ceadmon ceased
Thus spake the Man Divine : ' At break of day
Seek out some prudent man, and say that God
Hath loosed thy tongvie ; nor hide henceforth thy
gift.'
Then Ceadmon turned, and slept among his kine
Dreamless. Ere dawn he stood upon the shore
In doubt : but when at last o'er eastern seas
The sun, long wished foi', like a god upsprang
Once more he found God's song upon his mouth
Murmuring high joy ; and sought an ancient friend,
And told him all the vision. At the word
THE FIRST ENGLISH POET. 299
He to the Abbess with the tidings sped,
And she made answer, ' Bring me Ceadmon here.'
Then clomb the pair that sea-beat mount of God
Fanned by sea-gale nor trod, as others used,
The curving way, but faced the abrupt ascent
And halted not, so worked in botli her will.
Till now between the unfinished towers they stood
Panting and spent. The portals open stood :
Ceadmon passed in alone. Nor ivory decked,
Nor gold, the walls. That convent was a keep
Stroncj 'orainst invadino; storm or demon hosts,
And naked as the rock whereon it stood.
Yet, as a church, august. Dark, high-arched roofs
Slowly let go the distant hymn. Each cell
Cinctured its statued saint, the peace of God
On every stony face. Like caverned grot
Far off the western window frowned : beyond,
Close by, there shook an autumn-blazoned tree :
No need for gems beside of storied glass.
He entered last that hall where Hilda sat
Begirt with a great company, the chiefs
Far ranajed from end to end. Three stalls cross-
crowned
Stood side by side, the midmost hers. The years
Had laid upon her bi'ows a hand serene :
There left alone a blessing. Levelled eyes
Sable, and keen, with meditative might
Conjoined the instinct and the claim to rule :
Firm were her lips and rigid. At her right
Sat Finan, Aidan's successor, with head
Snow-white, and beard that rolled adown a breast
Never by mortal passion heaved in storm.
300 CEADMON THE COWHERD,
A cloister of majestic thoughts that walked
Humbly with God. High in the left-hand stall
Oswy was throned, a man in prime, with brow
Less youthful than his years. Exile long past,
Or deepening thought of one disastrous deed,
Had left a shadow in his eyes. The strength
Of passion held in check looked lordly forth
From head and hand : tawny his beard ; his hair
Thick-curled and dense. Alert the monarch sat
Half turned, like one on horseback set that hears,
And he alone, the advancing trump of war.
Down the long gallery strangers thronged in mass,
Dane or Norwegian, huge of arm through weight
Of billows oar-subdued, with stormy looks
Wild as their waves and crags ; Southerns keen-
browed ;
Pure Saxon youths, fair-fronted, with mild eyes,
These less than others strove for nobler place,
And Pilgrim travel-worn. Behind the rest
And higher-ranged in marble-arched arcade,
Sat Hilda's sisterhood. Clustering they shone,
White-veiled, and pale of face, and still and meek.
An inly-bending curve, like some young moon
Whose crescent glitters o'er a dusky strait.
In front were monks dark-stoled : for Hilda ruled
Though feminine, two houses, one of men :
Upon two chasm-divided rocks they stood.
To various service vowed though single Faith :
Not ever, save at rarest festival,
Their holy inmates met.
' Is this the man
Favoured, though late, with gift of song 1 ' thus spake
Hilda with gracious smile. Severer then
She added : ' Son, the commonest gifts of God
THE FIRST ENGLISH POET.
301
He counts His best, and oft temptation blends
With ampler boon. Yet sing ! That God who lifts
The violet from the grass could draw not less
Song from the stone hard by. That strain thou
sang'st,
Once more rehearse it.'
Ceadmon from his knees
Arose and stood. With princely instinct first
The strong man to the Abbess bowed, and next
To that great twain the bishop and tlie king
Last to that stately concourse each side ranged
Down the long hall ; then, dubious, answered thus :
' Great Mother, if that God Avho sent the song
Vouchsafe me to recall it, I will sing ;
But I misdoubt it lost.' Slowly his face
Down-drooped, and all his body forward bent
While brooding memory, step by step, retraced
Its backward way. Vainly long time it sought
The starting-point. Then Ceadmon's large, soft
hands
Opening and closing worked ; for wont were they.
In musings when he stood, to clasp his goad.
And plant its point far from him, thereupon
Propping his stalwart weight. Customed support
Now finding not, unwittingly those hands
Reached forth, and on Saint Finan's crosier-staff
Settling, withdrew it from the old bishop's grasp ;
And Ceadmon leant thereon, while passed a smile
From chief to chief to see earth's meekest man
The spiritual sceptre claim of Lindisfarne.
They smiled ; he triumphed : soon the Cowherd found
That first fair corner-stone of all his song ;
Thence rose the fabric heavenward. Lifting hands,
Once more his lordly music he rehearsed,
302 CEADMON THE COWHERD,
The void abyss at God's command forth-flinging
Creation like a Thought : where night had reigned,
The univei'se of God.
The singing stars
Which with the Angels sang when earth was made
Sang in his song. Fi'om highest shrill of lark
To ocean's moaning under cliffs low-browed,
And roar of pine-woods on the storm-swept hills,
No tone was wanting ; while to them that heard
Strange images looked forth of worlds new-born,
Fair, phantom mountains, and, Avith forests plumed
Heaven-topping headlands, for the first time glassed
In waters ever calm. O'er sapphire seas
Green islands laughed. Fairer, the wide earth's flower
Eden, on airs unshaken yet by sighs
Fi'om bosom still inviolate forth poured
Immortal sweets that sense to spirit turned
In part those noble listeners tnade that song !
Their flashing eyes, their hands, their heaving breasts,
Tumult self-stilled, and mute, expectant trance,
'Twas these that gave their bard his twofold might —
That might denied to poets later boi'n
"Who, singing to soft brains and hearts ice-hard,
Applauded or contemned, alike roll round
A vainly-seeking eye, and, famished, drop
A hand clay-cold upon tlie unechoing shell
Missing their inspiration's human half.
Thus Ceadmon sang, and ceased. Silent awliile
The concourse stood, for all had risen, as though
Waiting from heaven its echo. Each on each
Gazed hard and caught his hands. Fiercely ere long
Their gratulating shout aloft had leaped
But Hilda laid her finger on her lip
THE FIRST ENGLISH POET, 303
Or provident lest praise might stain the pure,
Or deeming song a gift too high for praise.
She spake : ' Through help of God thy song is sound :
Now hear His Holy Word, and shape therefrom
A second hymn, and worthier than the first.'
She spake, and Finan standing bent his head
Above the sacred tome in reverence stayed
Upon his kneeling deacon's hands and brow.
And sweetly sang five verses, thus beginning,
' Cum esset desjjonsata,' and was still
And next rehearsed them in the Anglian tongue :
Then Ceadmon took God's Word into his heart
And ruminating stood, as when the kine
Their flowery pastvire ended, ruminate ;
And was a man in thought. At last the light
Shone from his dubious countenance and he ypake :
' Great Mother, lo ! I saw a second Song !
T'wards me it sailed ; but with averted face
And borne on shifting winds. A man am I
Sluggish and slow that needs must muse and brood ;
Therefore those verses till the sun goes down
Will I revolve. If song from God be mine
Expect me here at morn.'
The morrow morn
In that high presence Ceadmon stood and sang
A second song, and worthier than his first ;
And Hilda said, ' From God it came, not man ;
Thou therefore live a monk among my monks.
And sinShe in some holy house
Shall dwell the Bride of Christ. But thou, just God,
This day avenge my people ! '
Windwaed field
Heard, distant still, tliat multitudinous foe
Trampling the darksome Avays. With pallid face
Morning belield their standards, raven-black —
Penda had thus decreed, before him sending
Northumbria's sentence. On a hill, thick-set
Stood Oswy's army, small, yet strong in faith,
A wedge-like phalanx, fenced by rocks and woods ;
A river in its front. His standards white
Sustained the Mother Maid and Babe Divine :
From many a crag his altars rose, choir-girt
And crowned by incense wreath.
An hour ere noon,
That river passed, in thunder met the hosts ;
But Penda, straitened by that hilly tract.
Could wield not half his force. Sequent as waves
On rushed they : Oswy's phalanx like a cliff
Successively down dashed them. Day went by :
At last the clouds dispersed : the westering sun
324 KING OSWY OP NORTHUMBRIA, OR
Glared on tlie spent eyes of those Mercian ranks
Whicli in their blindness each the other smote,
Or, trapped by hidden pitfalls, fell on stakes
And died blaspheming. Little help that day
Gat they from Cambria. She on Heaven-Field height
Had felt her death-wound, slow albeit to die.
The apostate Ethelwald in panic fled :
The East Anglians followed. Swollen by recent rains,
And choked with dead, the river burst its bound,
And raced along the devastated plain
Till cry of drowning horse and shriek of man
Rang far and farther o'er that sea of death,
A battle-field but late. This way and that
Briton or Mercian where he might escaped
Through flood or forest. Penda scorned to fly :
Thrice with extended arms he met and cursed
The fugitives on rushing. As they passed
He flung his crowned helm into the wave
And bit his brazen shield, above its rim
Levelling a look that smote with chill like death
Their hearts that saw it. Yet one moment more
He sat like statue on some sculptured horse
With upraised hand, close-clenched, denouncing
Heaven :
Then burst his mighty heart. As stone he fell
Dead on the plain. Not less in after times
Mercian to Mercian said, ' Without a wound
King Penda died, although on battle-field,
Therefore with Odin Penda shares not feast.'
Thus pagan died old Penda as he lived :
Yet Penda's sons Avere Christian, kindlier none ;
His daughters nuns ; and lamb-like Mercia's House,
Lion one while, made end. King Oswy raised
His monastei-ies twelve : beuigner life
THE WIFE S VICTORY.
325
Around them spread : wild waste, and robber bands
Vanished : the poor were housed, the hungry fed :
And Oswy sent his little new-born babe
Dewed with her mother's tear-drops, Eanflcda,
Like some young lamb with fillet decked and flow^er
Yet dedicated not to death, but life,
To Hilda sent on Whitby's sea-washed hill,
Who made her Bride of Christ. The years went by,
And Oswy, now an old king, glory-crowned.
His country from the Mercian thraldom loosed
And free from north to south, in heart resolved
A pilgrim, Eomeward faring with bare feet.
To make his rest by Peter's tomb and Paul's.
God willed not thus : within his native realm
The sickness unto death clasped him with hold
Gentle but firm. Long sleepless, t'ward the close
Amid his wanderings smiling, from the couch
He stretched a shrivelled hand, and pointing said,
* Who was it fabled she had died in age 1
In all her youthful beauty holy and pure,
Lo, where she kneels upon the wintry ground.
The snow-flakes circling round her, yet with face
Bright as a star ! ' so spake the king, and taking
Into his heart that vision, slept in peace.
His daughter, abbess then on Whitby's height,
Within her church interred her father's bones
Beside her grandsire's, Edwin. Side by side
They rested, one Bernicia's king, and one
Deii'a's — great Northumbria's sister realms ;
Long foes, yet blended by that mingling dust.
326 THE VENGEANCE OF
THE VENGEANCE OF THE MONKS
OF BABDENEY
Ostluyda, Queen of Mercia, translates the relics of her unole,
Oswald of Nortliumberlaucl, to the Abbey of Bardeney. The
monks refuse them admittance because King Oswald had con-
quered and kept for one 3'ear Lindsay, a province of Mercia.
Tliou,i,di hourly expecting the destruction of their Abbey, they
will 3'ield neither to threats nor to supplications, nor even to
celestial signs and wonders. At last, being convinced by the
reasoning of a devout man, they repent of their anger.
Silent, with gloomy brows in conclave sat
The monks of Bardeney, nigh the eastern sea ;
Rumour, that still outruns the steps of ill
Smote on their gates Avith news : ' Osthryda comes
To bury here her royal uncle's bones,
Northumbrian Oswald.' Oswald was a Saint ;
Had loosed from Pagan bonds that Christian land
His own by right. But Oswald had subdued
Lindsay, a Mercian province ; and the monks
Were sons of Mercia leal and true. Osthryda,
Northumbrian born, had wedded Mercia' s King ;
Therefore the monks of Bardeney pondered thus :
' This Mercian Queen spurns her adopted country !
Must Mercia therefore build her conqueror's tomlj 1
Though earth and hell cried "Ay," it should not be !'
Tlius mused the brethren till the sun went doAvn :
Then lo ! beyond a vista in the woods
Drew nigh a Bier, black-plumed, with funeral train :
Thereon the stern monks gazed, and gave command
To close the Abbey's gate. Beside that gate
THE MONKS OF BARDENEY. 327
Tent-roofed that Bier remained.
Before them soon
Stood np the royal herald. Thus he spake :
' Ye sacred monks of Bardeney's Abbey, hail !
Osthryda, wife of Ethelred our King,
Prays that God's peace may keep this House forever.
The Queen has hither brought, by help of God
King Oswald's bones, and sues for them a grave
Witliin this hallowed j^recinct.' Answer came :
' King Oswald, living, was Northumbria's King ;
King Oswald, by the pride of life seduced
Wrested from Mercia's sceptre Lindsay's soil ;
Therefore in Lindsay's soil King Oswald, dead.
May never find repose.'
Before them next
Three earls advanced full-armed, and spake loud-voiced :
' Our Queen is consort of the Mercian King ;
Ye, monks, are Mercian svibjects ! Sirs, beware !
Our King and Queen have loved you well till now,
And ranked your abbey highest in their realm :
But hearts ingrate can sour the mood of love ;
And Ethelred, though mild as summer skies
When mildly used, once angered ' Answer came :
' We know it, and await our doom, content :
If Mercia's King contemns his realm, more need
That Mercia's priests her confessors should die :
In Bardeney's church King Oswald ne'er shall rest :
Ye have your answer. Earls ! '
Through that dim hall
Ere long a gentler embassage made way.
Three priests ; arrived, they knelt, and, reverent,
spake :
• Fathers and brethren, Oswald was a Saint !
He loosed his native land from j^agan thrall :
328 THE VENGEANCE OF
Cliurclies and convents everywhere he built :
His relics, year by year, grow glorious more
Through miracles and signs. Fathers revered,
AVithin this sanctuary beloved of God
Vouchsafe his dust interment ! ' They replied :
' We know that Oswald is a Saint with God :
We know he freed his realm from pagan thrall ;
We know that churches everywhere he built ;
We know that from his relics Grace proceeds
As lijrht from sun and moon. In heaven a crown
Rests on Saint Oswald's head : yet here on earth
King Oswald's foot profaned our Mercian bound :
Therefore in Mercian earth he finds not grave.'
Silent those priests withdrew. An hour Avell-nigh
Went by in silence. Then Avitli forehead crowned
And mourner's veil, and step of one that mourns,
The Queen advanced, a lady at each side,
And 'mid the circle stood, and thus implored :
' Not as yom- Sovereign come I, holy Sirs,
Since all are equal in the Hovise of God ;
Nor .stand I here a stranger. Many a day
In this your church, I knelt, while yet a child ;
Then too, as now, within my breast there lived
The tenderest of its ardours and the best,
Zeal for my kinsman's fame. That time how oft
I heard my Father, Oswy, cry aloud,
" Brother, had I walked but in thy ways
My foot had never erred ! " In maiden youth
I met with one who shared my loyal zeal,
Mercian himself : 'twas thus he won my heart :
My royal husband shared it ; shares this hour
My trust that 'mid the altars reared by us
To grace this chiefest Minster of our realm
May rest the relics of our household Saint —
THE MONKS OF BARDENEY. 329
To spurn tliem from your threshold were to shame.'
She spake : benign and soft the answering voice :
' Entreat us not, thou mourner true and kind,
Lest we, by pity from the straight path drawn,
Sin more than thou. Thou know'st what thing love is,
Thus loving one who died before thy birth !
Up to the measure of high love and fit
Thou lov'st him for this cause, because thy heart
Hath never rested on base love and bad :
Lady, a sterner severance monks have made :
Not base and bad alone do they reject,
But lesser good for better and for best :
Therefore what yet remains they love indeed :
A single earthly love is theirs unblamed,
Their Country ! Lo, the wild-bird loves her nest,
Lions their caves : — to us God gave a Country.
What heart of man but loves that mother-land
Whose omnipresent arms are round him still
In vale and plain ; whose voice in every stream ;
Whose breath his forehead cools ; whose eyes with joy
Regard her offspring issuing forth each morn
On duteous tasks ; to rest each eve returning 1
And who that loves her but must hate her foes 1
Lady, accept God's Will, nor strive by prayer
To change it. In our guest-house rest this night,
Thou, and thy train.'
Severe the Queen replied :
' Yea in thy guest-hovise I will lodge this night,
Unvanquished, undiscouraged, not to cease
From prayer : of that be sure. I make henceforth
My prayer to God, not man. To Him I pray.
That Lord of all. Who changes at His will
The stony heart to flesh.'
She spake : then turned
330 THE VENGEANCE OF
On those old faces, keenlier than before,
Her large slow eyes ; and instant in her face
The sadness deepened : but the wrath was gone.
That sadness said, ' Love then as deep as mine.
And grief like mine, in other breasts may spring
From source how different ! ' Long she gazed, like
child
That knows not she is seen to gaze, with looks
As though she took that hoary-headed band
Into her sorrowing Iieart. Silent she sighed ;
Then passed into the guest-house with her train :
There prayed all night for him, that Saint in heaven
Ill-honoured upon earth.
Within their church
Meantime the monks the ' Dies Irae ' sang,
The yellow tapers ranged as round a corse,
And Penitential Psalms in order due.
Their rite was for the living : ere the time
They sang the obsequies of sentenced men,
Foreboding wrath to come. Sad Fancy heard
The flames up-rushing o'er their convent home.
The ruin of their church late-built, the wreck
It might be of their Order. Fierce they knew
That Mercian royal House ! Against their King
They hurled no ban : venial they deemed his crime :
' He moves within the limits of his right.
Though wrongly measuring right. He sees but this.
His subjects break his laws. Some sin of youth
It may be hides from him a right more high : '
Thus spake they in their hearts.
While rival thus
The brethren and the Queen sent up their prayer,
And sacred night hung midway in her covirse,
Behold, there fell from God tempest and storm
THE MONKS OF BARDENEY. 331
Buffeting that abbey's walls. The woods around
Devastated by stress of blast on blast,
Howled like the howling of wild beasts when fire
Invests their ambush, and their cubs late-born
Blaze in red flame. Trembling, the strong-built towers
Echoed the woodland moans. All night the Queen,
Propped by those two fair Seraphs, Faith and Love,
Prayed on in hope, or hearing not that storm,
Or mindful that where danger most abounds
There God is nearest still. Meantime the Tent
Covering that royal Bier, unshaken stood
Beside the unyielding abbey-gates close-barred,
Like something shielded by a heavenly charm :
"When morning came, shattered all round it lay
Both trunk and bough ; but in the rising sun
The storm-drop shook not on that snowy shrine.
Things wondrous more that Legend old records :
An hour past sunrise from the meads and moors
Came wide-eyed herdsmen thronging, with demand,
' What means this marvel 1 All the long still night,
While heaven and earth were dark, and peaceful sleep
Closed in her arms the wearied race of men.
Keeping our herds on meads and moorlands chill,
We saw a glittering Tent beside your gates :
Above it, and not far, a pillar stood.
All light, and high as heaven ! ' The abbot answered,
' Fair Sirs, ye dreamed a dream ; and sound your sleep
Untroubled by the terror of the storm
Whereof those woodland fragments witness still,
And many a forest patriarch prostrate laid :
There rose no pillar by our gates : yon Tent
Stood there, and stood alone.' In two hours' space
Shepherds arrived, from hills remoter sped,
332 THE VENGEANCE OF
Making the same demand. With eye ill pleased
Thus answered brief the prior : ' Friends, ye jest ! '
And they in wrath departed. Once again
Came foresters from Lindsay's utmost bound,
On horses blown, and spake : ' O'er yonder Tent,
Through all the courses of the long still night,
Behold, a shining pillar hovering stood :
It rained a glory on your convent walls :
It flung a trail of splendour o'er your woods :
We watched it hour by hour. Like Oswald's Cross
On Heaven-Field planted in the days of old.
It waxed in height : — the stars were quenched.'
Replied
With reddening brows the youngest of those monks,
* Sirs, ye have had your bribe, and told your tale :
Depart ! ' and they depaited great in scorn.
Long time the brethren sat ; discoursed long time
Each with his neighbour. ' Craft of man would force
Dishonest deed on this our holy Hovise,
By miracles suborned ; ' thus spake the first :
The second answered, ' Ay, confederates they !
The good Queen knew not of it : ' then the third,
' Not so ! these men are simple folks, I ween :
Nor time for fraud had they. What sail is yon
So weather-worn that nears the headland 1 ' Soon
A pilot stood before them ; at his side
A priest, long years an inmate of their House,
But late a pilgrim in the Holy Land.
Their greetings over, greetings warm and kind.
Thus spake the Pilgrim : ' Brothers mine, rejoice ;
Our God is with us ! For our House I prayed
Three times with forehead on the Tomb of Christ ;
Last night there came to me, in visible form,
THE MONKS OF BARDENEY. 333
An answer to that prayer. All day our ship,
Before a great wind rushed t'ward Mercian shores :
To them I turned not : on the East I gazed :
"O happy East," I mused, " Land, true home
Of every Christian heart ! The Saviour's feet
Thy streets, thy cornfields trod ! With these compared
Our country's self seems nothing ! " In my heart
Imaged successive, rose once moi'e those sites
Capernaum, Nain, Bethsaida, Bethlehem — •
Where'er my feet had strayed. At midnight, cries
Of wonder rang around me, and I turned :
I saw once more our convent on its hill :
I saw beside its gate a Tent snow-white ;
I saw a glittering pillar o'er that Tent
'Twixt heaven and earth suspense ! Serene it shone,
Such pillar as led forth the Chosen Ptace
By night from Egypt's coasts. From wave to wave
Moon-like it paved a path ! I cried, " Thank God !
For who shall stay yon splendour till it reach
That Syrian shore? England," I said, ''my country,
Shall lay upon Christ's Tomb a hand all light,
Whatever tempest shakes the world of men,
Thenceforth His servant vowed ! " '
When ceased that voice
There fell upon the monks a crisis strange ;
And where that Pilgrim looked for joy, behold,
Doubt, wrath, and anguish ! Faces old long since
Grew older, stricken as by hectic spasm,
So fierce a pang had clutched them by the throat ;
While drops of sweat on many a wrinkled l^row
Hung large like dewy beads condensed from mist
On cliffs by torrents shaken. Mute they sat ;
Then sudden rose, uplifting helpless hands,
As when from distant rock sore-wovxnded men,
334 THE at;ngeance op
Who all day long have watched some dreadful fight,
Behold it lost, or else foresee it lost,
And with it lost their country's hearths and homes,
And yet can bring no succour. Thus with them :
They knew themselves defeated ; deemed the stars
Of heaven had fought against them in their course ;
Yet still believed, and could not but believe
Their cause the cause of Justice, and its wreck
The wreck of priestly honour, patriot faith :
At last the youngest of the brethren spake ;
' Come what come may, God's monks must guard the
Eight.'
Death-like a silence on that conclave fell.
Then rose a monk white-headed, well-nigh blind,
Esteemed a Saint, who had not uttered speech
Since came the tidings of the Queen's resolve :
Low-voiced he spake, with eyes upon the ground
And inward smile that dimly reached his lips :
' Brethren, be wary lest ye strive with God
Through wrath, that blind incontinence of age,
For what He wills He works. By passion warped
Ye deem this trial strange, this conflict new,
Yourselves doomed men that stand between two Fates,
On one side right, on one side miracles !
Brethren, the chief of miracles is this,
That knowing what ye know ye know no more :
Ye know long since that Oswald is a Saint :
Ye know the sins of Saints are sins forgiven :
What then ? Shall man revenge where God forgives ?
Be wroth with those He loves ? Ye, seeing much.
See not the sun at noontide ! God last night
Sent you in love a miracle of love
To quell in you a miracle of wrath : —
Discern its import true !
THE MONKS OF BARDENEY. 335
Sum up the past !
Thus much is sure : we heard those thunder peals
Unheard by hind or shepherd, near or far :
'Tis sure not less that light the shepherds saw
"We saw not ; neither we nor yet the Queen.
What then 1 Is God not potent to divulge
The thing He wills, or hide it 1 Brethren, God
Shrouding from us that beam far dwellers saw
Admonished us perchance that far is near ;
That ofttimes distance makes intelligible
What, nigh at hand, is veiled. This too He taught,
That when Northumbrian foot our Mercia spurned
The men who saw that ruin saw not all :
The lioht of Christ drew near us in that hour ;
His pillar o'er us stood, and in our midst :
The pang, the shame, were transient. See the whole ! '
The old man paused a space, and then resumed :
' Brethren, that day our country suffered wrong :
One day she may inflict it. Years may bring
The aggressor of past time a penitent grief ;
The wronged may meet her penitence with scorn
Guiltier through malice than her foe's worst rage :
Were it not well to leave that time unborn
Magnanimous ensample? Hard it were
To lay in Mercian earth the unforgiven :
Wholly to pardon — that I deem not hard.
My voice is this : forgive we Oswald's sin,
And lay his relics in our costliest shrine ! '
Thus spake the aged man. That self-same eve,
The western sun descending, while the church,
Grey shaft transfigured by the glow divine,
Grey wall in flame of light pacific washed,
Shone out all golden like that flower all gold
Which shoots through sunset airs an arrowy beam,
336 VENGEANCE OF THE MONKS OF BARDENEY.
In charity peifected moved the monks,
No longer sad, a long procession forth.
With foreheads smoothed as by the kiss of death
And eyes like eyes of Saints from death new risen.
Bearing the relics of Northumbria's King,
Oswald, the man of God. Behind them paced
Warriors and chiefs ; Osthryda last, the Queen,
With face whereon that great miracvilous light,
By her all night unseen, appeared to rest.
And foot that might have trod the ocean waves
Unwetted save its palm. A shrine gem-wrought
Received the royal relics. O'er them drooped
Northumbria's standard, guest of Mercian airs
Through which it once had sailed, a portent dire :
And whosoe'er in after centuries knelt
On Oswald's grave, and, praying, wooed his prayer.
Departed, in his heart the peace of God,
Passions corrupt expelled, and demon snares,
Irreverent love, and anger past its bound.
HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT HIS PENTECOST. 337
HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT HIS
PENTECOST AT CARLISLE.
Saint Cutliburt wliilc a boy wanders among tlic woods of Nor-
thumbria, bringing solace to all. Later he lives alone in the
island of Fame. Being made bishop, many predict that he will
be able neither to teach his people nor to rule his diocese. His
people flock to him gladly, but rei^uire that he should teach
them by parable and tale. This he does, and likewise rules liis
diocese with might. He discourses concerning common life.
Keeping his Pentecost at Carlisle, he preaches on that Feast and
the Resurrection from the Dead. Herbert, an eremite, beseech-
ing him that the two may die the same day, he prays accordingly,
and they die the same hour.
Saint Cuthbert, yet a youth, for many a year
Walked up and down the green Northumbrian vales
Well loving God and man. The rockiest glens
And promontories shadowing loneliest seas,
Where lived the men least cared for, most forlorn,
He sought, and brought to each the words of peace.
Where'er he went he preached that God all Love :
For, as the sun in heaven, so flamed in him
That love which later fired Assisi's Saint :
Yea, rumour ran that every mountain beast
Obeyed his loving call ; that when all night
He knelt upon the frosty hills in prayer
The hare would couch her by his naked feet
And warm them with her fu.r. To manhood grown
He dwelt in Lindisfarne ; there, year by year
Prospering yet more in vigil and in fast ;
And paced its shores by night, and blent his hymns
With din of waves. Yet ofttimes o'er the strait
IV. z
338 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
He passed, once more in search of suffering men
Wafting tliem solace still. Where'er he went
Those loved as children first, again he loved
As youth and maid, and in them nursed that Faith
Through which pure youth passes o'er passion's waves
Like Him Who trod that Galilean sea :
He clasped the grey-grown sinner in his arms
And won from him repentance long delayed,
Then with him shared the penance he enjoined.
O heart both strong and tender ! offering Mass
Awe-struck he stood as though on Calvary's height :
The men who marked him shook.
Twelve winters passed :
Then mandate fell upon the Saint from God,
Or breathed upon him from the heavenly height.
Or haply from within. It drave him forth
A hermit into solitudes more stern.
* Farewell,' he said, ' my brethren and my friends !
No holier life than yours, pvire Coinobites
Pacing one cloister, sharing one spare meal,
Chanting to God one hymn ! yet I must forth —
Farewell, my friends, farewell ! ' On him they gazed
And knew that God had spoken to his soul
And silent stood though sorrowing.
Long that eve
The brethren grieved noting his vacant stall.
Yet thus excused their sadness : ' Well for him.
And high his place in heaven ; but woe to those
Henceforth of services hke his amerced !
Here lived he in the world ; here many throng ;
To him in time some lesser bishopric
Might well have fallen, behoof of countless souls !
Such dream is past forever,'
Forth he fared
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 339
To Fanie, a little rocky islet nigh,
Where man till then had never dared to dwell
By dreadful rumours scared. In narrow cave
Worn from the rock, and roughly walled around.
The anchoret made abode, w^th lonely hands
Raising from one poor strip his daily food
Barley thin-grown, and coarse. He saw by day
The clouds on-sailing, and by night the stars ;
And heard the eternal waters. Thus recluse
The man lived on in vision still of God
Tlirough contemplation known : and as the shades
Each other chase all day o'er steadfast hills,
Even so, athwart that Vision vinremoved
Forever rushed the tumults of this world,
Man's fleeting life, the rise and fall of states.
While changeless measured change; the spirit of prayer
Fanning that wondrous picture oft to flame
Until the glory grew insufferable.
Long years thus lived he. As the Apostle Paul
Though raised in raptures to the heaven of heavens,
Not therefore loved his brethren less, but longed
To give his life — his all — for Israel's sake
So Cuthbert, loving God, loved man the more.
His wont of old. To him the mourners came,
And sinners bound by Satan. At his touch
Their chains fell from them light as summer dust :
Each word he spake was as a Sacrament
Clothed Avith God's grace ; beside his feet they sat.
And in their perfect mind ; thence through the world
Bare their deliverer's name.
So passed his life :
There old he grew, and older yet appeared.
By fasts outworn, though ever young at heart ;
When lo ! before that isle a barge there drew
340 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
Bearing the royal banner. Egfrid there
With regal sceptre sat, and many an earl,
And many a mitred bishop at his side.
Northumbria's see was void : a council's voice
Joined with a monarch's called him to its throne :
In vain he wept, and knelt, and sued for grace :
Six months' reprieve alone he won ; then ruled
In Lindisfarne, chief bishop of the North.
But certain spake who deemed that they were wise,
Fools all beside : ' Shall Cuthbert crosier lift 1
A child, 'tis known he herded flocks for hire, •
Hotised in old Renspid's hut, his Irish nurse.
Who told him tales of Leinster Kings, his sires
And how her hands, their palace wrecked in war
Had snatched him from its embers. Yet a boy
He rode to Melrose and its wondering monks,
A mimic warrior, in his hand a lance.
With shepherd youth for page, and spake : " 'Tis
known
Christ's kingdom is a kingdom militant :
A son of Kings I come to guard His right
And battle 'gainst his foes ! " For lance and swoi'd
A book they gave him ; and they made him monk :
Savage since then he couches on a rock
As fame reports, with birds' nests in his beard !
Can dreamers change to Bishops 1 Vision-dazed
TNIove where he may that slowly wandering eye
Will see in man no more than kites or hawks ;
Men, if they note, will flee him.' Thvis they buzzed,
Self-praised, and knowing not that simpleness
Is sacred soil, and sown with royal seed
The heroic seed and saintly.
Mitred once
Such gibes no more assailed him : one short month
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 341
Sufficed the petty cavil to confute ;
One month well chronicled in book which verse
Late born, alas, in vain would emulate.
At once he called to mind the days tliat were ;
His wanderings in Northumbrian glens ; the hearths
That welcomed him so joyously ; at once
Within his breast the heart parental yearned ;
He longed to see his children, scattered wide
From Humber's bank to Tweed, from sea to sea,
And cried to those around him : ' Let us forth.
And visit all my charge : and since Carlisle
Remotest sits upon its western bound.
Keep there this year our Pentecost ! ' Next day
He passed the sands left hard by ebbing tide
His cross-bearer and brethren six in front
And trod the mainland. Reverent, first he sought
His childhood's nurse, and 'neath her humble roof
Abode one night. To Melrose next he fared
Honouring his master old.
Southward once more
Returning, scarce a bow-shot from the woods
There rode to him a mighty thane, one-eyed,
With warriors circled, on a jet-black horse.
Barbaric shape and huge, yet frank as fierce
Who thus made boast : ' A Jute devout am I !
What raised that convent-pile on yonder rock 1
This hand ! I wrenched the hillside from a foe
By force, and gave it to thy Christian monks
To spite yet more those Angles ! Island Saint,
Unprofitable have I found thy Faith !
Behold, those priests, thy thralls, are savage men,
Unrighteous, ruthless ! For a sin of mine
They laid on me a hundred days of fast !
A man am I keen-witted : friend and liege
342 now SAINT cuthbeht kept
I summoned, shewed my wrong, and ended thus :
" Sirs, ye are ninety-nine, the hundredth I ;
I counsel that we share this fast among us !
To-morrow from the dawn to evening's star
No food as bulky as a spider's tongue
Shall pass our lips ; and thus in one day's time
My hundred days of fast shall staml fulfilled."
Wrathful they rose, and sware by Peter's keys
That fight they would, albeit 'gainst Peter's self ;
But fast they would not save for personal sins.
Signal I made : then backward rolled the gates.
And, captured thus, they fasted without thanks,
Cancelling my debt — a hundred days in one !
Beseech you, Father, chide your priests who breed
Contention thus 'mid friends ! ' The Saint replied
' Penance is irksome. Thane : to 'scape its scourge
Ways are there various ; and the easiest this,
Keep far from mortal sin.'
Where'er he faced
The people round him pressed — the sick, the blind,
Young mothers sad because a babe was pale ;
Likewise the wives of fishers praying lovid
Their husbands' safe return. Rejoiced he was
To see them, hear them, touch them ; wearied never :
Whate'er they said delighted still he heard :
The rise and fall of empires touched him less,
Tlie book rich-blazoned, or the high-towered church :
' We have,' he said ' God's children, and their God :
The rest is fancy's work.' Him too they loved ;
Loved him the more because, so great and wise
He stumbled oft in trifles. Once he said,
* How well those pine-trees shield the lamb from
wind ! '
A smile ran round ; at last the boldest spake
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 343
' Father, these are not pine-trees — these are oaks.'
And Cuthbert answered, ' Oaks, good sooth, they are !
In youth I knew the twain apart : the pine
Wears on his head the Cross.' Instruction next
He gave them, how the Cross had vanquished sin :
Then first abstruse to some appeared his words.
' Father,' they answered, ' speak in parables !
For pleasant is the tale, and, onward passed,
Keeps in our heart thy lesson.'
While they spake
A youth rich-vested tossed his head and cried :
* Father, why thus converse with untaught hinds 1
Their life is but the life of gnats and flies :
They think but of the hour. Behold yon church !
I reared it both for reverence of thy Christ
And likewise that through ages yet to come
My name might live in honour ! ' At that word
Cuthbert made answer : ' Hear the parable !
My people craved for such.
A monk there lived
Holiest of men reputed. He was first
On winter mornings in the freezing stall ;
Meekest when chidden ; fervent most in prayer :
And, late in life, when heresies arose.
That book he wrote, like tempest winged from God,
Drave them to darkness back. Grey-haired he died ;
With honour was interred. The years went by ;
His grave they opened. Peacefully he slept.
Unchanged, the smile of death upon his lips :
O'er the right hand alone, for so it seemed,
Had Death retained his power : five little lines,
White ashes, showed where once the fingers lay.
All saw it — simple, learned, rich and poor:
None might divine the cause. That night, behold !
344 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
A Saintly Shape beside the abbot stood,
Bright like the sun except one lifted palm :
Thereon there lay a stain. " Behold that hand ! "
The Spirit spake, " that, toiling twenty years
Sent forth that book which pacified the world ;
For it the world would canonise me Saint !
See that ye do it not ! Inferior tasks
I wrought for God alone. Building that book
Too oft I mused, ' Far years will give thee praise.'
I expiate that offence." '
Another day
A sweet-faced woman raised her voice, and cried,
' Father ! those sins denounced by God I flee ;
Yet tasks imposed by God too oft neglect :
Stands thus a soul imperilled 1 ' Cuthbert spake :
' Ye sued for parables ; I speak in such
Though ill, a language strange to me, and new.
There lived a man who shunned committed sin,
Yet daily by omission sinned and knew it :
In his own way, not God's, he served his God ;
And there was with him peace ; yet not God's peace.
So passed his youth. In age he dreamed a dream :
He dreamed that, being dead, he raised his eyes,
And saw a mountain range of frozen snows.
And heard " Committed sins innumerable
Thoiigh each one small, so small thou knew'st them
not,
Uplifted, flake by flake as sin by sin.
Yon barrier 'twixt thy God and thee ! Arise,
Bemembering that of sins despair is worst :
Be strong, and scale it ! " Fifty years he scaled
Those hills ; so long it seemed. A cavern next
Entering, with mole-like hands he scooped his way.
And reached at last the gates of morn. Ah me !
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 345
A stoiie's cast from him rose the tree of Life :
He heard its sighs ecstatic : Full in view
The Beatific River rolled ; beyond
All-glorious shone the City of the Saints
Clothed with God's light ! And yet from him that
realm
Was severed by a gnlf ! Not wide that strait ;
It seemed a strong man's leap twice told — no more ;
But, as insuperably soared that cliff,
Unfathomably thus its sheer descent
Walled the abyss. Again he heard that Voice :
"Henceforth no place remains for active toils,
Penance for acts perverse. Inactive sloth
Through passive suffering meets its due. On earth
That sloth a nothing seemed ; a nothing now
That chasm whose hollow bars thee from the Blest,
Poor slender film of insubstantial air.
Self-help is there denied thee : for that cause
A twofold term thou need'st of pain love-taught
To expiate Love that lacked." That term complete
An angel caught him o'er that severing gulf :
Thenceforth he saw his God.'
With such discourse
Progress, though slow and interrupted oft,
The Saint of God, by no delay perturbed.
Made daily through his sacred charge. One eve
He walked by pastures arched along the sea,
With many companied. The on-flowing breeze
Glazed the green hill-tops, bending still one way
The glossy grasses ; limitless below
The ocean mirror, clipped by cape or point
With low trees inland leaning, lay like lakes
Flooding rich lowlands. Southward far, a rock
Touched by a rainy beam, emerged from mist,
346 HOW SAINT CUTHBEET KEPT
And slione, half green, half gold. That rock was
Fame :
Though strangei'R, those that kenned it guessed its
name :
' Doubtless 'twas there,' they said, ' our Saint abode ! '
Then pressed around him, questioning : ' Rumour goes,
Father beloved, that in thine island home
Thou sat'st all day with hammer small in hand.
Shaping, from pebbles veined, miraculous beads
That save their wearers still from sword and lance : — -
Are these things true 'i ' Smiling the Saint replied :
* True, and not true ! That isle in part is spread
With pebbles divers-fashioned, some like beads :
I gathered such, and gave to many a guest,
Adding, " Such beads shall count thy nightly px'ayers ;
Pray well ; then fear no peril ! " '
Others came
And thus demanded : ' Rumour fills the world.
Father, that birds miraculous crowned thine isle.
And awe-struck let thee lift them in thy hand.
Though scared by all beside.' Smiling once more
The Saint made answer, ' True, and yet not true !
Sea-birds elsewhere beheld not throng that isle ;
A breed so loving and so firm in trust
That, yet unharmed by man, they flee not man ;
Wondering they gaze ; who wills may close upon them !
I signed a league betwixt that race and man :
Pledging the mariners who sought my cell
To reverence still that trust.' He ended thus :
' My friends, ye seek me still for parables ;
Seek them from Natui^e rather : — here are two !
Those pebble-beads are words from Nature's lips
Exhorting man to pray ; those fearless birds
Teach him that trust to innocence belongs
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE, 347
By right divine, and more avails than craft
To shield us from the awressor.' Some were £flad
Heai'ing that doctrine ; others cried, ' Not so !
Our Saint — all know it — makes miraculous beads ;
But, being humble, he conceals his might : '
And many an age, when slept that Saint in death,
Passing his isle by night the sailor heard
Saint Cuthbert's hammer clinking on the I'ock ;
And age by age men cried, ' Our Cuthbert's birds
Revere the Saint's command.'
While thus they spake
A horseman over moorlands near the Tweed
Made hasty way, and thus addressed the Saint :
' Father, Queen Ermenburga greets thee well.
And this her message : — " Queen am I forlorn,
Long buffeted l)y many a storm of State,
And worn at heart besides ; for in our house
Peace lived not inmate, but a summer guest ;
And now, my lord, the King is slain in fight ;
And changed the aspect now things wore of old :
Thou therefore, man of God, approach my gates
With counsel sage. This further I require ;
Thy counsel must be worthy of a Queen,
Nor aught contain displeasing." ' Cuthbert spake :
' My charge requires my presence at Carlisle ;
Beseech the Queen to meet me near its wall
On this day fortnight.'
Thitherwards thenceforth
Swiftlier he passed, while daily from the woods
The woodmen flocked, and shepherds from the hills,
Concourse still widening. These among there moved
A hermit meek as childhood, calm as eld.
Long years Saint Cuthbert's friend. Ptecluse he lived
Within a woody isle of that fair lake
348 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
By Derweiit lulled and Greta. Others thronged
Round Cuthbert's steps ; that hermit stood apai"t
With large dark eyes upon his countenance fixed
And pale cheek dewed Avith tears. The name he bore
Was ' Herbei-t of the Lake.'
Two weeks went by,
And Cuthbert reached his journey's end. Next day
God sent once more His Feast of Pentecost
To gladden men ; and all His Church on earth
Shone out, irradiate as by silver gleams
Flashed from her whiter Sister in the skies ;
And every altar laughed, and every hearth ;
And many a simple hind in spirit heard
The wind which through that ' upper chamber ' swept
Careering through the universe of God,
New life through all things poured. Cuthbert that day,
Borne on by winged winds of rapturous thought,
Forth from Carlisle had fared alone, and reached
Ere long a mead tree-girded ; — in its midst
Swift-flowing Eden raced from fall to fall,
Showering at times her spray on flowers as fair
As graced that earlier Eden ; flowers so light
Each feeblest breath impalpable to man
Now shook them and now swayed. Delighted eye
The Saint upon them fixed. Ere long he gazed
As glad on crowds thronging the river's marge,
For now the high-walled city poured abroad
Her children rich and poor. At last he spake :
' Glory to Him Who made both flowers and souls !
He doeth all things well ! A few weeks past
Yon river rushed by wintry banks forlorn ;
What decks it thus to-day ? The voice of Spring !
She called those flowers from darkness forth ; she
flashed
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. ' 349
Her life into the snowy breast of each :
This day she sits enthroned on each and all :
The thrones are myriad ; but the Enthroned is One ! '
He paused ; then, kindling, added thus : ' O friends !
'Tis thus with human sovds through faith re-born :
One Spirit calls them forth from darkness ; shapes
One Christ, in each conceived, its life of life ;
One God finds rest enthroned on all. Once more
The thrones are many ; but the Enthroned is One ! '
Again he pau.sed, and mused ; again he spake :
* Yea, and in heaven itself, a hierarchy
There is that glories in the name of " Thrones : "
The high cherubic knowledge is not theirs :
Not theirs the fiery flight of Seraph's love,
But all their restful beings they dilate
To make a single, myriad throne for God —
Children, abide in unity and love !
So shall your lives be one long Pentecost,
Your hearts one throne for God ! '
As thus he spake
A breeze, wide-wandering through the woodlands near,
Illumed their golden roofs, while louder sang
The birds on every bough. Then horns were heard
Resonant from stem to stem, from rock to rock,
While moved in sight a stately cavalcade
Flushing the river's crystal. Of that host
Foremost and saddest Ermenburga rode,
A Queen sad-eyed, with large imperial front
By sorrow seamed : a lady rode close by j
Behind her earls and priests. Thovigh proud to man
Her inborn greatness made her meek to God :
She signed the Saint to stay not his discourse.
And placed her at his feet.
His words were great
S50 • How SAINT CDTlIBEfeT KEPT
He spake of Pentecost ; no transient grace,
No fugitive act, consummated, then gone,
But God's perpetual presence in that Church
O'er-shadowed still, like Mary, by His Spirit,
Fecundated in splendour by His Truth,
Made loving through His Love. The reign of Love
He showed, though perfected in Christ alone,
Not less co-eval with the i-ace of man :
For what is man 1 Not mind : the beasts can think :
Not passions ; appetites : the beasts have these :
Nay, but Affections ruled by Laws Divine :
These make the life of man. Of these he spake ;
Proclaimed of these the glory. These to man
Are countless loves revealing Love Supreme :
These and the Virtues, warp and woof, enweave
A single robe — that sacrificial garb
Worn from the first by man, whose every act
Of love in spirit was self-sacrifice.
And prophesied the Sacrifice Eterne :
Through these the world becomes one household vast ;
Through these each hut swells to a universe
Traversed by stateliest energies wind-swift,
And planet-crowned, beneath their Maker's eye.
All hail, Affections, angels of the earth !
Woe to that man who boasts of love to God,
And yet his neighbour scorns I While Cuthbert spake
A young man whispered to a priest, ' Is yon
That Anchoret of the rock 'I Where learned he then
This loving reverence for the hearth and home 1
Mark too that glittering brow ! ' The priest replied :
• What I shall a bridegroom's face alone be bright 1
He knows a better mystery ! This he knows,
That, come what may, all o'er the earth forever
God keeps His blissful Bridal-feast with man :
aiS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 35 1
Each true heart there is guest ! '
Once more the Saint
Arose and spake : * O loving friends, my children,
Christ's sons, His flock committed to my charge !
I spake to you bvit now of humbler ties,
Not highest, with intent that ye might know
How pierced are earthly bonds by heavenly beam ;
Yet, speaking with lame tongue in pai-ables,
I showed you but similitudes of things —
Twilight, not day. Make question then who will ;
So shall I mend my teaching,'
Prompt and bright
As children issuing forth to holyday.
Then flocked to Cuthbert's school full many a man
Successive : each with simpleness of heart
His doubt propovinded ; each his question asked.
Or, careless who might hear, confessed his sins,
And absolution won. Among the rest,
A little seven years' boy, with sweet, still face,
Yet strong not less, and sage, drew softly near.
His great calm eyes upon the patriarch fixed
And silent stood. From Wessex came that boy :
By chance Northumbria's guest. Meantime a chief
Demanded thus ; ' Of all the works of might,
What task is worthiest 1 ' Cuthbert made reply :
' His who to land barbaric fearless fares,
And open flings God's palace gate to all.
And cries " Come in ! " ' That concourse thrilled for
joy:
Alone that seven years' child retained the word :
The rest forgat it. ' Winifrede ' that day
Men called him ; later centuries, ' Boniface,'
Because he shunned the ill, and wrought the good :
In time the Teuton warriors knew that brow.
352 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
Their great Apostle he : they knew that voice :
And happy Fulda venerates this day
Her martyr's gravestone.
Next, to Cuthbert drew
Three maidens hand in hand, lovely as Truth,
Trustful, though shy : their thoughts, when hidden
most,
Wore but a semilucid veil, as when
Through gold-touched crystal of the lime new-leaved
On April morns the symmetry looks forth
Of branch and bough distinct. Smiling, they put
At last their question : ' Tell us, man of God,
What life, of lives that women lead, is best ;
Then show us forth in parables that life ! '
He answered : ' Three ; for each of these is best :
First comes the Maiden's : she who lives it well
Serves God in marble chapel white as snow.
His priestess — His alone. Cold flowers each morn
She culls ere sunrise by the stainless stream,
And lays them on that chapel's altar-stone
And sings her matins there. Her feet are swift
All day in labours 'mid the vales below.
Cheering sad hearts : each evening she returns
To that high fane, and there her vespers sings ;
Then sleeps, and dreams of heaven.'
With witchiug smile
The youngest of that beauteous triad cried :
' That life is sweetest ! I would be that maid ! '
Cuthbert resumed : ' The Christian Wife comes next :
She di-inks a deeper draught of life : round her
In ampler sweep its sympathies extend :
An infant's cry has knocked against her heart,
Evoking thence that human love wherein
Self-love hath least. Through infant eyes a spirit
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 353
Hath looked upon her, crying, "I am thine !
Creature from God ; dependent yet on thee ! "
Tlienceforth she knows how greatness blends with
weakness ;
Eeverence, thenceforth, with pity linked, reveals
To her the pathos of the life of man
A thing divine, and yet at every pore
Bleeding from crowned brows. A heart thus large
Hath room for many sorrows. What of that 1
Its sorrow is its dowry's noblest part.
She bears it not alone. Such griefs, so shared
Sickness, and fear, and vigils lone and long
Waken her heart to love sublimer far
Than ecstasies of youth could comprehend ;
Lift her perchance to heights serene as those
The Ascetic treadeth.'
' I would be that wife ; '
Thus cried the second of those maidens three :
Yet who that gazed upon her could have guessed
Creatvire so soft could bear a heart so brave 1
She seemed that goodness which was beauteous too ;
Virtue at once and Virtue's bright reward ;
Delight that lifts, not lowers us ; made for heaven ;
Made too to change to heaven some brave man's hearth.
She added thus : ' Of lives that women lead
Tell us the third ! '
Gently the Saint replied :
' The third is Widowhood — a wintry sound ;
And yet, for her who widow is indeed
That winter something keeps of autumn's gold.
Something regains of Spring's first flower snow-white,
Snow-cold, and colder for its rim of green.
She feels no more the warmly-greeting hand ;
The eyes she brightened rest on her no more ;
IV. A A
354 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
Her full-orbed being now is cleft in twain :
Her past is dead : daily from memory's self
Dear tbings depart ; yet still sbe is a wife,
A wife tbe more because of bridal bonds
Lives but their essence, waiting wings in heaven ;
More wife ; and yet, in that great loneliness,
More maiden too than when first maidenhood
Lacked what it missed not. Like that other maid
She too a lonely Priestess serves her God ;
Yea, though her chapel be a funeral vault.
Its altar black like Death ; the flowers thereon,
Tinct with the Blood Divine. Above that vault
She hears the anthems of the Spouse of Christ,
Widowed like her, though Bride.'
' O fair, O sweet,
beavxteous lives all three ; fair lot of woman ! '
Thus cried again the youngest of those Three,
Too young to know the touch of grief or cause it,
A plant too lightly leaved to cast a shade.
The eldest with pale cheek, and lids tear-wet,
Made answer sad : ' I would not be a widow.'
Then Cuthbert spake once more with smile benign :
' I said that each of these three lives is best : —
There are who live those three conjoined in one :
The nun thus lives ! What maid is maid like her
Who, free to choose, has vowed a maidenhood
Secure 'gainst chance or choice 1 What bride like her
Whose Bridegroom is the spouse of vestal souls 1
What widow lives in such austere retreat,
Such hourly thought of him she ne'er can join
Save through the gate of death 1 If those three lives
In separation lived are fair and sweet,
How show they, blent in one 1 '
Of those who heard
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 355
The most part gladdened ; those who knew how high
Virtue, renouncing all besides for God,
Hath leave to soar on eai-th. Yet many sighed.
Jealous for happy homesteads. Cuthbert marked
That shame- faced sadness, and continued thus :
' To praise the nun reproaches not, O friends,
But praises best that life of hearth and home
At Cana blessed by Him who shared it not.
The uncloistered life is holy too, and oft
Through changeful years in soft succession links
Those three fair types of woman ; holds, diffused.
That excellence severe which life detached
Sustains in concentration.' Long he mused ;
Then added thus : ' When last I roved these vales
There lived, not distant far, a blessed one
Revered by all : her name was Ethelreda :
I knew her long, and much from her I learned.
Beneath her Pagan father's roof there sat
Ofttimes a Christian youth. With him the child
Walked, calling him "her fi'iend." He loved the
maid :
Still young, he drew her to the fold of Christ ;
Espoused her three years later ; died in war
Ere three months passed. For her he never died !
Immortalised by faith that bond lived on ;
And now close by, and now 'mid Saints of heaven
She saw her husband walk. She never Avept ;
That fire which lit her eye and flushed her cheek
Dried up, it seemed, her tears : the neighbours round
Called her " the lady of the happy marriage."
She died long since, I doubt not.' Forward stepped
A slight, pale maid, the daughter of a bard.
And answered thus : ' Two months ago she died.'
Then Cuthbert : ' Tell me, maiden, of her death ;
356 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
And see you be not cliary of yoiu* words,
For well I loved thtat woman.' Tears unfelt
Fast streaming down her pallid cheek, the maid
Replied, yet often paused : 'A sad, sweet end!
A long night's pain had left her living still :
I found her on the threshold of her door :
Her cheek was white ; but, trembling round her lips
And dimly o'er her countenance spread, there lay
Something that, held in check by feebleness.
Yet tended to a smile. A cloak tight-drawn
From the cold March wind screened her, save one hand
Stretched on her knee, that reached to where a beam
Thin slip of watery sunshine, sunset's last.
Slid through the branches. On that beam, methought,
Rested her eyes half-closed. It was not so :
For when I knelt, and kissed that hand ill-warmed,
Smiling she said : " The small, un wedded maid
Has missed her mark ! Yovi should have kissed the
ring !
Full forty years upon a widowed hand
It holds its own. It takes its latest sunshine."
She lived through all that night and died while dawned
Through snows Saint Joseph's morn.'
The Queen, with hand
Sudden and swift, brushed from her cheek a tear ;
And many a sob from that thick-crowding host
Confessed what tenderest love can live in hearts
Defamed by fools as barbarous. Cuthbert sat
In silence long. Before his eyes she passed
The maid, the wife, the widow, all in one ;
With these, through these, he saw once more the
child.
Yea, saAv the child's smile on the lips of death,
That magic, mystic smile ! O heart of man,
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 357
What strange capacities of grief and joy
Are tliine ! How vain, how ruthless such, if given
For transient things alone ! O life of man !
What Avert thou but some laughing demon's scoff
If prelude only to the eternal grave !
' Deep cries to deep ' ; ay, but the deepest deep
Crying to summits of the Mount of God
Drags forth for echo, ' Immortality.'
It was the Death Divine that vanquished death !
Shorn of that Death Divine the Life Divine,
Albeit its feeblest tear had cleansed all worlds
Cancelled all guilt, had failed to reach and sound
The deepest in man's nature, Love and Grief,
Profoundest each when joined in penitent woe ;
Failed thence to wake man's hope. The loftiest light
Flashed from God's Face on Reason's orient verge
Answers that bird-cry from the Heart of man —
Poor Heart that, darkling, kept so long its watch
The auspice of the dawn.
Like one inspired
The Saint arose, and raised his hands to God ;
Then to his people turned with such discourse
As mocks the hand of scribe. No more he spake
In parables ; adumbrated no more
' Dimly as in a glass ' his doctrine high,
But placed it face to face before men's eyes,
Essential Truth, God's image, meet for man
Himself God's image. Worlds he showed them new.
Worlds countless as the stars that roof ovir night,
Fair fruitage of illimitable boughs
Pushed from that Tree of life from Calvary sprung
That over-toj)s and crowns the earth and man,
Preached the Eesm*gent, the Ascended God
Dispensing ' gifts to men.' The tongue he spake
358 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
Seemed Pentecostal — grace of that high Feast —
For all who heard, the simple and the sage,
Heard still a single language sovmding forth
To all one Promise. Froni that careworn Queen
Who doffed her crown, and placed it on the rock
Murmuring, ' Farewell forever, foolish gaud,'
To him the humblest hearer, all made vow
To live thenceforth for God, The form itself
Of each was changed to saintly and to sweet ;
Each countenance beamed as though with rays cast
down
From fiery tongvies, or angel choirs unseen.
Thus like high gods on mountain-tops of joy
Those happy listeners sat. The body quelled —
With all that body's might usurped to cramp
Through ceaseless, yet unconscious weight of sense
Conceptions spiritual, might more subtly skilled
Than lusts avowed, to sap the spirit's life —
In every soul its nobler Powers released
Stood up, no more a jarring crowd confused
Each trampling each and oft the worst supreme,
Not thus, but grade o'er grade, in order due.
And pomp hierarchical. Yet hand in hand,
Not severed, stood those Powers. To every Mind
That Truth new learned was palpable and dear,
Not abstract nor remote, with cordial strength
Enclasped as by a heart ; through every Heart
Serene affections swam 'mid seas of light
Reason's translucent empire without bound, '
Fountained from God. Silent those listeners sat
Parleying in wordless thought. For them the woi-ld
Was lost — and won ; its sensuous aspects quenched ;
Its heavenly import grasped. The erroneous Past
Lay like a shrivelled scroll before their feet ;
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 359
And sweet as some immeasurable rose,
Expanding leaf on leaf, varying yet one,
An Everlasting Present round them glowed.
Dead was desire, and dead not less was fear —
The fear of change — of death.
An hour went by ;
The sun declined : then rising from his seat
Herbert, the anchoret of the lonely lake,
INIade humble way to Cuthbert's feet with suit :
' Father, and O friend, thou saw'st me not ;
Yet day by day thus far I tracked thy steps
At distance, for my betters leaving place.
The great and wise that round thee thronged; the
young
Who ne'er till then had seen thy face ; the old
Who saw it then yet scarce again may see it.
Father, a happier lot was mine, though late,
Or had been save for sin of mine : each year
I sought thy cell, thy words of wisdom heard ;
Yet still, alas ! lived on like sensual men
Who yield their hearts to creatures — fixing long
A foolish eye on gold-touched leaf, or flower —
Not Him, the great Creator. Father and Friend,
The years run past. I crave one latest boon :
Grant that we two may die the self-same day ! '
Then Cuthbert knelt, and prayed. At last he spake ;
' Thy prayer is heard ; the self-same day and hour
We two shall die.'
That promise was fulfilled ;
For two years only on exterior tasks
God set His servant's hands, the man who ' sought
In all things rest,' nor e'er had ceased from rest
Then when his task was heaviest. Two brief years
He roamed on foot his spiritual realii^ ;
360 HOW SAINT CUTHBERT KEPT
The simj^le still he taught : the sad he cheered :
Where'er he went he founded churches still
And convents ; yea, and, effort costlier far,
Spared not to scan defect with vigilant eye :
That eye the boldest called not ' vision-dazed ' ;
That Saint he found no ' dreamer ' : sloth or greed
'Scaped not his vengeance : scandals hid he not,
But dragged them into day, and smote them down :
Before his face he drave the hireling priest
The bandit thane : unceasing cried, ' Ye kings,
Cease from your wars ! Ye masters, loose your slaves ! '
Two years sufficed ; for all his earlier years
Had trained the Ascetic for those works of might
Beyond the attemj^t of all but boundless love.
And in him kept unspent the fire divine.
Never such Bishop walked till then the North,
Nor ever since, nor ever, centuries fled.
So lived in hearts of men. Two years gone by.
His strength decayed. He sought once more his cell
Sea-lulled ; and lived alone with God ; and saw
Once more, like lights that sweep the unmoving hills,
God's Providences girdling all the world.
With glory following glory. Tenderer-souled
Herbert meantime within his isle abode.
At midnight listening Derwent's gladsome voice
Mingling with deep-toned Greta's, ' Mourner ' named ;
Pacing, each day, the shore ; now gazing glad
On gold-touched leaf, or bird that cut the mere.
Now grieved at wandering thoughts. For men he
prayed ;
And ever strove to raise his soul to God ;
And God, Who venerates still the pure intent,
Forgat not his ; and since his spirit and heart
Holy albeit, were in the eyes Divine
HIS PENTECOST AT CARLISLE. 361
Less ripe than Cuthbert's for the Vision Blest,
Least faults perforce swelling where gifts are vast,
That God vouchsafed His servant sickness-pains
Virtue to perfect in a little space,
That both might pass to heaven the self-same hour.
It came : that sun which flushed the spray up-lnn^led
In cloud round Cuthbert's eastern rock, while he
Within it dying chanted psalm on psalm.
Ere long enkindled Herbert's western lake :
The splendour waxed ; mountain to mountain laughed,
And, brightening nearer drew, and, nearing, clasped
That heaven-dropp'd beauty in more strict embrace :
The cliffs successive caught their crowais of fire ;
Blencathara last. Slowly that splendour waned ;
And from the glooming gorge of Borrodale,
Her purple cowl shadowing her holy head
O'er the dim lake twilight with silent foot
Stepped like a spirit. Herbex^t from his bed
Of shingles Avatched that sunset till it died ;
And at one moment from their distant isles
Those friends, by death united, passed to God.
362 SAINT FRIDESWIDA, OR
SAINT FBIDESIVIDA, OR TEE FOUNDA-
TIONS OF OXFORD.
FridesAvida flies from the piusuit of a wicked king, invoking
the Divine aid and the prayers of St. Catherine and St. Cecilia.
She escapes ; and at the hour of her death those Saints reveal
to lier that in that place, near the Isis, where she had siiccess-
ively opened a blind man's eyes and healed a leper, God will
one day raise up a seat of Learning, the light and the health of
the realm.
' One love I ; One : within His bridal bower
My feet shall tread : One love I, One alone :
His Mother is a Virgin, and His Sire
The unfathomed fount of piireness iindefiled :
Him love I "Whom to love is to be chaste :
Him love I touched by Whom my forehead shines :
Whom she that clasps grows spotless more and more :
Behold, to mine His spii*it He hath joined :
And His the blood that mantles in my cheek :
His ring is on my finger.'
Thus she sang ;
Then w\alked and plucked a flower : she sang again :
' That which I longed for, lo, the same I see :
That which I hoped for, lo, my hand doth hold :
At last in heaven I walk with Him conjoined
Whom, yet on earth, I loved with heart entire.'
Thus carolled Frideswida all alone.
Treading the opens of a wood far spread
Around the upper waters of the Thames.
Christian almost by instinct, earth to her
Was shaped but to sustain the Cross of Christ.
THE FOUNDATIONS OF OXFORD. 363
Her mother lived a saint : she taught her child,
From reason's dawn, to note in all things fair
Their sacred undermeanings. ' Mark, my child.
In lamb and dove, not fleshly shapes,' she said,
' But heavenly types : upon the robin's breast
Revere that red which bathed her from the Cross
"With slender bill striving to loose those Nails ! '
Dying, that mother placed within her hand
A book of saintly legends. Thus the maid
Clrew up with mysteries clothed, with marvels fed,
A fearless creature swift as wind or fii-e :
But fires of hers were spirit-fires alone,
All else like winter moon. The Wessex King
Had gazed upon the glory of her face
And deemed that face a spirit's. He had heard
Her voice ; it sounded like an angel's song ;
But wonder by degrees declined to love
Such love as Pagans know. The unworthy suit
She scorned, from childhood spoused in heart to Christ :
She fled : upon the river lay a boat :
She rowed it on through forests many a mile ;
A month had passed since then.
Midsummer blazed
On all things round : the vast, unmoving groves
Stretched silent forth their immemorial arms
Arching a sultry gloom. Within it buzzed
Feebly the insect swarm : the dragon-fly
Stayed soon his flight : the streamlet scarce made way :
In shrunken pools, panting, the cattle stood,
Languidly browsing on the dried-up sprays :
No bird-song shook the bower. Alone that maid
Glided light-limbed, as though some Eden breeze
Hers only, charioted the songstress on,
Like those that serve the May. Beneath a tree
364
SAINT FRIDESWIDA, OR
Low-ioofed at last she sank, witli eyes np-raised
On bonglis that, ivy-twined and creeper-trailed
Darkened the shining splendour of the sky :
Between their interspaces, here and there,
It flashed in purple stars.
Enraptured long.
For admiration was to her as love,
The maiden raised at last her mother's book,
And lit upon her childhood's favourite tale,
Catherine in vision wed to Bethlehem's Babe
Who from His Virgin-Mother leaning, dropped
His ring adown her finger. Princely pride
And pride not less of soaring intellect
At once in her were changed to j)ride of love :
In vain her country's princes sued her grace ;
Kingdoms of earth she spurned. Around her seat
The far-famed Alexandrian Sages thronged,
Branding her Faith as novel. Slight ami tall,
'Mid them, keen-eyed the wingless creature stood
Like daughter of the sun on earth new -lit : —
That Faith she shewed to be of all things greatest,
All lesser truths its prophets. Swift as beams
Forth flashed such shafts of high intelligence
That straight their lore sophistic shrivelled up,
And Christians they arose. The martyr's wheel
Was pictured in the margin, dyed with red,
And likewise, azure-tinct on golden ground,
Her queenly throne in heaven. ' Ah shining Saint
Half weeping, smiling half, the virgin cried ;
* Yet dear not less thy sister of the West ;
For never gaze I on that lifted face,
Or mark that sailing angel near her stayed.
But straight her solemn organs round me swell ;
All discords cease.' Then with low voice she read
THE FOUNDATIONS OF OXFORD. 365
Of Home's Cecilia, lier who won to Christ
(That earlier troth inviolably preserved)
Her Roman bridegroom wondering at that crown
Invisible itself that round her breathed
Rose-breath celestial ; her that to the Church
Gave her ancestral house ; and, happier gift,
Devotion's heavenliest instrument of praise ;
Her that, unf earing, dared that Roman sword ;
And when its work was done, for centuries lay
Like marble, 'mid the catacombs unchanged
In sleep-resembling death.
From earliest dawn
That maiden's eyes had watched : wearied at noon
Their silver curtains closed. Huge mossy roots
Pillowed her head, that slender book wide-leaved
In stillness, like some brooding white-winged dove
Spread on her bosom : 'gainst its golden edge
Rested, gold-tinged, the dimpled ivory chin —
Loud thunders broke that sleep ; the tempest blast
Came up against the woods, while bolt on bolt
Ran through them sheer. She started up : she saw
That Pagan prince and many a sworded serf
Rushing towards her. Fleeter still she fled ;
But, as some mountain beast tender and slight
That, pasturing spring-fed lilies of Cashmere,
Or slumbering where its rock-nursed torrents fall.
Sudden not distant hears the hunter's cry
And mocks pursuit at first, but slackens soon
Breathless and spent, so failed her limbs ere long ;
A horror of great faintness o'er her crept ;
More near she heard their shout. She staggered on ;
To threat'ning phantoms all things round w^ere
changed ;
About her towered in ruin hollow trunks
366 SAINT FRIDESWIDA, OR
Of spiked aud branchless trees, survivors sole
Of woods that, summer-scorched, then lightning- struck
A century past, for one shoit week had blazed
And blackened ever since. She knelt : she raised
Her hands to God : she sued for holier prayer
Saint Catherine^ Saint Cecilia. At that word
Behind her close a cry of anguish rang :
Silence succeeded. As by angels' help
She reached a river's bank : sun-hardened clay
Retained the hoof-prints of the drinking herd ;
And, shallower for long heats, the oxen's ford
Challenged her bleeding feet. She crossed unharmed,
And soon in green-gold pastures girt by woods
Stood \x\) secure. Then forth she stretched her hands,
Like Agnes praising God amid the flame :
' Omnipotent, Eternal, Worshipful,
One God, Immense, and All-compassionate,
Thou from the sinner's snare hast snatched the feet
Of her that loved Thee. Glory to Thy name.'
Thenceforth secure she roamed those woods and
meads ;
The dwellers in that region brought her bread,
Upon that countenance gazing, some with awe
]>ut all with love. To her the maidens came :
' Tell us,' they said, ' what mystery hast thou learned
So sweet and good ; — thy Teacher, who was he ;
Grey-haired, or warrior young 1 ' To them in turn
Ceaseless she sang the praises of her Christ,
His Virgin Mother and His heavenly court,
Warriors on earth for justice. They for her
Renoimced all else, the banquet and the dance,
And nuptial rites revered. A low-roofed house
Inwoven of branches 'mid the woods they raised ;
There dwelt, and sang her hymn, and prayed her prayer,
THE FOUNDATIONS OF OXFOKD. 367
And loved her Saviour- Sovereign. Year by year
More liigli her bright feet scaled the heavenly mount
Of lore divine and knowledge of her God,
And with sublinier chant she hymned His praise ;
While oft some bishop, tracking those great woods
In progress to his charge, beneath their roof
Baptizing or confii-ming made abode,
And all that lacked supplied, nor discipline
"Withheld, nor doctrine high. The outward world
To them a nothing, made of them its boast :
A Saint, it said, within that forest dwelt
A Saint that helped their people. Saint she was
And therefore wrought for heaven her holy deeds ;
Immortal stand they on the heavenly roll ;
Yet fewest acts suffice for heavenly ci-own ;
And two of hers had consequence on earth
Like water circles widening limitless.
For man still helpful. Hourly acts of hers
Interior acts invisible to men.
Perchance were worthier. Humblest faith and prayer
Are oft than miracle miraculous more :
To us the exterior marks the interior might :
These two alone record we.
Years had passed :
One day when all the streams were dried by heat
And rainless fields had changed from green to brown,
T'wards her there drew, by others led, a man
Old, worn, and blind. He knelt, and wept his prayer :
' Help, Saint of God ! That impious King am I,
That King abhorred, his people's curse and bane.
Who chased thee through these woods with fell resolve,
Worst vengeance seeking for insulted pride :
Rememberest thou that, near thee as I closed
Kneeling thou mad'st thy prayer 'I Instant from God
368 SAINT FRlDESWlDA, Ott
Blindness fell on me. Forward still I rushed,
Ere long amid those spiked and branded trunks
To lie as lie the dead. If hope remains
For me if any hope survives on earth
It rests with thee ; thee only ! ' On her knees
She sank in prayer ; her fingers in the fount .
She dipped ; then o'er him signed the Saviour's cross,
And thrice invoked that Saviour. At her word
Behold, that sightless King arose, and saw,
And rendered tlianks to God.
The legend saith
Saint Catherine by her stood that night, and spake :
' Once more I greet thee on thy dying day.'
Again the years went by. That sylvan lodge
Had changed to convent. Beautiful it stood
Not far from Isis, though on loftier ground :
Sad outcasts knew it well : whate'er their need
There found they solace. One day toward it moved,
Dread apparition and till then unknown,
Like one constrained, with self-abhorrent steps,
A leper long in forest caverns hid.
Back to their cells the nuns had shrunk, o' era wed :
Remained but Frideswida. Thus that wretch
With scai'ce organic voice, and aiding sign,
Wailed out the supplication of despair :
' Fly not, O saintly virgin ! Yet, ah me !
What help though thou remainest 1 Warned from
heaven,
I know that not thy fountain's healing wave
Could heal my sorrow : not those spotless hands :
Not even thy prayer. To me the one sole aid
Were aid impossible — a kiss of thine.'
A moment stood she : not in doubt she stood :
THE FOUNDATIONS OF OXFORD. 369
First slowly, swiftly then to where he knelt
She moved : with steadfast hand she raised that cloth
Which veiled what once had been a human face :
O'er it she signed in faith the cross of Christ ;
She wept aloud, ' My brother ! ' Folding then
Stainless to stained, with arms about him wound
In sacred silence mouth to mouth she pressed
A long, long sister's kiss. Like infant's flesh
Tlie blighted and the blasted back returned :
That leper rose restored.
The legend saith
That Saint Cecilia by her stood that night :
' Once more I greet thee on thy dying day.'
It came at last, that day. Her convent grew
In grace with God and man : the pilgrim old
Sought it from far ; the gifts of kings enlarged it :
It came at last, that day. There are who vouch
The splendour of that countenance never waned :
Thus much is sure ; it waxed to angels' eyes : —
Welcomed it came, that day desired, not feared.
By humbleness like hers those two fair deeds
Were long foi'gotten : each day had its task :
Not hardest that of dying. Why should sobs
Trouble the quiet of a holy house
Because its holiest passes 1 Others wept ;
The sufferer smiled : ' Ah, little novices,
How little of the everlasting lore
Your foolish mother taught you if ye shrink
From trial light as this ! ' She spake ; then sank
In what to those around her seemed but sleep.
The midnoon August sunshine on her hair
In ampler radiance lying than that hour
When, danger near her yet to her unknown,
IV. B B
370 SAINT FRIDESWIDA, OR
Beneath that forest tree her eyelids closed—
Her book upon her bosom.
Near her bed
Not danger now but heralds ever young,
Saint Catherine, Saint Cecilia, stood once more,
Linked hand in hand, with aureoles interwreathed :
One gazing stood as though on radiance far
With widening eyes : a listener's look intent
The other's, soft with pathos more profound.
The Roman sister spake : ' Rejoice, my child,
Rejoice, thus near the immeasurable embrace
And breast expectant of the unnumbered Blest
That swells to meet thee I Yea, and on the earth
For thee reward remaineth. Happy thou
Through prayer his sight i-estoring to thy foe,
Sole foe that e'er thou knew'st though more his own !
Child ! darkness is there worse than blindness far
"Wherein erroneous wanders human Pride ;
That prayer of thine from age to age shall guard
A realm against such darkness. "Where yon kine
Stand in mid ford, quenching their noontide thirst,
Thy footsteps crossed of old the watei's. God
In the unerasing current sees them still !
Close by, a nation from a purer flood
Shall quench a thirst more holy, quafiing streams
Of Knowledge loved as Truth. Majestic piles
Shall rise by yonder Isis, honouring, each,
My clear-eyed sister of the sacred East
That won to Christ the Alexandrian seers,
Winning, herself, from chastity her lore :
High on their fronts in statued grandeur ranged
With face to East, and cincture never loosed,
All Sciences shall stand, daughters divine
Of Him that Truth eterne and boon to man
TTTE FOTTNPATTONS OP OXFORD. 371
Holding in reverent hand, not lamp alone,
But lamp and censer both, and both alike
From God's great Altar lighted.'
Spake in tnrn
That Alexandrian with the sunlike e3^es :
* Beside those Sciences shall stand a choir
As fair as they ; as tall ; those sister Arts,
High daughters of celestial Harmony,
Diverse yet one, that bind the hearts of men
To steadfast Truth by Beauty's sinuous cords ;
She that to marble changes mortal thought ;
She that with rainbow girds the cloud of life ;
She that above the morning mist exalts
Eock-rooted domes of prayer ; and she that rears
With words auguster temples. Happy thou
Healing that leper with thy virgin kiss !
A leprosy there is more direful, child ! —
Therein the nations rot when flesh is lord
And spirit dies. Such ruin Arts debased
Gender, or, gendered long, exasperate more.
But thou, rejoice ! From this pure centre Arts
Unf alien shall breathe their freshness through the land.
With kiss like thine healing a nation's wound
Year after year successive ; listening, each,
My sister's organ music in the skies,
Prime Art that, challenging not eye but ear,
To Faith is nearest, and of Arts on earth
For that cause, living soul.'
That prophecy
Found its accomplishment. In later years,
There where of old the Oxen had their Ford,
The goodliest city England boasts arose,
Mirrored in sacred Isis ; like that flood
Its youth for aye renewing. Convents first
372 SAINT FRIDESWIDA.
Thi'ougli stately groves levelled their placid gleam,
With cloisters opening dim on garden gay
Or moonlit lawn dappled by shadowing deer ;
Above them earliest soared the chapel's bulk
With storied window whence, in hues of heaven.
Martyrs looked down, or Confessor, or Saint
On tomb of Founder wuth its legend meek
' Pro anima orate.' Night and day
Mounted the Church's ever-varying song
Sustained on organ harmonies that well
Might draw once more to earth, with Avings outspread
And heavenly face made heavenlier by that strain
Cecilia's Angel. Of those convents first
Was Frideswida's, ruled in later years
By Canons Regular, later yet rebuilt
By him of York, that dying wept, alas,
' Had I but served my Maker as my king ! '
To colleges those convents turned ; yet still
The earlier inspiration knew not change :
The great tradition died not : near the bridge
From Magdalen's tower still rang the lark-like hymn
On May-day morn : high ranged in airy cells,
Facing the East, all Sciences, all Arts,
And greater far than these all Virtues stood.
Best imaged there in no ideal forms,
Craft vinhistoric of some dreamer's brain.
But life-Kke shapes of plain heroic men
Who in their day had fought the fight of Faith,
Warriors and sages, poets, saints, and kings,
And earned their rest ; the long Procession paced,
Up winding slow the college-girded street
To where in high cathedral slept the Saint,
Singing its 'Alma Redemptoris Mater,'
On August noons, what time the Assumption Feast
THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX. 373
From purple zenith of the Christian heaven
Brightened the earth. That hour not bells alone
Chiming from countless steeples made reply :
Laughed out that hour high-gabled roof and spire ;
Kindling shone out those Sciences, those Arts
Pagan one time, now confessors white-robed ;
And all the holy City gave response,
• Deus illuminatio mea est.' *
THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OB
THE KING WHO COULD SEE,
Keuwalk, King of Wessex, is a Pagan, but refuses to persecute
Clnistians. He is detlironed by the Mercian King, and lives an
exile ill a Cbristian laud. There he boasts that he never accords
faith to what he liears, and believes only what lie sees ; yet, his
eye being single, he sees daily more of the Truth. Wessex is
delivered, and a great feast hekl at wliich the Pagan nobles,
priests, and bards all conspire for the destruction of the Faith.
Birinus, the bishop, having withstood them valiantly, Kenwalk
declares himself a Christian. Birinus i)ro]ihesies of England's
greatest King.
King Cynegils lay dead, who long and well
Had judged the realm of Essex. By his bier
The Christians standing smote their breasts, and said,
* 111 day for us : ' but all about the house
Clustering in smiling knots of twos and threes
The sons of Odin whispered, or with nods
Gave glad assent. Christ's bishop sent from Eome
Birinus, to the king had preached for years
The Joyous Tidings. Cynegils believed
" The motto of the University of Oxford.
374 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
And with him many ; but the most refrained :
With these was Kenwalk ; and, his father dead,
Kenwalk was king.
A valiant man was he
A man of stubborn will, but yet at heart
Magnanimous and just. To one who said
* Strike, for thine hour is come ! ' the king new-crowned
Made answer, ' Never ! Each man choose his path !
My father chose the Christian, Odin's I.
I crossed my father oft a living man ;
I war not on him dead.'
That giant hand
Which spared Religion ruled in all beside :
He harried forth the robbers from the woods
And wrecked the pirates' ships. He burned with fire
A judge unjust, and thrice o'er Severn drave
The invading Briton. Lastly, when he found
That woman in his house intolerable.
From bed and realm he hvirled her forth though
crowned,
Ensuing thence great peace.
Not long that peace :
The Mercian king, her brother, heard her tale
With blackening brow. The shrill voice stayed at last,
Doubly incensed the monarch made reply :
' Sister, I never loved yovi ; — who could love ?
But him who spurned you from his realm I hate :
Eear nought ! your feast of vengeance shall be full ! '
He spake ; then cried, ' To arms ! '
In either land.
Like thunders low and far, or windless plunge
Of waves on coasts long silent that proclaim.
Though calm the sea for leagues, tempest far off
That shoreward swells, thus day by day was heard
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 375
The direful preparation for a war
Destined no gladsome tonrnament to prove
But battle meet for ancient foes resolved
To clear old debts ; make needless wars to come.
Not long that strife endured ; on either side
Valour was equal ; but on one, conjoined,
The skill most practised and the heavier bones :
The many fought the few. On that last field
'Twas but the fury of a fell despair
Not hope, that held the balance straight so long :
Ere sunset all was over. From the field
A bleeding remnant dragged their king half dead :
The Mercian host pursued not.
Many a week
Low lay the broken giant nigh to death :
At last, like creeping plant down-dragged, not crushed,
That, washed by I'ains, and sunshine-warmed, once more
Its length uplifting feels along the air,
And gradual finds its 'customed prop, so he.
Strengthening each day, with dubious eyes at first
Around him peered, but raised at length his head,
And, later, question made. His health restored
He sought East Anglia, where King Anna reigned.
His chief of friends in boyhood. Day by day
A spirit more buoyant to the exile came
And winged him on his way : his country's bound
Once passed, his darker memories with it sank :
Through Essex hastening stronger grew his step ;
East Anglian breezes from the morning sea
Fanned him to livelier pulse : wild April growths
Gladdened his spirit with glittering green. More fresh
He walked because the sun outfaced him not,
Veiled, though not his. That shrouded sun had ta'en
Its passion from the wild bird's song, but left
376 THE BANQUET HALL OF VVESSEX, OR
Quiet felicities of notes low-toned
That kept in tune with streams too amply brimmed
To chatter o'er their pebbles. Kenwalk's soul
Partook not with the poet's. Loveliest sights
Like music brightening those it fails to charm,
Roused but his mirthful mood. To each that passed
He tossed his jest : he scanned the laboui-er's task ;
Reviled the luckless boor that ploughed awry
And beat the smith that marred the horse's hoof :
At times his fortunes thus he moralised :
' Here walk I, crownless king, and exiled man :
My Mercian brother lists his sister's tongue :
Say, lark ! which lot is happiest ] '
Festive streets
Tapestries from windows waving, banners borne
By white-clad children chanting anthems blithe ;
With these East Anglia's king received his friend
Entering the city gate. In joyous sports
That day was passed. At banquet Christian priests
Sat with his thanes commingled. Anna's court
Was Christian, and, for many a league around,
His kingdom likewise. As the earth in May
Glistens with vernal flowers, or as the face
Of one whose love at last has found return
Irradiate shines so shone King Anna's house
A home of Christian peace. Fair sight it was —
Justice and Love, the only rivals there
O'er-ruled it, and attuned. Majestic strength
Looked forth in eveiy glance of Anna's eye
Too great for pride to dwell there.- Tender-souled
As that first streak the harbinger of dawn
Revealed through clovidless ether, such the queen
All charity, all humbleness, all grace
All womanhood. Harmonious was her voice,
THE KING WHO COULD SEE, 377
Dulcet her movements, undisgui.sed her thoughts
As though they trod an Eden land luifallen
And needed raiment none. Some heavenly birth
Their children seemed, blameless in word and act,
The sisters as their brothers frank, and they
Though bolder, not less modest, Kenwalk marked,
And marking, mused in silence, ' Contrast strange
These Christians with the pagan races round !
Something those pagans see not these have seen :
Something those pagans hear not these have heard :
Doubtless there's much in common. What of that 1
'Tis thus 'twixt man and dog ; yet knows the dog
His master walks in worlds by him not shared —
Perchance for me there may be worlds unknown ! '
Thus God to Kenwalk shewed the things that bear
Of God true witness, seeing in his soul
Justice and Judgment, and, with these conjoined.
Valour and Truth : for as the architect
On tower four-square and solid plants his spire
And not on meads below though gay with flowers
On those fovn^ virtues God the fabric rears
Of virtues loftier yet — those three, heaven-born,
And pointing heavenward.
To those worlds unknown
Kenwalk ere long stood nigh. In three short months
The loveliest of those children, and last born.
Lay cold in death. Old nurses round her wailed :
The mighty heart of Kenwalk shook for dread
Entei-ing the dim death-chamber. On a bier
The maiden lay, the cross upon her breast :
Close by, the mother sat, pale as the child,
Yet calm as pale. When Kenwalk near her drew
She lifted from that bier a slender book
378 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
And read that record of the three days' dead
Raised by the Saviour from that death-cave sealed
A living man. Once more she read those words,
* I am the Resurrection and the Life,'
Then added, low, with eyes up cast to heaven,
' With Him my child awaits me.' Ken walk saw ;
And, what he saAv believing, half believed —
Not more — the things he heard.
Yes, half believed ;
Yet, call it obduracy, call it pride
Call it self-fear, or fear of priestly craft
He closed his ear against the Word Divine :
The thing he saw he trusted ; nought beyond.
Three years went by. Once, when his friend had named
The Name all-blessed, Kenwalk frowned. Since then
That Name was named no more. In later days
They chased the wild deer ; on the billow breathed
Inspiring airs ; in hall of joyance trod
The mazes of the dance. Then war broke out :
Reluctant long King Anna sought the field ;
Hurled back aggression. Kenwalk, near him still,
Watched him with insight keener than his wont
And, wondering, marked him least to pagans like
Inly, when like perforce in outward deed.
The battle frenzy took on him no hold :
Severe his countenance grew ; austere and sad ;
Fatal, not wrathful. Vicar stern he seemed
Of some dread, judgment-executing Power,
Against his yearnings ; not despite his will.
Once, when above the faithless town far off
The retributive smoke leaped up to heaven.
He closed with iron hand on Kenwalk's arm
And slowly spake — a whisper heard afar — -
' See you that town 1 Its judgment is upon it !
THE KING WHO COULD SKE. 379
I gave it respite twice, Tliis day its doom
Is irrevei'sible.'
The invader quelled
Anna and Kenwalk on their homeward way
Kode by the grave of saintly Sigebert,
King Anna's predecessor. Kenwalk spake :
' Some say the people keep but memory scant
Of benefits : I trust the things I see :
I never passed that tomb but round it knelt
A throng of sujiplicants ! King Sigebert
Conversed, men say, with prophet and with seer :
I never loved that sort : — who wills can dream —
Yet what I see I see.'
' They pray for him,'
Anna replied, ' who perished for their* sake :
Long years he lived recluse at Edmondsbury,
A tonsured monk : around its walls one day
Arose that cry, * ' The Mercian, and his host !
Forth, holy King, and lead, as thou wert wont
Thy people to the battle, lest they die ! "
Again I see him riding at their head
Lifting a cross, not sword. The battle lost
Again I see him fall' With rein drawn tight
King Kenwalk mused ; then smote his hands, and
cried
' My father would have died like Sigebert !
He lacked but the occasion ! ' After pause,
Sad-faced, with bitter voice he spake once more :
' Such things as these I might have learned at home !
I shunned my father's house lest fools might say,
" He thinks not his own thoughts." '
Thvis month by month.
Though Faith which ' comes by hearing ' had not come
To Kenwalk yet, no less since sight he used
380 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
In honest sort and resolute to learn,
God shewed him memorable things and great
Which sight unblest discerns not, tvitoring thus
A kingly spirit to a kingly part :
Before him near Faith lay.
The morrow morn
Great tidings came : in Wessex war was raised :
Kenwalk, departing thus to Anna spake,
To Anna, and his consort : ' Well I know
What thanks are those the sole your hearts could
prize : '
With voice that shook he added : ' Man am I
That make not pledge : yet, if my father's God
Sets free my father's realm ' again he paused ;
Then westward rode alone.
Well planned, fought well
For Kenwalk, of the few reverse makes wise,
From him had put his youth's precipitance,
That virtuous warfare triumphed. Swift as fire
The news from Sherburne and from Winbourne flashed
To Sarum, Chertsey, Malmsbury. That delight
On earth the nearest to religious joy.
The rapture of a trampled land set free,
Swelled every breast : the wounded in their wounds
Rejoiced, not grieved : the sick foi'gat their pains :
The mourner dashed away her tear and cried
' Wessex is free ! ' Remained a single doubt :
Christians crept forth from cave and hollow tree :
Once more the exiled monk was seen ; and one
Who long in minstrel's garb with harp in hand
Old, poor, half blind, had sat beside a bridge
And, charming first the wayfarer with song.
Had won him next with legends of the Cross,
Stood up before his altar. Rumour ran
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 381
' Once moi'e Birinus lifts his crosier-staff ! '
Then muttered priests of Odin, ' Cynegils
We know was Christian. Kenwalk holds — or held
Ancestral Faith, yet warred not on tlie new :
Tolerance means still connivance.'
Peace restored
Within King Kenwalk's echoing palace hall,
The hall alike of council and of feast,
The Great Ones of the Wessex realm were met :
Birinus sat among them, eyed from far
With anger and with hatred. Council o'er
Banquet succeeded, and to banquet song.
The Saxon's after-banquet. Many a harp
That day by flying hand entreated well
Divulged its secret, amorous, or of war ;
And many a warrior sang his own great deeds
Or dirge of ancient friend Valhalla's guest ;
Nor stinted foeman's praise. Silent meanwhile
Far down the board a son of Norway sat,
Ungenial guest with clouded brows and stern.
And eyes that flashed beneath them : bard was he.
Warrior and bard. Not his the song for gold !
He sang but of the war-fields and the gods ;
He lays of love despised. ' Thy turn is come.
Son of the ice-bound North,' thus spake a thane :
' Sing thou ! The man who sees that face, already
Half hears the tempest singing through the pines
That shade thy gulfs hill-girt.' The stranger guest
Answered, not rising : ' Yea, from lands of storm
And seas cut through by fiery lava floods
I come, a wanderer. Ye, meantime, in climes
Balm-breathing, gorge the fat, and smell the sweet :
Ye wed the maid whose sire ye never slew
And bask in unearned triumj)h. Feeble spirits !
382
THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
Endless ye deem the splendours of this hour,
And call defeat opprobrious ! Sii's, our life
Is trial. Victory and Defeat are Gods
That toss man's heart, their plaything, each to each :
Great Mercia knows that truth — of all your realms
Faithfullest to Odin far ! '
* Nay, minstrel, sing,'
Once more, not wroth, they clamoured. He replied :
' Hear then my song ; but not those songs ye sing :
I have against you somewhat, Wessex men !
Ye are not as your fathers, when, in youth,
I trod your coasts. That time ye sang of Gods
Sole theme for manlike song. On Iceland's shores
We keep our music's virtue undefiled :
While summer lasts we fight : by winter hearths
Or ranged in sunny coves by winter seas.
Betwixt the snow-plains and the hills of fire,
Singing we feed on legends of the Gods :
Ye sing but triumphs of the hour that fleets ;
Ye build you kingdoms : next ye dash them down :
Ye bow to idols ! O that song of mine
Might heal this people's wound ! '
Then rose the bax'd
And took his harp, and smote it like a man ;
And sang full-blooded songs of Gods who spurn
Their heaven to war against that giant race
Throned 'mid the mountains of old Jlitunheim
That girdle still the unmeasured seas of ice
With horror and strange dread. Innumerable
In ever-winding labyrinths glacier-thronged
Those mountains raise their heads among the stars,
That palsied glimmer 'twixt their sunless bulks
O'er-shadowing seas and lands. O'er Jotunheim
The glittering car of day hath never shone :
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 383
There endless twilight broods. Beneath it sit
The huge Frost-Giants, sons of Orgelmir,
Themselves like mountains, solitary now,
Now grouped, with knees drawn up and heads low
bent
Plotting new wars. Those wars the Northman sang ;
And thunder-like rang out the vast applause.
That hour Birinus whisjjered one close by :
' Not casual this ! Ill spirits, be sure, this day
And impious men will launch their fiercest bolts
To crush Christ's Faith for ever ! '
Jocund songs
That bard sang next : how Thor had roamed disguised
Through Jotunheim, and found the giant-brood
Feasting; and how their king gave challenge thus :
* Sir, since you deign us visit, show us feats !
Behold yon drinking horn ! with us a child
Drains it at draught.' The God inclined his head
And swelled his lips ; and three times drank : yet lo !
Nigh full that horn remained, the dusky mead
In mockery winking ! Spake once more the king :
' Behold my yovmgest daughter's chief delight,
Yon wild-cat grey ! She lifts it : lift it thou ! '
The God beneath it slipped his arm and tugged.
And tugging, ever higher rose and higher ;
The wild cat arched her back and with him rose ; —
But one foot left the ground ! Last, forward stept
A haggard, lame, decrepid, toothless crone.
And cried, * Canst wrestle, friend ? ' He closed upon
her :
Firm stood she as a mountain : she in turn
Closed vipon Thor, and brought him to one knee :
Lower she could not l)end him. Thor for rage
Clenched both his fists until his finger- joints
384 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
Grew white as snow late fallen !
Loud and long
The laughter rose : the minstrel frowned dislike :
' I have against you somewhat, Wessex men !
In laughter spasms ye reel, or shout applause
Mvisic surceased. Like rocks your fathers sat ;
In every song they knew some mystery lay,
Mystery of man or nature. Greater God
Is none than Thor, whom, clamouring, thus ye flout.
That Giant-King his greatness knew : at morn,
While vexed at failure through the gates he passed.
Addressed him reverent : '' Lift thy head, great Thor !
Disguised thou cam'st : not less we knew thee well :
Brave battle fought'st thou, seeming still to fail :
Thy foes were phantoms ! Phantasies I wove
To snare thine eyes because I feared thy hand.
And pledged thy strength to tasks impossible.
That horn thou could'st not empty was the sea !
At that third draught such ebb-tide stripp'd the shore
As left whole navies stranded ! What to thee
Wild-cat appeared was Midgard's endless snake
Whose infinite circle clasps the ocean round :
Then when her foot thou liftedst, tremour went
From iron vale to vale of Jotunheim :
Hadst thou but higher raised it one short span,
The sea had drowned the land ! That toothless crone
Was Age, that drags the loftiest head to earth :
She bent thy knee alone. Come here no moi-e !
On equal ground thou fight' st us in the light :
In this, our native land, the stronger we.
And mock thee by Illusions ! " '
After pa vise.
With haughty eye cast round, the minstrel spake :
' Now hear ye mysteries of the antique song.
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 385
Thougli few sliall guess their import ! ' Theu he sang
Legends primeval of that Northern race
And dread beginnings of the heavens and earth,
When, save the shapeless chaos, nothing was :
Of Ymer first, by some named Orgelmir,
The giant sire of all the giant brood :—
Him for his sins the sons of Bor destroyed ;
Then fashioned of his blood the seas and streams
And of his bones the mountains ; of his teeth
The cliffs firm set against the aggressive waves ;
Last, of his skull the vast, o'er-hauging heaven
And of his brain the clouds.
' Sing on,' they cried :
Next sang he of that mystic shape, earth-born,
The wondrous cow, Auhumla. Herb that hour
Was none, nor forest growth ; yet on and on
She wandered by the vapour-belted seas,
And, wandering, from the stones and icebergs cold
That creaked forlorn against the grey sea-crags
She licked salt spray, and hoary frost, and lived ;
And ever where she licked sprang up, full-armed,
Men fair and strong !
Once more they cried ' Sing on ! '
Last sang the minstrel of the Night and Day :
Car-borne they sweep successive through the heaven :
First rides the dusky maid by men called Night ;
Sleep-bringing, pain-assuaging, kind to man ;
With dream-like speed cleaving the stai-ry sphere :
Hrimfaxi is her horse : his round comj)lete
Foam from his silver bit bespangles earth,
And mortals call it ' Morn.' Day follows fast.
Her brother Avhite : Skinfaxi is his horse :
When forth he flings the splendours from his mane
, Both Gods and men rejoice.
IV. c c
386 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
Thus legends old
The Northman sang, till, fleeting from men's eyes
The present lived no longer. In its place
He fixed that vision of the world new formed
Which on the childhood of the Northern mind
Like endless twilight lay ; — spaces immense ;
Unmeasured energies of fire and flood ;
Great Nature's forces terrible yet blind
In ceaseless strife alternately supreme,
Or breast to breast with dreadful equipoise
In conflict pressed. Once more o'er those that heard
He hung that old world's low, funereal sky :
Before their eyes he caused its cloud to stream
Shadowing infinitude. He spake no word
Like Heida of that war 'twixt Good and 111 ;
That peace which crowns the just j that God Unknown :
Enough to him his Faith without its soul !
With glorying eye he marked that panting throng ;
Then, sudden, changed his note. Again of war
He sang, but war no more of Gods on Gods ;
He sang the honest wars of man on man ;
Of Odin, king of men, ere yet, death past,
He flamed abroad in godhead. Field on field
He sang his battles ; traced from realm to realm
His conquering pilgrimage : then ended, fierce :
' What God was this — that God ye honoured once 1
What man was this— your half-forgotten king 1
Your law-giver he was ; he framed your laws !
Your poet he : he shaped your earliest song !
Your teacher he : he taught you first your runes !
Your warrior — yours ! His warfare consummate,
For you he died ! Old age at last, sole foe
Unvanquished, found him throned in Gylfin's land :
Summoning his race around, him thus he spake :
THE KING WnO COULD SEE. 387
" ]My sons, I scorn that age should cumber youth !
Ye have youv lesson — see ye keep it well !
I taught you how to conquer ; how to live ;
Now learn to die ! " His dagger high he raised ;
Nine times he plunged it through his bleeding breast,
Then sheathed it in his heart. Ere from his lips
The kingly smile had vanished he was dead ! '
So sang the bard and rose : his work was done :
Abroad the tempest burst. 'Tvvas not his songs
Alone that raised it ! Memories which they waked
Memories of childhood, fainter year by year,
Tripled his might. Meantime a Saxon priest
Potential there, bent low, with eye-brow arched,
O'er Eardulf's ear, Eardulf old warrior famed,
And whispered long, and as he whispered glanced
Oft at Birinus. Keen of eye the King
The action noting well, the aim divined,
And thus to Offa near him spake, low-toned :
' The full-fed priest of Odin sends a sword
To slay that naked babe he hates so sore
The Faith of Christ ! '
Rising with fiery face
And thundering hand that shook the banquet board
Eardulf began : "* Ye are not what ye were ! "
So saith our stranger kinsman from the North,
A man plain-tongued ; I would that all were such !
Lords, and my King, this stranger speaks the truth !
I tell you too, we are not what we were :
Nor lengthened trail he hunts who seeks the cause.
Lo, there the cause among us ! Man from Rome !
I ask who sent thee hither 1 From the first
Rome and our native races stand at war ;
Her hope was this, to make our sons like hers
388 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
Liars and slaves, our daughters false and vile,
And, thus subverted, rule our land and us.
Frustrate in war, now sends she forth her priests
In peaceful gown to sap the mauly hearts
Her sword but manlier made. Ho, Wessex men !
You see your foe ! My counsel. Lords, is this :
The worm that sting us tread we to the earth
Then spurn it from our coasts ! '
Ere ceased the acclaim
Subdued and soft the Pagan pontiff rose,
And three times half retired, as one who yields
His betters place ; and thrice, answering the call
Advanced, and leaning stood : at last he spake
Sweet- voiced, not loud ; ' Ye Wessex Earls and
Thanes,
I stand here but as witness not as judge ;
Ye are the judges. Late ye heard — yea, twice —
Words strange and new; " Ye are not what ye were ! "
I witness this ; things are not what they were ;
For round me as I roll these sorrowing eyes
Now old and dim — perchance the fault is theirs —
They find no longer, ranged along your walls
Amid the deep-dyed trophies of old time.
That chiefest of your Standards, lost, men say.
In that ill-omened battle lost which wrecked
But late our Wessex kingdom. Odin's wrath —
I spare to task your time and patience. Lords,
Enforcing ti'uth which every urchin knows —
'Twas Odin shamed his foe ! Ah Cynegils !
What made thee Odin's foe ? Our friend was he !
Base tolerance first, connivance next, then worse,
Favoui'ed that Faith perfidious ! Stood and stands
A bow-shot hence that church the strangers built ;
Their church, their font ! The sti'angers, who are they 1
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 389
Snake-like and supple, winding on and on
Tlirough courtly chambers darkling still they creep,
Nor dare to face a people front to front ;
Let them stand up in light and all is well !
And who their converts 1 Late, to please a king
They donned his novel worship like a robe ;
When dead he lay tliey doffed it ! Earls and Thanes,
A nobler day is come ; a sager king ;
In him I trust ; in you ; in Odin most,
Our nation's strength, the bulwark of our throne.
I proffer nought of counsel. Ye have eyes :
The opprobrium sits among you ! '
From the floor
The storm of iron feet rang loud, and swords
Leaped flashing from their sheaths. In silence some
Waited the event : the larger part by far
Clamoured for vengeance on the outlandish Faith,
The loudest they, the apostates of past time.
Then stately from his seat Birinus rose,
And stood in calm marmorean. Long he stood
Not eager though expectant. By degrees
That tumult lessening, with a quiet smile
■And hand extended, far commanding peace,
Thus he addressed that concourse.
' Earls and Thanes,
Among so many here I stand alone,
Why peaceful ? why untroubled 1 In your hands
I see a hundred swords against me bent :
Sirs, should they slay me. Truth remains unpierced.
A thousand wheat ears swayed by summer gust
Affront one oak ; it slights the mimic threat :
So slight I, strong in faith, whose swords that err —
Your ignorance, not your sin. The Truth of God,
The Heart of man against you fight this day
390 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
And, with his heart, his hope. In every land
Through all the unnumbered centuries yet to come
The cry of women wailing for their babes
Restored through Christ alone, the cry of men
Who know that all is lost if earth is all,
The cry of children still unstained by sin,
The sinners' cry redeemed from yoke of sin,
Thunder against you. Pass to lesser themes.
' Eai"dulf, that raged against me, told you, Lords,
That Rome was still the hater of your race
And warred thereon. She warred much more on mine
Roman but Chi^istian likewise ! Ye Avere foes ;
Warring on you she warred on hostile tribes :
In us she tore her proper flesh and blood :
Mailed men were you that gave her blow for blow ;
We were her tender children ; on her hearths
We dwelt, or delved her fields and dressed her vines :
What moved her hatred 1 This. We loved a God
All love to man. With every God beside
Rome made her traffic : fellowship with such
Unclean we deemed : thenceforth Rome saw in us
Her destined foe.
' Three centuries, Earls and Thanes,
Her hand was red against us. Vengeance came :
Who Avrought it 1 Who avenged our martyred Saints
That, resting 'neath God's altar, cried, " How long? "
Alaric, and his, the Goths ! And who Avere they 1
Your blood, your bone, your spirit and your soul !
They with your fathers roamed four hundred years
The Teuton waste ; they swam the Teuton floods.
They pointed with the self-same hand of scorn
At Rome, their common foe ! Great Odin's sons
Together camo ye fi'om the shining East :
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 391
True man was he : ye changed him to false god !
That Odin, when the destined hour had pealed
Beckoned to Alaric, marched by Alaric's side
Invisibly to Rome !
' Ye know the tale :
Her senate-kings their portals barred ; they deemed
That awe of Rome would drive him back amazed ;
And sat secure at feast. But he that slew
Remus, his brother, on the unfinished wall,
A bitter expiation paid that night !
The wail went up : the Goths were lords of Rome !
Alaric alone in that dread hour was just
And with his mercy tempered justice. Why ?
Alaric that day was Christian : of his host
The best and bravest Christian. Senators
In purple nursed lived on, thenceforth in rags ;
To Asian galleys and Egyptian marts
The rich were driven ! the mighty. Gold in streams
Ran molten from the Capitolian roofs :
The idol statues choked old Tyber's wave :
But life and household honour Alaric spared ;
And round the fanes of Peter and of Paul
His soldiers stood on guard. Upon the grave
Of that bad Empire sentenced, nay of all
The Empires of this world absorbed in one
In one condemned, they throned the Church of Christ ;
His Kingdom's seat established,
' Since that hour
That kingdom spreads o'er earth. In Eastern Gaul
Long since your brave Burgundians kneel to Christ ;
Pannonia gave Him to the Ostro-Goths
Barbaric named ; and to the Suevi Spain :
The Vandals o'er the Mauritanian shores
Exa-lt His Cross with joy. Your pardon, sirs :
392 THE BANQUET HALL OF AVESSEX, OR
These lands to you are names ; but Odin knew them ;
A living man he trod them in his youth ;
Hated their vices ; bound his race to spurn
Their bait, their bond ! That day he saw hath dawned ;
O'er half a world the vivifying airs
Launched from your northei-n forests chaste and cold
Have blown, and blow this hour ! The Saxon race
Alone its destiny knows not. Ye have won
Here in this Isle the old Roman heritage :
Perfect yoiu- victory o'er that Pagan Ptome
With Christian Pome partaking !
' Earls and Thanes,
But one word more. Your pontifl: late averred
That kings to us are gods ; through them we conquer :
I answer thus : That Kingdom God hath raised
Is sovereign and is one ; kingdoms of earth,
How great soe'er, to it are provinces
In spiritual things. If princes turn to God
They save their souls. If kingdoms war on God
Their choice is narrow, and their choice is this :
To break, like that which falleth on a stone ;
Or else, like that whereon that stone doth fall,
To crumble into dust.'
The Pagan priest
Whispered again to Eardulf, ' Praise to Thor !
He flouts our king ! The boaster's chance is gone ! '
Then rose that king and spake in careless sort :
' Earls and my Thanes, I came from exile late :
It may be that to exile I return :
Not less my arm is long ; my sword is sharp :
Let him that hates me fear me !
' Eai'ls and Thanes,
I passed that exile in a Christian realm :
There of the Christian greatness, Christian right,
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 393
I somewhat heard, and heaving, disbelieved ;
Saw likewise somewhat, and believed in part :
Saw more, till nigh that part had grown to whole :
I saw that war itself might be a thing
Though stern, yet stern in mercy ; saw that peace
Might wear a shape deai-est to manliest heart,
Peace based on fearless justice militant
'Gainst wrong alone and riot. Earls and Thanes
Returned this day and in this regal hall
A spectacle I saw, if grateful less,
Not therefore less note-worthy — countless swords
In judgment drawn against a man unarmed ;
Yea, and a man unarmed with brow unmoved
Confronting countless swords. These things I saw ;
Fair sight that tells me how to act, and when ;
For I was minded to protract the time
Which strangles oft best purpose. At the font
Of Chi'ist — -it stands a bow-shot from this spot
As late we learned — at daybreak I and mine
Become henceforth Christ's lieges.
' Earls and Thanes
I heard but late a railer who affirmed
That kings were tyrants o'er the faiths of men
Flexile to please them : thus I made i-eply ;
The meanest of my subjects, like his king,
Shall serve his God in freedom : if the chief
Questions the equal freedom of his king
That man shall die the death ! Through Christian
Faith—
I hide not this — one danger threats the land :
It threats as much, nay more my royal House :
That danger must be dared since truth is truth :
That danger ye shall learn to-morrow noon :
Till comes that hour, farewell ! '
394 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
The matin beam,
God's winged messenger from loftier worlds,
Through the deep window of the baptistery
Glittered on eddies of the bath-like font
Not yet quiescent since its latest guest
Had thence arisen ; beside its marge the king
In snoAvy raiment stood ; upon his right,
Alfred, his first-born, boy of seven years old.
And, close beside, in wonder not in dread,
Mildrede, his sister, younger by one year,
Holding her brother's hand. From either waist
Flowed a white kirtle to the small snow feet
With roses tinged. Above it all was bare.
And with the f ontal dew-drops sparkling still ;
While from each head with sacred unction sealed
Floated the chrismal veil. That eye is blind
Which sees not beauty save on female brows :
On either face that hour the lustre lay ;
But hers was lustre passive, lustre pale ;
The boy's Avas active, daring, penetrating —
Keen as the Morning Star's. With dewy eyes
The strong king on them gazed, and inly mused,
' To God I gave them up : yet ne'er till now
Seemed they so wholly mine ! '
Birinus spake :
' Ye have been washed in baptism, though no sin
Hath yet been yours save Adam's, and confirmed ;
And houselled ye shall be at Mass seven days
Since Christ in infant bosoms loves to dwell.
Pray, day by day, that Christ would keep you piu^e
Pray for your Father : likewise pray for me
Old sinner soon to die.' Then raised those babes
Their baptism tapers high, and fishing eyes
THE KING AVHO COULD SEE. 395
That moved not on theii" backward-fluttering flames,
Led the procession to theii- pahxce home,
Their father pacing hist.
That day at noon
The monarch sat upon his royal throne
Birinus near him standing : at his feet
His children played ; while round him silent thronged
Warriors and chiefs. The king addressed them thus ;
' Birinus and the rest, I hold it meet
A king should hide a secret from his foes
But with his friends be open. Yestereve
I, Christian now, unfalteringly avouched
That in the victory of the Christian Faith,
True though it be, one danger I discerned :
That danger, and its root, I now divulge.
Saw ye the scorn within that Northman's eye
Last eve, when, praising Thor, in balance stern
He weighed what now we are with what we were
When first he trod our shores ! He spake the truth :
His race and ours are kin ; but his retain
Stronglier their manly virtue, frost and snow
Like whetstones sharpening still that virtue's edge ;
We soften with the years. Beggars this day
Sue us for bread ! Sirs, in a famine once
I saw, then young, a hundred at a time
That, linking hand in hand, loud singing rushed.
Like hunters chasing hart to sea-beat cliffs
And o'er them plunged ! Now comes this Faith of
Christ !
That Faith to which, because that Faith is true,
I pledged this morn my word, my seal, my soul.
The fate and fortunes of our native land
And all my royal House well knowing this
The king who loves his kingdom more than God
396 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX, OR
Better than both loves self — no king at heart.
Now comes this Christian Faith ! That Faith, be sure,
Is not a hardening faith : gentle it makes :
I told you, Lords, we soften day by day ;
I might have added that with growing years
Hardness we doubly need. "When Home was great
Our race, however far diffused, was one.
Made one by hate of Rome. When Rome declined
That bond dissolved. A second bond remained
In Odin's Faith : — Northmen alone retain it.
In them a new Rome rises ! Earls and Thanes !
The truth be ours though for that truth we die !
Hold fast that truth ; yet hide not what it costs.
Through fog and sea-mist of the days to come
I see huge navies with the raven flag
Steering to milder borders Christian half,
Brother 'gainst brother ranging. Kingdoms Seven
Of this still fair and once heroic land
I say, beware that hour ! If come it must
Then fall the thunder while I walk this earth
Not Avlien I skulk in crypts ! '
• The others mute
From joy malicious some, some vexed Avith doubt,
Birinus made reply : ' My Lord and King
Inly this day I gladden, certain now
That neither fancy-drawn nor angei'-spurred,
Nor seeking crowns for others or thyself,
Nor shunning woes the worst that earth can know
For others or thyself, but urged by faith,
God's greatest gift to man, thou mad'st this day
Submission true to Christ. So be it, King !
So rest content ! God with a finger's touch
Could melt that cloud which threats thy realm well-
loved ;
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 397
That threat I decin nor trivial nor obscure
Not thus He wills. Danger, distress, reverse,
Are heralds sent from God like peace and joy-
To nations as to men. Happy that land
■Which worketh darkling ; worketh without wage ;
And worketh still for God ! If God desired
A people for His sacrificial lamb
Happiest of nations should that nation be
Which died His willing victim !
' King and Son,'
With voice a moment troubled he resumed,
' Thy future rests with God ! Yet shake, oh shake
One boding brief, 'tis causeless, from thy breast,
Deeming thy race less valiant than the North :
Faithfuller they stand and nearer to their sires !
Remorseless less to others and to self
I grant them ; that implies not valiant less :
The brave are still in spirit the merciful ;
Far down within their being stirs a sense
Of more than race or realm. Some claim world-wide,
Whereof the prophet is the wailing babe
Smites on their hearts, a cradle decks therein
For Him they know not yet, the Bethlehem Babe. •
That claim thy fathers felt ! Through Teuton woods
Dead Rome's historian saw what he records,*
Moved forth of old in cyclic pilgrimage
Thick-veiled, the sacred image of the Earth,
All reverend Mother, crowned Humanity !
Not war-steeds haled her car but oxen meek ;
And, as it passed oppugnant bounds, the trump
Ceased from its blare ; the lance, the war-axe fell :
Grey foes shook hands ; their children played together.
Beyond the limit line of dateless wars
* Tacitus.
398 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX. OR
Looked forth tlie vision thus of endless peace.
Think'st thou that here was lack of manly heart ?
King, this was manhood's self ! '
While thus he spake,
Alfred, and Mildrede, children of the king,
That long time, by that voice majestic charmed.
Had turned from distant sports, upon their knees
Softly and slowly to Birinus crept.
Their wide eyes from his countenance moving not
And so knelt on ; Alfred, the star-eyed boy
Supported by his father's sceptre-staff
His plaything late, now clasped in hands high-held.
Him with a casual eye Birinus marked
At first ; then stood with upward brow in trance —
Sudden, as though with Pentecostal flame
His whole face brightened ; on him fell from God
Spirit Divine ; and thus the prophet cried :
* Who speaks of danger when the Lord of all
Decrees high triumph 1 Victory's chariot winged
Up-climbs the frowning mountains of Dismay,
As when above the sea's nocturnal verge
Twin beams, divergent horns of orient light
Announce the ascending sun. Whatever cloud
Protracts the conflict victory comes at last.
' What ho ! ye sons of Odin and the North !
Far off your galleys tarry ! English air
Reafen, your raven standard, darkened long,
Woven of enchantments in the moon's eclipse :
It rains its plague no more ! The Kingdoms Seven
Ye came to set a ravening each on each :
Lo, ye have pressed and soldered them in one !
THE KING WHO COULD SEE. 399
' Behold, a Sceptre rises — not o'er Kent
The first-born of the Faith ; nor o'er those vales
Northumbrian, trod so long by crowned Saints ;
Nor Mercia's plains invincible in war :
O'er Wessex, barbarous late, and waste, and small
The Hand that made the worlds that Sceptre lifts ;
Hail tribe elect, the Judah of the Seven !
* Piercing the darkness of an age unborn
I see a King that hides his royal robe
Assumes the minstrel's garb. Where meet the floods
That King abides his time. I see him sweep
Disguised, his harp within the Northmen's camp ;
In fifty fights I see him victory-crowned ]
I see the mighty and the proud laid low
The humble lifted. God is over all.
* The ruined cities 'mid their embers thrill :
A voice went forth : they heard it. They shall rise.
Their penance done, and cities worthier far
With Roman vices ne'er contaminate.
These shall not boast mosaic floor gem-wrought
And trod by sinners. In the face of heaven
Their minster turrets these shall lift on high
Inviting God's great angels to descend
And chaunt with them God's City here on earth.
' Who through the lethal forest cleaves a road
Healthful and fresh ? Who bridges stream high-
swollen 1
Who spreads the harvest round the poor man's cot ;
Sets free the slave 1 On justice i*ealms are built :
Who makes his kingdom great through equal laws
Not based on Pagan right, but rights in Christ,
400 THE BANQUET HALL OF WESSEX.
First just, theu free? Who from her starry gates
Beckons to Heavenly Wisdom — her who played
Ere worlds were shaped, before the eyes of God 1
Who bids her walk the peopled fields of men
The reverend street with college graced and church 1
Who sings the latest of the Saxon songs 1
Who tunes to Saxon speech the Tome Divine 1
' Sing, happy land ! The Isle that, prescient long
Long waiting, hid her monarch in her heart.
Shall look on him and ciy, " My flesh, my bone,
My son, my king ! " To him shall Cambria bow,
And Alba's self. His strength is in his God ;
The third part of his time he gives to prayer,
And God shall hear his vows. Hail, mighty King !
For aye thine England's glory ! As I gaze,
Methinks I see a likeness on thy brow,
A likeness not to Warrior, Priest, or Chief,
But Him, that child who kneels beside my feet !
The sceptre comes to him who sceptre spurned ;
Thi'ough him it comes who sceptre clasped in sport ;
From Wessex's soil shall England's hope be born
Two centuries hence ; and Alfred is his name ! '
EPILOGUE.
BEDES LAST MAY.
Bede issues forth from Jarrow, and visiting certain villagers
in a wood, expounds to them the Beatitudes of our Lord.
Wherever he goes he seeks records of past times, and promises
in return that he will bequeath to his fellow-countrymen
translations from divers Sacred Scriptures, and likewise a his-
tory of God's Church in their land. Having returned to his
monastery, he dies a most ha[ipy death on the feast of the
Ascension, while finishing his translation of St. John's gospel.
The ending of the Book of Saxon Saints.
With one lay-brother only blessed Bede
In after times ' The Venerable ' named,
Passed from his convent, Jarrow. Where the Tyne
Blends with the sea all beautiful it stood
Bathed in tlie sunrise. At the mouth of Wear
A second convent, Wearmouth rose. That hour
The self -same matin splendour gilt them both ;
And in some speech of mingling lights not words
Both sisters praised their God.
' Apart, yet joined ' —
So mvised the old man gazing on the twain :
Then onward paced with head above his book
Murmuring his office. Algar walked behind,
A youth of twenty years with tonsured head
And face, though young, forlorn. An hour had passed ;
They reached a craggy height ; and looking back
Beheld once more beyond the forest roof
IV. D D
402 bede's last may.
Those two fair convents glittering — at their feet
Those two clear rivers winding ! Bound by rule
Again the monk addressed him to* his book ;
Lection and psalm recited, thus he spake :
' Why placed ovir holy Founder thus so near
His convents % Why, albeit a single rule
At last a single hand had sway o'er both,
Placed them at distance % Hard it were to guess :
I know but this that severance here on earth
Is strangely linked with union of the heart,
Union with severance. Thou hast lost, young friend.
But lately lost thy boyhood's dearest mate
Thine earliest friend, a brother of thy heart
True Olmstian soul though dwelling in the world ;
Fear not such severance can extinguish love
Here or hereafter ! He whom most I loved
Was severed from me by the tract of years :
A child of nine years old was I when first
Jarrow received me : pestilence ere long
Swept from that house her monks save one alone
Ceolfrid, then its abbot. Man and child
We two the lonely cloisters paced ; we two
Together chaunted in the desolate church :
I could not guess his thoughts ; to him my ways
Were doubtless as the ways of some sick bird
Watched by a child. Not less I loved him well :
Me too he somewhat loved. Beneath one roof
We dwelt, and yet how severed ! Save in God
What know men, one of other? Here on earth,
Perhaps 'tis wiser to be kind to all
In large goodwill of helpful love yet free
Than link to one our heart —
Poor youth ! that love which walks in narrow ways
bede's last may. 403
Is tragic love, be sure.'
With gentle face
The novice spake his gratitude. Once more,
His hand upon tlie shoulder of the j'outh.
For now they mounted slow a bosky dell
The old man spake — yet not to him — in voice
Scarce louder than the murmuring pines close by ;
For, by his being's law he seemed, like them.
At times when pensive memories in him stirred,
Vocal not less than visible : ' How great
Was he, our Founder ! In that ample brow
What brooding weight of genius ! In his eye
How strangely was the pathos edged with light !
How oft, his churches roaming, flashed its beam
From pillar on to pillar resting long
On carven imagery of flower or fruit
Or deep-dyed window whence the heavenly choirs.
Gave joy to men below ! With what a zeal
He drew the cunningest craftsmen from all climes
To express his thoughts in form ; while yet his hand
Like meanest hand among us patient toiled
In garden and in bakehouse, threshed the corn
Or drave the calves to milk-pail ! Earthly rule
Had proved to him a weight intolerable ;
In spiritual beauty, there and there alone
Our Bennett Biscop found his native haunt,
The lucent planet of his soul's repose :
And yet — wondrous might of human love —
One was there, one, to whom his heart was knit,
Siegfried, in all unlike him save in worth.
His was plain purpose, rectitude unwarped
Industry, foresight. On his friend's behalf
He ruled long years those beauteous convents twain.
Yet knew not they wei-e beauteous ! An abyss
404 bede's last may.
Severed in spirit those in heart so near :
More late exterior severance came : three years
In cells remote they dwelt by sickness chained :
But once they met — to die. I see them still :
The monks had laid them on a single bed ;
Weeping, they turned them later each to each :
I saw the snowy tresses softly mix ;
I saw the faded lips draw near and meet ;
Thus gently interwreathed I saw them die —
Sti'ange strength of liuman love ! '
Still walked they on :
As high the sun ascended woodlands green
Shivered all golden ; and the old man's heart
Briglitened like them. His ever active mind
Inquisitive took note of all it saw ;
And as some youth enamoured lifts a tress
Of her he loves, and wonders, so the monk,
Well loving Nature loved her in detail
Now pleased with nestling bird, anon with flower
Now noting how the beech from dewy sheath
Pushed forth its silken leaflets fringed with down.
Exulting next because from sprays of lime
The little fledgeling leaves, like creatures winged
Brake from their ruddy shells. Jesting, he cried :
' Algar ! but hear those birds ! Men say they sing
To fire their darkling young with gladsome news,
And bid them seek the sun ! ' Sadly the youth
With downward front replied : ' My friend is dead ;
For me to gladden were to break a troth.'
Upon the brow of Bede a shadow fell ;
Silent he paced, then stopped : ' Forgive me, Algar !
Old men grow hard. Yet boys and girls salute
The May : like them the old must have their "maying";
This is pei-chance my last.'
bede's last may. 405
As thus he spake
They reached the summit of a grassy hill ;
Beneath there wound a stream upon its marge
A hamlet nestling lonely in the woods :
Its inmates saw the Saint and t' wards him sped
Eager as birds that, when the grain is flung
In fountained cloister-court of Eastern church
From all sides flock with sudden rush of wings
Darkening the pavement. Youths and maids came
first ;
Their elders followed : some his garments kissed
And some his hands. The venerable man
Stretched forth his arms, as though to clasp them all :
Above them next he signed his Master's cross ;
Then, while the tears ran down liis aged face.
Brake forth in grateful joy ; ' To God the praise !
When, forty years ago, I roamed this vale
A haunt it was of rapine and of wars ;
Now see I pleasant pastures, peaceful homes
And faces peacefuller yet. That God Who walked
With His disciples 'mid the sabbath fields
While they the wheat-ears bruised, His sabbath keeps
AVithin your hearts this day ! His harvest ye !
Once more a-hungered are His holy priests ;
They hunger for your souls ; with reverent palms
Daily the chaff they separate from the grain ;
Daily His Church within her heart conceives you,
Yea, with her heavenly substance makes you one ;
Ye grow to be her eyes that see His truth ;
Her ears that hear His voice ; her hands that pluck
His tree of life ; her feet that walk His ways.
Honouring God's priests ye err not my friends
Since thus ye honour God. In Him rejoice ! '
406 bede's last may.
So spake he, and his gladness kindled theirs,
With it their courage. One her infant brought
And sued for him a blessing. One, bereaved,
Cried out : * Your promised peace has come at last ;
No more I wish him back to earth ! ' Again
■Old foes shook hands ; while now, their fears forgot,
Children that lately nestled at his feet
Clomb to his knee. Then called from out that crowd
A blind man ; ' Read once more that Book of God !
For, after you had left us, many a m.onth
I, who can neither see the sun nor moon
Saw oft the God-Man walking farms and fields
Of that fair Eastern land ! ' He spake, and lo !
All those around that heard him clamoured, ' Read ! '
Then Bede, the Sacred Scriptures opening, lit
Upon the ' Sermon on the Mount,' and read :
' The Saviour lifted up His holy eyes
On His disciples, saying. Blessed they ; '
Expounding next the sense. ' Why fixed the Lord
His eyes on them that listened ? Friends, His eyes
Go down through all things, searching out the heart ;
He sees if heart be sound to hold His Word
And bring forth fruit in season, or as rock
Naked to bird that plucks the random seed.
Friends, with the heart alone we understand ;
Who doth His will shall of the doctrine know
If His it be indeed. When Jesus speaks
Fix first your eyes upon His eyes divine
There reading what He sees within your heart :
If sin He sees, repent ! '
With hands upheld
A woman raised her voice, and cried aloud,
' Could we but look into the eyes of Christ
bede's last may. 407
Nought should we see but love ! ' And Cede replied :
' From babe and suckling God shall perfect praise !
Yea, from His eyes looks forth the Eternal Love,
Though oft through sin of ours in sadness veiled :
But when He rests them on disciples true
Not on the stranger, love is love alone !
O gi'eat, true hearts that love so well your Lord !
That heard so trustingly His tidings good
So long, by trial proved, have kept His Faith,
To you He cometh — cometh with reward
In heaven, and here on earth.'
With brightening face
As one who flingeth largess far abroad.
Once more he raised the sacred tome, and read
Read loud the Eight Beatitudes of Christ ;
Then ceased, but later spake : ' In ampler phrase
Those Blessings ye shall hear once more rehearsed
And deeplier understand them. Blessed they
The poor in spirit ; for to humble hearts
Belongs the kingdom of their God in heaven ;
Blessed the meek — nor gold they boast nor power
Yet theirs alone the sweetness of this earth ;
Blessed are they who moui'n, for on their hearts
The consolation of their God shall fall ;
Blessed are they who hunger and who thirst
For righteousness ; they shall be satisfied ;
Blessed the merciful, for unto them
The God of mercy mercy shall accord ;
Blessed are they, the pure in heart ; their eyes
Shall see their God : Blessed the peacemakers ;
This title man shall give them — Sons of God ;
Blessed are they who suffer for the cause
Righteous and jvist : a throne is theirs on high :
Blessed are ye when sinners cast you forth,
408 bedb's last may.
And bi^and your name with falsehood for my sake ;
Rejoice, for great is yovir reward in heaven.'
Once more the venerable man made pause,
Giving his Master's Blessings time to sink
Through hearts of those who heard. Anon with speech
Though fervent, grave, he shewed the glory and grace
Of those majestic Virtvies crowned by Christ
While virtues praised by worldlings passed unnamed ;
How wondrously consentient each with each
Like flowei'S well matched or music notes well joined :
Then changed the man to deeper theme ; he shewed
How these high virtues, ere to man consigned.
Were warmed and moulded in the God-Man's heart ;
Thence born, and in its sacred blood baptized.
' What are these virtues but the life of Christ 1
The poor in spirit ; must not they be lowly
Whose God is One that stooped to wear our flesh 1
The meek ; was He not meek Whom sinners mocked 1
The mourners ; sent not He the Comforter ?
Zeal for the good ; was He not militant ?
The merciful ; He came to bring us mercy ;
The pure in heart ; was He not virgin-born 1
Peacemakers ; is not He the Prince of Peace 1
Sufferers for God ; He suffered first for man.
O Virtues blest by Christ, high Doctrines ye !
Dread Mysteries ; royal records ; standards red
Wrapped by the warrior King His warfare past.
Around His soldiers' bosoms ! Recognise,
O man, that majesty in lowness hid !
Put on Christ's garments. Fools shall call them
&'■
rags-
Heed not their scoff ! A prince's child is Man,
Born in the purple ; but his royal robes
bede's last may. 409
None other ai*e tlian those the Saviour dyed,
Treading His Passion's wine-press all alone :
Of such alone be proud ! '
The old man paused ;
Then stretched his arms abroad, and said : 'This day
Like eight great angels making way from Heaven
Each following each, those Eight Beatitudes,
Missioned to earth by Him Who made the earth
Have sought you out ! What welcome shall be theirs 1 '
In silence long he stood ; in silence watched,
With faded cheek now flushed and widening eyes,
The advance of those high tidings. As a man
AVho, when the sluice is cut, with beaming gaze
Pursues the on-rolling flood from fall to fall,
Green branch adown it swept, and showery spray
Silvering the berried copse, so followed Bede
The progress of those high Beatitudes
Brightening, with visible beams of faith and love,
That host in ampler circles, speechless some
And some in passionate converse. Saddest brows
Most quickly caught, that hour, the glory-touch,
Reflected it the best.
In such discourse
Peaceful and glad the hours went by, though Bede
Had sought that valley less to preach the Word
Than see once more his children. Evening nigh
He shared their feast ; and heard with joy like theirs
Their village harp ; and smote that harp himself.
In turn become their scholai-, hour by hour
Forth dragged he records of their chiefs and kings.
Untangling ravelled evidence, and still
Tracking traditions upwards to their source,
Like him, that Halicarnassean sage,
Of antique history sire. ' I trust, my friends,
410 bede's last may.
To leave your sons, for lore by you V)estowed
Fair recompense, large measure well pi'essed down,
Kecording still God's kingdom in this land
History which all may read, and gentle hearts
Loving, may grow in grace. Long centuries passed
If wealth should make this nation's heart too fat
And things of earth obscure the things of lieaven
Haply such chronicle may prompt high hearts
Wearied with shining nothings, back to cast
Remorseful gaze through mists of time, and note
That rock whence they were hewn. From youth to age
Inmate of yonder convent on the Tyne,
I qviestion every pilgrim, priest, or prince,
Or peasant grey, and glean from each his sheaf :
Likewise the Bishops here and Abbots there
Still send me deed of gift, or chronicle
Or missive from the Apostolic See :
Praise be to God Who fitteth for his place
Not only high but mean ! With wisdom's strength
He filled our mitred Wilfred, born to rule ;
To saintly Cuthbert gave the spirit of prayer ;
On me, as one late born, He lays a charge
Slender, yet helpful still.'
Then spake a man
Burly and big, that last at banquet sat,
' Father, is history true 1 ' and Bede replied ;
' The man who seeks for Truth like hidden gold,
And shrinks from falsehood as a leper's touch
Shall write true history ; not the truth unmixed
With fancies, base or high; not truth entire;
Yet truth beneficent to man below.
One Book there is that errs not : ye this day
Have learned therefrom your Lord's Beatitudes :
That book contains its histories — like them none
bede's last may. 411
Since written none from standing point so liigli,
With insight so inspired, svich measure just
Of good and ill ; high fruit of aid divine.
The slothful spurn that Book ; the erroneous warp :
But they who read its page, or hear it read
Their guide God's Spirit, and the Church of God
Shall hear the voice of Truth for ever nigh,
Shall see the Truth, now sunlike, and anon
Like dagger-point of light from dewy grass
Flashed up, a word that yet confutes a life,
Pierces, perchance a nation's heart : shall see
Far more — the Truth Himself in human form
Walking not farms and fields of Eastern lands
Alone, but these our English fields and farms ;
Shall see Him on the dusky mount at prayer ;
Shall see Him in the street and by the bier ;
Shall see Him at the feast, and at the grave ;
Now from the boat discoursing, and anon
Staying the storm, or walking on its waves ;
Thus shall our land become a holy land
And holy those who tread her ! ' Lifting then
Heavenward that tome, he said, ' The Book of God !
As stands God's Church, 'mid kingdoms of this world
Holy alone, so stands, 'mid books, this Book !
Within the " Upper Chamber " once that Church
Lived in small space ; to-day she fills the world :
This Book which seems so narrow is a world :
It is an Eden of mankind restored ;
It is a heavenly City lit with God :
From it the Spirit and the Bride say " Come : "
Blessed who reads this Book ! '
Above the woods
Meantime the stars shone forth ; and came that hour
When to the wanderer and the toiling man
412 bede's last may.
Repose is sweet. Upon a leaf-strewn bed
The venerable man slept well that night :
Next morning young and old pursued his steps
As southward he departed. From a hill
O'er-looking far that sea-like forest tract
And many a church far-kenned through smokeless air,
He Ijlessed that kneeling concovirse, adding thus
' Pray still, O friends, for me, since spiritual foes
Threat most the priesthood : — pray that holy death,
Due warning given, may close a life too blest !
Pray well, since I for you have laboured well,
Yea, and will labour till my latest sigh •
Not only seeking you in wilds and woods
Year after year, but in my cell at night
Changing to accents of your native tongue
God's Book Divine. Farewell, my friends, farewell ! '
He left them ; in his heart this thought, ' How like
The great death-parting every parting seems ! '
But deathless hopes were with him, and the May ;
His grief went by.
So passed a day of Bede's ;
And many a studious year were stored with such ;
Enough but one for sample. Two glad weeks
He and his comrade onward roved. At eve
Convent or hamlet, known long since and loved,
Gladly i-eceived them. Bede with heart as glad
Renewed with them the memory of old times,
Recounted benefits by him received
Then strong in youth, from just men passed away,
And preached his Master still with power so sweet
The listeners ne'er forgat him. Evermore,
Parting, he planted in the ground a cross.
And bade the neighbours till their church was built
Round it to pray. Meanwhile his youthful mate
bede's last may. 413
Changed by degrees. The ever varying scene
The biting breath and balmy breast of spring
And most of all that old man's valiant heart
Triumphed above his sadness, fancies gay
Pushing beyond it like those sunnier shoots
That gild the dark vest of the vernal pine.
He took account of all things as they passed ;
He laughed ; he told his tale. With quiet joy
His friend remarked that change. The second week
They passed to Durham ; next to Walsingham 3
To Gilling then ; to stately Richmond soon
High throned above her Ouse ; to Ripon last :
Then Bede made pause, and spake; ' Not far is York;
Egbert who fills Paulinus' saintly seat
"Would see me gladly : such was mine intent.
But something in my bosom whispers, " Nay,
Beturn to that fair river crossed by night,
The Tees, the fairest in this Northern land :
Beside its restless wave thine eye shall rest
On vision lovelier far and more benign
Than all it yet hath seen." ' Northward once more
They faced, and, three days travelling, reached at eve
Again those ivied clilf s that guard the Tees :
There as they stood a homeward dove, with flight
Softer for contrast with that turbulent stream,
Sailed through the cinmson eve. ' No sight like that ! '
Thus murmured Bede ; ' ever to me it seems
A Christian soul returning to its rest.'
A shade came o'er his countenance as he mused ;
Algar remarked that shade, though what it meant
He knew not yet. The old man from that hour
Seemed mirthful less, less buoyant, beaming less,
Yet not less glad.
At dead of night, Avhile hung
414 bede's last may.
The sacred stars upon their course half way,
He left his couch, and thus to Egbert wrote,
Meek man — too meek — the lirother of the kinsf.
With brow low bent, and onward sweeping hand,
Great words, world-famed : ' Remember thine account !
The Lord's Apostles are the salt of earth ;
Let salt not lose its savour ! Flail and fan
Are given thee. Purge thou well thy threshing floor !
Repel the tyrant ; hurl the hireling forth ;
That so from thy true priests true hearts may learn
True faith, true love, and nothing but the truth ! '
Before the lark he rose the morrow morn,
And stood by Algar's bed, and spake : ' Arise !
Playtime is past ; the great, good work returns ;
To Jarrow speed we ! ' Homeward, day by day,
Thenceforth they sped with foot that lagged no more,
That youth, at first so mournful, joyous now.
That old man oft in thought. Next day, while eve
Descended dim, and clung to Hexham's groves.
He passed its abbey, silent. Wonder-struck
Algar demanded, * Father, pass you thus
That church where holy John * ordained you priest ?
Pass you its Bishop, Acca, long your friend ?
Yearly he woos your visit ; tells you tales
Of Hexham's saintly Wilfred ; shows yon still
Chalice or cross new- won from distant shores :
Nor these alone : — glancing from such last year
A page he read you of some Pagan bard
With smiles ; yet ended with a sigh, and said :
" Where is he now 1 " ' The man of God replied :
* Desire was mine to see mine ancient friend ;
For that cause came I hither : — time runs short ' : —
* St. Jolni of Beverley.
bede's last may. 415
Then, Algar sighing, thus he added mild,
' Let go that theme ; thy mourning time is past :
Thy gladsome time is now.' As on they walked,
Later he spake : ' It may be I was wrong ;
Old friends should part in hope.'
On Jarrow's towers,
Bright as that sunrise while that pair went forth
The sunset glittered when, their wanderings past,
Bede and his comrade by the bank of Tyne
Once more approached the gates. Six hundred monks
Flocked forth to meet them. * They had grieved, I
know,'
Thus spake, low-voiced, the venerable man,
' If I had died remote. To spare that grief
Before the time intended I returned.'
Sadly that comrade looked upon his face,
Yet saw there nought of sadness. Silent each
Advanced they till they met that cowled host :
But three weeks later on his bed the boy
Remembered well those Avords,
Within a cell
To Algar's near that later night a youth
Wrote thus to one far off, his earliest friend :
' O blessed man ! was e'er a death so sweet !
He sang that verse, " A dreadful thing it is
To fall into the hands of God, All-Just ; "
Yet awe in him seemed swallowed up by love ;
And ofttimes with the Prophets and the Psalms
He mixed glad minstrelsies of English speech,
Songs to his childhood dear !
' blessed man ! .
The Ascension Feast of Christ our Lord drew nigh ;
He watched that splendour's advent ; sang its hymn :
"All-glorious King, Who, triumphing this day.
416 bede's last may.
Into the lieaven of heavens didst make ascent,
Forsake us not, poor orphans ! Send Thy Spirit,
The Spirit of Truth, the Father's promised Gift,
To comfort us, His children : Hallekijah."
And when he reached that woi-d, "Forsake us
not,"
He wept — not tears of grief. Witli him we wept ;
Alternate wept ; alternate read our rite ;
Yea, while we wept we read. So passed that day.
The suilerer thanking God with labouring breath,
*' God scourges still the son whom He receives."
'Undaunted, unamazed, daily he wrought
His daily task ; instruction daily gave
To us his scholars round him ranged, and said,
" I will not have my pupils learn a lie,
Nor, fruitless, toil therein when I am gone."
Full well he kept an earlier promise, made
Ofttimes to humble folk, in English tongue
Rendering the Gospels of the Lord. On these.
The last of these, tlie Gospel of Saint John,
He laboured till the close. The days went by,
And still he toiled, and panted, and gave thanks
To God with hands uplifted ; yea, in sleep
He made thanksgiving still. When Tuesday came
Suffering increased; he said, "My time is shoi-t;
How short it is I know not." Yet we deemed
He knew the time of his departure well.
' On Wednesday morn once more he bade us write :
We wrote till the tliird hour, and left him then
To pace, in reverence of that Feast all-blest,
Our cloister court with hymns. Meantime a youth,
Algar by name, there was who left him never ;
bede's last may. 417
The same that hour beside him sat and wrote :
More late he questioned : " Father well-beloved,
One chapter yet remaineth ; have you strength
To dictate more "? " He answered : " I have strength ;
Make ready, son, thy pen, and swiftly write."
When noon had come he turned him round and
said,
" I have some little gifts for those I love ;
Call in the Brethren ; " adding with a smile,
"The rich man makes bequests, and why not 11"
Then gifts he gave, incense or altar-cloth,
To each, commanding, " Pray ye for my soul ;
Be strong in prayer and offering of the Mass,
For ye shall see my face no more on earth :
Blessed hath been my life ; and time it is
That unto God God's creature shovild return ;
Yea, I desire to die, and be with Christ."
Thus speaking, he rejoiced till evening's shades
Darkened around us. That disciple young
Once moi^e addressed him, " Still one verse remains ; "
The master answered, " Write, and write with speed ; "
And dictated. The young man wrote ; then said,
" 'Tis finished now." The man of God replied :
" Well say'st thou, son, ' 'tis finished.' In thy
hands
Receive my head, and move it gently round,
For comfort great it is, and joy in death.
Thus, on this pavement of my little cell,
Facing that happy spot whereon so oft
In prayer I knelt, to sit once more in prayer,
Thanking my Father." ''Glory," then he sang,
"To God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost ; "
And with that latest Name upon his lips
Passed to the Heavenly Kingdom.'
lY. E E
418 bede's last may.
Thus with joy-
Died holy Bede upon Ascension Day
In Jarrow Convent. May he pray for us,
And all who read his annals of God's Church
In England hovised, his great bequest to man !
NOTE S.
Page 191. The Irish Mission in England during the seventh
century ivas one of the great things of history.
The following expressions of Dr. von DiiUinger respecting the
Irisli Cliurch are more ardent than any I have ventured to use : —
' During the sixth and seventh centuries the Church of
Ireland stood in the full beauty of its bloom. The spirit of
the Gospel operated amongst the people with a vigorous and
vivifying power : troojis of holy men, from the highest to the
lowest ranks of society, obeyed the counsel of Christ, and
forsook all things that they might follow Him. There was
not a country in the world, during this period, which could
boast of pious foundations or of religious communities equal to
.those that adorned this far distant island. Among the Irish
the doctrines of the Christian religion were preserved pure and
entire ; the names of lieresj^ or of schism were not known to
them ; and in the Bishop of Rome they acknowledged and
venerated the Supreme Head of the Church on earth, and con-
tinued with him, and through him with the whole Church, in
a never interrupted communion. The schools in the Irish
cloisters were at this time the most celebrated in the West . . .
The strangers who visited the island, not only from the
neighbouring shores of Britain, but also from the most remote
nations of the Continent, received from the Irish people the
most hospitable reception, a gratuitous entertainment, free
instruction, and even the books that were necessary for the
studies. . . . On the other hand, many holy and learned
Irishmen left their own country to proclaim the Faith, to
establish or to reform monasteries in distant lands, and thus
to become the benefactors of almost every country in Europe . . .
The foundation of many of the English Sees is due to Irishmen.
. . . These holy men served God, and not the world ; they
possessed neither gold nor silver, and all that they received
from the rich passed through their hands into the hands of the
420 NOTES.
Ijoor. Kings and nobles visited them from time to time only
to pray in their churches, or to listen to their sermons ; and as
long as they remained in the cloisters they were content with
the humble food of the brethren. Wherever one of these
ecclesiastics or monks came, he was received by all with joy ;
and whenever he was seen journeying across the country, the
people streamed around him to implore his benediction, and to
hearken to his words. The priests entered the villages only
to preach or to administer the Sacraments : and so free were
they from avarice, that it was only when compelled by the rich
and noble that they would accept lands for the erection of
monasteries.'
Page 196. For both countries that early time was a period of
ivoiulerful spirittial greatness.
I cannot deny myself the pleasure of quoting the following
passage, illustrating the religious greatness both of the Irish
and the English at the period referred to :
' The seventh and eighth centuries are the glory of the Anglo-
Saxon Church, as the sixth and seventh are of the Irish. As
the Irish missionaries travelled down through England, France,
and Switzerland, to Lower Italy, and attempted Germany at
the peril of their lives, converting the barbarian, restoring the
lapsed, encouraging the desolate, collecting the scattered, and
founding churches, schools, and monasteries as they went
along ; so amid tlie deep pagan woods of Germany, and round
about, the English Benedictine plied his axe, and drove his
plough, planted his rude dwelling, and raised his rustic altar
upon the ruins of idolatry ; and then, settling down as a colonist
upon the soil, began to sing his chants and to copy his old
volumes, and thus to lay the slow but sure foundations of the
new civilisation. Distinct, nay antagonistic, in character and
talents, the one nation and the other, Irish and English— the
one more resembling the Greek, the other the Roman— open
from the first perhaps to jealousies as well as rivalries, they
consecrated their respective gifts to the Almighty Giver, and,
labouring together for the same great end, they obliterated
whatever there was of human infirmity in their mutual inter-
course by the merit of their common achievements. Each by
turn could claim pre-eminence in the contest of sanctity and
learning. In the schools of science England has no name to
rival Erigena in originality, or St. Virgil in freedom of thought ;
nor (among its canonised women) any saintly virgin to compare
with St. Bridget ; nor, although it has 150 saints in its calendar,
can it pretend to equal that Irish multitude which the Book of
Life alone is large enough to contain. Nor can Ireland, on the
other hand, boast of a doctor such as St. Bede, or of an apostle
equal "to St. Boniface, or of a martyr like St. Thomas ; or of so
ITOTES. 421
long a catalogue of royal devotees as that of the thirty male or
female Saxons who, in the course of two centuries, resigned
their crowns ; or as the roll of twentj'-three kings, and sixty
queens and princes, who, between the seventh and the eleventh
centuries, gained a place among the saints.' — Cardinal Newman,
Historic tikcklics, 'The Isles of the North,' pp. 128-9.
Page 215.
Instant each navy at the other dashed
Like wild beast, instinct-tatoght.
This image will be found in the description of a Scandinavian
sea-light in a remarkable book less known than it deserves to
be, 2'he Invasion, by Gerald GriflBu, author of The Collegians.
The Saxons were, however, in early times as much pirates as
the Danes were at a later.
Page 217. The achievement of Hastings had been rehearsed
at a much earlier period by Harald.
Page 233. At Ely, Elmham, and beside the Cam.
In the reign of Sigebert, Felix, Bishop of East Anglia, founded
schools respecting which ]\Iontalembert remarks : ' Plusieurs
ont fait remonter a ces ecoles monastiques I'origine de la celebre
universite de Cambridge. '
Page 237. IIoiu bcaiUiful, Sion, are thy courts !
The following hymns are from the Office for the Consecration
of a Church.
St. Fursey. Page 254.
ffoio one loith brow
Lordlier than man's, and visionary eyes.
' AVhilst Sigebert still governed the kingdom there came out
of Ireland a holy man named Fursey, renowned both for his
words and actions, and remarkable for singular virtues, being
desirous to live a stranger for Our Lord, wherever an opportunity
should offer. ... He built himself the monastery ( Burghcastle
in Suffolk) wherein he might with more freedom indulge his
heavenly studies. There falling sick, as the book about his
life informs'-us, he fell into a trance, and, quitting his body
from the evening till the cockcrow, he was found worthy to
behold the choirs of angels, and hear the praises which are
sung in heaven. ... He not only saw the greater joys of the
Blessed, but also extraordinary combats of Evil Spirits. ' — Bede,
Hist., book iii. cap. xix. ' C'etait un moine irlandais nomme
Fursey, de tres-noble naissance et celebre depuis sa jeunesse
422 NOTES.
dans son pays par sa science et ses visions. . . . Dans la
priucipale de ses visions Ampere et Ozanam se sont accordes a
reconnaitre une des sources poetiques de la. Divme Comidic.'' —
Montalembert, Lcs Moines iV Occident, tome iv. pp. 93-4.
Page 291. ' None lovcth Song that loves not Light aiul Truth.'
This is one of the poetic aphorisms of Cadoc, a Cambrian
prince and saint, educated in the Irish monastery of Lismore,
and afterwards the founder of the great Welsh monastery of
Llancarvan, in which he gave religious instruction to the sons
of the neighbouring princes and chiefs.
Page 294.
True life of man
Is life within.
This thought is taken from one of St. Teresa's beautiful works.
Page 310. Ccadmon, the earliest hard of English song.
' A part of one of Ceadmon's poems is preserved in King
Alfred's Saxon version of Bede's History.' (Note to Bede's .
Ecclesiastical History, edited by Dr. Giles, p. 218.)
Page 340. Who told Mm tales of Leinstcr Kings, his sires.
' L'origine irlandaise de Cuthbert est affirme sans reserve par
Reeves dans ses JVotcs sur Writtcnhach, p. 5. Lanigan (c. iii.
p. 88) constate qu'Usher, "Ware, Colgan, en ont eu la meme
opinion. . . . Beaucoup d'autres anciens auteurs irlandais et
anglais en font un natif de I'Irlande. ' — Montalembert, Les Moines
d Occident, tome ii. pp. 391-2.
Page 349. Tlic thrones are myriad, hut the Enthroned is One.
' Oft as Spring
Decks on thy sinuous banks her thousand thrones,
Seats of glad instinct, and love's carolling.'
Wordsworth (addressed to the river Greta).
Page 362. Saint Fridcswida, or the Foundatio'ns of Oxford.
Saint Frideswida died in the same year as tlie Venerable Bede,
viz. A.D. 735. Her story is related by Montalembert, Lcs Moines
d' Occident, vol. v. pp. 298 — 302, with the following references,
viz. Leland, Collectanea, ap. Dugdale, t. i. p. 173 ; cf. Bolland,
t. viii. October, p. .535 a 568. I learn from a Catholic prayer-
book published in 1720 that the Saint's Feast used to be kept
on the 19th of October. Her remains, as is commonly believed,
.still exist in the Cathedral of Oxford.
NOTES. 423
Page 386. Your teacher he : he taught yoio first yom- Runes.
■ ' The Icelandic chronicles point out Odin as the most per-
suasive of men. They tell us that nothing could resist the
force of his words ; that he sometimes enlivened his harangues
with verses, which he composed extempore ; and that he was
not only a great poet, but that it was he who first taught the art
of poesy to the Scandinavians. He was also the inventor of
the Runic characters.' — Northern Antiquities, p. 83. j\Iallet
asserts that it was to Christianity that the Scandinavians owed
the practical use of those Runes which they had possessed for
centuries : — 'nor did they during so many years ever think of
committing to writing those verses with which their memories
were loaded ; and it is probable that they only wrote down a
small quantity of them at last. . . . Among the innumerable
advantages which accrued to the Northern nations from the
introduction of the Christian religion, that of teaching them to
applj' the knowledge of letters to useful purposes is not the
least vahrable. Nor could a motive less sacred have eradicated
that habitual and barbarous prejudice which caused them to
neglect so admirable a secret.' — P. 234. Mallet's statement
respecting the Greek emigration of the Northern ' Barbarians '
from the East is thus confirmed by Burke. ' There is an
unquestioned tradition among the Northern nations of Europe
importing that all that part of the world had suffered a great
and general evolution by a migration from Asiatic Tartary of a
people whom they call Asers. These everywhere expelled or
subdued the ancient inhabitants of the Celtick or Cimbrick
original. The leader of this Asiatic army was called Odin, or
AVodin ; first their general, afterwards their tutelar deity. . . .
The Saxon nation believed themselves the descendants of
those conquerors.' — Burke, Abridgment of English History,
book ii. cap. i.
Page 395. Like hunters chasing hart to sea-heat cliffs.
This is recorded by Lingard and Burke.
Page 401. Bcde's Last May.
This nan-ative of the death of Bede is closely taken from a
letter written by Cutlibert, a pupil of his, then residing in
Jarrow, to a fellow-pupil at a distance. An English version of
that letter is prefixed to Dr. Giles's translation of Bede's Ecclesi-
astical History. (Henry G. Bohu.) The death of Bede took
place on Wednesday, May 26, a.d. 735, being Ascension Day.
424 NOTES.
Page 405. They Inmger for your souls ; ivith reverent palms.
'But in a mystical sense the disciples pass through the corn-
fields when the holy Doctors look with the care of a pious
solicitude upon those whom they have initiated in the Faith,
and who, it is implied, are hungering for the best of all things
— the salvation of men. But to pluck the ears of corn means
to snatch men away from the eager desire of earthly things.
And to rub with the hands is, by examples of virtue, to put
from the purity of their minds the concupiscence of the flesh, as
men do husks. To eat the grains is when a man, cleansed from
the filth of vice by the mouths of preachers, is incorporated
amongst the members of the Church.' — Bede, quoted in the
Catena Aurca. — Commentary on St. Mark, cap. ii. v. 23.
END OF VOL. IV.
Richard Clay d; Sons, Limited, London cfc Bwagay.
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