University of Virginia Library

O england, which erewhile a peerless gem,
Set in St. Peter's triple diadem,
So sparkledst, that the nations in amaze
Stood dazzled in the lustre of thy rays!
My Country! what a grief art thou to me,
Fallen from thine original majesty!
How oft, lamenting o'er thy sad career,
For thee, for thee, I pour the pensive tear,
And marvel at thy ignominious fate,
So holy once and excellently great!

Oh, medley of strange opposites combined!
Oh, wonder, envy, pity, of mankind!
So wise, so high; so ignorant, so base;
So rich in nature, and so poor in grace;
A land of truth, by fictions all depraved!
A land of freedom, to itself enslaved!
The lowest depth, alas, of all thy woe
So little thy true misery to know!
Ah, hadst thou only in a happier hour
More faithfully withstood the Tempter's power;
Nor meanly at an abject despot's nod
Forsworn thy Creed, and turn'd thee from thy God;
Not then, as now, the spoil of sense and time,
Shorn of ideas celestial and sublime,
Would thy whole life to ruin blindly go,
Pour'd on materialities below:
Not then, as now, unable to resume
Thy forfeit place in world-wide Christendom,
Wouldst thou in bitter isolation dwell,
Nursing within thy breast a secret Hell,
Which haply, soon or late, may burst amain
And rend thy growth of centuries in twain!

Oh, too unconscious of thy strange decay!
Didst thou but understand in this thy day
The things which, now to thee an idle song,
To thy true peace and truest life belong;
With what a generous warmth wouldst thou receive
That message, which to scorn and disbelieve
Is now thy boast! Ah! ere it be too late,
Queen of the Isles! reverse thy coming fate,
And recognise in thy misfancied foe
The Holy Church, sole healer of thy woe.
E'en now methinks, allured by Mary's prayer,
I see thee lend a less reluctant ear,
And, mindful of thy Faith's immortal home,
Turn a half-wistful glance to injured Rome!
E'en now I hear, in whispers borne around,
A yearning sigh for something more profound;
And mid thy discords catch a tone sublime
That seems the prelude of a better time!

Such tones on Euthanase's ear there fell
Soft-soothing; as the wonder-working spell
Of that fair flower of Avon in his hand
Recall'd him, wandering on Oblivion's strand.
For now a solemn pause announces all
Prepared;—and but some hand pontifical
Is needed, Heaven's own diadem to place
Upon that forehead of surpassing grace;
When plucking sharp his mantle's russet fold,
“They bring the Coronal! Behold, behold!”
His friend exclaims. He turn'd, and, through the door
That from the Abbey-Cloister led of yore,
With waving lights, and chant reëcho'd clear
Antiphonally from the distant rear,
At the far end the Northern Transept down
Forth issues the Procession of the Crown.

Foremost of all, advancing grave along,
Of youthful priests a lovely shining throng,
With one, their leader, who on high before
The Instruments of Christ's dear Passion bore.
In snowy albs array'd, that swept the lawn,
And crimson stoles across their bosoms drawn,
Wands of victorious laurel in their hands,
Their foreheads filleted with myrtle bands,
Around each guileless head a nimbus bright
Weaving innocuous its golden light,
Serene in sweetest majesty they came
A blooming pageantry, and sang the Psalm
Of royal David—“Oh, how lovely shine
Thy Tabernacles, Lord of hosts divine!
My spirit faints away Thy Courts to see,
My flesh exults, O living God, in Thee!
Where hath the sparrow found himself a nest?
Here, Lord, within Thy Sanctuary blest;
Where spreads the turtle-dove her brooding wing?
Amidst thine altars, O my God and King!”

Of whom thus Theodore: “Ah! gaze thy fill,
And let this Heaven-imprinting spectacle
Sink in thy spirit's depth; for these are they,
The Seminary Priests—who in the day
Of false Elizabeth, and through the time
Of later-born apostasy and crime,
Confronting all the might of England's laws,
Stood up undauntedly in Faith's high cause,
And gloried by a traitor's death to die,
Battling against Satanic heresy!
For certain slaughter from the first prepared,
Like early victims for the altars rear'd,
Hunted, proscribed, in loathsome dungeons laid,
To all their kindred an opprobrium made,
Betray'd to death and torture,—bound in chains,
Hung,—disembowell'd amid cruel pains,
Their living hearts they offer'd to the Lord,
Torn from their bleeding breasts by hands abhorr'd;
And gave their blood, so miserably spilt,
In mediation for their country's guilt;
Too glad to pour their tender lives away
In the pure hope of England's better day!
Hail, Flowers of Martyrdom! hail, lovely band!
Dear Intercessors of your native land!
Who for the love of God's eternal truth
Renounced the pleasant joyance of your youth,
Now foremost in the line that comes to set
On Mary's brow her mystic coronet!”

“Hail,” Euthanase rejoins, “O Patriots blest!
But whence the halos which their brows invest?
On Saints beatified such honours wait,
But these were never raised to Saints' estate.”

“Few only,” thus the other in reply,
“Few only of the glorious Saints on high
On earth have honour, and for one below
The mansions of the skies a thousand show.
Yet the times come, and are not far away,
When yonder Blest shall see their Festal-day
In Britain's Isle, if right the signs I read,
And have of worship due their earthly meed;
To them invoking throngs shall pour their sighs,
To them the dedicated temple rise!
And you, dear Saints, forgive the long delay,
Nor cease for your loved Albion to pray,
Till every hill and vale, from shore to shore,
Rings with the Angelus it heard of yore!”

Meanwhile, from forth his flower of Paradise,
That water-lily fair, began to rise
And through the Monk's more inward sense to pour
A keener, rarer odour than before;
As if to rally from its hidden source
With subtle searchings all his spirit's force
For what remain'd. Anon there thrills a peal
Of music most inspired, ecstatical,
And forth appears the long coruscant line
Of England's Pontiff-Sanctities divine.

In Hierarchal order, See by See,
And all the pomp of sacred majesty,
Sublime they came, a marvel to behold,
Glory immortal of the days of old!
Each at his side a jewell'd crozier bore,
Each on his head a jewell'd mitre wore,
Each in august pontificals array'd
Honour and grace in all his mien display'd.
Of whom revolving, as they onward came,
To which in turn belong'd each sainted name
Of Pontiff blest, eternized in the page
Of England's history from age to age,
Thus Euthanase: “E'en such a mitred line,
Things earthly to compare with things divine,
These aged eyes beheld some while ago,
Within the Church yet Militant below,
Triumphant here. For when, at Peter's call,
Our first high Synod met since England's fall,
Duly convened where central in the land
Mary beholds her own fair College stand,
(Five summers past, so quick the moments fly,
Just on the verge of this half century),
I too was there, the closing scene to view,
Marking well pleased our Hierarchy new
Around the cloisters wend with glad acclaim,
And joying to behold in England's realm
The basis firm, by that High Synod's aid,
Of order for the coming ages laid!”

“Ah, Euthanase, and could but then thy gaze
Have pierced mortality's enfolding haze,
There hadst thou seen,” makes Theodore reply,
“How, in advance of that high Company,
Floated aloft in circumambient light
St. Michael, brandishing his sword of might;
The same that smote the Rebel Prince accursed,
With his apostate Spirits at the first.
For those were they, the honour of thy time,
Who come in Apostolic strength sublime,
For England's championship with Hell to fight,
And save her haply in her own despite,
Now in predestination's iron date
Nearing the secret crisis of her fate:
Whom to receive her greatness shall restore,
And raise her glory higher than before;
Whom to reject abandons her a prey
To ruin, loss, and infinite decay!
But, as I think, the Crown must now be near,
For see who strewing blossoms next appear!”

Thereat in purple mantles richly dight
Of boyish princes came a pageant bright;
Some with emblazon'd bannerets display'd
Symbolical of Heaven's unsullied Maid;
Others incessant scattering on their way
Pinkest and whitest tufts of spicy may,
So thick that scarce the floor of emerald green
For very snow of blossoms could be seen.
“Of Britain's kings the sainted youthful race
Ere yet she lost her heritage of grace!
Who leads the rest with our Salvation's Sign,
St. Kenelm, glory of old Mercia's line!”
Said Theodore. “All these as Martyrs died;
Or, Confessors of Christ, for regal pride
A cloister chose; or fell in pilgrimage;
Who might have been the glory of their age,
Had they so will'd; but they its glory fled,
And chose another glory in its stead:
Now with the Lamb they reign for ever His,
And share with Mary the abodes of bliss!
Oh, see upon each brow and beaming face
How shine baptismal innocence and grace!”

Then from within the Transept's depth of light
Began to dawn a brightness yet more bright,
So full, so rich, so luminous, so keen,
It seem'd they had till now in darkness been;
Brightness—yet such as dazzled not the eyes,
But with its roseate hues of Paradise
Rather infused in them new strength to see,
Participants of its own purity!
Forth from the Crown it stream'd, which borne along
Mid incense-wreaths and wafts of joyous song,
Now came in view. Upon a cushion white
Of downy plumes it lay, a lovely sight,
Thrilling the heart-strings by its presence blest
With a new sense of bliss before unguess'd.
A Heaven to see! But who of mortal birth
Might paint the sight? So little there of earth,
So much ethereal seem'd—a tracery rare
Alternately of rose and lily fair,
Lost in a mystery of spiry rays!—
So much to Euthanase a moment's gaze
Reveal'd; but when he strove with curious eye
Its more exact proportions to espy,
The clear empyreal texture undefiled
From that too earthly glance itself withheld,
And all a maze became—a maze of light
So purely and insufferably bright,
That nature reel'd, and reason from her throne
Seem'd on the instant headlong toppling down.
Inward he shrank, resolved to search no more;
And straightway all was lovely as before!

But who is he with such a glorious mien
That bears the Diadem of glory's Queen;
In England's old Regalia of state
A King array'd, magnificently great?
Already the Franciscan's heart had guess'd,—
Of England's monarchs greatest, wisest, best,
Edward the Confessor, his childhood's love,
Earliest of all his chosen Saints above.
Absorb'd in worship of that splendour fair
Which he so well had merited to bear;
His rich dalmatic floating to the ground,
His saintly retinue attendant round,
Serene he came, in every step a King,
While thus a thousand greeting voices sing:
“High glory to the Diadem divine,
Fabric immortal of the sacred Trine!
High glory to the Diadem divine,
Lady of grace, predestinated thine!
The Diadem prepared from endless days
In thy Immaculate Conception's praise;
No other crown so excellently fair,
No brow so fitted such a crown to wear!”

By this, the Pontiff Saints who went before
Had through the Abbey's Sanctuary-door
Enter'd the Choir, and there on either hand
Majestical in solemn order stand;
To whom nor blazon'd throne, nor altar fair,
For Coronation rite were wanting there;
Such change angelic ministries unseen
Had wrought on what had lately ruin been.
For where, before our holy Faith's decay
Rose the High Altar of an earlier day,
Long since by ruthless hands defaced, destroy'd,
And leaving in its stead a doleful void,
There now inlaid with gems of orient light
Another Altar stood superbly bright,
Surpassing all that fancy can invent
In symmetry and sculptured ornament;
So fair, so rich, so mystic to behold,
It seem'd as though that Altar of pure gold
Which glows upon the Heaven's translucent floor,
Circled with odorous incense evermore
Of saintly prayer, had left its upper realm,
And buoyant on the wings of Cherubim
Floated to earth! Behind it, tier on tier,
A super-altar rose in beryl clear,
With golden candlesticks and flowers bedight,
In preparation for th' approaching rite;
While on its left, upon a dais green,
A vacant throne of amethyst is seen,
Lovelier than that which Solomon of old
Devised of ivory and finest gold.

Here, then, the Pontiff Majesties divine
On either side appear in solemn line,
Of whom, as now in clearer view they show,
Some Euthanase or knew or seem'd to know;
Aidan and Ninian among the rest;
St. Cuthbert and St. Swithun; Anselm blest;
St. Thomas, Canterbury's ancient pride,
Patron of England's clergy and their guide,
(He with his priests upon the Altar's right
As Celebrant stood forth in aureoled light);
St. Chad; St. Dunstan's majesty severe;
Wolstan and Osmund; Wilfrid ever dear.
Such in appearance as at boyhood's dawn
Their figures oft in fancy he had drawn,
Musing o'er Butler's monitory page
Beneath the murmurous summer foliage,
So in resemblance now they met his sight,
The same in countenance and form and height,
Save only that more glorious they seem'd
Than ever thought conceived or fancy dream'd!

Thus as he notes, a merry pealing chime
Rings out as in the Abbey's olden time;
And up the choir the Diadem is borne,
Glittering resplendent as the star of morn,
On bended knee received with reverence due,
And on the Altar laid in open view.