Gaston de Blondeville, or The court of Henry III Keeping festival in Ardenne, a romance. St. Alban's Abbey, a metrical tale; With some poetical pieces. By Anne Radcliffe ... To which is prefixed: A memoir of the author, with extracts from her journals. In four volumes |
 | I. |
| III,IV. |
 | Gaston de Blondeville, or The court of Henry III |  |
129
XLI.
But, though these lighted halls are gone,And darkly stands that tower and lone,
The sacred temple still endures;
A truer worship it secures.
And, though the gorgeous shrines are o'er,
And their pale watch-monks now no more;
Though torch, nor voice, from chantry-tomb,
Break, solemn, through the distant gloom;
Though pilgrim-trains no more ascend
Where far-seen arches dimly bend,
And fix in awe th' admiring eye
Upon the Martyr's crown, on high,
And watch upon his funeral-bed;
Nor hundred Monks, by Abbot led,
Through aisle and choir, by tomb and shrine,
Display the long-devolving line,
To notes of solemn minstrelsy,
And hymns, that o'er the vaulting die
Yet, we here feel the inward peace,
That in long-reverenced places dwells;
Our earthly cares here learn to cease;
The Future all the Past expels.
130
Where once the weeping Palmer prayed,
We feel, as o'er the graves we tread,
His thrill of reverential dread.
| Gaston de Blondeville, or The court of Henry III | |