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 A VISION OF SAINTS 
 
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 BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 POETICAL 'WORKS. In 5 vols. Fcap. 8vo, 
 each 5^. 
 
 Vol. I. Songs of Two Worlds. 
 Vol. n. The Epic of Hades. 
 Vol. III. GwEN, AND The Ode of Life. 
 Vol. IV. Songs Unsung, and Gycia. 
 Vol. V. Songs of Britain. 
 
 POETICAL V/ORKS. In one volume. With 
 Portrait. Crown 8vo, 6s. ; cloth gilt, gilt leaves, 
 7^. 6d. 
 
 AN ILLUSTRATED EDITION OF 
 
 THE EPIC OF HADES. With 16 Autotype 
 Dlustrations, after the Drawings of the late George 
 R. Chapman. 4to, cloth extra, gilt leaves, 21s. 
 
 A PRESENTATION EDITION OF 
 
 THE EPIC OF HADES. With Portrait. 4to, 
 cloth extra, gilt leaves, 105. 6d. 
 
 London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., LtP
 
 A VISIOxN OF SAINTS 
 
 BY 
 
 LEWIS MORRIS 
 
 FIDELIBUS 
 
 LONDON 
 
 KECiAN TAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., Lt' 
 
 1890
 
 
 {The ligliti c/tyanslalion and o/ rcp7-o<iuctinn are reserz'eii.)
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The writer has carried out in the present poem the 
 design which he had long entertained of attempting 
 for the beautiful Christian legends and records that 
 which has so often been done for the mythology of 
 Greece. 
 
 It has been, as will be seen, his desire, not to confine 
 himself to the Saints of any one Church or Creed, 
 but to appeal to the spirit common to them all, 
 which in all ages, and through every form of belief, 
 has animated the whole company of faithful men. 
 
 Penbryn, 
 
 October, 1890.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Introduction ... ... ... ... ... i 
 
 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus ... ... 6 
 
 S. Christopher ... ... ... ... ... 19 
 
 Antoninus Pius ... ... ... ... 35 
 
 SS. Perpetua and Felicitas ... ... ... 43 
 
 S. Cecilia ... ... ... ... ... 60 
 
 SS. Adrian and Natalia ... ... ... ... 69 
 
 S. Phocas ... ... ... ... .. 84 
 
 S. Dorothea ... ... ... ... ... 96 
 
 S. Alexis ... ... ... ... ... 107 
 
 S. Marina ... ... ... ... ... ... 134 
 
 S. Francis of Assisi ... .,. ... ... 143 
 
 S. Elizabeth of Hungary ... ... ... ... 162 
 
 S. RocH... ... ... ... ... ... 184
 
 vi Contents. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 S. Catharine of Siena ... ... ... ... 196 
 
 George Herbert ... ... ... ... 209 
 
 John Bunyan ... ... ... ... ... 222 
 
 Henry Martyn ... ... .. ... ... 240 
 
 Elizabeth Fry ... ... ... ... ... 256 
 
 Father Damien ... ... ... ... 271 
 
 Conclusion ... ... ... ... ... ... 289
 
 A VISION OF SAINTS. 
 
 Once, long years since, I dreamt a dream of Greece 
 And fair fantastic tales of Nymph and Faun 
 And thin heroic forms, and ghostly gods 
 Floating in loveliness by grove and hill 
 And lake-side, all the joyous innocent grace 
 Of the old Pagan fancies ; mixt with tales 
 Of passion and unhappy deeds of old. 
 Dark, unforgotten. 
 
 Yesternight I knew 
 Another dream, a vision of old Rome, 
 Sterner and harsher, and the new-born grace 
 Of sacrifice ; of life which for the Truth 
 Bore misery to the death, while they, the blithe 
 Faint gods of Fancy, sank to fiends of 111 
 
 B
 
 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Athirst for pain and blood, and the old grace 
 To the new suffering, and the careless lives 
 That were content to enjoy, and asked no more 
 Than some brief glimpse of Beauty ere they died, 
 To grave bent brows, and tortured limbs, and all 
 The armoury of pain. 
 
 And once again, 
 As the great Master passed from Hell to Heaven, 
 With an angelic guide, I seemed to tread 
 Where in the infinite Empyrean dwell 
 The blessed company of Saints, and move, 
 Conveyed by soaring wings to highest heaven, 
 'Midst those who bare of old the victor's palm 
 And wore the crown — martyr and eremite, 
 Lives spent in toil for God, or fired with love. 
 An infinite concourse pure and white as snow ; 
 While far away on that unbounded air 
 Scarce reached by sight were saints of hoary eld, 
 Who by old Nile or the Chaldaean plain,
 
 A Visio7i of Saints. 
 
 Through grave hves lighted by a certain hope, 
 Foreknew the weighing of the soul for doom, 
 And that unaided, darkling way which threads 
 The Valley of the Shadow, and passed to life 
 Dim centuries, ere yet the Lawgiver 
 Strode from the fiery Hill with face aflame, 
 Down to the listening Tribes, 
 
 Not of old days 
 Were all the souls I saw, nor yet of Rome, 
 In birth or faith, but down long vistas gray 
 Of centuries we fared, by endless ranks 
 Of sanctity, cloistered or secular, 
 But all of Heaven ; and later born in tim,e, 
 Preachers inspired and ministering souls 
 Of women, whom no vow nor cell immured, 
 But a great pity drew and pious care 
 For fallen lives, and those who in the world, 
 Not of it — poets, thinkers, lawgivers, 
 Lovers of Country, of the Race, of God,
 
 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 High souls and just who wrought in sight of all, 
 Toilers obscure who worked their work and died — 
 Bloom, in all time, the innumerable throng 
 That, year by year, the Eternal Seasons raise 
 To make our poor world sweet. 
 
 All these I saw, 
 A concourse vast of every race and tribe 
 And tongue ; till as I gazed, a shining band 
 New risen, and bearing on their front the mark 
 Of our quotidian life and modern speech, 
 Streamed through the boundless vast; and as we passed 
 These saints long risen, or mortal yesterday, 
 I questioned him who led me of the lives 
 And fate of some, and he, with solemn speech, 
 Made answer as we went. 
 
 But ere we came 
 To real lives, lived upon earth for Heaven, 
 Two gracious legends, like the vanished tales 
 Of older Greece, twin dreams within my dream, 
 
 I
 
 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Each with its precious, hidden treasure, took 
 
 My eyes awhile, twin truths on which are built 
 
 Our newer, higher hope, but of old time 
 
 Unknown or dimly felt — the blessed dream 
 
 Which all have dreamt and shall, of life which ends not 
 
 With the last breath, but, to some finer air 
 
 Escaping, doth renew itself and fare 
 
 To what high work we know not, in some sphere 
 
 Unreached by thought, yet sure ; and one the strength 
 
 Of weakness, when the too strong soul bows low 
 
 Before God's will, and doth exalt itself 
 
 Through self-surrender. These, the corner-stones 
 
 Of all our Faith, my guide, in parables 
 
 Part true, part feigned, declared to me, and I 
 
 Listened with eager ears. 
 
 And first I seemed 
 To greet a joyous, radiant company, 
 Seven comely youths who, fresh from secular sleep, 
 From out a caverned hillside issued blithe 
 To meet the long-lost day. And thus my guide :
 
 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 " When Rome was Pagan still, a little band 
 
 Of ardent, generous youths who called on Christ, 
 
 Fled their idolatrous city, thinking scorn 
 
 To kneel to those false gods their souls abhorred — 
 
 And loathing that accursed heathen rout 
 
 Turned to the silence of the lonely hills 
 
 That brood round Ephesus, and found at length 
 
 Shelter and peace, within a winding cave 
 
 High on the rock-faced side of Cselian, 
 
 And there dwelt safe, lifting their gracious hymns 
 
 In worship to the Lord, 
 
 At last there came 
 Some heathen passer-by, who heard the sound. 
 And straight betrayed them. And the tyrant sent
 
 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. 
 
 His soldiers, and that none came forth again 
 
 Rolled in the narrow entrance monstrous rocks, 
 
 Which shut out air and light. Then when they knew 
 
 No change of night and day, and all their food 
 
 Had failed, came Heaven-sent sleep to close their eyes. 
 
 Deep sleep which knew no waking fell on them 
 
 For the long space of nigh two hundred years. 
 
 There they slept on till now the conquering Cross 
 Bare sway, and 'twas a Christian Csesar ruled 
 Where raged the Pagan erst. For thirty years 
 The pious Theodosius swayed the might 
 Of Rome, and then the powers of evil bred 
 Dark heresies to rend the seamless robe 
 The Pagan might not. Doubting voices cried, 
 ' No resurrection is there, but the body 
 Lies rotting in the earth, and the freed soul 
 Weltering upon the unbounded seas of space 
 Is lost within the Universe, nor more
 
 8 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Takes its old shape. What ? did the prophets know, 
 
 Moses, Esaias, and the rest, this thing? 
 
 There is no place of souls nor judgment day 
 
 Of deeds done in the flesh, nor heaven nor hell, 
 
 Only upon the earth our kingdom is. 
 
 Be wise and occupy, for never indeed 
 
 Comes any resurrection of the dead ; • 
 
 The dead are gone, cleave to the living alone ; 
 
 Use all your nature. Lives the flower again, 
 
 The brute that comes so near us, and is full 
 
 Of faithful love and reverence for man 
 
 As man for God ? If all these die and pass. 
 
 Then shall not we ? What else than arrogant pride 
 
 Blinds men to fact, and fools them with a world 
 
 No eye has seen, which all the seers of old 
 
 Knew not nor proved ? Nay, surely it were well 
 
 To take our lives in our own hands, and tread 
 
 Our fearless paths not looking for reward 
 
 To any dim unreal sphere, but deem
 
 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. 
 
 Our individual life ends with the grave, 
 As ends the flower in frost ; or if there come 
 Something of higher life, yet 'tis the Race 
 Which profits, nought beside. Wherefore in vain 
 Are all your hopes of heaven, your fears of hell, 
 Since 'tis not men who live again, but Man.' 
 
 Thus having heard, the pious Caesar turned. 
 Struck cold with doubt, as one a palsy takes, 
 Making his limbs hang impotent, his will 
 Powerless to live or die. Alone he sate. 
 Hating the voice, hating his doubt, himself 
 Who doubted, and long time from sight of men 
 Withdrew himself and, clad in sackcloth, pined 
 With ashes on his head, yet found not peace 
 For all his penance, but the spectral doubt 
 Weighed on him like a nightmare night and day. 
 
 Now at the selfsame hour, when Caesar strove 
 With his immense despair, a humble hind,
 
 lo A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Seeking to find a shelter for his flock, 
 Chanced on the secret cave of CteUan, 
 And toiling with his fellows rolled aside 
 The rocks which sealed its mouth, and went his way, 
 Nor entered ; but when now, returning dawn 
 Flooded the long-sealed vault with cheerful day. 
 It pierced to where the sleepers lay, and breathed 
 Some stir of coming life, and they once more 
 Drinking the brisk sweet breath of early morn 
 Opened their long-closed eyes, and woke again 
 To the old earth, and kept the far off past 
 Unchanged in memory, and spake with mirth 
 Of their long sleep, and the fair dreams it brought, 
 And said a prayer, and sang a hymn, and then. 
 Urged by the healthy zest of vigorous youth. 
 Sent one among them, Malchus hight, to buy 
 Food for their hunger. 
 
 Fearfully he stole 
 Down the long steep to where great Ephesus
 
 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesiis. i i 
 
 Shining beneath him lay. Scant change was there, 
 
 Only the stately house of Artemis 
 
 He found not where it stood. Half dazed he seemed 
 
 By too long sleep. But when he gained the gate 
 
 Of the city, on the walls behold the Cross ! 
 
 The witness to the faith by which he lived, 
 
 The blessed symbol, which to own was death ! 
 
 But still he seemed to dream, and wondering sought 
 
 Another gate, and there again the Cross ! 
 
 And as he mused what portent 'twas he saw 
 
 The passers freely named the holy name 
 
 Which yesternight brought doom. Then with great joy, 
 
 Yet deep perplexity, he turned to greet 
 
 Some face he seemed to know, but it was strange, 
 
 And strange the fashion of the dress, and strange 
 
 The accent of the tongue, till, half afraid. 
 
 Entering where bread was bought, and offering goLl, 
 
 The seller looking saw an ancient coin 
 
 Of Decius, and would ask him whence it came,
 
 i 2 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Deeming he found by some unhallowed spell 
 Forbidden treasure, and the youth's strange garb 
 And speecli, and great perplexity, enforced 
 The doubt, so that they bound him fast and haled him 
 Through the long streets, where all in vain he sought 
 One friendly glance, to where upon his throne 
 The Bishop judged ; and when the aged man 
 Questioned him of the thing, and what had been, 
 And sware him on the Cross, straightway the youth — 
 ' We fled the tyrant Decius, who would bid us 
 Serve the false gods, and — was it yesternight ? — 
 Rolled ponderous rocks to seal the cave where I 
 And my companions slept ; but now, I pray you 
 What is it that has been ? Bear you the Cross 
 And fear not ? Call men now upon the name 
 Of Christ and dread not all the bitter pains — 
 The dungeon, and the torture, and the stake, 
 The tyrannies our fathers knew and we ? 
 What change is this assails my ears and eyes —
 
 The Seven Sleepers of Ephes2is. i 
 
 o 
 
 Strange speech, strange vestments, forms and faces strange? 
 Where is the shining house of Artemis ? 
 I pray you tell me what it is has been, 
 And whether I be alive or long time dead, 
 Deceived in dreams by long unnoted years.' 
 
 Then fell the Bishop, full of pious awe, 
 Prostrate at Malchus' feet — the aged man 
 Before the spirit clothed with changeless youth, 
 Since well he knew what thing his eyes had seen — 
 A miracle of life, raised from the grave, 
 A miracle of Heaven. And all the throng, 
 Bishop and governor, with all the great 
 And noble of the city, white-haired lords, 
 And stately matrons, coming, knelt with him 
 Before the youth, o'er whose unwrinkled brow 
 Two hundred years had passed and left no sign — 
 Swift-coming age before eternal youth, 
 Brief life before the endless life of death.
 
 14 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Then went they forth, that noble throng, and all 
 The city, to where upon the Cailian hill 
 The seven youthful martyrs lay so long. 
 There in the cave, the blessed company 
 Sate cheerful, wondering much to see the throng, 
 With Malchus leading them ; and as the array 
 Drew nearer, heard the sound of hymns, and saw 
 The sacred symbol borne on high, and knew 
 All that had been, and that the might of Wrong 
 Was broken, and the world was of the Faith, 
 And the false gods no more ; and then they raised 
 Their clear accordant strains in praise to heaven, 
 And from their happy heads crowned round with light. 
 And from their cheeks red with the heavenly rose, 
 And from their lips touched with divinest song. 
 An effluent glory shone, and all who saw 
 Knew that their eyes beheld the blessed dead.
 
 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. \ 5 
 
 Last, Theodosius wrestling with his doubt, 
 
 And ahnost conquering, sped o'er land and sea 
 
 To see the portent, and when he was come 
 
 And stood before the place the Pagan erst 
 
 Sealed fast with monstrous rocks, on the young lives 
 
 Fresh vowed to Christ, and left them there to die, 
 
 He knelt in silence, and the fire of faith 
 
 Burned high in him, and dried the deeps of doubt. 
 
 And when he looked on those immortal eyes, 
 
 And that first bloom of an immortal youth, 
 
 His faith grew perfect, and he blest the Lord 
 
 Who sent the sign. Then, with one voice sublime. 
 
 The seven awakened spirits sang, ' Believe, 
 
 Believe through us, O Caesar ! We are dead. 
 
 And yet we hve. Praise Heaven that we have seen 
 
 The faith triumphant. Ere the last great day 
 
 The Lord has raised us that men should be strong. 
 
 And doubt no longer, but believe indeed
 
 1 6 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 The life and resurrection of the world.' 
 
 And when their voices died away they bowed 
 Their heads upon their breasts, and kneeling, gave 
 Their spirits back to God ; and all who saw, 
 And all who heard, Caesar, and all the throng. 
 Doubted no more, but rose and did believe." 
 
 Which things, when I had heard, again I seemed 
 To hear my guide, " Know, thou that hearest me, 
 Through the round world this fair old legend runs 
 Where man is higher than the beasts that die. 
 The Hindu, dreaming on his seething plains. 
 Cherishes it ; the fierce false prophet stole 
 The story ; and throughout the fabulous East 
 It lives and thrives to-day ; the frozen North 
 Holds it for true ; o'er all the ancient world 
 Some fair faint blossom of the gracious tale
 
 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. i 7 
 
 Lingers, and in the modern springs anew 
 In witness to the hght-winged hours which snatch 
 The swift unconscious hfe from youth to age. 
 Too fair, too fleeting, change confusing change — 
 Change of a day which works the work of years ; 
 Unchanging years, which seem but as a day ! " 
 
 " But with still clearer voice, and sweeter tongue, 
 Thus speaks the legend : ' Sleep and Death are one, 
 Not diverse, and to Death's long slumber comes 
 Awakening sure and certain, when the Dawn 
 Of the Last Day shall break, and shall unseal 
 The long-closed eyes, as that strong sun of Spring 
 Illumed the caves of sleep, and stirred the blood 
 Which else had slumbered still.' Yet since no sign 
 Comes from our sleepers here, the yearning hearts 
 Which mark the struggling breath come short and faint, 
 The tired eyes close, and the calm peace which smooths 
 The weary brow — and feel 'tis sleep — no more — 
 
 c
 
 1 8 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Yet find no proof, cherish the legend fair, 
 Because life longs to be, because to cease 
 Is terrible, because the listening soul 
 Waits for some whisper from beyond the grave, 
 Waits still, as it has waited through all time, 
 Waits undismayed, whate'er its form of creed, 
 Nor fails, though all is silence, to hold fast, 
 Deep in its sacred depths, too deep for thought, 
 The Resurrection and the Life to be."
 
 6^. Christopher. 1 9 
 
 Next 'twas a tall and stalwart form I saw, 
 
 Like Herakles of old, who strode along, 
 
 Bearing a staff which seemed to bud and bloom 
 
 Into the martyr's palm. Fainter he showed 
 
 In outline than the rest, as if I saw 
 
 A veiled life half hid behind a cloud 
 
 Of legend, or a real life, perhaps. 
 
 Set round with precious gems of allegory 
 
 And consecration fashioned from the sum 
 
 Of meaner lives, less sinful, less cast down, 
 
 And less triumphant. Was it parable, 
 
 Not fact, that bid him be ? Then it was well 
 
 To feign the tale — the wave of death, the power
 
 20 A Vision of Saitits. 
 
 Of evil, the strong man who turned to good, 
 Whose fleshly strength was broken by the weight 
 Of a Httle child — and this dim saint, the thrall 
 Of evil once, is precious, as the lives 
 We track from birth to death. 
 
 Thus then my guide 
 Held converse as we passed. 
 
 " No name there is 
 More strange and quaint and sweet than Christopher's, 
 Who bore the Christ. 
 
 In the far fabulous East 
 He served, a soldier. Nature, which so oft 
 Grudges her gifts, gave this man strenuous limbs 
 And giant strength, joined with the choicer gift 
 Of a keen brain, and daring will, and high 
 Ambition which aspires. Him the clear voice 
 Of high adventure called o'er land and sea, 
 The magical music, heard of nobler souls. 
 Which dulls all lower voices. More than Prince
 
 S. Christopher. 2 1 
 
 This strenuous champion showed, a King of men, 
 
 Who saw Power shining starlike on the hills 
 
 And set his face to reach it. Luxury 
 
 Held him nor sensual ease, who was too great 
 
 For silken fetters ; a strong will and arm 
 
 Bent to a higher end than those, and fired 
 
 By higher longings. 
 
 Every soul of man 
 Knows its own weakness, so this strength o'ergrown 
 Only achievement drew. O'er land and sea. 
 From realm to realm, he fared, seeking a Lord 
 Still mightier than the last, until at length 
 A slumbering soul, not prizing good or ill, 
 He found a puissant Prince and served content. 
 
 But 'mid the rugged ways of this sad world. 
 As now he fared unmoved, the frequent sight 
 Of evil ; the blind rage which takes and sways 
 The warrior in the fight ; the hopeless pain
 
 2 2 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Which unregarded cries to Heaven ; the wrong 
 
 Done on the earth for ever ; the great sum 
 
 And mystery of Evil, worked on him 
 
 With that strange spell of power which only takes 
 
 The strong soul captive. Here was strength indeed, 
 
 Greater than mortal, which had power to bind 
 
 The mightiest in chains, now forcing them 
 
 Despite themselves to wrong, now binding them 
 
 With sensual fetters. Was not this enough 
 
 To limit Heaven itself? So this rude soul 
 
 Bowed to it, taking Evil for his god, 
 
 A voluntary thrall. Yet not to him 
 
 The smooth foul ways of sense, the paths of wrong. 
 
 Brought pleasure of themselves ; only a beat 
 
 Of pulsing life, the keenness and the glow 
 
 Of full impassioned being. So long time 
 
 He served the Lord of Evil ; deeds of wrong 
 
 And anger knew he, stains of sensual sin ; 
 
 So that, for dread of him, men named his name
 
 5". Christopher. 23 
 
 ' The Unrighteous,' but he recked not. Power and fame 
 Sufficed him long, and hid from him the fashion 
 Of his own life, and by what perilous ways 
 He went, and black unfathomed gulfs of 111. 
 
 Till one day, as he journeyed (so the tale, 
 The allegory of this sinful soul) 
 Through a thick wood, which was the deadly shade 
 Of sense, and of the world, which hid the heavens, 
 Blinding the eye of day ; with wondering thought 
 He knew his vanquisher, the Lord of 111, 
 Cower down as from a blow, hiding his eyes 
 From some white suffering form. 
 
 And lo ! his gaze 
 Met that great symbol of all sacrifice 
 Which men have worshipped since ; the soft sad eyes. 
 The painful limbs fixed to the Tree of Death 
 Which is the Tree of Life ; and all the past 
 Fell from him, and the mystery of Love
 
 24 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And Death and Evil ; Might which gives itself 
 
 To save the Race, and dying, breaks in twain 
 
 The vanquished strength of Hell ; all these transformed 
 
 His inmost being, and his prisoned soul, 
 
 Spurning its former chain, stood fair and free, 
 
 Unfettered, for a while, and then he fell 
 
 Prone on the earth, the mild and pitying eyes 
 
 Bent on him still. There he lay motionless 
 
 A night of precious sorrow, till at last 
 
 The sun rose on the earth and on his soul. 
 
 And Dawn, returning, brought the purer Day. 
 
 But when he rose the ancient mastery 
 And thirst for power, springing anew in him 
 Once more resistless, over land and sea 
 Drave him to seek this new and mightier Lord 
 Who brake the power of 111. So far and wide 
 He fared, a passionate Pilgrim, but found not 
 The Lord Divine — for Him indeed his eyes
 
 S. Chi'istophe7\ 25 
 
 Saw not as yet — filled with the pride of life, 
 Touched with desire for good, since it was strong, 
 But prizing strength alone. 
 
 Till as he fared 
 His footsteps chanced upon a stony land 
 Where sprang no herb. There, in a lonely cell. 
 Pondered an aged man ; no other thing 
 Of life was there, only wan age, which paused 
 Upon the verge of death. His giant strength 
 Was flagging now. Beyond the ghostly hills 
 The sun was sinking, and the gray of night 
 Stole upward. Through the plain beneath the cell 
 A broad black river raged, spanned by no bridge 
 For travellers, but a dark road stole to it 
 O'ergloomed by cypress, and no raft was there 
 Nor ferry. Evermore beyond the shade. 
 Breast-high, the strong stream roared by dark as doom. 
 
 There on the brink he paused, and saw no soul,
 
 2 6 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Watching the stream of death. Great misery 
 And weakness took him, and he sank, o'erborne, 
 Prone on the strand. Then on the farther shore 
 The sunset, glancing for a moment, fired 
 A thousand palace casements, soaring spires, 
 And airy domes, and straight his glad soul knew 
 That he had seen the city of the King. 
 
 Then presently he heard a reverend voice 
 From out the gloom. And now the sun had set, 
 And all the hills were hidden. 
 
 ' Son, thou com'st 
 Seeking the Lord of Life. There is no way 
 But through yon cruel river. Thou wert strong : 
 Take rest and thought till strength return to thee. 
 Arise, the Dawn is nigh.' 
 
 Then they twain went. 
 And there that faint soul rested many days.
 
 5". Christopher. 27 
 
 But when the strong man's strength was come again 
 
 His old guide led him forth to where the road 
 
 Sank in that dark swift stream. The hills were veiled ; 
 
 There was no city to see, nought but thick cloud, 
 
 And still that black flood roaring. Then he heard 
 
 The old voice whisper, ' Not of strength alone 
 
 Come they who find the Master, but cast down 
 
 And weak and wandering. Yet since strength indeed 
 
 Well used is precious, therefore shalt thou plunge 
 
 In yon cold stream. Death shall not come to thee, 
 
 Nor in those chill dark waters shall thy feet 
 
 Slip, nor thy life be swallowed. Be it thine 
 
 To bear in thy strong arms the fainting souls 
 
 Of pilgrims who pass onward day and night, 
 
 Seeking the Lord of Light. Thou who long time 
 
 Didst serve the Lord of Evil now shalt serve 
 
 A higher ; and because great penances 
 
 Are fitting for great wrong, here shalt thou toil
 
 28 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Long years, till haply thou shalt lose the stain 
 Of sense and of the world ; then shall thy eyes 
 See that thou wouldst. Go, suffer and be strong.' 
 
 Then that rude soul, treading those stony ways. 
 Went down into the waters. Piteous cries 
 Called loud to him for help, poor wayfarers 
 Come to life's goal ; wan age and budding youth-. 
 And childhood fallen untimely. He stooped down 
 AVith wonder mixed with pity, solacing 
 Those weakling limbs, and, bearing in his arms 
 The helpless burden, through the chill dark depths 
 Of those black swirling waters, undismayed, 
 Strode onward. Oftentimes the deadly chill 
 Of ice-cold floods too strong for feebler hearts 
 Assailed him, yet his giant stature still 
 Strode upright through the deep to the far shore. 
 And those poor pilgrims with reviving souls 
 Blessed him, and left the waters, and grew white
 
 S. Christopher. 29 
 
 And glorified, and in their eyes he knew 
 
 A wonder and a rapture as they saw 
 
 The palace of the King, the domes, the spires, 
 
 The shining oriels sunlit into gold, 
 
 The white forms on the verge to welcome them, 
 
 And the clear heights, and the discovered heaven. 
 
 But never on his eyes, for all his toil, 
 
 Broke that clear sun, nor those fair palace roofs, 
 
 As erst upon his weakness. Day and night 
 
 He laboured unrewarded, with no gleam 
 
 Of that eternal glory, which would shine 
 
 Upon those fainting souls, whom his strong arms 
 
 Bare upward. Day and night he toiled alone 
 
 Amid the deeps of death. Oft would he rise 
 
 At midnight, when the cry of sinking lives 
 
 Called to him on the brink, and succour them 
 
 Without a thought of fear. Yea, though the floods 
 
 Roared horribly, and deep called unto deep,
 
 30 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Straight through those hidden depths he strode unmoved 
 A strong, laborious, unrewarded soul. 
 
 Was it because the blot of former sin 
 
 Clung to him still uncleansed ? I cannot tell ; 
 
 The stain of ill eats deep. But to my thought 
 
 Not thus the legend runs ; rather, I deem 
 
 He loved in good the strength which erst enthralled 
 
 His life to ill. Therefore this striving soul 
 
 Still laboured unfulfilled. 
 
 Thus the slow years 
 Passed, till the giant strength at times would flag 
 A little, and yet bore on. But one still night, 
 Ere cockcrow, when the world was sunk in sleep, 
 A summons came ; and he arising saw. 
 With some strange new compassion, on the brink 
 A childish form. A sweet sad glance divine 
 Shone from the eyes. And as the strong man took 
 The weakling to his heart, through the great power
 
 S. Christopher. 31 
 
 Of Pity with new strength, he braved the deep 
 Careless with that Hght load. 
 
 But in mid stream 
 The more than human force, the dauntless spirit 
 Which long time bore unfalt'ring the great load 
 Of mortal ills — ay, though the loud winds beat 
 And the thick night was blind — these failed him now, 
 And, as by some o'erwhelming weight opprest, 
 His flagging forces tottered ; the cold wave 
 Rose high around him ; the once haughty head 
 Bowed low, the waters steaHng to his lip 
 Engulfed ; the burden of the painful world 
 Crushed his weak shoulders ; and a bitter cry 
 Burst from him — ' Help ! I faint, I sink, I die, 
 I perish ; I am spent, and can no more. 
 My strength is naught, the deep floods swallow me. 
 Not of myself I conquered, but of Thee.' 
 
 Then suddenly from his spent life he knew
 
 32 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 The load withdrawn, and through the midnight gloom 
 There burst the glorious vision of his dreams, 
 The palace of the King, the domes, the spires, 
 The shining oriels sunlit into gold. 
 The heaven of heavens discovered, and a voice — 
 ' Thou hast sustained the whole world, bearing Me 
 The Lord of Earth and Heaven. Rise; turn awhile 
 To the old shore of Time. I am the King 
 Thou seekest. I have known thy sin, thy pain. 
 Thy tears, thy penitence. If thy soul ask 
 Proof of these things, this sign I give to thee. 
 Set thou thy staff to-night upon the verge 
 Of these dark waters, and with break of dawn 
 Seek it, and thou shalt find it burgeon forth 
 With fair white scented blossoms. This shall be 
 Witness of what has been.' 
 
 And he with joy, 
 Vanquished at length, obeyed, and with the dawn 
 Where stood his staff, there sprang the perfumed cup
 
 S. Christopher. 33 
 
 And petals of a lily : so the tale. 
 
 Nay, but it was the rude strength of his life 
 
 Which blossomed into purity, and sprang 
 
 Into a higher self, beneath the gaze 
 
 Of a little child. — Nay, but it was the might 
 
 Of conscious strength, which cast its robes of price 
 
 Down on the earth ; the new self stripped and purged 
 
 Of ingrained pride, which from the deeps of death 
 
 Rose painful to the stable earth again, 
 
 And grew regenerate through humility. 
 
 So for the remnant of his days he served 
 The Lord of Good, a champion of the Right, 
 Grown meek. At last the Pagan governor 
 Bade him deny the Lord who succoured him ; 
 Whom he contemning, gained a martyr's crown 
 Through pain and death, and is Saint Christophen" 
 
 He ended, and I mused in silent thought 
 
 D
 
 34 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 On this quaint legend, when again my guide — 
 " Even so they toil as he, the striving souls 
 Who live on earth to-day engrossed with care 
 Willing to better our poor world, which calls 
 Always with piteous suffrages to Heaven — 
 Strong souls with deep compassion for the race, 
 Seeming possest, yet vainly, since their labour 
 Born of the half unconscious pride of strength 
 Is only part for others, or for God. 
 But when a nobler, self-less passion fills 
 The heart and soul, then only fit reward 
 Is theirs, and from the depths of their dead selves, 
 And from the staff of their discarded strength. 
 And from the unneeded treasures of their past, 
 The yearning to fulfil the Perfect Scheme, 
 The full surrender to the Heavenly Will, 
 Obedience, self-effacement, sacrifice. 
 Life a white perfumed blossom springs to Heaven."
 
 Antoninus Puis. 35 
 
 And as we left the haunted border-land 
 
 Of fantasy, for lives, which lived and died 
 
 In the long-vanished centuries, true indeed 
 
 Though broidered here and there with flowers of gold 
 
 By pious hands devouter than our own, 
 
 Yet mainly true ; first of the endless line 
 
 I saw a calm and Princel}' Presence come. 
 
 Who, stately as the Imperial Purple, bore 
 
 His robe, a saint in mien, mild, innocent, 
 
 Perfect in manhood, with clear eye serene, 
 
 And lofty port ; who from the sages took 
 
 What lessons earth could give, but trod no less 
 
 The toilsome path of Duty to the end ; 
 
 And as he passed I knew the Kingly ghost
 
 36 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of Antonine, who knew not Christ indeed 
 Yet not the less was His. I marked the cahn 
 And thoughtful face of him who ruled himself, 
 And through himself the world, and 'mid the soil 
 And foulness of unfettered lusts kept pure 
 His virgin soul, and o'er the servile crowd, 
 Trembling, betrayed, beneath the armed heels 
 Of a long line of tyrants trodden in blood, 
 Wielding a blameless sceptre, stayed awhile 
 By a white life, and perfect, lived for good 
 The hurrying doom and ruin of the world. 
 
 Whom when we passed, thus spake my heavenly guide 
 
 " There are of Him, who call not on His name. 
 
 And this is of them, the best flower and fruit 
 
 Of all the Heathen world, the Sage who ruled 
 
 The race of men, for whom the fatal gift 
 
 Of power unfettered worked nor hurt nor harm. 
 
 But left his soul unchanged : for whom the gross
 
 Antoninus Pins. 37 
 
 And sensual lusts which wrecked the hapless line 
 Of Cresars were as nought, the coward fears 
 Of tyranny unknown, the secret arts 
 Of the informer hateful ; but he lived 
 The foremost citizen of Rome — no more 
 Nor lower, happy, loving wife and child 
 And all his people as a father might 
 The offspring of his love. Then first indeed 
 Crowned, on a throne. Divine Philosophy 
 Swayed all the race of men, like that fair dream 
 Of the Athenian sage, and too great weal 
 Lulled them to sleep, till they forgot to prize 
 Their freedom lost for ever. All his soul 
 Was filled with love of peace, holding it more 
 To save a single citizen than slay 
 A thousand enemies. A thrifty hand 
 Grudging his people's toil, not less he planned 
 Great works and beautiful, which might enrich 
 The City of the world, and, loving peace,
 
 38 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Yet not the less the reverence for his name 
 
 Spread to earth's limits. On the distant bank 
 
 Of Phasis, to a king whom Ccesar named, 
 
 The stubborn tribesmen bowed. The Parthian spared 
 
 Armenia at his nod. The Scythian hosts 
 
 On the Cimmerian shore confessed his might, 
 
 And on the wild Sarmatian plains his word 
 
 Was law, and many a barbarous chieftain came 
 
 To kneel his vassal, whom with soothing words 
 
 He would dismiss, deeming his load of rule 
 
 Sufficient without more. For that great gift 
 
 Of Rome to men, just laws and wise, his thought 
 
 Devised new gains, filled with the purest love 
 
 Of Heaven-sent equity ; and that rare flower 
 
 Of tolerance which best of all adorns 
 
 The philosophic brow, which those who call 
 
 On a Diviner name learn last of all, 
 
 Which wise Aurelius knew not, nor the books 
 
 Of all the sages taught, in this pure heart
 
 Antoninus Pitts, 39 
 
 Sprang up self-sown, and bloomed in noble deeds, 
 From sceptic Greek and unbelieving Jew, 
 Shielding the faith of Christ, not carelessly, 
 With that contemptuous charity the fruit 
 Of cold and doubtful minds, but born of trust 
 In the old faith, and therefore generous. 
 
 Dost wonder that against so white a soul, 
 
 So pure, so innocent, so rich in love. 
 
 There burned the causeless enmity that fires 
 
 The traitor's base ambition ? Two there were ; 
 
 But one the Senate doomed, the other fell 
 
 By his own hand. But when they told the saint, 
 
 Seeking to unmask some deep conspiracy, 
 
 He would not. ' Sure,' he said, ' 'twere little gain 
 
 To learn that of the people of my love 
 
 So many hate me.' Ah, fair words and high 
 
 Of one who spotless filled the blood-stained throne 
 
 Round which for two long centuries had twined
 
 40 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Rank growths of vile mistrust and hate and blood ! 
 
 Thus through his long and peaceful years the saint 
 Lived cheerful. All good things were his to hold. 
 And hardly clouded days, because his soul 
 Took willingly his lot. And yet he lost 
 His well-loved sons before their budding age 
 Had come to flower. And yet 'twas his to bear 
 The curse of a vile woman ; but his faith, 
 Greater than her offence, forbade him still 
 To hold her false ; too pure, too meek a soul 
 To mate with such, or haply half aware 
 And yet forgiving all, like Him who bade 
 The sinner sin no more. Still on his life 
 The Sun of Righteousness shone clear and lit 
 His way with gleams of Heaven, and all his days 
 Were gilded, year by year, until the end, 
 As his who treads the duteous paths of life 
 And is content.
 
 Antonin7is Puts. 41 
 
 Then, when he came to die, 
 Commending, with cahn love, his only child 
 And, most of all, the Empire which he loved 
 To him who followed him, the sage his hand 
 Had trained in his own virtues, tranquilly 
 He laid him on his bed ; and when the end 
 Drew near, the watchers heard the failing voice 
 Wander in dreams, and whisper of the State 
 And all his hopes for her. And when he woke. 
 Laying all signs of sovereignty aside, 
 He bade them take the golden Victory, 
 The solemn symbol of Imperial power. 
 And bear it to Aurelius. Last, when now 
 Life's tide was ebbing fast, he summoned to him 
 The tribune of the guard, and uttered clear, 
 As should an Emperor who led his hosts 
 To battle with the evil of the world, 
 The password of the day — one word, no more, 
 Calm and Imperial — * ^quanimitas.' "
 
 42 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And something in me seemed to rise and break 
 
 In utterance, and as we passed I cried, 
 
 "This man was of Thy name, O Lord, and Thou, 
 
 Among the ranks of those who lived ere yet 
 
 Thou camest, or called not on Thee, having come, 
 
 Didst never leave Thyself, or then or since, 
 
 Wholly without a witness, but didst set 
 
 Thy light for all to see, these precious blooms 
 
 Of purity, these priceless lives unstained 
 
 And spent for Duty, 'mid the strifes, the lusts 
 
 Of a polluted world."
 
 kSkS. Perpetua and Felicitas. 43 
 
 And then I saw 
 Two girlish mothers, bearing each a child 
 Clasped to her breast, one with the conscious pride 
 Of noble birth, and one a lowlier form, 
 Who to the other looked with loving eyes 
 In which the old respect was mingled now 
 With a new sense of equal sisterhood ; 
 And both with rapt gaze went, as keeping still 
 Some memory of surprise, since first they rose 
 From earth to heaven ; and my guide named their names 
 Discoursing thus : 
 
 " By the Tyrrhenian Sea 
 In Africa, when nigh two hundred years 
 Passed since Christ died, there lived a youthful wife,
 
 44 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Bearing her first-born infant at her breast, 
 
 Perpetua, of noble Hneage, nursed 
 
 Safe in the shelter of her happy home 
 
 From maidenhood to gracious motherhood ; 
 
 Nor broke there on her careless hours a sound 
 
 Of the great suffering of the painful world, 
 
 But evermore in gracious liturgies 
 
 Of homely life she spent her careless days. 
 
 Shielded from every breath of ruder air 
 
 Which might assault her, fenced about secure 
 
 By walls of love ; sire, mother, brother, spouse. 
 
 Linking close arms around her, and her birth 
 
 And name, and rank and wealth, and honour of men 
 
 Made this rude path of life and rugged steep 
 
 Show, like the fields of June, a maze of flowers. 
 
 Now on those calm and slumbering days there burst 
 The New Faith like a flame, and the quick soul 
 Of the young wife was fired, and she became
 
 kS^*. Perpettia and Felicitas. 45 
 
 A catechumen holding fast the truth, 
 
 Scorning the Pagan gods ; and her young brother, 
 
 Like her, believed, and so in piety 
 
 They lived, till came an overwhelming wave 
 
 Of bloodshed once again, and they denounced 
 
 The faithful pair, and first Perpetua. 
 
 But when this great blow fell on him, her sire, 
 
 A noble, holding fast the faith of old 
 
 And loving with a father's love his girl 
 
 And her young child, ere yet the shadow of doom 
 
 Fell on them, went to her, and of his love 
 
 Would seek to bend her, using all the strength 
 
 Which venerable age and filial awe 
 
 Might give him ; bade her pause awhile and seek 
 
 Counsel of wiser heads than hers, who knew 
 
 The riddles of the Faith, and what deep truths. 
 
 Though hid by myth, maybe, and parable. 
 
 The Pagan forms concealed. But she, with clear
 
 46 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Undoubting faith : ' My father, canst thou change 
 
 The fashion of a vessel, giving it 
 
 Another name ? ' And he : ' Nay, 'twere the same 
 
 Howe'er men called it.' Then she answered straight, 
 
 With fearless voice, ' Nor canst thou change my soul. 
 
 Which bears the name of Christ.' Then with deep grief 
 
 The old man raised his hand as if to strike, 
 
 But could not, seeing her undaunted soul. 
 
 And went his way, nor troubled her ; and she, 
 
 In that short time of rest, cleansing her soul 
 
 With the baptismal waters, rose refreshed, 
 
 A Christian, strong to suffer and give praise. 
 
 Then in a few brief days began the tale 
 
 Of Martyrdom. 'Tis her own voice that speaks 
 
 The story of her suffering. ' In the gloom 
 
 Of a dark prison cell, where stifling heat 
 
 And the rude insults of the brutal guard 
 
 Tortured each sense, I lay in misery. ., . :^J
 
 6"6'. Pe7'petua and Felicitas. 47 
 
 There my young bondswoman Felicitas, 
 
 Wanting a month to labour, took with me 
 
 The sacred lustral waters, and we sate 
 
 Pining amid the squalor of the jail. 
 
 Until at last, their hard hearts moved by Heaven, 
 
 They brought my darling to me, and I gave him 
 
 Milk from my breast, and thenceforth day and night 
 
 I lived content, my child within my arms ; 
 
 And those dull prison walls seemed more to me 
 
 Than my sire's palace, since I held my love 
 
 And kept my faith unchanged, and grew to be 
 
 Happier than ever in that careless life 
 
 AVithin my palace home. 
 
 And then one day 
 My brother, who was partner in my bonds, 
 Seeing my cheerful and undaunted soul, 
 Spake thus to me : " Sister, I do perceive 
 Thou art Heaven's favourite ; therefore to thy prayer 
 Doubtless the Lord will grant a blessed dream.
 
 48 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Sent through the watches of the night, if thou 
 Wilt kneel to ask it, and we too shall know 
 Whether the martyr's crown is ours to wear 
 Or shameful freedom." Then I prayed, and, lo ! 
 In the still watches of the night, a dream 
 Which showed a golden stairway to the skies. 
 Around it swords and hooks and all the array 
 Of martyrdom were ranged, and at its foot 
 A loathly monster, crouching, coil on coil, 
 To take the souls of those who fain would rise. 
 And when, with fear and trembling, I liad passed, 
 Naming the sacred Name, to some blest place, 
 A garden, I ascended ; there I saw 
 A shepherd with his flock around him ranged 
 By myriads on the grass, who welcomed me 
 And gave me of some mystic food, which I 
 Received with folded hands and took and ate. 
 And all the throng of saints, with one accord. 
 Pealed forth " Amen ; " and sudden I awoke.
 
 SS. Perpetua and Felicitas. 49 
 
 Hearing their voices, and upon my lips 
 Lingered the sweetness of that heavenly food. 
 And when I told my brother of my dream, 
 We knew our hour was come, our fate assured. 
 And we with nothing more of fear nor hope. 
 
 Then after many days my father came, 
 
 Borne down with grief. " Daughter," he cried, " I pray 
 
 thee. 
 Pity these scant gray hairs. If e'er thy sire 
 Loved thee beyond thy brethren, cherished thee 
 Through all thy childhood, watched thee till thou camest 
 To honourable wedlock, now, I pray thee, 
 Have pity on him ; make him not the shame 
 Of all mankind. Or if indeed I fail, 
 With all my love, to bend thee, pity her, 
 Thy mother, who has borne thee, and who yearns 
 To clasp her child again. If none of these 
 Move thee, have pity on thy child, who pines 
 
 E
 
 50 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Without thee, nor can live without thy breast. 
 
 Nay, daughter, have compassion ! See, thy father 
 
 Kneels to thee, lady, and in tears, and is 
 
 Thy suppliant for thyself!" But I, who knew 
 
 How wise he was and tender, felt my soul 
 
 Pierced through with sorrow. Yet the Faith ! the Faith ! 
 
 Should I betray it? " Nay," I said, " my father; 
 
 We all are in God's hand, who rules all things 
 
 Even as He will." 
 
 Then sorrowful he went. 
 
 Now, when the day was come when we should stand 
 
 For trial of the Judge Hilarion, 
 
 Even as we stood before him, set on high 
 
 For all to see, when my turn came to plead, 
 
 Confessing Christ, I heard a cry, and lo ! 
 
 My father with my infant in his arms. 
 
 Conjuring me with tender words of love 
 
 To spare him and my child, whom I had given
 
 6*6'. Perpettia and Felicitas. 51 
 
 Life, and now doomed to death, recounting all 
 
 The misery I should bring. And my sweet turned 
 
 His darling eyes on me, and smiled and stretched 
 
 His little hands to me, and seemed to seek 
 
 His mother's breast. And the stem judge himself 
 
 Besought me to have mercy and to spare 
 
 My father and my child, and bade me burn 
 
 A little incense to the gods. But I, 
 
 Some new strength firing me, which swept away 
 
 The love of sire or child, made answer straight, 
 
 " I will not," and confessed I was of Christ. 
 
 And when my father strove to force me down 
 
 And hush my voice, the stern Hilarion 
 
 Gave word that they should scourge him ; and I heard 
 
 The sound of blows, and felt my father's pain 
 
 Quiver through every nerve, and grew so faint 
 
 That he should suffer thus, and all for me, 
 
 Amid his honoured age, that scarce I marked 
 
 That cold voice dealing doom, the dreadful death
 
 52 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of those the fierce brutes' tooth or claw or horn 
 Rends limb from limb. 
 
 And then they scourged with thongs 
 Our brother martyrs, while ourselves indeed, 
 Me and my bondswoman Felicitas, 
 They buffeted with blows upon the face. 
 
 But many visions, through the grace of Heaven, 
 Came to me ere the end, and on the eve 
 Of the great shows, when all day long my limbs. 
 Racked in the cruel stocks, scarce ceased to pain, 
 Amid the troubled thoughts of coming doom, 
 The hushed arena framed with cruel faces 
 Ready to gloat on death, the sudden roar 
 As from the darkling dens the famished beast 
 Leapt forth in fury, and the echoing cries 
 From the base coward throng reclining safe 
 To see their fellows bleed, there came a dream 
 Heaven-sent. For, lo ! without the dungeon door
 
 5'5'. Perpetua and Felicitas. 5^ 
 
 o 
 
 One seemed to knock ; and when I opened to him, 
 The martyred saint, Pomponius, stood without. 
 Clad in white robes of brightness, all besprent 
 With pomegranates of gold. One word he spake : 
 *' Perpetua, we await thee." And I followed, 
 And through dark ways he led me, till we came 
 Forth 'mid the still arena's sudden blaze. 
 And then he left me, and they bade me fight 
 No tiger, but some loathly shape of man. 
 Who held a bough laden with golden fruit 
 For prize of victory. Then we strove long 
 Together ; but I conquered, and I gained 
 The precious fruit, and suddenly I knew 
 That not with ravening tooth or rending claw 
 Alone 'twas mine to fight, but with the force 
 Of Evil, human-shaped. Evil without, 
 Evil within, if one would keep the Faith.' 
 
 Dear soul, so far she speaks, the rest for her
 
 54 -^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 Is silence, but a witness speaks who saw 
 
 What things were done. When their last day was come, 
 
 On that accursed Pagan holiday, 
 
 The people heard, thrilled with a shameful joy, 
 
 The roarings of the famished brutes beneath. 
 
 And they, too, heard it, and the gathering roar 
 
 Of the more brutal crowd ; sitting alone 
 
 In silence and in darkness, till the hour 
 
 When they, weak nursing mothers, faithful youths, 
 
 Noble and slave, alike went forth to face 
 
 The oft imagined dread, the tooth, the claw, 
 
 The piercing horn, the spring, the devilish strength. 
 
 The same Hand fashioned which could frame the lamb. 
 
 Sure, 'twere no wonder if those delicate lives, 
 
 Forlorn of help, scorned, tortured, of their God 
 
 Forsaken, as their Master, had shrunk back 
 
 From that intolerable fear; but they 
 
 Shrunk not at all, strong souls, but dauntless went. 
 
 Leaving their new-born joys, and the young lips
 
 ^'.S'. Perpetua and Felicitas. 55 
 
 Of children at the breast, home, love, young life, 
 And all for Christ, fronting the horrible dread 
 Unmoved, unfearing — went without a word 
 Through hollow stifling dungeons, lost in gloom, 
 To where, on a sudden, blazed the noonday glare 
 Above the arena, and the solitude 
 Horrid with pitiless eyes, and the loud roar 
 Of the imprisoned beasts behind the bars. 
 That presently the cruel spite of men 
 Should loose on them. 
 
 And there they stood and sang 
 A hymn 'midst jeering thousands. On the youth 
 Who suffered first, a leopard, springing, bathed 
 His poor frame in a baptism of blood ; 
 And when, oh, shame ! they stripped those wifely limbs 
 Before the ribald gaze of countless eyes — 
 They had not looked for that — a deadly chill 
 Took them, and what the terror of the beasts, 
 The lions' dreadful roaring, the fierce growl
 
 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of the impatient tigers, the red jaws 
 
 Of the tall bears who shook their bars, the low 
 
 Fierce muttering of the bulls, whose lurid eyes 
 
 Glared on them, could not, wifely modesty 
 
 Had well-nigh done, when some new Heaven-sent shame 
 
 Touched the vile throng, who bade the jailers hide 
 
 Their nakedness ; and there, in robes of white, 
 
 Naming the holy Name, they stood and took 
 
 The mad brutes' horrible rage, and, pierced and tost 
 
 By the sharp horn, and hurled in air, and trod 
 
 By the fierce rushing feet, they lay alone, 
 
 Bleeding upon the sand, swooning away, 
 
 Or by some heavenly ecstasy possessed 
 
 Which dulled their pain. 
 
 But when Perpetua 
 Knew life return, she her dishevelled hair 
 Tied in a knot, and round her wounded limbs 
 Gathered her robe, and seeing on the ground 
 The young Felicitas, assuaged her pain
 
 5'5. Perpetua and Felicitas. 57 
 
 if 
 
 And lifted her, waiting again the rush 
 Ot the fierce beast ; but when he came no more, 
 The sordid crowd, still hungering for blood, 
 Demanded they should die before their eyes. 
 
 Then, in their midst, the dauntless martyr band 
 Stepped forth and gave the sacred kiss of peace, 
 And met swift death ; but she, Perpetua, 
 From some unskilful hand or timorous, took 
 Repeated blows, and languished long, and bore 
 Wound upon cruel wound ere her pure spirit 
 Was freed and rose, and rested with the blest." 
 
 And stra-ght my heart, hearing this piteous tale, 
 
 Was melted in me, and I seemed to cry, 
 
 " These are Thy saints, O Lord, like those whose bones ' 
 
 Lie scattered in Thy Alpine valleys cold. 
 
 Or who to-day by Thy idolatrous East, 
 
 Or Thy old Nile, or on the desert sands,
 
 58 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Or gemlike islets of the tropic sea, 
 
 Have died without a murmur for Thy sake. 
 
 Thou askest of Thy creatures sacrifice, 
 
 And it is given, nor yet with readier soul 
 
 In the first ages of the Faith than now. 
 
 Haply with blinder courage 'twas they went, 
 
 These protomartyrs, to their doom, than those 
 
 Who die to-day. With what high flame of faith 
 
 These souls were set on fire, who met unmoved — 
 
 Delicate lives lapt round with luxury — 
 
 The scorn of men, the jeering careless crowd, 
 
 The tortures of the fiends, rather than pay 
 
 False homage to false gods ! And yet, indeed, 
 
 I know not if there be not sacrifice 
 
 As willing now ; the Indian well to-day 
 
 Is choked with women's corpses, who had bought 
 
 Ease, wealth, and life, nay, more — the dearer lives 
 
 Of children — had they borne to bend the knee 
 
 To the false Prophet. Nay, Thy hand, O Lord,
 
 SS. Perpetua and Felicitas. 59 
 
 Is strong as it was then, Thy seeming face 
 
 Averted as 'twas then, till the last breath 
 
 Sobs from the painful lips, and Thou dost bid them 
 
 Enter into Thy joy. Thou seest all 
 
 And speakest not, but these Thy servants hear 
 
 Some still small whisper which the duller sense 
 
 Of the world may not take. But whoso hears 
 
 Thy voice, for him the aspect of things seen 
 
 And felt — the world without, the world within — 
 
 The old familiar landmarks of his life. 
 
 The heavens, the earth, the sea, no longer show 
 
 As undetermined fantasies ; but all 
 
 The smiling summer pla,ins, the storm-wrapt hills. 
 
 The clear cold dawn, the angry furious night. 
 
 Lives bright as Heaven, lives dark as nether Hell, 
 
 Joy, grief, pain, pleasure, mingle and are part 
 
 Of the unfolding mystery of Faith."
 
 6o A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Then, as we passed, we came on one whose face 
 The whole world knows — so fine a soul and hand 
 Saw her long since, and fixed her for our eyes — 
 A maiden with rapt gaze, and at her side 
 An idle music ; listening half entranced 
 To some celestial harmonies unheard 
 Save by pure souls like hers. There was no need 
 To name her name, when thus the tale began : 
 
 " Once in old Rome, long centuries ago, 
 There lived a pair, noble in rank and soul. 
 Who, though the Pagan idols still bare sway. 
 Knelt not to them, holding the faith of Christ. 
 And one fair girl was theirs, Cecilia,
 
 6^. Cecilia. 6 1 
 
 Nourished on thoughts of virgin purity 
 
 Which filled her cloistered gaze. No earthly love 
 
 IMight touch her pure pale soul, which always viewed, 
 
 Lit only by the frosty moon of faith, 
 
 The cold clear peaks of soaring duty pierce 
 
 The still blue vault of heaven, as soar the snows 
 
 Of lifeless Alp on Alp, where comes no herb 
 
 Nor blade of green, but all the icy world 
 
 Dreams wrapt in robes of sterile purity. 
 
 For evermore to her rapt eyes the skies 
 
 Stood open, evermore to her rapt ear 
 
 Celestial music came, and strains unheard 
 
 By mortal ear amid the throng of life 
 
 Hushed all the lower tones and noise of earth 
 
 With heavenly harmonies ; and the high notes 
 
 Of the angelic chanting seraphim 
 
 Would occupy her life, until her soul, 
 
 Rapt by the ravishing sound, would seem to 'scape
 
 62 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 From her raised eyes, and float, and speed itself 
 
 Between the rhythmic wings of harmony, 
 
 Even to Heaven's gate, and was transformed and lost 
 
 Its earthly taint; and sometimes on her lips 
 
 Thin traces of the heavenly music dwelt, 
 
 Which bound the listener fast, and of her skill 
 
 Some half-remembered echoes, faint yet sweet, 
 
 Were born again on lute or pipe, and linked 
 
 The world with Heaven ; the immortal chanting quires 
 
 With earth's poor song ; the anthems of the blest 
 
 With our weak halting voices, till the being 
 
 Of that fair virginal interpreter. 
 
 Pierced with keen melodies, and folded round 
 
 With golden links of gracious harmonies, 
 
 Was all possest of Heaven, and to her thought 
 
 It seemed a guardian angel stood by her 
 
 In sleep or waking hours, so that no care 
 
 For earth or earthly love might press on her. 
 
 Such sweetness touched her voice ; the sacred quire
 
 5". Cecilia. d^, 
 
 Would hearken pleased, and voices not of earth 
 Mingled with hers harmonious, and she drew 
 From voice and hand such descants as the skies 
 Themselves had envied, as with pipe on pipe 
 Conjoined with wedded notes and varying tones 
 She made high music to our Lord in heaven. 
 
 Now, when this maiden lost in dreaming thought 
 
 Was of full age, her father bade her wed 
 
 A noble Roman youth, Valerian, 
 
 A Pagan yet ; but she, whose filial love 
 
 Constrained her to obey, beneath her robes 
 
 Of marriage hid a robe of penance still, 
 
 And to her husband, whom indeed she loved 
 
 With wifely love, confessed her mystic tale — 
 
 How night and day, whether she slept or woke, 
 
 A ghostly presence, standing at her side, 
 
 Kept watch and ward, nor left her. And when he 
 
 Asked sight of him, and proof, she bade him seek
 
 64 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 The saintly Urban in the Catacombs, 
 
 Where he lay hid, and he consenting went, 
 
 And rose converted from his old unfaith 
 
 And was baptized ; and when, a Christian now, 
 
 He sought his home again, he heard within 
 
 Enchanting music sweet, and strains divine ; 
 
 And long time Ustening rapt, at last he came 
 
 To his wife's chamber, and beheld, indeed, 
 
 His eyes being opened by his faith, a form 
 
 Celestial standing by her, with a crown 
 
 Of roses in each hand, in scent and hue 
 
 Immortal, and the Angel as they knelt 
 
 •Crowned each with them — the crown of martyrdom. 
 
 And then, because the Lord Valerian 
 
 Obeyed so well, the Angel bade him ask 
 
 What boon he would. And he : * My lord, I have 
 
 A brother of my love, Tiburtius ; 
 
 Let him believe.' And he made answer to him.
 
 S. Cecilia. 
 
 *So shall it be, and ye shall both attain 
 
 The martyr's crown.' And then he passed away. 
 
 And presently Tiburtius, entering, 
 
 Though yet he might not see the roses, knew 
 
 Their fresh immortal sweetness flood the air 
 
 With fragrance, and he heard the gracious words 
 
 Cecilia spake, and all her proofs inspired 
 
 Of Heaven and of the truth, and so his heart 
 
 Was touched and he baptized and held the Faith. 
 
 But when the Pagan Lord, Almachius, 
 Who governed, heard these things, he bade them cease 
 To call on Christ, and when they would not, sent them 
 To prison dungeons foul, and thence to death. 
 
 Last, when the brothers died, his pitiless rage 
 Summoned Cecilia. Her, with threats of pain 
 And horrible death, he bade do sacrifice 
 To the false gods. She, with a smile of scorn,
 
 66 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Denied him ; and the people round who heard 
 Her constancy, wept for the fate they knew 
 Waited the fair girl-wife, and, bathed in tears, 
 Confessed themselves to be like her, of Christ, 
 Till the fierce prefect, mingling rage with fear, 
 Spake thus : ' What art thou, woman, who dost dare 
 Defy the gods ? ' And she, with lofty scorn : 
 'I am a Roman noble.' Then said he, 
 ' I ask thee of thy faith ? ' And she : ' Oh, blind ! 
 See these whom my example drew to Christ, 
 Take them for answer.' 
 
 Then with panic haste 
 He sent a headsman whose keen axe should end 
 That high undaunted courage. He, with fear 
 And trembling hand, upon her slender throat 
 And virgin breast planting three cruel strokes, 
 Fled, leaving her for dead. But three days yet, 
 Three precious days, she lingered, strengthening all 
 Her converts in the Faith, and to the poor
 
 .S. Cecilia. 67 
 
 Vowing her wealth ; and last of all she sent 
 For Urban, and besought him of his grace 
 That of her palace they should make a church 
 For Christian worship. 
 
 Then she raised her voice 
 In soaring hymns of praise, and with her sang 
 The quire of Angels, chanting row on row 
 Celestial strains, and the rapt hearers knew 
 The sound of heavenly music and the lyres 
 Of the angelic company ; and yet, 
 When her voice soared no longer, but was still, 
 Fair dying echoes, fainter and more faint. 
 Stole downward from the skies, and then were lost 
 Within the heavens — the music of a soul 
 Which joins the eternal concert and is blest. 
 
 And still where once she sang, the unfaiUng spell 
 Of music rises heavenward, day by day ; 
 For, as she would, they built a stately church
 
 68 A Vision of Saiiiis. 
 
 Above her. There, when centuries were past, 
 The Pontiff Paschal found her body lie, 
 Wrapt in a tissue of gold, and by her side 
 Her husband and his brother. 
 
 And, again, 
 After long centuries they built a shrine, 
 And set in it a statue of the saint 
 In Parian marble. On her side she rests 
 As one asleep ; the delicate hands are crossed, 
 Wrist upon wrist ; a clinging vestment drapes 
 The virgin limbs, and round her slender throat 
 A golden circlet masks her cruel wound. 
 And there she lies for all to see ; but still 
 Her voice is sounding in the Eternal Psalm 
 Which the Church singeth ever, evermore. 
 The Church on earth, tlie Church of Saints in Heaven."
 
 SS. Adrian and Natalia. 69 
 
 And then it was a youthful pair who came, 
 
 And noble both, who to each other clung 
 
 In tender love : he a young soldier tall, 
 
 With the proud mien and port of one who strode 
 
 From the far North to the extremest South 
 
 Before Rome's conquering legions, o'er the world. 
 
 Bearing the eagles forth ; she a fond wife, 
 
 Who clasped and kissed his hand, and gazed on him 
 
 With youthful eyes, while with the unbraided gold 
 
 Of her fair hair, bright as the crowns they wore, 
 
 He with pure yearning played. I knew them not, 
 
 Nor doth the world as yet, when thus my guide : 
 
 " Adrian, Tribune of the Imperial Guard,
 
 yo A Vision of Saints. 
 
 When the tenth wave of blood assailed the Faith, 
 Served in Bithynia. There, a youth in years, 
 He lived in wedlock with his youthful love, 
 Natalia, fair, and virtuous as fair, 
 And secretly of Christ. When came command 
 That all should kneel before the heathen gods, 
 The brave S. George tore from the city walls 
 The shameful edict. Then, with coward rage, 
 The Pagan Caesars in one day haled forth 
 Two score to death with torture. In the hall 
 Of judgment Adrian, as beseemed his rank, 
 Stood with his soldiers. Fierce and fiercer still 
 The torturers plied their hellish arts; and he, • 
 Seeing how firm the martyrs stood and bore 
 Fell malice and the black despite of men, 
 Wondered to see their pious constancy. 
 Last, his great heart grew sickened at the wrong, 
 And then the strong resistless tide of Faith 
 Took him, and he believed, because he knew,
 
 55. Adrian and Natalia. 
 
 That this thing was of God ; and his brave soul, 
 Which scorned conceahiient and the hypocrite's wiles, 
 Burst into word and act, and from his breast 
 He tore the glittering emblems of his rank, 
 And, flinging from him the dishonoured sword 
 Which served the Pagan, being now of Christ, 
 While all his soldiers wondered, knowing not 
 What thing he would, amid the painful throng 
 Of prisoners standing, cried aloud and said, 
 ' I too am with them, for I am of Christ ; 
 Torture me, slay me, too.' Then, with amaze, 
 The guards advancing haled him with the rest 
 To prison and to death. But he gave thanks 
 For what had been, and, glorying in his faith, 
 Went with his suffering brethren to his doom. 
 
 Now, when these things were done, there fell deep awe 
 And pity on all who heard, and to the house 
 Of Adrian hastened breathless messengers
 
 72 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 To tell of what had been, and how its lord, 
 Spurning the Pagan gods, had braved his doom. 
 * Adrian is Christian and holds fast the Faith, 
 And goes to torture for his Master's name.' 
 Thus said they ; and his wife, who heard the tale, 
 Felt her young heart beat slow, then cease with pain, 
 And swooned ; but when her life returned again, 
 Gave thanks and wept for joy that he, her love, 
 Was worthy to bear witness to the Faith 
 And know a blessed death. 
 
 Quickly she rose 
 And hastened to the prison cell, and there 
 Fell prone on his belovbd neck, and kissed 
 His heavy chains, giving God praise that he, 
 Like her, was of the Faith, and bade him keep 
 The Truth through death and torment to the end. 
 And comforted her love, and clasped him round. 
 And, on his dear lips showering kisses, went 
 Back to their lonely palace. Three long days
 
 55". Adrian and Natalia. yT, 
 
 She spent in prayer for him, on whom the fell 
 Forces of evil worked their will, and doomed 
 His life to cruel death ; but never again, 
 Loving with all her tender heart, would dare 
 To seek his prison cell, lest haply Love 
 Should conquer Duty ; but her faithful prayer 
 Rose for him day and night, that he might live 
 Or die, if such God's will, true to the Faith. 
 
 Hut on the prisoner, Adrian, longing came. 
 
 When now he was condemned and the new day 
 
 Should bring him death with pain, if only he 
 
 Might see his love once more, and when 'twas night, 
 
 Though firm and constant in the Faith and strong 
 
 To die for it, an innocent desire 
 
 To look once more in those beloved eyes, 
 
 And press once more those stainless lips, and hear 
 
 Once more that tender voice, and seem again 
 
 A lover as of yore ; and, offering gold
 
 74 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And giving surety for his safe return 
 
 Ere the dawn brought the day when he should die, 
 
 The prison doors flew open, and he stole — 
 
 Free once again, as if the fateful Past 
 
 Were but a dreadful nightmare of his sleep — 
 
 Forth from the dungeon's close and filthy air, 
 
 Through the cool night, by the familiar ways, 
 
 None in the darkness marking him, to where. 
 
 Within his palace halls, Natalia mused, 
 
 Sad, silent, lonely, half distraught in mind — 
 
 Sad she should see no more the well-loved face, 
 
 Glad that her love bare witness to the Faith — 
 
 Seeking to exorcise her painful thought 
 
 With spinning. 
 
 Then one hastened in and cried, 
 ' Be of good heart, dear mistress, for my lord, 
 'Scaping the dungeon, comes and will be here. 
 Prepare for flight ; you shall live happy yet. 
 Have all things ready. Lo ! the night is dark ;
 
 SS. Adrian and N^atalia. 75 
 
 Take horse and flee/ 
 
 Then through that faithful heart 
 A thousand warring tides of passion surged — 
 Hope, fear, love, duty, natural joy and pride 
 Because she was a wife and rapt in love ; 
 But at the last, the passion of the Faith 
 Prevailing, prone to earth she fell, and cried, 
 ' Ah, miserable me, who am too vile 
 To wed with one who wears the martyr's crown ! 
 Shall not all men cry shame on me, whose love 
 Led Adrian astray, who else had dared 
 The fiercest torments which the devilish spite 
 Of Hell devised for him ! Oh, my lost love, 
 'Twere better I should love thee thus, and bear 
 Part in thy glory, though it came with death. 
 Than live with thee dishonoured and, through me, 
 Sinking in coward fear the love of God. 
 Nay, my sweet Adrian, not for me indeed 
 Shalt thou deny the Faith.'
 
 7 6 A V^ision of Saints, 
 
 Now Adrian heard, 
 Standing without, his wife's belovfed voice, 
 And caught her words, and could not brook delay 
 An instant, but burst swiftly in and clasped her 
 Close to his heart, and lifting up his voice — 
 ' Noblest and best of women, I give praise 
 To God that thou art strong, and that thy soul 
 Is steadfast as my own. I do but come 
 To say to thee " Farewell," for with the day 
 I am condemned to die. Full well I knew 
 Thy love would never tempt me to be false ; 
 For only utter faithfulness is love. 
 But now thy loyal soul has smoothed my path 
 And left my duty easier, and I go 
 Back to my dungeon with a cheerful heart 
 That I have seen thy face.' 
 
 Then she arose 
 And kissed him, and upon his breast she laid 
 Her wifely head ; and straight, without a word,
 
 ^'kS. Adrian and Natalia. J J 
 
 They twain went unattended through the night, 
 Who might have fled, and by the well-known streets, 
 Hushed now and slumbering; guarded by no guard 
 Save their own honour, sought the prison gate. 
 And, much amazed, the warder marked them come. 
 Hand clasped in hand, and swung the sounding door ; 
 And in his prison cell till dawn of day 
 They sate together, waiting for the end. 
 
 And Adrian, when the day was come, went forth 
 
 To judgment, and they scourged him sore and racked 
 
 His limbs with cruel tortures. But his wife 
 
 They drave forth from him, and he lay alone 
 
 On the cold ground, with none to comfort him, 
 
 Since well they knew what charity inspired 
 
 The womanly soft hearts which called on Christ ; 
 
 And she, lamenting sore and half distraught 
 
 Because he suffered with no hand to soothe 
 
 His painful limbs, rose suddenly and took
 
 78 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 A daring purpose. From her comely head 
 
 She sheared the golden treasure of her hair, 
 
 Donning man's garb, and gained the prison gate, 
 
 Disguised, nor known to any as she went, 
 
 A man with all a woman's pitying heart, 
 
 A woman with the courage of a man ; 
 
 And, gaining entrance, sought her love, and bound 
 
 His piteous wounds, soothed him with loving words. 
 
 ' Light of mine eyes, how blest art thou,' she cried, 
 
 ' To suffer for the Faith ! ' and strengthened him, 
 
 And lulled his pain to sleep, and with him sate, 
 
 Sleepless herself, his head upon her breast, 
 
 Filled with deep grief and saintly ecstasy. 
 
 Until the slow dawn, glimmering, brought the day. 
 
 Then, when the sun had risen, there came command 
 That he should die ; but first, with hateful art, 
 His good right hand they severed while he lived. 
 And she saw all, and watched without a word,
 
 .S"^, Adrian and Natalia. 79 
 
 And all her tender woman's heart stood still 
 
 To see his pain, and fain had borne it all — 
 
 Filled with high pride, yet tortured with regret 
 
 That she had wrought this thing ; and round him cast 
 
 Her wifely arms, prayed with him, and sustained 
 
 His ebbing life, till, ere the headsman came 
 
 To sever from the trunk the well-loved head, 
 
 AVith one deep sigh, he breathed his last and gave 
 
 His soul to God. 
 
 But she, when all was done. 
 Kissed him upon the painless brow, and stooped 
 And took his severed hand, the dear dead hand 
 Which oft had smoothed her hair ; and in her bosom, 
 Upon her wifely breast, she hid it close, 
 The dear dead hand ! and, hurrying to her home, 
 Safe in her palace chamber folded it 
 With linen kerchiefs fine, and wrapt it round 
 With precious spices sweet and perfumed oils, 
 And by her lonely bedside kept it long,
 
 So A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And often, ere the grey dawn broke, would rise 
 And kiss and clasp it, giving thanks to God 
 That her love kept the Faith. 
 
 But the saint's body 
 Some faithful Christians stealing from the jail 
 Bore to Byzantium ; there with pious care 
 They buried it, and costly obsequies. 
 
 But she, the sainted woman, dwelt alone 
 
 Long time within her palace, cherishing 
 
 The memory of her love. Caesar at last. 
 
 Hating her constant soul, bade her prepare 
 
 For wedlock with some favourite of the Court, 
 
 A Tribune of the Guard. No word she breathed 
 
 Of disobedience, but one night she fled 
 
 Her widowed home, and, taking ship, sailed forth 
 
 To Argyropolis, across the sea ; 
 
 And when they told her how her love was laid 
 
 Hard by, within a costly sepulchre,
 
 kS'kS'. Adrian and Natalia. 8i 
 
 Dwelt there long time, grown happier that she held 
 
 Her love's beloved dust. Oft in the night 
 
 She rose and took her to the tomb, and there 
 
 Knelt, and full often in her weary sleep. 
 
 Heavy with tears, the blessed Adrian 
 
 Visited her in dreams, and shone on her 
 
 Bright with the glory of beatitude. 
 
 Beckoning that she should follow, till her soul, 
 
 Straining its earthly fetters, longed to rise 
 
 And join her love in bliss. And so at length 
 
 Her fervent prayer was granted. Death set free 
 
 That faithful heart ; and when at last, it loosed 
 
 Her prisoned spirit, lo ! a glorious quire 
 
 Of Angels, and amid them Adrian, 
 
 To meet her as she rose ; and sphere on sphere 
 
 They soared together heavenward into joy, 
 
 Where are the just of old, the seers, the saints 
 
 And witnesses, and there, no more to part. 
 
 Bathed in the full light of the Heavenly Sun, 
 
 G
 
 82 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 They dwell together for ever and are blest." 
 
 And as I listened, rapt in tearful thought, 
 
 And musing on the mystery of Pain 
 
 That wings the saintly soul, I heard again : 
 
 " Not only through the dungeon or the rack 
 Is won the Martyr's crown. Blest souls indeed 
 Are those which suffer openly, and reap 
 Through bodily pain the rich reward of Love — 
 Dear souls and strong ; but those who only bear 
 The suffering of the soul, when the racked spirit 
 Gives love for faith, and dooms a life to die, 
 Dearer than life, for duty, and lives on 
 And bears and does not die, but wears its pain 
 For weary years, and hears no loud acclaim 
 Of heavenly quires, and bears no victor's palm, 
 But lives self-doomed to solitude and doubt,
 
 6^6". Adrian and Natalia. 83 
 
 And finds the closed heavens deaf, the past a dream, 
 
 And all the future dumb — for these, too. Heaven 
 
 Keeps its own crown, as precious as the pearl 
 
 Of sacrifice which decks the painful brow 
 
 Of agony, — its own triumphant crown. 
 
 For what is martyrdom but witness borne 
 
 To God and Truth, in body as in soul, 
 
 Through life and death, though sudden stress of pain 
 
 Or life-long suffering witness to the Right ? "
 
 84 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 'Twas an old man came next, who bore the pahii, 
 
 Mild and of venerable mien, with hair 
 
 And beard of silver, yet his sunburnt cheek 
 
 Showed ruddy with the hue of health which still 
 
 Smiles like an Indian summer on the lives 
 
 Of those who, like the first great Husbandman, 
 
 Breathe purer air far from the dust of towns. 
 
 And watch the fair flowers blow, the fruits grow ripe, 
 
 Changing their healthy toil for tranquil sleep, 
 
 And mingling works of mercy with pure thoughts 
 
 And meditations. Him indeed I knew not. 
 
 And yet half guessed his tale. 
 
 And this it was :
 
 S. Phocas. 85 
 
 " In Pontus, by Sinope, dwelt of old, 
 
 Three centuries after Christ, an aged man, 
 
 Phocas by name. He to his lowly home 
 
 Retiring from the busy city, spent 
 
 Plis life in meditation on the Faith, 
 
 Sweetening his honest toil. Day after day 
 
 Within his narrow garden-ground he found 
 
 Fit labour for his hands ; eve after eve. 
 
 When the sweet toilsome day at last was done, 
 
 He strayed among the flowers and fruits his skill 
 
 Had reared — the roses red and white which filled 
 
 The air with perfume, like the fragrant flower 
 
 Of sanctitude ; the white cups veined with gold 
 
 Of lilies, pure as blameless lives, which breathe 
 
 Their sweetness to the heavens ; the flower which bears 
 
 The symbols of the Passion; the mild roots 
 
 And milky herbs which nourish those white lives 
 
 That scorn to batten on the blood and pain
 
 86 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of innocent dumb brutes ; such honeyed fruits 
 
 As our first parents ate in Paradise — 
 
 Rich apples, golden pears, pink pomegranates, 
 
 The pendent purple of the trellised grape, 
 
 And blushing peaches, and the perfumed globes 
 
 Of melons ; all the flowers and fruits the isles 
 
 Of the enchanted dim Hesperides 
 
 Bore in the fabled eld. Of these he took 
 
 Sufficient for his hunger, praising God, 
 
 And of the rest he gave of charity 
 
 To all the poor and weak, free without price, 
 
 Following his Master's word. And all the poor 
 
 And needy blessed him and revered the skill 
 
 Which reared them, and the venerable years 
 
 Of that good gardener. None who came to him 
 
 His generous hand denied, but he would give them 
 
 Shelter and food, and, when the day was done. 
 
 Converse on things Divine, and many a word 
 
 Of Truth which swayed the listener, if he were
 
 5". PJiocas. 87 
 
 A Pagan still, or heartened him indeed 
 If he already held and loved the Faith. 
 
 For while to some pure souls the thought, the dream. 
 
 The blessed vision are enough, the sounds 
 
 Heard by rapt ears, the opened heavens, the joy 
 
 Of contemplation only, when the sands 
 
 Of the desert or the cloistered vistas dim 
 
 Show ghostly 'neath the midnight stars, for some 
 
 Labour is best — not sordid labour vile 
 
 And turned to earth, but that which working still 
 
 For Heaven doth therefore gain a purer height 
 
 Than any ; and for him the varied page 
 
 Of Nature painted by a hand divine 
 
 Brought meditation, and he found a voice 
 
 In every bursting flower and mellowing fruit ; 
 
 In every life which, governing its way; 
 
 By heavenly rule, lived on without offence 
 
 And did fulfil its part ; in every weed
 
 88 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Which cumbered earth, yet doubtless were of aid 
 If we might read its secret ; every growth 
 Of poison, which from the same elements, 
 The bounteous earth, the wooing of the sun, 
 The same fair fanning breezes, as the grain 
 On which our lives are nourished, waxed and grew 
 To deal out death and torment. Long he mused 
 On all these things — how one great Husbandman 
 Planted them all, and framed them as He framed 
 The tiger and the lamb ; and so he gained 
 Mild wisdom from his daily task, and awe, 
 And wonder, which is kin to faith, and thence 
 True faith in God and man, and was content 
 To sow the seed of good within his soul. 
 As in the earth, and root the evil out. 
 And living only for the Faith, to work 
 And be at peace, leaving the rest to Him 
 Who sends in season, sun and rain and cloud 
 And frost, and in whose hand are flower and fruit
 
 6". Phocas. 89 
 
 To give or to withhold, in earth and heaven. 
 
 Now, one fair summer eve, as Phocas sate 
 At supper, came a knock, and he in haste 
 Opening, three strangers waited at the door, 
 Whom he bade enter and take food and rest ; 
 And when they were refreshed, he questioned them 
 What errand brought them. And they said in turn, 
 ' We seek a certain Phocas — know'st thou him ? — 
 Who dares to call on Christ, and have command 
 To slay him found.' Then tranquilly the saint — 
 * Sleep now and rest. I know him. W' ith the dawn 
 I will conduct you to him.' And they slept, 
 Not dreaming whom they saw, and were content. 
 
 But he, when all the house was dark and still, 
 Stole out into his garden. The faint stars, 
 Pale in the radiance of the summer night, 
 Trembled above him ; at his feet the flowers
 
 90 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 He loved so well declined their heavy heads 
 
 And slumbering petals. One loud nightingale, 
 
 Thrilling the tender passionate note of old, 
 
 Throbbed from a flower-cupped tree, and round him all 
 
 The thousand perfumes of the summer night 
 
 Steeped every sense in fragrance sweeter far 
 
 Than frankincense the skill of men compounds 
 
 In Araby the Blest. Then on the grass 
 
 He sate him down, rapt deep in musing thought ; 
 
 And o'er him, ghostly white or gleaming red, 
 
 The roses glimmered, and the lilies closed 
 
 Their pure white cups, and bowed their heads, and seemed 
 
 To overhear his thought. ' Should he then fly. 
 
 To live a little while, leaving his home 
 
 And all that made it dear, the flowers, the fruits 
 
 He loved, and preach the Faith a little yet 
 
 Before Fate called him ? Surely life is sweet 
 
 To tranquil souls, which scorn delights and take 
 
 Something of Heaven on earth ; ay, sweeter far
 
 S. PJiocas. 91 
 
 Than the old haste of flushed and breathless chase, 
 Strong pulses, vaulting projects, hot designs 
 To capture worthless ends. Haply 'twere well 
 For this, to leave the solitude he loved 
 As others wife or child.' 
 
 But as he mused, 
 The thought of full obedience filled his soul; 
 Submissive to the Heavenly AVill which sent 
 Those fatal messengers, and destined for him 
 The martyr's crown, and swayed and took so fast 
 His doubtful mind, that presently he rose, 
 As one whose purpose halts not — rose and went 
 As in a dream, and coming brought a spade 
 And softly, half in dreams, began to delve 
 The flower-lit turf, within a sheltered nook 
 O'ergrown with roses and the perfumed gloom 
 Of blossomed trees. And as he wrought, he laid 
 Turf upon turf, and hollowed out a space 
 In the fresh virgin mould which lay beneath,
 
 92 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Shaped deftly in the semblance of a cross, 
 Large as might take the stature of a man. 
 And still half dreaming, nor confessing yet 
 What thing he did, deeper and yet more deep 
 He dug and laboured, till with earliest dawn, 
 Just as the waking birds began their song. 
 He flung the last mould upwards, smoothing fair 
 The edges of the trench, and knew at length 
 That all night long he laboured at his grave. 
 
 And at its foot were lilies white and gold, 
 And at its head were roses white and red. 
 And all around a pitying quire of flowers 
 Bent down regarding it ; and when he saw. 
 Still half as in a dream, he whispered, ' Lo ! 
 The narrow bed is ready ; ere 'tis day 
 The sleeper shall be laid in it, and prove] 
 Unbroken slumbers blest, until the peal 
 Of the loud Angel wakes him from the skies.'
 
 S. Phocas. 93 
 
 Then to his home returning grave and slow, 
 He sought his guests, on whom the new-born day- 
 Was rising. They with half-awakened eyes 
 Greeted their coming host, and, bidding him 
 Good morrow, rose and took the frugal meal 
 His care provided. Then the question came, 
 ' Hast brought him whom we seek ? ' And he : ' I have.' 
 And they : ' Where find we him ? ' And he : ' Behold, 
 I am the man — none else.' Then deep distress 
 Took them, and great perplexity, who knew 
 The man whose life they sought the same who gave 
 Shelter and food. But he, revolving all, 
 The martyr's palm and that unchanged resolve 
 Of the still night, bade them take heart for all 
 Their duty bade them. And he led them forth. 
 Through maiden flowers fresh opened to the day, 
 Brushing the dewdrops from them as they went 
 To where, set round with blooms, they found his grave
 
 94 ^ Visiojt of Saints. 
 
 Fresh delved in daisied turf, and there they bound 
 
 Their wiUing prisoner, and the headsman's axe, 
 
 Even as he knelt, a smile upon his lips, 
 
 By one swift, skilful blow and merciful, 
 
 Upon the grassy margin, painlessly 
 
 Severed his life. And there they laid him down, 
 
 Amid the joyous matins of the birds. 
 
 In the sweet earth ; and by his head there sprang 
 
 Lush roses red and white, and by his feet 
 
 Deep chaliced lilies mingled white with gold ; 
 
 And there he waits the day the just shall rise 
 
 And bloom, as these on earth, beyond the skies." 
 
 But when I heard the gracious tale, which showed 
 Like some fair blossom with a fragrant heart, 
 Thus would I answer : " Blameless anchorite. 
 Meek martyr, self-betrayed, some saints there be 
 Whose youthful suffering draws a readier tear
 
 S. PJiocas. 95 
 
 Than thine ; and yet, for me, that duteous life 
 Of honest toil for others, that great faith 
 Thou show'dst, that simple eagerness to bear 
 The martyr's palm, that night beneath the stars 
 Of summer, fashioning thy flower-decked grave, 
 That lonely suffering, mark thy life and death 
 With a more calm and gracious note than theirs 
 Who, 'mid the applauding saints around, the throng 
 Of heavenly faces stooping from the skies, 
 In the arena dauntless met their end ; 
 A simpler nor less touching piety 
 Than theirs who, 'mid the dust of mortal strife. 
 Shed their pure lives upon the sullen sand."
 
 96 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And then there passed a beautiful fair maid, 
 
 A virgin martyr, from whose comely head 
 
 Shone brighter than her crown, a ray serene 
 
 Of stainless purity. Her spotless robe 
 
 Gleamed with strange hght, and at her breast she bore 
 
 Celestial lilies and a fragrant spoil 
 
 Of roses red and white, red as the blood 
 
 Of Martyrdom, white as the innocent hfe 
 
 Of maidenhood ; and straight I knew the name 
 
 Of Dorothea, whose fair story fires 
 
 Poet and painter still ; and as I gazed 
 
 I heard, with eager ears, my guide recount 
 
 The half-remembered tale, and thus he spake :
 
 ^9. Dorothea. 
 
 97 
 
 " In Csesarea dwelt a noble maid, 
 
 A Christian, serving God with prayer and alms 
 
 And fasting. None more beautiful or pure 
 
 In all the city, and her fitting name 
 
 AVas Dorothea. And the fame of her, 
 
 Her beauty, and her saintly life went forth 
 
 Through all the country. 
 
 When the governor, 
 Who hated Christ, holding the older creed. 
 Heard of her name and deeds, he gave command 
 That they should bring her to him. On a day 
 He sate on high in judgment, when they brought 
 The maid ; and she, with mantle folded close 
 Around her, and chaste downcast eyes, drew near, 
 When he with threatening voice would ask of her, 
 ' Who art thou ? ' And the maiden : ' Sir, my name 
 Is Dorothea, and I serve the Lord.' 
 Then he, with fury : ' Thou shalt serve our gods 
 
 M
 
 98 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Or die the death.' But she, with accents mild : 
 
 ' If I shall die, the sooner shall my eyes 
 
 Behold His Presence whom they long to see.' 
 
 And he: 'Whom namest thou?' Then she: 'The 
 
 Lord, 
 In whom I live, who is my Heavenly Spouse, 
 Who dwells in Paradise, with whom I long 
 To be, leaving this dead poor earth, and know 
 The heavenly fruits that in His garden ripe, 
 The roses that shall never fade, but bear 
 .Such amaranthine blooms as heat nor cold 
 Withers, nor time, but blush for ever sweet. 
 Work thou thy will. For me to die is gain, 
 And to live, loss ; but for thy Pagan gods, 
 I will have none of them, nor sacrifice 
 To wood or stone, the figments of men's hands.' 
 
 Then he, who could not bend that steadfast soul, 
 Commanded they should take her to her cell.
 
 S. Dorothea. 99 
 
 Thither he summoned an apostate pair, 
 Christita and Calista, once of Christ, 
 On whom the fear of swift and painful death, 
 The terror of the torments which the spite 
 Of men prepared for them, worked in such sort 
 That they renounced the Faith and knelt again 
 Before the old false gods. To these he gave 
 Great promise of reward if they should make 
 This noble virgin partner in their sin. 
 And to her prison cell, day after day, 
 Despatched them, and they strove to do his will, 
 Using the coward's weapons, — fear of death, 
 Hope of some baser happiness, and doubts 
 If 'twere indeed of God the Faith she held. 
 Or if 'twere haply best to live and serve 
 The elder gods to whom their fathers knelt ; 
 And how 'twas sweeter far to know the love 
 Of spouse and children, and the joys of home. 
 Than to fling life away upon a dream.
 
 TOO A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And feel the ravening tigers' jaws, the bite 
 Of the keen flames, withering the flesh, tlie keen 
 'I'hin knives, the crushing rack, and all the arts 
 Of the tormentors' hands. But as they spake 
 She with such faith reproved their perfidy 
 That in despair they ceased. 
 
 At last, in turn, 
 ^Vith such clear thought and Heaven-sent utterance 
 .She bore on them ; dressed with such precious robes 
 The beauty of the Truth ; spurned with such power 
 The Pagan lie ; showed with such pitying love 
 The misery of unfaith, the joys they lost 
 Who did deny the Faith, knowing it true 
 And having once believed ; that suddenly. 
 As self-convicted by the accusing voice 
 Of their own selves, those weak apostate souls 
 Shrank from her as from a consuming fire. 
 And, grown repentant of their wrong, confessed 
 Their fault, and, falling down before her feet,
 
 S. Dorothea. loi 
 
 Besought her she would pray for them, and seek 
 
 Remission of their sins ; and' she, indeed. 
 
 With great joy kneeling with them, sought in prayer 
 
 Forgiveness for their fault, and when they rose. 
 
 She kissed them, and they went, with steadfast voice 
 
 And joyful, openly confessing Christ. 
 
 But when the tyrant learnt what thing had been. 
 
 He gave command that those poor penitents 
 
 Should die by fire before the virgin's eyes, 
 
 That she might share their pain. The fierce flames leapt, 
 
 The hapless sisters suffered, giving praise. 
 
 And Dorothea watched their pangs, and cried, 
 
 ' Fear not, dear sisters ; suffer to the end, 
 
 And take for price of those brief fleeting pains 
 
 Eternal bliss in Heaven.' So they died firm. 
 
 And she, in turn before the tyrant brought, 
 
 Was doomed to instant death. But ere she died 
 
 They racked her tender limbs, while she gave thanks
 
 I02 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And bore their worst unmoved ; and then they led her 
 To where the headsman with his gleaming axe 
 Awaited her, and with him welcome Death. 
 
 But as she passed, there rose the mocking voice 
 
 Of one, a lawyer, who, when first the maid 
 
 Was brought to judgment, mocked the words she spake 
 
 Of the sweet flowers and fruits of Paradise, 
 
 Which ever in the garden of the Lord 
 
 Spring in perpetual beauty; nor doth there 
 
 Snow come, nor frost, but evermore the heavens 
 
 Smile on them, and they ripen, and they breathe 
 
 Celestial odours fine, celestial hues 
 
 Brighten them, and whoso shall take of them 
 
 Shall taste eternal bliss. Seeing her pass. 
 
 And mindful of her words, inflamed with scorn, 
 
 His shallow witless mirth and Pagan spite 
 
 Broke forth. ' Fair maiden hastening to thy Spouse, 
 
 Send me, I pray thee, of the fruits, the flowers
 
 S. Dorothea. lo 
 
 o 
 
 Of His celestial garden ; for with us 
 'Tis winter, and no flowers nor fruits are here, 
 But only clouds and snows and bitter winds. 
 Scourging the naked fields. Send me of them, 
 For fain am I to take them.' As he spake 
 The maiden, bending, with a gentle smile. 
 Answered, ' I will.' And he, with scoffs and jeers, 
 Turned with his graceless fellows, mocking her ; 
 But she went calm and cheerful to her death. 
 
 Now, when she reached the place where she should die. 
 
 She knelt awhile, bowing her head in prayer ; 
 
 And when she rose prepared for death, there came 
 
 A precious portent. For beside her stood, 
 
 To comfort her, a youthful Angel fair, 
 
 Witli locks of gold, and eyes as blue as Heaven ; 
 
 And in his hands he bore, so runs the tale, 
 
 A basket, and, within, three golden fruits 
 
 Of Paradise, of scent and hue divine,
 
 I04 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And with them three fair roses, sweeter far 
 Tlmn the twice-bearing Paestine gardens bare, 
 Summer and autumn. Then, with a sweet smile 
 Of Faith triumphant : ' Pray you, good my lord, 
 Carry these fruits and flowers to him who spake 
 While I was passing to my death, and say, 
 " 'Tis Dorothea sends them, and she goes 
 Before thee to the garden whence they came, 
 And doth await thee there." ' 
 
 Then with the word 
 She bent lier gentle neck upon the block, 
 And took the blow which sped her soul to Heaven. 
 
 Now, as she died, the scoffing lawyer stood 
 
 Among his comrades, jesting at the gift 
 
 The maiden promised. But when now they sate 
 
 Feasting, around them gilded images 
 
 Of the false gods, taking no care nor thought 
 
 For what had been, the torture and the pain.
 
 ^. Dorothea^ lo' 
 
 Lo ! suddenly a heavenly presence showed, 
 From whence he knew not, fair, with shining face, 
 And locks of gold, and eyes as blue as Heaven, 
 And in his hand a basket with the fruits 
 And flowers of Paradise, who spake no word 
 But, ' Dorothea sends them, and she goes 
 Before thee to the garden whence they came, 
 And doth await thee there,' and having said, 
 Vanished as he had come. 
 
 And the youth's heart 
 Was touched with awe and pity, and he rose, 
 And his heart melted, and he seemed to take 
 Of the celestial fruit, as one who takes 
 The Eucharistic bread ; and straight his soul 
 Rose to new life, and held the Faith, and owned 
 The Holy Name, and bore like her his pain, 
 And passed from pain to life, and gained the crown 
 Of martyrdom, and is like her in joy."
 
 io6 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And when he ceased, my soul within me cried, 
 " Oh, sweet celestial flowers and fruits divine, 
 Which are good words and faithful deeds that spring 
 From flower to fruit in Heaven ! Shall any hear 
 This precious legend with a heart unmoved 
 By the ineffable gifts whose sign ye are — 
 The flower of loving words, which can disarm 
 The brute within our hearts ; the precious fruit 
 Of faithful deeds, which he who tastes and makes 
 His own shall find indeed a heavenly food — 
 Strengthen his strength, make clean his soul, and breed 
 New thoughts within him, till his lower self, 
 Sunk deep in sense, dull, gross, denying Heaven, 
 Falls down from him, and, a new creature, comes 
 To soar through suffering to a higher life."
 
 S. Alexis. 107 
 
 And then there seemed a breach in the long ranks 
 Of saintly Kves. Till then I heard the tale 
 Of martyrdoms where the fierce Pagan raged 
 Against the nascent faith. Henceforth my dream 
 Was chiefly of white lives, which gained the crown 
 By too great scorn of self, who gave to Heaven 
 Not of its own alone, but part of earth's, 
 And yet grew blessed. Martyrdoms there were, 
 Even as of old, when with fierce bigot rage 
 Christian with Christian striving, plied anew 
 The Pagan's hellish arts of pain and death. 
 The dungeon and the stake, the rack, the sword. 
 Seeking — oh, shameful thought ! — to chase from earih 
 The heretic God bore with. None of these
 
 io8 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 I saw, or seeing, asked not of my guide, 
 
 Because my soul grew sick, and could not bear 
 
 The piteous tale. But of self-sacrifice — 
 
 Lavish, indeed, yet blest — high sacrifice 
 
 Vowed to great ends and blest, my ears were full, 
 
 As one in pilgrim's garb, ascetic, seared, 
 
 Still with some ghost of pain, and some faint trace 
 
 Of sadness in his eyes, and yet withal, 
 
 Despite his humble garb and lowly port, 
 
 A Roman noble, met my curious gaze ; 
 
 And this the tale I heard : 
 
 " When the first Innocent was Pope of Rome, 
 A Senator there was, Euphemian, 
 Who long with Aglae, his wife, had prayed. 
 Having great riches and no heir to take them, 
 Yqx offspring of their love. At length their prayer 
 Was granted, and a son was born to them, 
 Alexis, fair of body and white of soul.
 
 S. Alexi'i. 109 
 
 Him the pure vision through his growing years 
 Failed not, but always on his life there shone 
 The light of the Unseen, so that he fared 
 Through all the heats of youth a soul unstained, 
 Clothed in the spotless garb of innocence, 
 And, 'mid the pomps of rank and riches, still 
 Lived evermore in great humility 
 As lived his Master, and still kept a heart 
 Touched with compassion for the poor and weak ; 
 And, being purer than the rest, was fain. 
 Through self-contempt and saintly diffidence, 
 To mortify the sinful flesh, and make 
 A daily penance for the wrong he loathed. 
 
 Therefore, while outwardly in silk and gold. 
 The emblems of his proud patrician birth. 
 He showed before men's eyes, he bore beneath, 
 Seeking to mortify this load of flesh, 
 Next to his flesh, a painful vest of hair;
 
 1 1 o A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And, though he walked before men's eyes a bright 
 And smihng presence, in his secret cell 
 Bewailed with vigils and with tears the wrong 
 He never did, a pure soul bowed and bent 
 By the great burden of the sinful world. 
 
 Thus sped the fleeting years, which crowned his youth 
 
 With manhood. Never did his dreaming thought 
 
 Turn to the earth or earthly things, but still 
 
 The heavens stood open ; the immortal youth 
 
 Of the adoring angels dimmed the charm 
 
 Of earthly beauty, and he lived apart, 
 
 Like that rapt boy who saw as in a glass 
 
 A fair reflected image in the stream. 
 
 And loved it only. Then the sire and dame, 
 
 Because they fain would see their noble tree 
 
 Blossom before they died^ would urge their son 
 
 That he should wed, and named to him a maid 
 
 Fair, modest, high of birth, higher of soul,
 
 S. Alexis. 1 1 1 
 
 Whom from a child he knew, and well had loved ; 
 
 And he, long time delaying, at the last, 
 
 Being dutiful and fain to do their will. 
 
 Consented, and the glad day dawned when they 
 
 Together in God's house, bridegroom and bride, 
 
 Knelt at the altar, and the vows were pledged 
 
 And the words spoken which should make them one. 
 
 So all day long the joyous marriage feast 
 
 Sped gaily to the cheerful sound of song. 
 
 But from his bride, her soft eyes looking love, 
 
 The young Alexis stood apart, and mused 
 
 As one whom some deep sorrow presses down ; 
 
 And through the long halls passing, sad, distraught, 
 
 To all the greetings of the courtly throng 
 
 Made hardly answer. For before his eyes 
 
 Ever the beatific dream of old, 
 
 The virginal whiteness of the saints, the pure 
 
 Angelic faces bent before the throne.
 
 112 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Filled all his musing thought, until the feast, 
 
 The acclaiming friends, the mirth, nay, the meek face 
 
 Of his young bride, showed dim and scarcely seen 
 
 Before his rapturous gaze ; nor could he brook 
 
 The innocent thoughts of love fulfilled which flush 
 
 The dreams of youth. Such thoughts were not for one 
 
 Who had seen the opened heavens, the throng of saints, 
 
 And the pure Virgin Mother ; not for him 
 
 The pulse of earthly passion. Could he dare 
 
 To quench in deeps of sense the pale white fire 
 
 Of the ascetic soul? Could mortal love 
 
 Allure him from his heavenly home, or turn 
 
 His duteous thought to earth ? Nay, nay ; he could not. 
 
 A stern voice bade him fly, while yet 'twas time. 
 
 And yet 'twas hard to leave the home he loved 
 
 And those who loved him. But what said the Word ? 
 
 ' Who leaves not father, mother, wife, and child 
 
 For Me and for My kingdom, loves not me.' 
 
 ' Love I not thee, oh Lord? Shall not I dare
 
 6". Alexis. 1 1 
 
 To give all things for Thee ? And yet Thy Word 
 Bids each man, leaving all, cleave to his wife. 
 How shall I dare desert her in her grief? 
 How shall I bear to leave her to men's spite 
 And mockery — a wife her husband shuns, 
 A bride yet not a wife. And my dear sire, 
 And gracious mother ? Is not wedlock blest, 
 And are they not of Thee ? Do I not cast 
 Reproach on those white souls, who lived in pure 
 And blessed union ? If our Lord on earth 
 Dwelt in His father's house, and deigned to be 
 In Cana, at the marriage feast, nor scorned 
 To make the water wine, why should not I — 
 Being but a worm, indeed, a thing of nought. 
 Too low, too vile for Heaven, too weak for earth — 
 Why should not I, taking my humble part 
 In the great throng of life, foregoing all 
 My dim celestial dream, bearing the cross 
 In all humility, accept my part. 
 
 o
 
 114 ^ Vision of Saints, 
 
 Rearing my children in the fear of God 
 
 And love of Christ, hastening the blessed hour 
 
 When all the world is His, and He shall tread 
 
 All earthly crowns beneath His feet and reign 
 
 A King among His saints? Surely 'twere best 
 
 To advance His kingdom thus ? ' And then he turned 
 
 Back to the joyful feast, and sate beside 
 
 His innocent love, regarding well content 
 
 Her fair unsullied beauty, and would strive 
 
 To take the joyous greetings of his kin, 
 
 And look with loving glances on his bride. 
 
 So all day long the joyous marriage feast 
 
 Sped gaily to the cheerful noise of song. 
 
 And now the sun had sunk beyond the west, 
 
 And night had fallen, when a dread voice seemed 
 
 To summon him away, bidding him fly 
 
 The world and worldly joys. So clear it came 
 
 And awful to his ear, he could not stay,
 
 5'. Alexis. 1 1 
 
 He durst not tarry. ' I have need of thee, 
 
 Alexis ' — so it spake. And he, who heard 
 
 The voice as of the Lord, without a doubt, 
 
 Obedient to the heavenly summons, rose 
 
 And sought his bride ; and on her hand he set, 
 
 In token of his love and troth, a ring 
 
 Of purest gold, and round her slender waist 
 
 A zone of precious gems, and on her head 
 
 A veil of costly purple. Then in tears. 
 
 The dread voice calling always, with one kiss 
 
 He left her, and flung forth into the night, 
 
 Unseen, and no man found him till he died. 
 
 Then through that hapless house there went a sound 
 Of wailing. All the ways they searched to find 
 The truant, but in vain ; and straight their joy 
 Was turned to grief, and they in garb of woe 
 Sate mourning, without hope, the son, the spouse, 
 Whom never should they see until the end.
 
 I 1 6 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 But when the bridegroom fled into the night, 
 
 Leaving behind him light and hfe and love, 
 
 Obedient always to the heavenly voice 
 
 Which summoned him away, his faltering steps 
 
 Led him to Tiber's bank, whereon he found 
 
 A little boat ; and, clad in pilgrim's garb, 
 
 All night he laboured seaward, till he came 
 
 To Ostia. There a bark in act to sail 
 
 For Asia took him, and he crossed the deep, 
 
 An exile self-pursued. No vain regret 
 
 For vanished riches held him, or lost love, 
 
 Or for the toil and hunger which he knew, 
 
 Following the heavenly voice, and so content. 
 
 Only at times some shade of doubt would come, 
 
 Considering all his mother's love, his sire 
 
 Left childless, and the sad surprise which filled 
 
 His bride's sweet eyes when he would go from her, 
 
 And how the house stood empty of delight,
 
 5". Alexis, 11 "J 
 
 And how those innocent lives must pine an.l droop 
 That he might do God's will ; and all the load 
 And tangle of the too-perplexed world ! 
 
 So, after storm-tost days, he gained at length 
 The Syrian shore, and there long time he lived, 
 A hermit, at Edessa, lone, unknown, 
 Spending his days in alms, his nights in prayer, 
 Till gradually through the land his fame 
 Waxed, and the people's voice acclaimed him saint. 
 Then he, who wept his vileness and was filled 
 With saintly thoughts of deep humility, 
 Fled once again, sailing across the sea 
 For Tarsus, where of old the sainted Paul 
 Hallowed the earth. 
 
 But a great tempest rose. 
 And drove the ship for many a darkling day 
 Far from her course ; and when the sky grew cle.ir, 
 Behold, the well-remembered coast again
 
 I 1 8 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 By Ostia, where the yellow Tiber stains 
 The purple depths of the Tyrrhenian Sea, 
 And, lost in distance on the northern sky, 
 Rome and the stately palace of his sires. 
 
 But when Alexis saw the well-known shore 
 
 Hard by his ancient home, straightway his soul 
 
 AVas filled once more with doubt, because he knew 
 
 That 'twas the Lord who ruled the storm, and drave 
 
 The strong ship from her course ; and when he mused 
 
 On all the past, how the strange people turned 
 
 His humbleness to pride, it seemed indeed 
 
 That here was his best sacrifice — to live 
 
 Within his father's house, unseen, unknown. 
 
 For since long years of penury had worked 
 
 Their will on him, and seared his cheek, and bent 
 
 His body, and bleached his hair, and hardly left 
 
 The embers of his youth, he might deceive 
 
 The gaze of loving eyes.
 
 6^. Alexis. 119 
 
 So he set forth, 
 Wrapped in his pilgrim's cloak, along the still 
 Dead marsh, a solitary wayfarer, 
 Slow, leaning on his staff, obscured with dust 
 And weariness, until, at last, with eve 
 Rome and the stately palace of his sires. 
 
 Now when he gained the lofty gate where dwelt 
 
 His noble sire, the loved home of his youth 
 
 And manhood, where his fair unwedded wife 
 
 Still pined for him, the Lord Euphemian 
 
 Went forth with all his pomp ; and as he passed, 
 
 Alexis — knowing all the work of time 
 
 And toil and fastings, and his whitened hair. 
 
 His furrowed brow, his straight form bowed and bent, 
 
 His ragged garb, which was a robe of silk. 
 
 And all the change, whose briefer name is age — 
 
 Stood forth, and threw him at his feet, and sought 
 
 Some humble food and shelter. And his sire.
 
 I 20 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Knowing his son was meek and pitiful 
 Of all the poor and weak, and how, perchance, 
 He, too, was now a w^anderer poor as this, 
 Was touched with ruth and raised the suppliant, 
 Bade him be of good cheer, and signed to them 
 Who followed, they should give him food and place 
 Beneath his palace roof, and, charging them 
 That he should want for nothing, went his way ; 
 Nor knew he by his blood's unwonted thrill 
 That 'twas his son he looked on. So once more 
 Within his father's house Alexis lay. 
 
 But those his careless menials, knowing naught 
 Of what had been, and deeming him no more 
 Than the poor wayworn wanderer he seemed, 
 Beneath the marble staircase of the house, 
 Found him some darkling cell, wherein he stayed 
 Being gentle and of great humility ; 
 And seeing him so meek, no chiding word
 
 S. Alexis. 12 1 
 
 E'er passed his uncomplaining lips, they deemed, 
 
 With the dull insolence of servitude, 
 
 That 'twas some idiot, weak of speech and brain, 
 
 Who lay there ; and they plucked his beard and smote 
 
 His patient cheek, and on his suffering head 
 
 Heaped dust and ashes. But he spake no word 
 
 Reproachful of them, knowing well indeed 
 
 How^ great the load of his offence^ and how 
 
 The Lord of all was mocked upon the Tree. 
 
 So in the house where he was heir to all. 
 
 He lay long years, knowing the bitter bread 
 
 Of penury, and cold, and all despite. 
 
 Long years he lived, below the lowest slave 
 
 In food and lodging, who was heir to all. 
 
 But harder than all else it was to bear 
 
 The daily, nightly sights and sounds of home ; 
 
 To see his mother, ageing day by day. 
 
 Pass forth, still mourning for her son, and fear
 
 122 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 To meet the eyes which, had they met his own, 
 Piercing his secret through, had ended all; 
 To know himself the cause of grief and woe 
 To her who bore him ; yet withhold the word 
 Which spoken had brought joy to innocent hearts ! 
 
 And most of all things was it grief to him, 
 In the dead hours when all beside was still, 
 Nightly to hear the sound of grief and tears. 
 And know the voice of her who was his bride. 
 Widow ere wedded. ' Whither, love, art gone? ' 
 So wailed the voice ; ' and wherefore didst thou wed, 
 To leave me thus to mourn for thee, and bear 
 Despite and scorn of men ? Are we not one. 
 Knit by the law of God, — one flesh, one soul. 
 One being, fused by the mysterious word 
 W^hich spoken joined our lives ? Return ! return ! 
 I weary for thy voice. Return ! oh love ! 
 But thou art far across the pitiless seas.
 
 6". Alexis. 123 
 
 Or, haply, 'mid the sunless ways of death ! ' 
 
 Night after night the waitings came and pierced 
 His heart, and banished sleep, and wrung his soul 
 With torture ; for the suffering of the soul, 
 Deeper than bodily anguish piercing, wears 
 The writhing life. For sometimes he would dream 
 He heard the voice, and then a mocking fiend 
 Would chide him for his flight, and whisper, ' Rise. 
 Duty lies plain before thee. Rise and seek 
 Thy injured wife ; ask pardon of thy sire, 
 And her thy mother. Pride it was — nought else — 
 Apeing contrition, drove thee, that thou wert 
 Not as the world, the dim unnoted throng 
 Of those for whom the trivial daily road 
 Lies between lilies. Rise and take thy place, 
 Bearing the wholesome load of common life. 
 As did thy sires before thee.' 
 
 Then the saint :
 
 124 ^ Vision of Sainis. 
 
 ' I may not know if I do right indeed, 
 
 Such doubt o'erclouds my soul ; but this I know — 
 
 There is a whiteness in virginity j ^ 
 
 There is a virtue in the Ufe withdrawn 
 
 By desert sands or antred wilds, apart 
 
 From wealth, and ease, and crowded haunts of men. 
 
 There, on the vigils of the saints, the skies 
 
 Burst open sudden, and the Mother of God 
 
 Opens her virgin arms and clasps her Son, 
 
 Virgin like her ; and round the throne there shine 
 
 Angels and high archangels, row on row, 
 
 Pure all and virgin ; and below them stand 
 
 The virgin martyrs. These my eyes have seen ; 
 
 These, when the desert stars shone clear and cold, 
 
 And lions roared around the springs ; these, too, 
 
 These, when the hot noon quivered round the palm=^. 
 
 The opening heavens revealed. And shall 1 bear 
 
 To tread the flowery paths of life and sink 
 
 To earthly joys ? Nay, I am vowed, I am vowed !
 
 6". Alexis. 12, 
 
 The fields grow white, the harvest of the Lord 
 Ripens, and shall men dream of wedlock, now 
 At the full end and judgment of the world ? ' 
 
 Then with divided soul Alexis rose — 
 It was the dead of night — and through the long 
 Hushed corridors, with noiseless footfall, sought, 
 If haply he might see his love again, 
 Himself unseen, the well-remembered door ; 
 And, pausing at the threshold, spied within 
 His maiden consort, kneeling bathed in tears, 
 Keeping a vigil for the man she mourned. 
 And heard her loving lips pronounce his name 
 In grief. ' Alexis, whither art thou gone ? 
 Return, my love, return ! ' 
 
 Even where he stood, 
 Hid by the arras, reached the wailing voice. 
 And, by her lamp's dim light, he saw the lines 
 0.1 the beloved brow, which time and grief
 
 126 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Had drawn, and all for him ; and then great ruih 
 And yearning took him, and he longed to speak, 
 But while he mused, loud on his watching ear 
 A voice, which seemed of God, arose and hushed 
 All thoughts beside. ' Alexis, be thou strong.' 
 
 Then, with a groan as of a breaking heart, 
 His grief burst into utterance, and sighed, 
 ' No more, dear wife, no more ! ' 
 
 And then he stole, 
 Ghost-like, to his own place. 
 
 But she who heard 
 The words, and knew the voice, gazed with wide eye-^ 
 Then swooned, as 'twere his spirit greeting her ; 
 Nor slept, but with the morning told the tale. 
 And, grieving deep, was somewhat comforted 
 To think that he had come to her from Heaven. 
 
 And he, when he had gained his poor retreat,
 
 6^. Alexis. 127 
 
 Slept not. His suffering heart was riven in twain, 
 His limbs refused their office, and his voice 
 Grew feeble, as by sickness marred, or age. 
 Nor from his humble pallet ever again 
 Rose he, but sank, with every day that came, 
 To deeper weakness still. At last he knew 
 His hour was come, and so implored of one 
 Who tended him, the means to write ; and then 
 A letter wrote he, setting forth at large 
 The truth of all these things, and his sad life, 
 And prayed forgiveness of his sins, and hid 
 The scroll within his vesture, next his heart ; 
 And then his face grew calmer, and his eye 
 As of a saint in glory. Till one day 
 They found him in his poor cell, lying dead. 
 Clasping the letter, on his face a smile. 
 
 Now, when Alexis lay in act to die. 
 
 It chanced that very day Pope Innocent
 
 128 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Said solemn Mass for Caesar, and the Court 
 
 Knelt round, and, with the rest, Euphemian. 
 
 And when the mystic sacrifice was done. 
 
 And the proud concourse turned in act to go, 
 
 From the high altar pealed a voice which said 
 
 Tn solemn accents, ' Seek the holy man 
 
 Who this day comes to die, and ask of him 
 
 His prayers for Rome ; ' and while in awe they stayed 
 
 Expectant, then the strange voice once again— 
 
 ' Go, seek him of the Lord Euphemian.' 
 
 And he, who heard it, knew not what the words 
 
 Meant, but, the Emperor bidding him, went forth 
 
 To gain his home, while after him there came 
 
 Caesar and all the Fathers of the Church, 
 
 With long-drawn pomp, the Pontiff at their head. 
 
 Now, when Euphemian gained his stately house, 
 Lo ! dark upon the gleaming marble stair 
 The slaves had laid a lifeless body down
 
 .5'. Alexis. 129 
 
 To carry forth for burial ; and they said 
 To him who questioned them, * My gracious Lord, 
 This was the pilgrim whom thou bad'st us take 
 Beneath thy roof years since, and he till now 
 Hath dwelt here of thine alms. An hour ago 
 He died, and soon we bear him to his grave ; 
 But in his grasp he holds a secret scroll 
 Which never would he part with, night or day. 
 See ! will it please you look upon his face ? ' 
 
 Then, with great awe, the Lord Euphemian 
 
 Drew near the bier, remembering the voice 
 
 Which sent him there and bade him kneel and ask 
 
 A blessing of the dead, like him of old 
 
 Who fed the holy angels unawares, 
 
 And, marked with reverent eyes the pilgrim garb, 
 
 The scroll grasped tight within the wasted hand, 
 
 And all the marks of saintly poverty, 
 
 Nor knew on whom he looked. But when he drew 
 
 K
 
 1 30 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 The face-cloth from the visage of the dead, 
 
 His life stood still ; for straight the father's heart, 
 
 Through all disguise of penury and years, 
 
 Leapt to his son. For, lo ! the wayworn face 
 
 Grew young in death, a smile was on the lip 
 
 As of old time, but round the saintly head 
 
 There shone a glory brighter than the day — 
 
 Sign of his rank in Heaven ; and on his knees 
 
 The father fell before the son, and wept, 
 
 Giving God praise. And while he knelt, there came 
 
 Caesar and Pontiff,- and they knelt with him ; 
 
 And the Pope reverently pressed the hand 
 
 Stiffened in death, beseeching of the dead 
 
 That he should give the scroll. And straight his grasp,. 
 
 Relaxing, yielded; and the Chancellor 
 
 Read to the assembled nobles the strange tale 
 
 Of Life and Death, which thou hast heard to-day. 
 
 But when within the house the news was told,
 
 S. Alexis. 131 
 
 The childless mother and the widowed wife, 
 
 Descending, threw themselves upon the bier. 
 
 Kissing the wasted form ; plunged deep in woe, 
 
 Yet taking comfort that the dead they loved 
 
 Reigned now among the saints. Seven days and nights 
 
 They watched and wept before him, and a throng 
 
 Of halt and sick, and many a one was healed 
 
 Of his infirmity. Such things the saint 
 
 Wrought, with God's help, upon them for their faith. 
 
 Then, lest some secular use might mar the place 
 
 Made sacred by his pain, upon the ground 
 
 Where stood that stately house, they reared the Church 
 
 Of S. Alexis, and the marble stair 
 
 Which sheltered him they left as when he died. 
 
 And there a sculptor carved him, in mean garb 
 
 Rechning, by his side his pilgrim's staff, 
 
 And in his hand the story of his life 
 
 Of virgin pureness and humility."
 
 T3- A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And, when the tale was done, again my guide : 
 
 " Shall any scoff, deeming the sacrifice 
 
 Was vain, a sheer self-torment all unasked, 
 
 Which wrecked four innocent lives ? Does God then ask 
 
 Such service of His creatures ? Does He cast 
 
 Contempt upon His gracious paths of life. 
 
 Which all alike may tread — the precious flowers 
 
 Which, by the sacred light and warmth of home, 
 
 Bloom fragrant to the skies ; the childish eyes 
 
 Which bring back Heaven ; the priceless liturgies 
 
 Of daily fruitful sacrifice ; the joys 
 
 Shared, and so doubled ; all the blessed pain 
 
 Of loss ; the open grave ; the sacred grief 
 
 That lifts us from the earth ? Nay, nay, our lives 
 
 Are double, and our souls, as fitting those 
 
 Who move from earth to Heaven. Life has its joys, 
 
 And all may take them blameless. Yet there is 
 
 A something higher, too, than these — a thrill 
 
 Of ecstasy, a perfect path which hangs 
 
 Heavenward upon the everlasting hills.
 
 6". Alexis. i;^ 
 
 oo 
 
 Above the flowery meads, the harvest fields, 
 
 The blushing vineyards, 'mid the perilous snows 
 
 Where comes not Xvit. Know we not well the snare 
 
 Of wealth, the deep retributive pain of sense, 
 
 Which ofttimes clog the sad wayfarer's feet 
 
 Who treads life's common paths. There are some souls 
 
 Too fine and pure to tread them. Were it well 
 
 That this brave heart had borne its share of love 
 
 And rank and riches, and had lived its life, 
 
 Making another's happy in like sort, 
 
 And spent its little tale of common days, 
 
 And passed and left no sign ? Or was it best 
 
 To have touched a high ideal unattained. 
 
 To have grown from sufferance to high victory, 
 
 To have left the world a story, which shall serve 
 
 For ages yet, of soul defeating sense ; 
 
 Of aspirations flown too high for earth ; 
 
 Of life which spurns the binding chains of love, 
 
 And lower weal, and blameless happiness, 
 
 And soars aloft and takes the hues of Heaven ? "
 
 134 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 And then it was a girl who seemed a youth, 
 With pure sweet eyes, wearing a monkish garb. 
 Within whose arms a young child nestled close, 
 While she along the fields of Paradise 
 Plucked liUes for it. Spotless innocence 
 Shone from her, and around her comely head 
 A finer motherhood. And thus the voice : 
 
 " In Egypt long ago a humble hind 
 Lived happy. One fair daughter of his love 
 Was his, a modest flower, that came to bless 
 The evening of his days. But time and change 
 Assailed his well-loved home, and took from him 
 The partner of his life ; and when the blow
 
 6^. Marina. 135 
 
 Had fallen, loathing of the weary world 
 
 Seized hina, and, leaving his young girl behind 
 
 With some who tended her, he went his way 
 
 Across the desert sands, and in a cave 
 
 Long time he lived, a pious eremite 
 
 Withdrawn from men. But when the rapid years 
 
 Hurried his child to budding maidenhood, 
 
 Knowing the perils of the world, his soul 
 
 Grew troubled, and he could not bear the dread 
 
 That day and night beset him for her sake ; 
 
 So that his vigils and his prayers seemed vain, 
 
 Nor bore their grateful suffrage to the skies, 
 
 Since over all his mind would brood a doubt • 
 
 For her and her soul's healtli, revolving long 
 
 How she should 'scape the world and be with him. 
 
 Because no woman might draw near the cell 
 
 Of any pious hermit. At the last 
 
 He counselled her, taking the garb of man. 
 
 To come to him, leaving the world behind;
 
 136 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And the fair girl, loving her sire, obeyed, 
 And lived with him in duty to the end. 
 
 And when he died, leaving the girl alone, 
 The brethren of a holy convent near, 
 Seeing the friendless youth, and pitying 
 His loneliness, and holding high his love 
 For his dead sire, offered him food and home 
 Within the holy house ; and there he served, 
 A young man in the blossom of his age, 
 Sweet natured, pious, humble, drawing to him 
 The friendship of the youths, the love of maids. 
 
 But all his soul was rapt with thoughts of Heaven, 
 Taking no thought for earth, and so it came 
 The youthful Brother grew in every grace 
 And great humility, and was to all 
 Example of good life and saintly thought. 
 And was Marinus to the monks, who loved
 
 6^. Marina. 137 
 
 Their blameless serving-lad, nor knew at all 
 That 'twas a maid indeed who lived with them. 
 
 Now, as in all humility he served, 
 
 The Abbot, trusting him beyond the rest, 
 
 Would send him far across the desert sands. 
 
 With wagons and with oxen, to the sea. 
 
 As steward for the House ; and oftentimes 
 
 The young man stayed far from his convent home, 
 
 With some rude merchant who purveyed their food ; 
 
 And oft amid the wild seafaring folk 
 
 His days were passed, and coarse disordered lives ; 
 
 And oftentimes the beauty of the youth 
 
 Drew many a woman's heart who deemed him man. 
 
 But still the saintly tenour of her way 
 
 The maiden kept, clothed round with purity, 
 
 So that before her face the ribald rout 
 
 Grew sober, and among the styes of sense 
 
 She walked a saint clothed round with purity,
 
 1 2>^ A Vision of Saints. 
 
 A youth in grace, keeping a virgin heart. 
 
 But one, the daughter of his host, would cast 
 A loving eye upon him — all in vain ; 
 For careless still he went his way, nor took 
 Heed of her love nor her, and oftentimes 
 He would reprove her of his maiden soul, 
 Knowing a woman's weakness, and would say, 
 ' Sister, I prithee think of whom thou art, 
 And set a watch upon thy feet.' But she, 
 Hating the faithful candour of the youth, 
 Fell into utter wretchlessness of sin ; 
 And when her sire, discovering her disgrace. 
 Threatened her for her fault, a shameless thought 
 Seized her, and she, with feigned reluctancy, 
 Sware he deserted her, and with her child 
 Came to the saintly Abbot, where he sate 
 Judging the brethren. And great anger seized 
 The reverend man that at his heart he nursed
 
 S. Marina. 139 
 
 A viper which thus stung him, and he cried, 
 
 ' Vile wretch, who dost disgrace our holy house ! 
 
 Thou hypocrite, soiling the spotless robe 
 
 Of saintly purity ! I do denounce 
 
 Thy wickedness. No longer canst thou be 
 
 A brother to thy brethren here, who live 
 
 Pure lives unstained. My sentence on thee is 
 
 That thou be scourged, and from this reverend house 
 
 Withdraw thyself, and work what viler work 
 
 The brethren find for thee ; and this poor child 
 
 Take thou with thee, and look that thou maintain 
 
 Its growing life, since thus thy duty bids thee. 
 
 Or if my mercy spare thee from the stripes 
 
 Thou hast deserved, 'tis for its sake, not thine. 
 
 Go, get thee gone, and never dare again 
 
 Pollute my presence.' 
 
 Long she strove to speak, 
 But her lips formed no word. And then she rose 
 Meekly, and, answering no word, went forth.
 
 140 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Bowed down with shame, and yet not ill content, 
 
 Deeming it but the penance which her sins 
 
 Had merited. And when the little one 
 
 Stretched forth its hands, she clasped it to her breast, 
 
 Her virgin breast, and all the sacred glow 
 
 Of motherhood, which lurks within the hearts 
 
 Of innocent maidens, rising soothed her pain ; 
 
 And, wandering forth, she found some humble hut 
 
 For shelter. There by alms and servile tasks, 
 
 'Mid great despite of all who knew her once 
 
 In days of honour ; hungry, lonely, poor. 
 
 And ofttimes begging bread, she pined long time, 
 
 Till the young life Heaven gave her throve and grew 
 
 In happy innocence, and all who passed 
 
 Might hear twin voices mingling in the hymns — 
 
 The father's, who was mother, and the child's — 
 
 And wondering went their way. 
 
 So that pure soul 
 Grew tranquil, even on earth. Yet in her heart
 
 S. Marina. 1 4 1 
 
 Deep down the rankling sorrow dwelt, and burned 
 The sources of her being, and sometimes 
 Her penance grew too hard, and almost broke 
 The bonds of silence ; then again her soul 
 Took courage, persevering to the end, 
 Knowing her sins, and how the pain she bore, 
 Though undeserved, was nothing to the sum 
 Of her offence, dear heart ! and hoping from it 
 The fair reward of utter faithfulness. 
 
 But not the less the insults and the shame 
 
 Consumed her life and strength, and day by day, 
 
 When now the innocent she loved had grown 
 
 To happy childhood, weaker and more weak, 
 
 Her failing forces waned, till on her bed 
 
 Stretched helpless lay the maid. And when she knew 
 
 Her hour was come, she summoned to her side 
 
 An aged woman whom she knew of yore. 
 
 What time she seemed a frank and eager youth. 
 
 Ere her shame took her ; and when she was come.
 
 142 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Quickly with trembling hand she beckoned her, 
 Giving her charge, when she was dead, to take 
 Her child to the good brethren, with her prayer 
 That they should keep it safe. 
 
 Then with weak hand 
 She bared her innocent virgin breast and smiled, 
 A sad wan smile, and, looking up to Heaven, 
 Breathed her last breath. 
 
 And she who saw, amazed, 
 With mingled joy and tears, composed with care 
 The virgin limbs, and wrapped her in her shroud, 
 And hasting to the convent with the child 
 Left orphan, told the tale. And when he heard. 
 The holy Abbot knelt with bitter grief 
 All night before the altar, asking grace 
 Of Heaven, that he had wronged that saintly soul 
 By base suspicion ; and the brotherhood 
 Mourned for the pure girl-saint, who bore so long 
 In blessed silence taunts and spite and shame. 
 Obedient and in great humility."
 
 5. Francis of Assist. 143 
 
 And then it was a saint, still, as it seemed, 
 
 Clad in monastic habit, — many a hand 
 
 Of painter limns him — with dark beard and hair 
 
 And melancholy eyes. Full well I knew 
 
 The worn ascetic figure, bearing with it 
 
 The lily and the lamb ; the tearful gaze 
 
 Which wept the sad world's sin, while the high voice 
 
 Sang praise for all ; the poet-monk who lit 
 
 Of his seraphic ardour the faint fires 
 
 And embers of the Faith. And thus I heard : 
 
 " To wealthy Bernardone and his wife. 
 Madonna Pica, seven long ages since, 
 In fair Assisi, on the Umbrian hills,
 
 144 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 Was born a son, Giovanni, whom his fellows, 
 Because he loved the joyous tongue of France, 
 Would call ' Francesco.' Thence has come a name 
 Through every Christian realm resounding still. 
 Beloved for ever, and the ear which hears 
 * S. Francis of Assisi ' knows it takes 
 A name in which all saintly memories 
 Are stored as in a precious vase fulfilled 
 Of spikenard, and the faithful listening soul 
 Rejoices at the name and is content. 
 
 Now, when the boy had come to youthful years, 
 Being his father's son, rich in all store 
 Of gay attire, and filled with pride of life 
 And luxury, yet would his generous heart 
 Stand at the gate of pity, prompt to give 
 If any asked ; so that the citizens 
 Loved the gay, careless youth for all his faults. 
 Till, when he grew a stripling, a fierce feud
 
 S. Francis of As si si. 145 
 
 Between Assisi and her sister town 
 Of high Perugia, raging, burst in war ; 
 And the young Bernardone, with the rest, 
 Bare arms, and, being taken, twelve long months 
 Lay prisoner in the fortress. When the strife 
 Was done and he set free, the burning grasp 
 Of fever seized him, and he pined long weeks 
 And months upon his bed. There, as he lay 
 Hovering 'twixt life and death, his sobered thought 
 Turned oft to Heaven, and all his reckless youth 
 Stood up accusing, and a great contempt 
 For this poor fleeting world and all its joys 
 Filled his reviving life, and crowned his years 
 With grave and sudden manhood ; and he rose 
 Leaving his former self, a higher hope 
 Firing his soul than those low aims of yore, 
 
 Yet outwardly he kept his wonted use 
 
 Of splendour, and among the admiring throng 
 
 L
 
 146 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of his dear town he seemed to fare as erst 
 
 A glittering }'outh, though 'neath his costly robe 
 
 He bore a painful garment, till one day, 
 
 Meeting some poor and humble wayfarer, 
 
 He knew a noble comrade who had served 
 
 With bravery in the war, leading the van 
 
 With glory, but whom now some sudden spite 
 
 Of Fortune left a beggar. When he saw 
 
 The honoured face seamed with the lines of want 
 
 And hunger, and the noble form obscured 
 
 By rags and penury, the love of God — 
 
 Which is the love of man — rose up aflame 
 
 Within his breast, and hurriedly he stripped 
 
 His broidered velvets from him, clothing round 
 
 The naked, as his Lord commanded him. 
 
 And with the beggar left his purse, and took 
 
 His rags, and through the thronged street passed unmoved. 
 
 Rapt by an ecstasy of sacrifice. 
 
 And gained his home, a beggar in men's sight.
 
 S. Francis of Assist. 147 
 
 But wealthy in the love of God and man. 
 
 Thence ever in his breast the fire of faith 
 
 Burned higher, till one day, within the shrine 
 
 Of San Damiano praying, where he mourned 
 
 The high church half in ruin ; as he knelt, 
 
 There spake within his soul a voice, which said, 
 
 ' Build thou My falling Church.' And he who heard, 
 
 Deeming it was the ruin where he knelt 
 
 The strange voice bade him build, turning in haste 
 
 To seek his father's house, sold of their store, 
 
 And brought the priests the gold. But when his sire 
 
 Was angered for the thing, he fled in fear, 
 
 Doubting if he had heard the voice aright, 
 
 Which bade him build the Church of God indeed, 
 
 Not one poor tottering shrine ; and when he came, 
 
 After long days, worn, pale, in evil case, 
 
 And hungry, all the people deemed the youth 
 
 A madman, and his father prisoned him
 
 14^^ A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Within his house long time. But she, his mother, 
 
 The mild Madonna Pica, came to him, 
 
 And comforted her son, bidding him yield 
 
 Obedience to his sire. Yet, though he loved 
 
 His gentle mother well, the fire of faith 
 
 Burned bright within him, and he spurned the world 
 
 And its poor wealth. And when his sire at last, 
 
 Being a worldling wholly, summoned him 
 
 Before the Bishop, presently his son, 
 
 Kneeling before the holy man, flung down 
 
 His costly robe, as one who cast away 
 
 All worldly wealth, and all the ties of earth. 
 
 And gave himself to Heaven. And there he lay 
 
 Naked, except his painful vest of hair, 
 
 Until the old man, shedding grateful tears 
 
 ()f tenderness, stooped down and gently raised 
 
 The suppliant, and round his limbs he cast 
 
 His own white robe ; and thenceforth the young life 
 
 Died to the world, and lived for Heaven alone.
 
 S. Fraricis of Assist. 149 
 
 Thus the swift years passed by and left him, man. 
 And turning to the sick and leprous lives, 
 He spent himself in pity ; and found peace 
 In happy daily labour, till his soul 
 Filled with the bliss of living, and his joy 
 And thankfulness and praise burst forth in song, 
 As o'er the sunburned Umbrian hills he fared, 
 He and his chosen Brother, year by year. 
 Summer and winter, when the high-built town 
 Glimmered in early dawn, and the thin towers 
 Gleamed misllike : or when now a golden rose 
 Of sunset woke them, as it wakes to-day 
 His high arcades, his convent cells, where towers, 
 Leaving the files of sombre cypress-spires, 
 Church over church ; or when the valleys slept 
 In twilight, and the shrill cicale chirped 
 Among the olives, and the passionate song 
 Of nightingales, from every bush and grove,
 
 150 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Throbbed liquid through the gloom ; then would his voice 
 Rise clear to Heaven, and these the words he sang : 
 
 * Almighty Lord Most High, to Thee belong 
 Glory and honour, and to none beside ; 
 
 No soul there is worthy to name Thy Name. 
 
 ' I praise Thee for Thy creatures, oh my God, 
 And specially for him who gives us Day, 
 The Sun, my brother ; radiant is his face, 
 And in his light we see Thy image. Lord. 
 
 * I praise Thee, Lord, because Thy hand has made 
 The Moon, my sister, and the countless host. 
 
 In shining mail, which fills the lucid heavens. 
 
 ' I praise Thee for my brothers, Thy great Winds, 
 For Air and Cloud, Thy Heavens serene, and all 
 Thy seasons which give sustenance to men.
 
 6". Francis of Assist. 151 
 
 * I praise Thee for my sister, the bland force 
 Of Water, who, to serve the needs of men, 
 Yields without stint her chaste and precious power. 
 
 * I praise Thee for my strenuous brother Fire, 
 By whose brave aid Thou dost illume the night ; 
 Jocund and fair is he, unquenched and strong. 
 
 * I praise Thee for our bounteous mother Earth, 
 Who keeps and nourishes our race, and gives 
 
 A thousand kindly fruits to cheer our lives, 
 Sweet flowers of varied hues, and every herb. 
 
 * I praise Thee for the souls which, for Thy love, 
 Forgiving evil, sorrow bear and pain ; 
 
 Blessed are they who meekly take Thy cross, 
 
 And gain, oh Thou Most High ! to wear Thy crown. 
 
 ' I praise Thee for our sister bodily Death,
 
 152 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Whom none who live and breathe shall 'scape at last. 
 Woe, woe to them who die in mortal sin ! 
 But blest are they, oh Lord, who do Thy Will ; 
 They shall not dread the great, the second Death. 
 
 * Thy Name, dear Lord, let all men praise and bless, 
 And serve Thee still in utter humbleness ! ' 
 
 Thus in an ecstasy of faith he lived, 
 
 Begging his bread long time ; for all his wealth 
 
 He gave to build the churches which he loved, 
 
 And in his narrow cell below the hill 
 
 On which Assisi towers, hard by the shrine, 
 
 Our Lady of the Angels, happy years 
 
 He dwelt and pondered, till at length he knew 
 
 His mission to the world, to preach, to call 
 
 All people to new life, speaking the words 
 
 God gave him, not his own. And everywhere 
 
 There came a blessing on his work, and men
 
 S. Francis of Assist. 1 5 , 
 
 And pious women listened, and his words 
 Burned like a fire within their hearts. And last 
 Faring to Rome, the Pope, warned in a dream, 
 Wherein the pilgrim, of his strength, upheld 
 The tottering Church, gave to his saintly Rule 
 A blessing ; and he turned with joyful heart 
 To his poor cell, and gathered round him all 
 His Brethren of the Faith, and there he spent 
 Long happy years of blessed Poverty. 
 
 Likewise, because for faithful souls the lot 
 
 Of God's dumb creatures presses with a weight 
 
 Of wonder whence they come, and for what end, 
 
 These humble helpers of our race, to whom 
 
 Their master is as God, or how the doom 
 
 Of nothingness at last awaits their good 
 
 And honourable service ; and because, 
 
 Loving his Lord, he loved all creatures too 
 
 His hand had fashioned ; worm and creeping thing
 
 154 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 Upon his path he crushed not, but would set 
 
 In safety ; and the joyous songs of birds, 
 
 The soaring lark, the passionate nightingale. 
 
 He knew for hymns of praise, and oft would join 
 
 His jubilant voice with theirs. Around his feet, 
 
 As in the fields he walked, the innocent lambs 
 
 Would gambol, and the timid fur-clad things 
 
 Nestled within his bosom, fearing not 
 
 His gentle hand. But most of all the birds 
 
 He loved, the swift-winged messengers who pass 
 
 'Twixt earth and Heaven, and seem as if they bear 
 
 A double nature, close in brotherhood 
 
 With all he loved ; and when he heard their song. 
 
 Pierced through with joy and utter thankfulness. 
 
 He with alternate praise would join with them, 
 
 And once, with soaring antiphons at eve, 
 
 Vied with a nightingale, till the brief night 
 
 Was well-nigh spent, and he could sing no more, 
 
 Since his voice failed him. And he bade the blithe
 
 6'. Francis of Assist. 155 
 
 Cicale chirping in the acacia thus, 
 
 ' Sing, sisters ; praise the Lord ; ' and hearing him. 
 
 They shrilled their answering song, and he was glad. 
 
 And one, the foremost of his band, there was. 
 
 The Lady Clara, then and now a saint. 
 
 She with the Master lived in grave discourse 
 
 And holy converse, and one day it seemed. 
 
 When at their frugal meal upon the grass 
 
 She, with her sisters, sate around the saint, 
 
 He with such sweet discourse declared the Faith, 
 
 That they forgot their food and paused to take 
 
 The spiritual feast, with eyes and hearts 
 
 Raised up to Heaven ; and all the folk around 
 
 Marked how the convent and the low church gleamed 
 
 With light which shone like fire, and, hasting there, 
 
 Found the saints wrapt in silent musing thought, 
 
 Forgetful of their meal, and knew the light 
 
 Was but the fire divine of Faith, w^hich burned
 
 156 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Within those saintly hearts, and to their homes 
 Turned wondering. 
 
 But while he lived serene, 
 Dissolved in happy tears, his soul desired 
 The martyr's blessed palm, and fain would go 
 Forth to the Paynim host, which then bore rule 
 O'er all the sacred fields of Palestine ; 
 But a storm drove him back. Then to the Moor 
 He yearned to preach ; but grievous sickness came, 
 And stayed his feet. Last, by the fabulous Nile, 
 He gave his body to burn if they would take 
 The Faith of Christ ; but when the Moslem heard, , 
 Deeming such sacrifice too great for man, 
 He sent hinr home with honour. Not for him 
 The martyr's palm, but to build up the Church 
 By years of labour crowned with saintly death. 
 
 Thus ten years passed, and then upon the plain 
 Around his :cell the Brethren of his Rule
 
 6^. Francis of Assist. 1 5 7 
 
 In thousands flocked from every Christian land, 
 
 And by his triple Vow of Poverty, 
 
 Obedience, Chastity, bound fast their lives, 
 
 As the saint bade them, and to every clime 
 
 Went forth his envoys. He it was who first, 
 
 A rapt ascetic, with foreseeing mind, 
 
 Brought to the service of the Faith the lives 
 
 Whose path lay through the world, and the fresh zeal 
 
 Of Woman, from the peasant to the Queen. 
 
 Long from his place he governed far and wide 
 
 His nascent order, till at last, his soul 
 
 Grown sick for Heaven and heavenly thoughts, he passed, 
 
 Far from his brethren and the praise of men. 
 
 To some lone cell on the precipitous side 
 
 Of blue Alverno, high above the vale, 
 
 Above the winding river, above the heights 
 
 Of white Assisi, where his failing sight 
 
 Might rest upon the everlasting hills. 
 
 There, in rapt contemplation and fair dreams,
 
 158 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 He spent his soul. 
 
 There, year by rapturous year, 
 The heavens stood open to his gaze ; the face 
 Of the Madonna, with the Child Divine, 
 Beamed on him. There the blessed Presence filled 
 His yearning eyes. There, in an ecstasy 
 'Twas said, the failing body, strong in love, 
 And the pure soul cleansed from her earthy stains, 
 Took his dear Master's wounds, and bore again 
 The Passion ; and the inmost Heaven, unsealed, 
 Opening disclosed the Angelic Host and all 
 The glories else unseen by mortal eye, 
 Till, in seraphic ardour, the saint's soul, 
 Throbbing with bliss well-nigh too great for earth, 
 Wore thin the walls of life, and sickness came, 
 And weakness, and his eyes grew dim with tears — 
 Tears not of sorrow all, but niixt with joy 
 For those his happy visions ; tears of pain 
 For the world's sin ; tears of a faithful hope
 
 vS. Francis of Assist. 159 
 
 For Heaven and all the blessedness to be. 
 
 There, when he knew his end draw nigh, he hailed 
 The coming freedom ; and, because his soul 
 Was humble, ordered that his bones should rest 
 Where, mouldering in unconsecrated ground, 
 The malefactors lay. Then, with weak voice, 
 Bidding them set him on the sweet bare earth 
 Beneath the evening sky, he murmured low 
 The Imploring Psalm, ' To Thee, Lord, have I cried ; 
 Thou art my hope ; ' and struggling to the close, 
 * Bring my soul out of prison/ straightway breathed 
 His last pure breath. 
 
 Then those who loved him bare 
 His body to the tomb. And when they passed 
 By San Damiano, all the sorrowing nuns, 
 S. Clara and her sisters, weeping, knelt 
 And kissed his hands ; and that dishonoured grave, 
 Since there a saint slept in the peace of Heaven,
 
 i6o A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Grew honoured for all time and consecrate. 
 
 And over him they built a stately church, 
 
 Wherein, beneath a costly pillared shrine 
 
 Of jasper and of sardonyx, he waits, 
 
 Who was so poor in life, the Judgment Day, 
 
 And named it by his name ; and there, hard by, 
 
 They reared a stately convent of his Rule ; 
 
 And church and convent, of the loving skill 
 
 Of painters whom the Faith's reviving fire 
 
 Kindled to Art, glow with celestial hues 
 
 Of beauty. There the archaic simple hand 
 
 Of Cimabue wrought. There Giotto dreamt 
 
 His saintly stories, only part of earth. 
 
 While the stern Bard of Heaven and Hell stood near 
 
 With counsel, honouring the name he deemed 
 
 ' A sunrise on the world.' There, quaintly true, 
 
 Orcagna, Cavallini, Gozzoli, 
 
 Light the rich walls. There blooms the stainless thought
 
 6*. Francis of Assist. i6i 
 
 Of the Angelic Brother, and the pure 
 
 Rapture of Perugino, and the soul 
 
 He reared, the wonder and despair of Art, 
 
 Raffaelle, and a throng of names inspired 
 
 Who sought not fame of men. And compassed round 
 
 By those high glories lies the sacred dust 
 
 Of him who, wedding saintly Poverty, 
 
 Lived there long time despised, though now he soars 
 
 Higher than earthly thrones, a Saint in Heaven." 
 
 M
 
 1 62 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Next came a queenly, youthful figure, clad 
 
 In the Franciscan garb, a slender form 
 
 With dark-brown hair and eyes, whose lap was filled 
 
 With roses white and red, like those which crowned, 
 
 In token of her purity and love, 
 
 The brow of Cecily. Great tenderness 
 
 And pity beamed from out her saintly eyes, 
 
 And, kissing as she went her stainless robe, 
 
 Knelt many a soul her faithful voice and hand 
 
 Had raised from earth to heaven. As she came 
 
 This fair half-legendary tale I heard : 
 
 " To Andreas of Hungary the Queen, 
 His consort, seven long centuries ago,
 
 S. Elizabeth of Hiingary. 163 
 
 Bore one fair daughter. All the realm that year 
 Was free from war, a bounteous harvest blessed 
 The peaceful land, and with her birth a saint 
 To bless the Church of God. 
 
 From her first years 
 Saintly she showed and meek ; no childish tear 
 Of petulance she shed, and when she spake 
 Her speech was as a prayer. All the broad plain 
 Of Hungary rejoiced to see her grow 
 As wise as fair, and through the land the fame 
 Of her young goodness spread and made men glad. 
 
 Now, when King Herman, of Thuringia, learned 
 
 This prodigy, he sent an embassy 
 
 To Hungary to ask of Andreas 
 
 His daughter in betrothal for his son 
 
 Prince Lewis, and the messengers returned 
 
 And brought the child with them, and, with her, store 
 
 Of costly stuffs and jewels the far East
 
 164 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And rich Byzantium yielded. And the King 
 
 Loved the child well, and with her love she lived, 
 
 Brother and sister; and her youthful heart 
 
 Was filled with Heaven, and every day that came 
 
 Brought its fair tale of saintly sacrifice, 
 
 And more and more for God and in His fear 
 
 She lived her girlish life, filling her days 
 
 With pity and compassion, till she showed 
 
 As 'twere some sweet child-angel whom the hand 
 
 Of a great painter limns. Not as a child 
 
 Of this poor trivial world she seemed, but grave, 
 
 As one who strayed from Heaven to earth and found 
 
 No meet companion. But the Prince loved well 
 
 His young betrothed, albeit well he saw 
 
 She was not as the rest, fearing sometimes 
 
 Lest she might choose to be the Bride of Heaven, 
 
 And not for him. Yet, while the good King lived. 
 
 None dared to thwart the young Elizabeth 
 
 In any work of pity, nor might the tooth
 
 6". Elizabeth of Httngary. 165 
 
 Of env3' touch her. But when death cut short 
 
 His Ufe, the stranger, now a friendless maid, 
 
 Dwelt long forlorn, because the jealous Queen 
 
 And her proud daughter Agnes, envying 
 
 Her saintly life, with scoffs and jeers would naock 
 
 Her sacrifice, and deepest contumely. 
 
 So that her young and modest soul would shrink 
 
 Within her at the cruel daily taunts 
 
 Which marred her life ; and all the courtly throng 
 
 Marked her disgrace, and mocked her ; and her sister, 
 
 The Princess Agnes, jealous of her love. 
 
 Would wring her heart, declaring that her brother 
 
 Wanted no nun for bride, but would dismiss her 
 
 To Hungary in shame. Such rankling shafts 
 
 Of venom launched they as the poisoned tongue 
 
 Of envious women can ; and she, alone. 
 
 Unfriended, bare it, nor complaining word 
 
 Would speak to her betrothed, who marked it all 
 
 In silence, nor yet spake, being indeed
 
 J 66 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 A youth as yet in tutelage, who owed 
 Obedience to the Queen, doubting, maybe, 
 Within his inmost heart if this pure soul 
 Were not too high for earth and earthly love. 
 
 But not the less his faithful love and trust 
 Sustained her soul. No public word he spake 
 Of comfort, but ofttimes, when she would sit 
 In tears within her chamber, sick at heart 
 For the despite and all the contumely 
 The others showered on her, her youthful lover 
 Would come to her, comforting her with words ; 
 And when they were apart, his faithful thought 
 Fixed on her still, he, coming, brought with him 
 Some little gift she loved — a rosary 
 Of beads, a silver crucifix, a chain 
 Of gold in token of his love. And she, 
 Loving him next to Heaven, would dry her tears 
 And run to meet him, and throw girlish arms
 
 5*. Elizabeth of Hungary. 167 
 
 Around him, and would strain him to her heart 
 And take his kisses as a maiden should 
 Who loves and is beloved, and with good heart 
 And cheerful bear her cross, nor cease at all 
 From works of mercy, trusting to her love. 
 
 Now one day, as it chanced, her lover went 
 With neighbouring princes to the chase, and stayed 
 Longer than was his wont, and when he came. 
 Or over-tired or busied with his guests. 
 Brought not his wonted gift, nor did embrace 
 His love with kisses ; and the jealous throng 
 Marked him ; and she, perceiving with what joy 
 They saw his coldness, found her fainting heart 
 Sink in her, and she sent a messenger 
 Who should enquire of Lewis and his love. 
 And when he came, he found the weary Prince 
 Lying at rest ; and when he asked of him 
 If he still loved the Princess, for the throng
 
 1 68 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Had marked his coldness ; springing to his feet, 
 
 The Prince rephed, 'Seest thou yon lofty hill 
 
 Which towers above us ? If it were of gold 
 
 P'rom base to peak, pure gold, Heaven be my witness, 
 
 I would give it all for her. I love none other. 
 
 I must have my Elizabeth ; I love her 
 
 Better than all the world.' And then he drew 
 
 A little silver mirror from his purse. 
 
 Wrought deftly, with an image of the Lord, 
 
 And sent it her for gage ; and when the maid 
 
 Took it, she kissed with joy and reverence 
 
 The sacred image, doubting him no more 
 
 Till they were wed — he a tall, vigorous youth, 
 
 Of ruddy cheek, blue eyes, and royal port, 
 
 And in his speech as modest as a maid ; 
 
 And she a budding maiden, dark of hair 
 
 And eye, the large dark eye, which always glowed 
 
 With inward light of love and charity, 
 
 And which great pity for the labouring world
 
 6^. Elizabeth of Hungary. 169 
 
 Ofttimes impearled with tears. 
 
 And so long time 
 They lived together in happy wedded love. 
 But she, within her royal cloister, still 
 Kept her old penances, and oft at night 
 She left her husband while he slept, and knelt 
 On the cold ground, and oftentimes she scourged 
 Her tender flesh ; and he, who loved her dear, 
 Would chide her, but in vain. Yet none the less 
 She did fulfil her lofty courtesies, 
 And rode out with him to the chase, and showed 
 A Queen for all to see. Though when he went 
 She donned a mourning weed, when he returned 
 She, in her royal mantle clad, would greet 
 Her spouse, and would embrace him as he leapt 
 Down from his charger, every inch a Queen, 
 Greeting her lord with wifely tenderness ; 
 Yet when they sat at meat, 'twas bread alone 
 They served to her, and in her cup they poured
 
 1 70 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Not wine, but water only, till her spouse 
 Tasting the cup one day, it seemed to him 
 The water of her saintly penance glowed 
 Like some celestial wine pressed from the grapes 
 Of Paradise, and not a word he spake. 
 Because he held long time his wife was served 
 By angel hands and fed on angels' food. 
 
 And one day, when her lord had made a feast 
 For all his brother princes, filled with pride 
 Of his fair wife, and willing that his peers 
 Should judge her beauty, he gave charge to her 
 That, clothed in costly robes, a Queen to see, 
 She should attend the feast ; and she, who held 
 Obedience more than all, arrayed herself 
 In queenly garb. Upon her raven hair 
 She set a glittering diadem of gems^ 
 And round her shapely form a royal robe 
 Of green and gold, and o'er her fair neck threw
 
 S. Elizabeth of Hungary. 171 
 
 An ermined mantle. As she issued forth 
 
 From out her queenly bovver to join her lord, 
 
 Behold, a hapless beggar, spent with cold 
 
 And hunger, met her, asking charity ; 
 
 And when he prayed her, in the sacred Name, 
 
 To succour him, she, with the holy fire 
 
 Of pity rising in her, stripped from her 
 
 The ermine, and around the shivering form 
 
 Wrapped it, and went, half doubting if her spouse 
 
 Would pardon her. And when he came, she ran 
 
 And, leaning on his bosom, told him all ; 
 
 And while he stood irresolute, behold. 
 
 Her maiden with the mantle in her arms. 
 
 ' Madam, I found your ermine in its place ; 
 
 Why did your Highness leave it ? ' Then she clasped it 
 
 Around her ; and her husband, as he heard, 
 
 Knew well the beggar was the Lord of all; 
 
 Willing to test her love and charity ; 
 
 And they together went ; and all the guests
 
 172 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Marvelled to see her beauty — such a light 
 Shone from her jewelled mantle, and her head 
 Seemed set with glory, and her tender eyes 
 Lit with the glow of Heaven and saintly love. 
 
 And one day, when she toiled amidst her poor 
 
 At Eisenach, she came upon a child 
 
 Outcast of all, because a loathly plague 
 
 Of leprosy possessed him, so that none 
 
 Would touch him. Straight she took him in her arms, 
 
 Moved by a holy pity, and up the steep 
 
 Carried him to her castle, while the throng 
 
 Of courtiers shrank from her, and in her bed 
 
 Laid him, and tended him with saintly love, 
 
 Despite the old Queen's anger, all unmoved. 
 
 And when her lord returned, and they would tell him 
 
 What they had seen, he hurried to the place, 
 
 Half in disgust, and snatched the coverlet 
 
 Aside ; and, lo ! no leper child was there,
 
 6^. Elizabeth of Htingary. 173 
 
 Only the childish radiant form which lay 
 Within the manger once at Bethlehem ; 
 And as they gazed the lovely vision smiled 
 And faded, and was gone. 
 
 Again, one day, 
 When to her work she issued forth alone 
 In winter down the snows, and in her robe, 
 To feed the hungry, doles of meat and bread. 
 Upon the frozen path she chanced to meet 
 Her husband, and in jest he greeted her. 
 ' What dost thou here, my Elsbeih, and what store 
 Lies hid within thy cloak ? ' Then, with a blush 
 Of modesty divine, which lit her face 
 With double beauty, she drew close her robe. 
 Lest he should see. But he, with frolic mirth 
 Persisting, drew it back, and in the fold 
 He seemed to see, amid those wintry snows, 
 Celestial roses red and white, which breathed 
 A fragrance not of earth ; and when he sought
 
 174 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 To clasp her to his breast, lo ! from her eyes 
 An awful radiance shone, too bright for earth ; 
 And, bidding her go forward on her way, 
 One heavenly bloom he took, and next his heart 
 He laid it, and, with head declined, and slow, 
 And pondering much, climbed to their royal home. 
 
 In such good works she spent her saintly life. 
 
 When famine vexed the people, and her lord 
 
 Was with his liege far off, she opened wide 
 
 The royal granaries to save, unasked. 
 
 Those starving lives ; and when the pestilence, 
 
 A dread familiar following in its train, 
 
 Seized them, her hand it was that smoothed the bed 
 
 Of sickness, rearing costly hospices 
 
 For all, but chiefly for the helpless lives 
 
 Of children. When she walked among the throng, 
 
 A tall young queenly figure breathing grace, 
 
 The little ones would cling to her and lisp
 
 S. Elizabeth of Hungary. 175 
 
 The sacred name of mother ; and she stooped 
 And cherished them, speaking with homely words 
 Of comfort, and for them she sold her robes, 
 Her gems, and all the precious things she loved, 
 Nay, even the jewels of the State. And he 
 Returning, when they came and made complaint 
 Of all she lavished, with a smile would say, 
 ' Nay, is my dear wife well, and are they well, 
 My children ? Ay ? Then it is well with me. 
 If she but spare my castle, it is well ; 
 Let her give alms.' And she, with all her brood, 
 Came forth and flung her on his breast, and kissed 
 Her love, and welcomed him with tender words — 
 ' See, I have given the Lord what is His own. 
 And He preserves us these.' 
 
 Thus sped their wedded lives, till the sad year 
 When, the third time, the armies of the Cross 
 Sailed forth to fight the Crescent. At their head
 
 176 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 The Kaiser went, leading the princely throng, 
 And Lewis with them. And the brave man feared 
 One thing alone, to see his sorrowing wife 
 Blanch at the news. Therefore the Cross he took 
 Not on his breast he bore, but carried it 
 Hid safe from prying eyes, because he dared not 
 Witness her pain. But one fair summer eve, 
 As they together sate within her bower, 
 Asking of him an alms for some good end, 
 Which he in jest denied, she with blithe heart 
 Snatched his purse from him, and beheld within 
 The Cross, and straight, knowing what thing it was. 
 Swooned at his feet ; and when her life returned. 
 Weeping, she said, * Dear husband, stay with me 
 If God so will ;' and he, dissolved in tears : 
 * Dear wife, I dare not; I am vowed to Heaven.' 
 Then she : ' God's will be done.' And so he went ; 
 And she a two days' journey fared with him 
 Ere she could say ' Farewell,' nor saw her eyes
 
 .S. Elizabeth of Httngary. 177 
 
 Her love again on earth ; for when he reached 
 The far Calabrian shore, some swift disease 
 Seized him, and to the nobles round his bed 
 Commending his loved wife and children dear, 
 Within the Patriarch's arms the Landgrave died. 
 
 And she, when now the news of her lost love 
 Came to her, swooned away, and lay for dead 
 Long time, and at the last, a broken heart, 
 Tending her infant brood, she bore to live ; ' 
 But when her shield, her stay, her strong support 
 Was taken from her, then she 'gan to prove 
 The vile despite they know who find the world, 
 The ungrateful world, scorning their feebleness. 
 From her proud castle home they drove her forth, 
 Her and her children, and, amid the snows 
 Of winter, down the rocky steep they went, 
 A sad procession. In her arms the Queen 
 Folded her suckling child, born when his sire 
 
 N
 
 178 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Was dying far away, and with her went 
 Three faithful ladies, bearing each a child, 
 Seeking some hind's poor hut ; and as they went 
 Down the rough slippery way, her weary feet 
 Stumbling, upon the ground she lay, and then 
 A thing in shape of woman, whom her hand 
 Tended through sickness, mocked her as she fell. 
 Yet not the less her sweet and patient spirit 
 Was all unmoved to wrath ; and, having found 
 Some humble shelter, day by day she wrought 
 At spinning for her children, whom her skill 
 Furnished with food and clothing, till the knights 
 From the Crusade returning, set her boy 
 Upon his father's throne, and gave to her 
 Marbourg for dower, where with her girls she dwelt 
 Long unmolested. 
 
 But a pitiless man, 
 Conrad the priest, within whose bigot soul 
 Pity nor mercy dwelt ; whether to make
 
 6". Elizabeth of Hiingaiy. r 79 
 
 Her life one penance, that he might increase 
 His baleful power o'er that pure heart, or else 
 Wishing to set her name among the saints, 
 And his the honour, laid upon her soul 
 Penance too hard to bear. He took from her 
 Her children one by one, lest too much love 
 Might hinder her from Heaven. He took from her 
 The one delight of giving, which grows strong 
 With waning hfe ; and when she fain would take 
 The vows of San Francesco, and would beg 
 Her bread throughout the world, this too forbade ; 
 And when, with clothing torn and things of shreds, 
 She, who was once a queen, through her own town 
 Wandered, the children of her loving care 
 Mocked her as one demented. Yet she bore 
 All this and worse, meek and without complaint, 
 Until the pious seemed to see once more 
 The lowly Clara and revered a saint.
 
 1 8o A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Yet worse than all her unearned penances, 
 
 The tooth of slander would invade her peace ; 
 
 And she, the saintly lady whose white life 
 
 Was all of Heaven, leaving within the grave 
 
 All earthly love, knew as a worldling might 
 
 The breath of shame — she whose fair delicate flesh 
 
 Was scarred with lashes which the fanatic rage 
 
 Of the dark bigot wreaked on her. And yet 
 
 Her cup of suffering was not full ; but last 
 
 The dark priest took from her the faithful hearts 
 
 Who, knowing her in honour, were content 
 
 To cleave to her disgrace, and in their stead 
 
 Sent two base creatures, who should make her drain 
 
 Dishonour to the dregs, forbidding her 
 
 The alms she loved, or that which was indeed 
 
 Her second nature — her unsparing work 
 
 Among the poor and sick. No marvel then 
 
 That, ere her morning broadened into noon.
 
 S. Elizabeth of Hungary. 1 8 1 
 
 Her great compassion, languishing and pent 
 
 Like an undying fire within her soul, 
 
 Burned with a quenchless longing, and consumed 
 
 Her tender youth, which all her pains and stripes. 
 
 The scourge of slander, nay, her dead love's loss, 
 
 Slew not ; or that her life, laid on a bed 
 
 Of suffering, day by day waned low and lower, 
 
 Nor ever again revived, but sank at last 
 
 In that thick darkness which we christen Death. 
 
 And when upon her bed she came to die, 
 Being but four and twenty summers old. 
 When she had lain twelve days or more, they heard 
 Who tended her, a sweet and soaring strain 
 - Sound from her lips, as to the wall she turned 
 Her wasted face. All her last day on earth 
 She strove in prayer, till by the mystic food 
 Her listening ear, enfranchised, seemed to hear 
 Voices of angels, and the Mother of God
 
 1 82 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 In converse with her, and the sound of hymns 
 
 Sweeter than any sounds of earth ; and last, 
 
 When now her strength had failed, one word she spake 
 
 ' Silence ! ' — no more, as one who fain would hear 
 
 The heavenly quires ; and then she made response, 
 
 ' Contempsi regnum mundi Domine.' 
 
 And then the voices ceased, and she with them 
 
 Closed her pure saintly life. 
 
 And round her bed 
 The people gathered, mourning, bathed in tears. 
 Four days she lay unburied in the midst, 
 While the crowd knelt and kissed. 
 
 And on the site 
 Of her poor home they reared the stately Church 
 Of S. Elizabeth, and her shrine within, 
 Built high on steps worn hollow by the knees 
 Of countless pilgrims ; till the gathering storm 
 Oi revolution burst, and violated 
 Those sacred walls, and one of her own blood.
 
 6". Elizabeth of H^mgavy, i8^ 
 
 a 
 
 The Landgrave Philip, came with reckless hand 
 And razed the shrine, and scattered far and wide 
 The relics of the saint ; and no man knows 
 Their resting-place, but her soul rests with God." 
 
 Thus he ; and then, with graver thought and voice, 
 
 My soul within me burst in words and cried, 
 
 " ' Be good, be good ! ' — this is the word that Heaven 
 
 Proclaims, not 'happy;' or if happiness 
 
 Come, 'tis despite the pain the careless world 
 
 Wreaks upon finer souls. Here there is strife, 
 
 Injustice, suffering, and the cruel sense 
 
 Of failure, when the victor's palm, indeed, 
 
 Is theirs to claim. Death comes and takes our lives 
 
 With half our work undone, and Faith itself 
 
 Breeds its own errors and misguides the soul, 
 
 And all our happiness seems sunk in night, 
 
 Till the Great Dawn arising brings with it 
 
 New heavens and new earth."
 
 184 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Then a form meek 
 And pitiful, in manhood's early prime, 
 With mild soft eyes, who wore the pilgrim's garb. 
 The scallop in his hat, the staff, the scrip, 
 The wallet, and yet seemed a noble still 
 For all his poverty ; and my guide said — 
 
 " In Languedoc, of noble parents came, 
 
 When thirteen centuries were passed from Christ, 
 
 A youth, who bore upon his breast from birth, 
 
 Symbol of dedication to the Faith, 
 
 A tiny cross. Him with all pious care 
 
 His mother. Libera, for works of good 
 
 And sanctity, through all his glowing youth,
 
 S. Rock 185 
 
 Trained year by year ; and on his soul he bore 
 The cross, as on his breast, and gave his Ufe, 
 His heart, his all, to Heaven. 
 
 But not with him 
 The pale ascetic fervours of the cell, 
 Nor cloistered virtues lived apart from men, 
 Where the rapt soul communes alone with God, 
 Prevailed ; but life Uved as his Master's erst, 
 Among the poor and weak, healing the sick, 
 And filled with pity for the fallen lives 
 Of sinners, raising them to light and hope — 
 Life spending happy, and laborious days. 
 Each bringing something of accomplished good. 
 And sinking at its close in well-earned rest ; — • 
 'Twas this blest lot he prized. 
 
 Thus, all his youth 
 He lived in innocence. But ere he reached 
 The gate of early manhood. Death, which comes 
 To rich and poor, took from him at a blow
 
 1 86 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 His father's guiding hand, his mother's prayers, 
 And he, an orphan, rich in lands and gold, 
 Was left to work what work was his, alone. 
 
 Then with no pause of doubt, knowing the words 
 Of his dear Master, and remembering well 
 His answer to the youth who, rich as he, 
 Would fain obey, straightway he gathered all 
 His wealth, and of it to the poor and weak 
 Gave part in alms, and of the rest he reared 
 Hospices for the sick, wherein the skill 
 Of wise physicians, working under Heaven, 
 Might heal them ; and he donned a pilgrim's garb, 
 And then on foot, obscure, like any hind, 
 Painful with staff and wallet toiled to Rome. 
 
 But when his feet had left the Alpine snows. 
 Crossing the Lombard plain, one eve, he climbed. 
 Through groves of oak, to where, its slender towers
 
 S. Roch. 187 
 
 Dark on the twilight glow, throbbing with noise 
 
 Of loud-tongued waters hurrying to the plain, 
 
 By Orvieto's city and sacred shrine, 
 
 Acquapendente hung. But as he came, 
 
 The nameless dread of some invisible ill. 
 
 The unguarded city gates, the tolling knells, 
 
 The sick and dying cumbering the ways 
 
 With none to aid, the still, deserted streets. 
 
 The sullen silence echoing cries of pain 
 
 From the blind, close-shut dwellings, smote on him 
 
 With a strange pity, and he hastened on. 
 
 And when he asked of one who fled, what ill 
 
 Befell the town, " The plague ! " he cried, " the plague ! 
 
 Fly too, or thou art doomed." But he who heard, 
 
 Without a moment's doubt, filled with great ruth 
 
 And eagerness, pressed onward, as a player 
 
 Who knows and loves his part, and round his feet 
 
 Dread signs of death and suffering everywhere 
 
 Grew thicker, till at length he gained the gate
 
 1^8 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of the great hospice, thronged from floor to roof 
 With hopeless pain. Then, in an ecstasy, 
 He entered, and besought that he might serve ; 
 And they consenting, he, with fervent prayer 
 And great compassion, and the finer skill 
 Which Faith can breed, and comfortable words, 
 And signing with the Cross where'er he came, 
 Heartened those helpless sufferers in such sort 
 That many, whom now the instant might of Death 
 Held in its grasp, escaped ; and presently, 
 The fierce infection waning, all the land 
 Revered the youth, so young, so beautiful, 
 So fearless and devoted, and they grew 
 To hold him more than man, till to their thought 
 He showed as 'twere an angel sent from Heaven 
 To bid them live. 
 
 Thence fared he through the land 
 Of the Romagna. There by field and town 
 Was pestilence, and he was in the midst,
 
 ^. Roch. 189 
 
 Dauntless amid the harm, tending the sick, 
 Himself unscathed. And thence to Rome herself, 
 Where too was plague; there three long years he wrought, 
 'Mid scenes of death and pain, tending the sick. 
 Always unscathed, and wheresoe'er he went 
 A blessing went with him upon his work. 
 
 Yet one incessant prayer his faithful lips 
 Would breathe to Heaven, if only he might earn 
 The martyr's palm : but never at all there came 
 An answer to his prayer, nor could he die, 
 Nor be at rest, for God had need of him. 
 
 Thus, year by year, from town to suffering town 
 He journeyed, still unscathed, rapt by good works 
 Of mercy. At the last his footsteps came 
 To fair Piacenza, where a dreadful ill 
 Consumed the people. There long time he served. 
 Tending the sick. There, too, a blessing came
 
 I go A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Upon his work, till one sad night he sank, 
 O'ercome by toil and watching, on the ground ; 
 And when he woke, a burning fever raged 
 Through every vein, and on his breast, behold, 
 A horrible tumour. Then, because his pain 
 Had grown too great for silence, and he feared 
 To wake the suffering sleepers, he crawled forth 
 And laid him down to die ; and when the guard, 
 Fearing the plague, constrained him, slowly crept, 
 Tottering in pain, upon his pilgrim's staff, 
 Beyond the city gates, to a thick wood 
 Where no man came, and there prepared to die. 
 
 But not yet came his Fate, for some poor hind 
 
 Succoured him, and would dress his wound and bring 
 
 His daily food, or, as some tell, there came 
 
 A bright angelic form to comfort him, 
 
 And he was healed ; and when his strength returned, 
 
 Exulting in his soul that he was found
 
 S. Roch. 191 
 
 Worthy to sufifer for his Lord, and filled 
 With holy pride, he rose and took his way 
 Across the swelling Apennines, the plains, 
 The Alpine snows, clad in his pilgrim's garb, 
 A worn and weary man, bent by long toil 
 And wan from mortal sickness, till he gained 
 His own fair native land ; and to a town 
 Which was his own, and all the country folk 
 His vassals born, he came, so changed and bent 
 By long and suffering years, no living eye 
 Knew him, and 'midst the people who were his 
 The pilgrim walked unknown who was their lord. 
 
 And he, because he scorned to take again 
 
 His lordly rank, but rather chose to be 
 
 In great humility and serve unknown 
 
 The suffering race of men, would speak no word 
 
 Of recognition, but, a stranger still. 
 
 Passed through the country side, nor claimed his own,
 
 T92 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Loving the saintly poverty which brought 
 His soul to God, and set him free to move 
 Lowly amongst the lowly, doing good. 
 
 Then, since great strifes and bitter jealousies 
 
 Vexed all the country side, the folk who deemed 
 
 His pilgrim's robe no other than a cloak 
 
 To hide the traitor, haled him to the judge, 
 
 His father's brother. No defensive word 
 
 He spoke, nor knew his kinsman, whom he doomed 
 
 To lifelong prison. And the pilgrim, glad 
 
 Of salutary pain, and holding all 
 
 Was of God's will — the judge's ignorance 
 
 Of his own blood, and all his punishment — - 
 
 Kept silence till the end, and to his cell 
 
 And chains went silently, who for a word 
 
 Had been set free with honour. There he pined. 
 
 In a close dungeon pent, long weary years, 
 
 Leaving his fate to Heaven.
 
 .S". RocJi. 193 
 
 And when his hour 
 Was come, the jailor, taking to his cell 
 His bread and water, found the prisoner lie 
 Dead on his pallet, and around his head 
 And from his wasted face a glory shone 
 Which lit the gloom, and by his side a scroll. 
 Writ by what hand none knew : " Whoever dreads 
 The pestilence that stalketh through the night 
 Shall seek the intercession of the saint 
 Who lies here dead — Roch, Lord of Languedoc." 
 
 Then in a moment, looking on the face 
 Of the worn pilgrim-prisoner dead and cold, 
 They knew again the ardent, generous youth 
 Who, gay with robes of price and gems and gold, 
 In the first bloom of manhood, beamed on them 
 And gave up all for Heaven, and tender ruth 
 For dim afflicted lives whom the hard fate 
 Of hopeless sickness took. And so their eyes 
 
 o
 
 194 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Were opened;, and the judge, his kinsman, wept 
 His hapless fate, stricken with a deep remorse 
 For what had been ; and, touched with vain regret, 
 His vassals laid him in a costly tomb 
 With tears and lamentations ; and they thought 
 That from the sacred relics of the dead, 
 As when he lived, there went a virtue forth 
 In plague and sickness, so that still he seemed 
 To heal them. 
 
 And when now a century passed; 
 The strong sons of the Mistress of the seas, 
 Who languished oft beneath the dreadful scourge 
 The seething Orient bredj sailed out and snatched 
 His sacred dustj and forth, with pious care 
 And honour, all the fairy city came 
 To meet them ; and above him, presently. 
 They reared a church in honour of the saint, 
 San Rocco, and a pitiful Brotherhood, 
 Named by his name, to aid the poor and sick,
 
 5. Rock 195 
 
 Wherein the proudest noble joyed to serve — 
 The Scuola di San Rocco, — and a house 
 Stately as any which the enchanted sea 
 Exhales in dreaming Venice. There the skill 
 Of Tintoretto and his scholars limned 
 On wall and ceiling stories of our Lord, 
 His Death, and his Ascension to the skies, 
 With lavish hand, so that it glows to-day 
 A miracle of Art, which fitly frames 
 A statue of the saint ; and there he stands, 
 As stands his soul, among the heavenly host, 
 In honour nowj who died a prisoner here."
 
 196 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Next 'twas a woman, bearing in her hand 
 A Uly. Round her maiden limbs she drew 
 The habit of S. Dominic. Her worn face 
 Bore anxious traces still, as that of one 
 Whom, loving best the cloister, the sad world 
 Calls to its service and denies to Heaven ; 
 And I bethought me of a cloudless noon 
 By Fonte Branda, 'mid the merry talk 
 Of thirsty peasants, while the churches towered 
 High on the rocky spurs, and her low home 
 Showed like a sacred shrine, W'here the saint once 
 Doubted herself, not God. And thus the voice : 
 
 " In fair Siena, on the Tuscan hills,
 
 5. Catharine of Siena. i97 
 
 Giacomo Benincasa lived and died 
 
 Five centuries ago. To him were born, 
 
 And his wife Lapa, many stalwart sons 
 
 And fair-grown daughters. One, their dearest child. 
 
 Was Catharine, latest born and best beloved, 
 
 So fair, so blithe, so sweet in infancy. 
 
 The neighbours named her name Euphrosyne. 
 
 But as she grew, no longer the young maid 
 
 Showed as her comrades, but the world unseen 
 
 Made grave her gaze and checked the innocent flow 
 
 Of girlish laughter, and the pictured tales 
 
 Of saintly lives within the incensed gloom 
 
 Of the great cliurches drew her childish feet 
 
 \Vith a strange charm. For one day, as she came. 
 
 Being but seven summers in the world. 
 
 She and her brother, from some natal feast, 
 
 They sate at sunset on the rocky hill 
 
 By Fonte Branda, and as Catharine gazed
 
 198 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 On the tall campanile of the church 
 Above her, lo ! beyond the slender shaft, 
 The heavens stood open, and her wondering gaze 
 Saw our dear Lord in glory, and the saints 
 Around Him. As she looked upon the sight 
 In ecstasy, her eyes grew fixed, and she 
 Gazed on, unconscious that her brother's voice 
 Called to unheeding ears ; and when he turned 
 And drew her from her place, she saw no more 
 The opened heavens, and, sobbing from her heart. 
 Sank on the ground with bitter childish tears. 
 
 Nor ever from her thought the wondrous dream 
 Of that blest evening faded. More and more 
 Silent she grew, and grave, and wandered forth 
 In solitude, if haply once again 
 That glorious vision took her longing eyes; 
 But never more it came. But she, who read 
 The tale of Catharine and the sponsal ring
 
 kS". Cat ha r me of Siena. 199 
 
 Which bound her to the Lord, prayed if perchance 
 
 She also might be His ; and when she came 
 
 To her full age, being sweet and beautiful, 
 
 Her parents, loving not her penances. 
 
 Her fasts, her vigils, her ascetic dreams. 
 
 Would give their girl in marriage ; but her soul. 
 
 Fixed on that heavenly bridal, took no thought 
 
 For earthly love, and still her days were spent 
 
 In solitary prayer. Then, that hard toil 
 
 Might check her wandering dreams, her parents laid 
 
 Hard household tasks upon her, loading her 
 
 \Vith mean and weary toils, and all the house 
 
 Mocked her and jeered ; but in her heart she kept 
 
 This comfort — ' Were not, then, the blessed saints 
 
 Mocked even as I, and shall I be ashamed 
 
 To bear as they did ? ' To her humble tasks 
 
 She bent her unrepining ; food and rest 
 
 Almost she took not, yielding place to prayer ; 
 
 And, lest her fairness might allure the eyes
 
 200 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of youthful lovers, from her shapely head 
 
 Sheared the luxuriant treasure of her hair, 
 
 To lay before the altar, offering all 
 
 Her youth, her life to Heaven. Thus she lived 
 
 A recluse self-ordained ; but still her sire 
 
 Urged her to wed, till one day, to her cell 
 
 Chancing to come, it seemed a snow-white dove 
 
 Hovered above her as she knelt, and then 
 
 The good man, fearing lest his will withstood 
 
 The Spirit which thus visibly guided her. 
 
 Entreated her no more, leaving her free 
 
 To do Heaven's will. And to the holy house 
 
 Of Dominic she went, and there she sought 
 
 To serve, a penitent, but never yet 
 
 Made full profession, though she found no less 
 
 A penance for herself On a bare board 
 
 She lay, a log her pillow, and no word 
 
 For three long years she spake ; but from her cell 
 
 High in her father's roof, with earliest dawn,
 
 5. Catharine of Siena. 201 
 
 And when the darkening ways grew dim with night, 
 Daily she dimbed the steep where the tall Church 
 Of San Domenico towered, by whose thin shaft 
 She saw Heaven opened once, and there she knelt 
 Before the altar rapt in ecstasy. 
 
 But not yet found she peace or rest, for still 
 The Enemy of Man spread for her snares 
 To take her fast. Thoughts sent he to her soul 
 Like fiery darts, thoughts which she deemed of sin, 
 Such as assailed the blessed Anthony. 
 Or was it, surely, that to this white life 
 The dreams of blameless love, and hearth and home, 
 And the soft hands of children at the breast, 
 Seemed perilous for ill ? But when they came, 
 She prayed anew for help, she took not food, 
 She scourged herself before the altar- place 
 Till her blood flowed. And when she called for ai.l 
 At midnij;ht in the lonely church, she seemed
 
 202 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 To see a visible Presence walk with her, 
 
 Speak to her words of sweetness, comfort her 
 
 As One alone might comfort, flood her soul 
 
 With faith, till, as she walked, the darkling aisles 
 
 Glowed with warm light, and the chill pavement smiled 
 
 Decked with sweet summer flowers ; and evermore 
 
 The gracious accents of a voice Divine, 
 
 Filling her ears, made precious melody, 
 
 Waking the ghostly solitude with sound, 
 
 And blessed faces bent, and blest hands swept 
 
 Celestial lyres unseen. And then sometimes 
 
 They came not, nor the Presence, and her soul 
 
 Fainted within her, lest those heavenly dreams 
 
 Were nought but snares, unreal fantasies 
 
 Sent of the enemy to take her soul — 
 
 The dreams which bind the saintly dreamer fast 
 
 (Like siren voices sounding o'er the sea. 
 
 Which whoso heard, nor fled nor stopped his ears, 
 
 Lay bound for ever and lost) 3 nor ever again
 
 S. Catharine of Siena. 203 
 
 The healthful daily load of duty done 
 Allures, nor honest toil, who pines in chains 
 Self-forged, a prisoner to his brooding thought. 
 
 And so she turned from penance and from fast 
 
 And blessed contemplation to the tasks 
 
 Of Christian duty. To the poor and weak 
 
 She lived a servant. One poor wretch there was, 
 
 Sick of a hopeless ill. For her she bore 
 
 Through wintry nights, on her bent back, the load 
 
 Of fuel for her fire. Another, white 
 
 With leprosy, she succoured where she lay 
 
 Houseless without the walls. In her own bed 
 
 She laid and tended her, till on her hands 
 
 The hopeless evil showed. Yet nought she earned 
 
 Of gratitude, and when the leper died. 
 
 She only, and none other, durst prepare 
 
 Her corpse for burial ; and, behold, her hurt 
 
 Was cleansed from that same hour ! And on a day
 
 204 A Vision of Saiitfs. 
 
 When from the town she went on some soft task 
 Of mercy, through the city gates there came 
 A sad procession ; for a robber went 
 Forth to his shameful doom, rending the air 
 With blasphemies and wild despairing cries, 
 While in his wake the angry people surged 
 With curses ; and her tender saintly heart 
 O'erflowed with pity, and she took her place 
 Beside him, speaking with such gracious words 
 That his hard heart was melted, and confessed 
 His heinous sin and its just punishment. 
 And while she knelt in prayer, forgetting all, 
 Lo ! the poor penitent, * like a gentle lamb,' 
 Went tranquil to his death, and she who saw, 
 Calling him ' her sweet brother,' laid his head 
 Upon the block ; and when the keen axe fell. 
 She sate, his severed head within her hands, 
 All bathed in precious blood, while her rapt eyes 
 Saw the saved soul borne upward into heaven.
 
 .S". Catharine of Siena. 205 
 
 In such fair works of love the virgin saint 
 
 Spent her pure days, till through the land her fame 
 
 Spread far and wide ; and when the Florentines 
 
 Grew rebels to the Church, the Pontiff named her 
 
 Arbitress of the strife, confiding to her 
 
 The terms of peace. But when she made her way 
 
 To Florence, straight a tumult, and she hid, 
 
 Learning too soon how base the ingrate throng, 
 
 Within the cloister. 'Twas her voice which called 
 
 The Holy Father home, her woman's voice — 
 
 None other. Weighty matters of the State 
 
 Were hers to adjudge, untrammelled, as she would \ 
 
 So that the visionary girl of yore 
 
 Rose to the stately woman, ruling well, 
 
 As might a Queen, in honour and fame of men. 
 
 But in the midst of all the pomp, the glare 
 
 Of rank and power, still would her yearning gaze
 
 2o6 ' A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Steal backward to the days, now long ago, 
 
 When painfully at midnight up the steep 
 
 Her feet would climb, and in the towering church 
 
 Pour Out her innocent soul, and feel the breath 
 
 Of Love Divine upon her cheek, and walk 
 
 Encompassed round with Heaven and the fair dreams 
 
 Which could defy the morning and waxed strong 
 
 Even in the blaze of noon ; and she would prize 
 
 The contemplative life, the silent thought. 
 
 Which there she knew, above the clamorous din 
 
 And turmoil of the world, the hopes, the fears, 
 
 The slanderous tooth of secret enmity, 
 
 The envy of false friends. And so deep care, 
 
 Chafing the thin-worn vesture of her life, 
 
 Laid her at last upon her bed, and broke, 
 
 Before her footsteps trod life's middle way. 
 
 The silver cord, and loosed her soul to Heaven, 
 
 But as she lay upon her bed and knew
 
 5*. Catharine of Siena. 207 
 
 Her end drew near, one word she spoke alone-^ 
 * Nay, Lord, 'twas not vainglory, as they say, 
 That drew me, but Thine honour, and Thine alone ; 
 And thou, Lord, knowest this it was, not pride.' 
 And so she passed away." 
 
 But when his voice 
 Was silent, all my soul broke forth in words 
 Of Love which conquered Doubt. 
 
 " Dear spotless soul, 
 Still through thy house men go, and wondering mark 
 Thy place of prayer, thy chamber, and thy cell. 
 Here 'twas the Lord appeared, and gave to thee 
 His sacred heart. Here, in this very spot. 
 Thou clothedst Him as He sate in rags and seemed 
 A beggar. All the house is filled with thee 
 And the white sim.ple story of thy life ; 
 Still, far above, the high church on the hill
 
 2o8 A Visio7i of Saints. 
 
 Towers where, in prayer, thou seemedst to walk wrai)t 
 
 round 
 l5y an ineffable Presence ; thy low roof 
 Is grown as 'twere a shrine, where priest and nun 
 And visionary girls from age to age 
 Throng and repeat the self-same prayers, thyself 
 Didst offer year by year. 
 
 Comes there no end 
 Of yearning for our race on earth, nor stay 
 Of penance, nor unmingled happiness 
 Till Heaven is gained ? or in high Heaven itself 
 Can fancy image, or can faith sustain, 
 No shadow, nor satiety of joy? 
 I cannot tell, I know not, but I know 
 'Tis not for happiness we are, but God."
 
 George Herbert. 209 
 
 And then I saw a reverend figure come, 
 
 ^Valking with meditative steps and slow, 
 
 Who listened as the blest Cecilia erst 
 
 To high celestial music, else unheard ; 
 
 And straight I knew the Priest, from whose full heart 
 
 AVelled a clear spring of quaint and sacred song. 
 
 And seemed again to tread the dewy meads 
 
 Of Sarum, and to see the thin spire pierce 
 
 The sunset skies, as I by Bemerton 
 
 Strayed rapt in thought. And as we passed, my guide 
 
 '■'• Not of one Church, or age, or race alone 
 The saints are born, nor of one clime they come, 
 But 'mid the grass-green English landscapes dwell 
 
 p
 
 2IO A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Pure saintly souls, as by the slender towers 
 
 Of olive-grey Assisi, or white shrines 
 
 Washed by the purple sea. There walked on earth 
 
 The saint thou seest, high of birth and name, 
 
 Yet lowly as his Lord, when once he gave 
 
 His life to Him, and with each day that dawned 
 
 Renewed his saintly vows, and lived content 
 
 For the brief years Heaven would. 
 
 Not always turned 
 His soul to Heaven ; the splendours of the Court 
 Dazzled his youth, and the fair boundless dreams 
 Of youthful hope. For he, by name and blood 
 A noble, 'neath our Abbey's reverend shade, 
 Amid the cloistered shades of Westminster, 
 Drank with deep draughts the lore of Greece and Rome, 
 And then within the time-worn Halls which watch 
 The slow-paced Cam; and there his studious eyes 
 Kept nightly vigil, and his sweet shy Muse 
 Tuned her clear voice for Heaven, a stainless youth
 
 George Herbe^'t. 2 f i 
 
 Who to his loved and gracious mother vowed 
 The firstlings of his song. For him the flow 
 Of sweet concordant descants soothed his soul 
 Till Heaven stood open. But not yet his thought 
 Turned to the Altar, since in high respect 
 And favour of his king, he stayed to take 
 AVhat high advancement his unwearied thirst 
 For knowledge, and his gay and polished wit, 
 Wielding the tongues of France and Spain, and thine, 
 Great Dante, and his courtly presence clad 
 In robes of price, might offer. Then at length. 
 When now his growing soul grew sick of Courts, 
 Yearning for Heaven, the hand of Death removed 
 His potent friends, and last, the king himself; 
 And one by one the fetters broke which bound 
 His soul to earth, and soon he turned to hear 
 His mother's pleading words ; and, stronger still. 
 The voice within which called him set him free — 
 Free from himself and wholly vowed to God.
 
 2 12 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Then, when the courtiers scoffed at him and hade liim 
 
 Choose hun some nobler Hfe and worthier, 
 
 Thus made he answer : ' Though the sacred name 
 
 Of priest be now despised, yet will I strive 
 
 To do it honour. All my little store 
 
 Of learning cheerful will I yield to Him 
 
 Who gave it, grieving sore I yield Him naught 
 
 Who made me His. Oh, let me strive to be 
 
 Likened to Him, and make Humility 
 
 Lovely in all men's eyes, following still 
 
 My merciful meek King.' 
 
 So he became 
 A servant of the Altar, for awhile 
 A deacon only, fearing yet to take 
 The priestly office. At the last, when now 
 His struggling years had reached life's midmost way, 
 Whence turn our faces homewards, weak in frame 
 Though strong in spirit, 'mid the golden meads
 
 George Herbert. 2 r 3 
 
 He ministered a priest, where the gray spire 
 Of Sarum points to Heaven, and consecrates 
 The rich low vale with grace. There he should see 
 Three brief and saintly years before the end. 
 
 There from him all his courtly robes, his silks, 
 
 His sword, he put away, and in the garb 
 
 Of priesthood did endue himself, and vow 
 
 His contrite soul to Heaven. Within his church, 
 
 With all doors closed, he passed, as the law bade. 
 
 To take full seisin, and, their pastor now. 
 
 To toll, with his own hand, the bell which called 
 
 The faithful. Then because he came not back 
 
 After long hours, they sought him, and, behold, 
 
 Through the low casement looking, saw the saint 
 
 Prostrate before the altar, rapt in prayer 
 
 For strength to do God's work ; and there he framed 
 
 His rule of life, and vowed to keep it stilL
 
 214 -^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 Even so the good Priest lived his tranquil days, 
 
 His saintly helpmeet working with him still 
 
 In alms and prayer. Daily the orisons 
 
 Of those pure souls, and theirs who dwelt with them, 
 
 Three orphaned girls, rose morn and eve to Heaven, 
 
 Pollowing the sober uses of their Church, 
 
 Matins and vespers. All the country side 
 
 Loved that white life, and knelt with reverent hearts 
 
 Whene'er within the little oratory 
 
 The daily Liturgies were sung. The hind 
 
 Paused at his task when o'er the neighbouring leas, 
 
 Summer and winter, thrilled the solemn bell 
 
 That called the saint to prayer, and oftentimes. 
 
 Touched by some new devouter impulse, left 
 
 The brooding oxen at the plough, and knelt 
 
 Awhile within the reverend walls, and took 
 
 The good man's blessing, and returned with strength 
 
 Fresh braced for toil. Thus he, within a realm
 
 George Herbert. 21 
 
 Whereon the coming shadow of strife and blood, 
 The fanatic's guile and hate, the atheist's sneer, 
 Brooded already, and the darkling stain 
 Of worldly ease, and sloth, and sensual sin, 
 Renewed the pure devotion of a Church 
 Stripped of its Pagan gauds and robed for Heaven. 
 
 Ah i saintly life, for which the round of praise 
 
 And duty was enough, far from the din 
 
 And noise of Courts ; for which to praise the Lord 
 
 And feed His helpless poor sufficed to fill 
 
 Thy days with blessedness ! I hear thee yet 
 
 Bid the poor wife who stammered forth her need 
 
 Be of good cheer, nor fear to tell thee all. 
 
 I see thee, clad in courtly silks erewhile, 
 
 Stoop when thy neighbour's wagon, with its load 
 
 Of humble produce, on the rugged way 
 
 To Sarum fell, raise him, and from the mire 
 
 Replace his burden with long toil, and then.
 
 2i6 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Giving an alms and bidding him take heed, 
 Even as he loved his soul, to spare his beast, 
 Pace half-unconscious the astonished street 
 Of the prim city, miry, unashamed. 
 
 But clearer yet I see thee, when the strain 
 Of unheard rhythms filled thy happy ears, 
 Wander from field to field ; and on the road 
 To the great Minster, when thy soul had need 
 Of new refreshment, and upon thy way. 
 Hoarding faint echoes of a voice Divine, 
 Glow into fervent verse, and stone by stone 
 Build up thy ' Temple ;' and anon sit rapt, 
 Leaving thy humbler liturgies awhile, 
 Within the heaven-lcissed fane the centuries 
 Mellow, and listen to the soaring chant 
 Sung daily still, the jubilant anthem's voice 
 Of praise, the firstborn precious harmonies 
 Of England's sacred song; the o'ermastering joy
 
 George Herbert. 2 1 7 
 
 Of the full organ-music glooming deep 
 From aisle to aisle, or caught from height to height, 
 Till lost at last as at Heaven's gate, and thou 
 And thy rapt soul floated with it to joy. 
 
 Ah ! blessed blameless years, to which too soon 
 
 Stern Nature set her limit. Thy weak frame 
 
 Three little years of too great happiness 
 
 Strained first, then wore out quite ; thy failing strength 
 
 First to the Minster might not bear thee more 
 
 To foretaste Heaven. Then to thy lowly church 
 
 No more thy footsteps fared. Thy oratory 
 
 Thou still didst keep ; and each succeeding day. 
 
 Matins and vespers, would thy feeble voice 
 
 Give praise as thou wert wont, nor would thy soul 
 
 Deny, while still thy body could, her due 
 
 Of worship to the Lord who succoured thee, 
 
 Lauding Him always. Last, when now 'twas grown 
 
 Too weak to serve, a faithful priest and friend.
 
 2 1 8 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Said the loved prayers, while thou with thankful heart 
 Listenedst and wert content, and on thy lips 
 Hovered a saintly smile ! 
 
 Now when his life 
 Flowed nearer to its sea, there came a priest. 
 Sent from his saintly friend of youth and age, 
 Nicholas Ferrar. ' Prithee,' cried the saint, 
 ' Take to my friend this message. God is good, 
 And just in all His ways. Of His great grace 
 I do rejoice in that which pleaseth Him, 
 Ay, even to wane and die. Tell him my heart 
 Is fixed on Him, and waits the appointed change 
 With hope and patience. Sir, I pray you, give him 
 This little book, the portrait of long strife 
 Betwixt my soul and Heaven, ere yet I took 
 My Master's name, wherein I now go free. 
 See, it is called " The Temple ; " it and I 
 Are less than His least mercies. Bid him, sir, 
 Burn it, if judged unhelpful to weak souls.
 
 George Herbert. 219 
 
 I prize it not. I look back from this place 
 
 On my past life, the music that I loved, 
 
 The beauty I held dear, the pleasant talk 
 
 Of books and men, and all are but a dream 
 
 And unreturning shadow, and I know 
 
 I go, as did my sires, to make my bed 
 
 In darkness ; and I praise the Hand which gives 
 
 Such patience to me now, and brings me safe 
 
 Through Death's dark gate to Heaven.' 
 
 And he, when come 
 To his last earthly Sunday, suddenly 
 Rose in his bed, and, taking in his hand 
 His viol, once again with feeble voice 
 Sang his own hymn : 
 
 ' The Sundays of Man's life. 
 Threaded together on Time's string, 
 Make bracelets to adorn the wife 
 Of the Eternal Glorious King.
 
 2 20 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 On Sunday Heaven's gate stands ope, 
 Blessings are plentiful and ripe, 
 
 More plentiful than hope ! ' " 
 
 " More plentiful," 
 I cried, " and poured from no unfruitful horn. 
 Ay, but thy hope was great, pure saint, who thus 
 From out thy dying chamber wentest forth 
 Cheerful into the void, and didst defy 
 The Enemy, yielding thy grateful soul 
 Into His hands who gave it. Shall thy life 
 Fade from our thoughts, dear heart ? Nay, while thy clear 
 And yearning soul distils in verse that breathes 
 Fresh odours of the Heaven it loved, and decks 
 With quaint conceits thy Church, thy Faith, thy Lord, 
 As erst the kneeling kings who honoured Him 
 With frankincense and myrrli ; nay, while the spire 
 Thou lovedst, still points its finger to the skies,
 
 G cor ore Herbert. 221 
 
 And this our England keeps her sober faith — 
 
 Not of the zealot born, nor of the priest — 
 
 And men still prize the gentle life and path 
 
 Of contemplation, lit with flowers of good, 
 
 And scented sweet with praise and works of ruth 
 
 And charity. The fashion of our lives, 
 
 Our thoughts, our faiths, our Heaven may suffer change, 
 
 But this one never."
 
 o o ^ 
 
 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Next it was a man 
 With ruddy face and fair hair sprent with gray, 
 And somewhat stern of aspect, till he spoke — 
 A tall and vigorous form, a little bent 
 By too long prison years, in modest garb 
 A Puritan ; who next in time was born 
 To him whom last I saw ; differing in all, 
 In mien, in thought, in speech, yet each inspired 
 And saintly. As I looked I seemed to know 
 The wondrous peasant, who by dreaming thought. 
 Fine as the Bard's who sang of Heaven and Hell, 
 Tightened his long duress, and for our aid 
 Has left a record of the Pilgrim soul
 
 John Bunyan. 223 
 
 Faring to Heaven by rough and perilous ways, 
 Which myriads since have trod. And thus my guide : 
 
 " ' Poor and of meanest rank, and most despised,' 
 At Elstow, in the dewy, daisied fields 
 Hard by the dreaming Ouse, was born the saint 
 Thou seest, ere yet the clang of civil strife 
 Frighted our land, and 'neath that large bold will 
 Which swayed the Commonwealth, his budding life 
 Ripened to manhood. In his father's home, 
 A humble cottage, with the timbered walls 
 Of older England, grew the stalwart youth 
 Whom blameless strength and rude untempered force 
 Urged sometimes headlong, prizing overmuch 
 The sports his skill made dear ; the flying ball 
 Winged by the tireless arm ; the joyous toil 
 Of emulous comrades when the deafening peal 
 Swung from the reeling tower, and bell with bell 
 Mingled reverberant chimes ; the village green
 
 2 24 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 When from the short sweet grass the merry din 
 Of youthful voices rose, till the tired sun 
 Lengthened the shadows, and the faint young stars 
 Relit the fading skies. And oftentimes, 
 In his hot youthful haste, his careless tongue 
 Would break in reckless and impatient speech, 
 And oaths profane, till sober hearers shunned 
 The rude wild youth. And yet his life was pure 
 Of grosser sin \ the Fiends of Drink and Lust 
 Allured him not ; only his hasty youth 
 Possessed his life too much, and hurried him 
 By earthly flower-set ways and far from Heaven. 
 
 But not the less his self-accusing soul 
 Suffered for his offence. Visions by night 
 Oppressed his boyish sleep. He saw Heaven's dome 
 Aflame with fire, the boundless firmament 
 Shivered by mighty thunders ; over all 
 The loud Archangel pealing, and a throne
 
 John Bunyan. 22 
 
 Set in the East, whereon sate One whose face 
 Shone like the Morning Star. Anon the earth, 
 Rent by a terrible earthquake, sank with him 
 Into the nether hell, 'mid the dread sights 
 And sounds of doom, when suddenly there came 
 One who, on shining wings descending, snatched 
 His fainting soul from that accursed throng ; 
 And lo, it was a dream ! 
 
 Soon, when the storm 
 Of warfare burst, upon the Midland fields, 
 A boy in years, against the faithless king 
 He served a soldier, for the cause he loved, 
 And saw his comrade at his side fall dead, 
 Shot through the brain. Yet when that bitter strife 
 Was ended, to his old rude hfe he turned, 
 As reckless as of old, until he found 
 A sweet girl-wife, devout, whose simple faith 
 Loving the ancient worship drew his feet 
 Sunday by Sunday to the gray old church. 
 
 Q
 
 2 26 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Matins and Vespers, and the tranquil rite, 
 
 The surpliced priest, low prayer, and soaring chant 
 
 Worked on him, and the cheerful Sunday sports, 
 
 The dance, the race, the swift unerring shaft, 
 
 When hymns and prayers were done ; and so he lived 
 
 A blameless, unawakened life. 
 
 Till last. 
 One fateful Sabbath morning, as he sate 
 Within the village church, the preacher's voice. 
 Bidding them keep the holy day of rest. 
 Seemed to the awakened conscience of the youth 
 To probe his inner soul. The merry throng 
 Crowded the green when the reproving voice 
 Was still, and with them he. But as his arm 
 Was raised to strike the ball, again the voice 
 Loud on his inner ear, and in the skies 
 A pitying Heavenly face, and all his strength 
 Sank nerveless, sudden as by that strange chill 
 Which strikes the paralytic, and he knew
 
 John Bunyan. 22; 
 
 Some vague awakened consciousness of guilt 
 And terror ; but as yet no healing power 
 Refreshed his restless soul, only despair 
 And wretchlessness, and such ungoverned speech 
 That, hearing him, some hapless wanton once 
 Reproved him for his fault. 
 
 Then with sad heart 
 He strove to mend. He set a ceaseless watch 
 Upon his careless tongue, the sports he loved 
 He shunned as sin, all innocent delights 
 He dared no more enjoy; the game, the dance, 
 Music at last, and song, with iron will 
 He put from him, and of the mellow voices 
 Of chiming bells and the tumultuous joy 
 Of mixed reverberant sound partook no more, 
 Standing without, beneath the reeling tower. 
 An outcast in the darkness, grown at last 
 Afraid lest haply the impending walls, 
 As in Siloam erst, avenged his sin.
 
 2 28 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Thus did he strive long time with his own soul, 
 A doubter self-accused, till one fair day, 
 Working in summer, in the silent streets 
 Of Bedford, at his task, he chanced to hear 
 Three humble women, sitting in the sun, 
 Discourse of things Divine ; and all his heart 
 Was kindled into faith in the new birth 
 They spake of, and again and yet again, 
 Day after day, he sought them ; for his soul 
 Cared but for Heaven alone. 
 
 And then again, 
 Like his own Pilgrim, who had travelled far 
 From the sad City on the road to Heaven, 
 Yet passed to Doubting Castle, he would make 
 A trial of his faith, still sore afraid 
 Lest he had none, bidding the little pools 
 Of water dry because the Word had said 
 That whoso should believe, even as a grain
 
 John Bunyan. 229 
 
 Of mustard-seed, might work all miracles ; 
 And when he dared not put it to the touch 
 Fresh doubts assailed his soul. Was he elect 
 Among the saints of God? The day of Grace, 
 Was it not past for him ? Was there yet room 
 For such as he ? Ah, nay ; too late ! too late ! 
 The ranks of the elect were full, the tale 
 Accomplished, and for him the Pit of Hell, 
 Naught else, for all his prayers. * Go sin ; thy fate 
 Is sealed, thou canst not change it,' pealed the voice 
 Of Evil. But the undying voice within 
 Answered, * I will not.' And amid the gloom 
 Of utter hopelessness he kept his feet 
 From straying, though each trivial act or word 
 He feared might turn to ill. Terror of death 
 Pressed sore on him, lest he should die in sin, 
 And yet he feared to live, lest haply use 
 Might dull that healing pain. The lowest brute. 
 Nay, the poor reptile on his path, he deemed
 
 230 A Visio7i of Saints. 
 
 Happier than he ; or if at times he held 
 
 Some hope of heaven, the Tempter came and bade him, 
 
 In visions in the watches of the night, 
 
 Renounce the Hand which saved him. * Sell him,' cried 
 
 The Tempter's voice within him, day and night 
 
 Sounding through every trivial act and thought, 
 
 Sleeping or waking ; till one night it seemed. 
 
 After long struggles and convulsive throes. 
 
 As if at last his weary, o'erwrought brain 
 
 Assented to the wrong. And straight the day 
 
 Grew black as night, the very stones cried out 
 
 Against his sin. 
 
 And then, oh joy ! there came, 
 Even in the Valley of the Shadow of Death, 
 To this poor pilgrim soul a heavenly Light 
 And Voice of Comfort. All his former sins 
 Of doubt or word or act, he knew forgiven 
 Of a great Love and Grace ; and happiness 
 Unmixed with fear, and full assurance, filled
 
 John Bunyan. 231 
 
 That self-tormented soul. Rapt in high joy, 
 When, like St. Francis 'midst his feathered throng, 
 He paced the new-sown fallows whence should spring 
 Life's seed, as for his soul, his jubilant heart 
 Would almost to the cawing rooks impart 
 His tale of Love Divine. 
 
 So that vexed soul 
 Found peace at last, and saw with clearer sight 
 "The heights of grace and love and mercy." Soon 
 Within the lustral waters of the Ouse 
 His life was cleansed, and thenceforth dedicate 
 To preach the Word he loved, his eloquent speech. 
 Not tongue-tied by the learning of the schools. 
 Speaking to sinners. As one from the dead, 
 As one who bore a fire, oppressed by guilt 
 And terror, came he, whom nor guilt nor hell 
 Could silence, but 'neath humble roofs and low, 
 Or on the village green, beneath the skies, 
 Always he preached the Word. The liturgies
 
 232 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Dear to the saintly Herbert drew him not, 
 
 For whom each prayer rose new-born from the heart 
 
 To clothe itself in words, and so he spake 
 
 With full assurance, soul to soul, and led, 
 
 In part despite his creed, men's careless lives 
 
 To good and was content. Ay, though the fire 
 
 Of fierce sectarian passion and loud strifes 
 
 Swept the enfranchised land, and slander's tooth 
 
 Assailed his peace, yet worked he for his Lord 
 
 And was content. 
 
 But on those halcyon days 
 Broke the intolerant law. The warning came 
 That he, on pain of weary prisoned years, 
 And exile, and the bondsman's death in life. 
 Should preach the Word no more. He took no heed. 
 But when they closed his place of praise and prayer, 
 In sheds or barns, or 'mid the shadowy woods. 
 He spake to kindling souls. Last, when the law 
 Forbade the freedom more, he scorned to obey,
 
 John Bunyan. 233 
 
 Since if it were a sin to meet, and draw 
 All men to follow Christ, then sin he would. 
 
 Therefore to prison haled they him, away 
 From his loved home. His dear and ailing wife 
 He left ; his helpless children four he left ; 
 And one, his little daughter blind from birth. 
 Whom more than life he loved, to the hard world 
 And penury and suffering years he left. 
 To do God's will ; though all his father's heart 
 Yearned to them, knowing all the bitter pains. 
 Cold, hunger, nakedness, which should await 
 The lives his faith made orphan. Yet his heart 
 Was steadfast. ' I must do His will, I must, 
 And venture all for Him.' 
 
 And so his feet, 
 Pacing this weary wilderness, at length 
 Came on a certain place where was a Den, 
 And there he laid him down for twelve long years,
 
 234 ^ Vision of Sain is. 
 
 And dreamt his deathless dream. 
 
 Dear prison cell 
 Above all others blest ! where self-immured, 
 Because he might not purchase liberty 
 With silence from good words, that suffering soul 
 Languished long years, no cloistered convent pure 
 Bore rarer fruit than thine, nor hermitage 
 Beneath the desert stars. There lives no race 
 Of Christian men but dreams thy dream, nor creed 
 But holds it dear, because its clear voice calls 
 Deep in the sacred silence of the soul ! 
 
 For here it was that Christian rose and fled 
 The City of Destruction, and alone 
 Toiled on the rugged, narrow way, to where 
 The wicket gate was set, and a fair light 
 To guide to it. Here fell his feet awhile 
 Into the Slough of Despond. Here he found 
 The House of the Interpreter, and climbed
 
 John Bunyan. 235 
 
 The Hill of Difficulty, and reposed 
 
 Within the Palace Beautiful, and slept 
 
 In Peace, and from the ramparts with the dawn 
 
 Looked down upon Emmanuel's land, a fair 
 
 And smiling country, rich with flowers and fruits 
 
 And water-springs, and on the further heaven 
 
 Flushed with the rising Sun, the untrodden snows 
 
 Of the Delectable, Eternal Hills, 
 
 Hard by the City of God. And here he took 
 
 His armour, and went fearless down to fight 
 
 Apollyon, and prevailed, and saw beneath, 
 
 Stretched in thick darkness, filled with dreadful sounds, 
 
 The Valley of the Shadow of Death, and dared 
 
 To thread the darkling pass, where piteous wails, 
 
 And rising fiery smoke, and dead men's bones. 
 
 And dreadfuller, the onward rushing flight 
 
 Of Fiends unseen, the spectral shades of Doubt, 
 
 Assailed his steadfast soul. And here he saw 
 
 Vanity Fair, the sad world's counterfeit,
 
 236 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Wherefrom the martyred Pilgrim passed to Heaven. 
 And liere the dungeon glooms of Doubting yawned 
 The stronghold of Despair, which held him fast 
 Whose lips had tasted of the River of Life. 
 Here smiled the plains of Beulah, and beyond 
 Stole the dark deep which all mankind must cross, 
 Sinner and saint ; and here the golden domes 
 Of the Celestial City beamed on him 
 Who after Life's sad pilgrimage was blest ! 
 
 But when to his dear home he came again, 
 After twelve years of prison, free to preach 
 His message as he would, he knew what change 
 Time brings to all ; dead was his sightless girl. 
 And bare his humble home. So with brave heart 
 He set himself to work, but chiefly vowed 
 His toil to Heaven. To labour for his Church 
 Was all his joy, and yet his worldly store 
 Increased, and he in great respect of men,
 
 John Bunyan. 237 
 
 With his good wife, among his stalwart boys, 
 
 Flourished long busy years ; and all the doubt 
 
 And misery of old were gone, and clear 
 
 The sunset of the evening of his days 
 
 Shone on him, tranquil gold. Through all the strife 
 
 Of those dark troubled times, he lived unmoved 
 
 A peaceful life, scorning the narrow bonds 
 
 Dear to the zealot, broad in tolerance 
 
 For every Christian creed or rite or name 
 
 Which loved the Spirit of God ; and toiled for souls 
 
 In his dear native town, and was content. 
 
 Then while as yet his green, unbroken age 
 Was vigorous, came the end which comes at last 
 To all things living. One there was whose wrath 
 Burned fierce against his son, and he who knew 
 The blessing of the Peacemakers was fain 
 To reconcile the pair. And as he rode 
 Loving his task, upon the wintry way
 
 238 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 A sudden rain-storm chilled his weary frame, 
 And fever racked his limbs. Ten suffering days 
 He lingered far from home, and with the cry, 
 ' Take me — to Thee I come,' breathed out his life." 
 
 Which things when I had heard, my kindling soul 
 
 Burst into words : " Oh, precious gift and rare 
 
 Of Heaven, which from the slough of common hfe, 
 
 And stony wastes of penury, despite, 
 
 Oppression, want, despondency, canst raise 
 
 The perfumed rose of Fancy, and the pure 
 
 White lily of the Saint ! Ah^ not alone 
 
 In cloistered convents cold, or storied shrines, 
 
 Springs up the saintly life, nor in the Halls 
 
 Of Learning blooms the flawless flower of thought ! 
 
 Myriads of faltering feet have trod the road 
 
 Thou troddest once, and fought and fallen, or come 
 
 Through thee to victory, and as they pass,
 
 John B tiny an. 239 
 
 Fired with a broader faith and wider hope 
 
 Than that thou knewest ; on their painful way, 
 
 Not wholly thine, but to the self-same goal. 
 
 Still solaced by thy precious allegory. 
 
 Take thee and thy quaint Dream for staff and guide, 
 
 Throughout the perilous pilgrimage to Heaven."
 
 240 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Then came another, of priestly garb and mien, 
 A young man still, wanting the years of Christ, 
 But long since with the saints. Not as the priest 
 Of Sarum, or that peasant pilgrim, he 
 A poet with the contemplative gaze 
 And listening ear, but quick of force and eye, 
 Who fought the wrong without, the wrong within, 
 And, being a pure saint, like those of old, 
 Abased himself and all the precious gifts 
 God gave him, flinging all before the feet 
 Of Him whose name he bore — a fragile form 
 Upon whose hectic cheek there burned a flush 
 That was not health ; who lived as Xavier lived, 
 And died like him upon the burning sands, 
 Untended, yet whose creed was far from his
 
 Henry Martyn. 241 
 
 As pole from pole ; whom grateful England still 
 Loves, though his face I knew not. And my guide, 
 Breathing his name, spake thus : 
 
 " In Truro town, 
 Hard by the wave-worn headlands of the West, 
 When now the eighteenth century of the Faith 
 Drew near its end, its martyr that should be 
 Was Henry Martyn born. His father's arm 
 Long in the dark abysses of the mine 
 Slaved for his children's bread. His little son, 
 A weakly boy and studious, sate apart, 
 Shunning the school's rude games, too oft the sport 
 Of coarser wills and stronger, till he found 
 A stout young arm, upon whose ready aid 
 He rested and was happy ; and his keen 
 And vivid brain grew stronger, and his thirst 
 For knowledge, till at length, a boy in age. 
 To Granta's venerable halls he went, 
 
 R
 
 242 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 A student not obscure, and with hard toil 
 Laboured four happy years of blameless youth, 
 And took at last the foremost place, and rose 
 To fame and honour of men, and reaped the high 
 Reward of studious hours, the untroubled life 
 Spent in the contemplative courts where comes 
 No murmur of the world, but only thought 
 And knowledge draw the thinker, till sometimes 
 The careless soul, missing the wholesome stir 
 Of daily care, grows slothful, the quick brain 
 Sinks low in indolent ease and base content, 
 And bears no worthy fruit. 
 
 But not for him 
 These perils were, because a higher thirst — 
 Higher than wealth, or ease, or honour of men, 
 Or learning's self— possessed his yearning soul ; 
 When the same friend who helped his friendless youth, 
 Now to a full and finer manhood grown. 
 Bade him do all things not for fame of men,
 
 Henry Martyn. 24^ 
 
 But for God's glory. And his sister's voice 
 
 Thrilled on him in the pure unworldly words 
 
 Of simple fervour. Not at first his soul 
 
 Gave heed, impatient with those warning words, 
 
 And fired with youthful pride and hot pursuit 
 
 Of flying knowledge ; but at length the spark 
 
 Kindled within him, and the sudden loss 
 
 Of the dear father of his love laid bare 
 
 The chambers of his soul, and filled his heart 
 
 With other thoughts than earth's, till, when he gained 
 
 The meed of all his hopes, which opened to him 
 
 The path of earthly honour, the youth's heart 
 
 Knew, with a sick surprise, his empty hand 
 
 Grasped but a shadow. 
 
 Then the awakened gaze. 
 Turned wholly from the earth ; on things of Heaven 
 He dwelt both day and night. The thought of God 
 Filled him with infinite joy ; his craving soul 
 Dwelt on Him as a feast, as did the soul
 
 2 44 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of rapt Francesco in his holy cell 
 
 In blest Assisi ; and he knew the pain, 
 
 The deep despondence of the saint, the doubt, 
 
 The consciousness of dark offence, the joy 
 
 Of full assurance last, when Heaven itself 
 
 Stands open to the ecstasy of faith. 
 
 Therefore, though all men smiled on him, though smooth 
 
 Life's path lay stretched before him — wealth and fame, 
 
 The dignity of learning, the high meed 
 
 Which crowns the pleader's skill, the Senate itself, 
 
 Waiting his keen young brain — he turned from all 
 
 To that untried, laborious way which lay 
 
 Across wide seas, to spend a lonely life 
 
 Spreading the light he loved, beneath the glare 
 
 Of tropic skies, by desert sands and wilds 
 
 Far from all Christian converse, and the gain 
 
 Of our long eighteen centuries, and pine 
 
 Alone 'mid millions, knowing not his Lord ;
 
 Henry Martyn. 245 
 
 The Brahmins' fables, the relentless lie 
 
 Of Islam — these he chose to bear, who knew 
 
 How swift the night should fall on him, and burned 
 
 To save one soul alive while yet 'twas day. 
 
 This filled his thoughts, this only, and for this 
 
 On the pure altar of his soul he heaped 
 
 A costlier sacrifice, this youth in years, 
 
 For whom Love called, and loving hands, and hope 
 
 Of childish lives around him, offering these, 
 
 Like all the rest, to God. 
 
 Yet when his hour 
 Was come to leave his England, was it strange 
 His weakling life pined for the parting kiss 
 Of love and kindred, whom his prescient soul 
 Knew he should see no more, and, week by week 
 Tossed on the wandering wave, driven back once more 
 By battling winds, looked with deep longing eyes 
 On the dear shore? Yet never did he pray 
 The cup might pass from him, not when the curse
 
 146 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of war assailed his gentle eyes and wrung 
 
 His soul with agony. A priest, he filled 
 
 All priestly duty, though his shuddering soul 
 
 Shrank from the sight of blood. Through storm and stress 
 
 And perils of the sea, through all despite 
 
 Of scoffing men, who lent no willing ear 
 
 To his high message, still the humble saint 
 
 Was instant in his work, and bore the jeers 
 
 And unbelief around him, he who left 
 
 His place of honour for the Faith, and did 
 
 His uncomplaining service. Thus at last 
 
 He reached the Indian shore, where he would spend 
 
 His life in saintly labours till the end. 
 
 There ten long years he toiled on, day by day, 
 Writing his patient record of a soul 
 Which struggles for the Right. The home of friends 
 Who cared for him and Heaven, and would have kept 
 him,
 
 Henry Martyn. 247 
 
 Impatient for his work, he left behind, 
 
 And straight, across the burning plains, alone, 
 
 Sped, cheerful, where no ray of Christ had risen 
 
 To break the age-long gloom ; there, solitary, 
 
 Unfriended, solaced by no answering soul, 
 
 With little blessing on his work, or fruit 
 
 Of his great toil, reproaching every hour 
 
 He lost for God, knowing how short his span, 
 
 And how immense his task, now preaching oft 
 
 To careless ears, now spending his keen brain 
 
 As when he wrought for fame and honour of men, 
 
 With Munshi and with Pundit, if his skill 
 
 Might give to each, in his own tongue, the Word, 
 
 He spent his youth. Last, when his task of love 
 
 Was done, and seven long years of ceaseless toil 
 
 Had worked their will on him, there came fresh griefs 
 
 To try his faith. The woman of his love 
 
 Feared to leave all and give her life to his, 
 
 And both to God ; his sisters passed away
 
 248 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 To Heaven, nor saw him more. There seemed on earth 
 
 Nothing for which to Hve, except the Faith ; 
 
 The last of all his race, unloved, alone — 
 
 Only the Faith, the Faith ! until his soul 
 
 Wore thin her prison bars, and he was fain 
 
 To rest awhile, or work no more the work 
 
 For which alone he lived. 
 
 Then over seas 
 Once more he took his way, leaving the land 
 Where he had hoped to die, along the roll 
 Of the warm tropic wave. Once more he saw 
 Ceylon's green palm-fringed shore, the sumptuous tomb 
 Of him, his brother of old, who strove like him 
 To spread the Faith, and, like him, died for it, 
 S. Francis Xavier, and among the caves 
 Of storied Elephanta stayed ; but soon, 
 His great zeal firing him, took ship again, 
 And, after weary wanderings, gained at last 
 The Persian wastes, and took the difficult way
 
 Henry Mai^tyn. 249 
 
 To Shiraz through the desert. Day by day 
 The fierce sun blazed upon the sands ; by night 
 The dead air, like a furnace blast, assailed 
 His fevered frame, and parched him and consumed him 
 With horrible thirst, and robbed his eyes of sleep 
 Till life was well-nigh spent. And then the hand 
 Which seemed to guide him always led his feet 
 To a sweet vale, England in sight and sound, 
 Hidden in the horrible waste, where cool airs blew. 
 Streams ran, and birds sang clear, and wheat was gold. 
 Then all his faithful heart burst forth in praise, 
 As did the Kingly Bard's : ' He maketh us 
 To lie down in green pastures, and beside 
 The clear cool waters leadeth.' Thus his soul 
 Made laud, and was content, praising the Lord, 
 In Shiraz. 
 
 There one happy toilsome year 
 He sojourned. Day by day the sages came 
 Who held the faith of Islam, and would hear
 
 250 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of Him whose Name he taught. Through the long days 
 
 He laboured at his work, spending the gifts 
 
 God lent him, for the Faith. Last, when at length 
 
 The Gospel spake to Persian ears, he bore 
 
 His work to Tabriz, where he sought the King, 
 
 Faring by night along the moonlit vales, 
 
 Through bowery lanes, where the loud nightingales 
 
 Thrilled the white fields with song. Then feverish heats 
 
 Burned him upon his way, and sapped his strength ; 
 
 And when, weak unto death, he reached the place 
 
 Where the King sojourned late, he found him not, 
 
 Only his courtiers' scorn. Then his great heart 
 
 Broke in impatient words. ' My God,' he cried, 
 
 ' What have I done that men should mock me thus. 
 
 Save only love for Thee ? ' And when he turned 
 
 Despairing homeward, soon again he pined 
 
 Prostrate in pain, the fever seizing him 
 
 Two weary months, and his brain burned like fire, 
 
 A present^death in life. Yet not the less
 
 Henry Alartyn. 251 
 
 His faithful soul bare witness to the Faith. 
 
 Rejection, sickness, torment — what are these 
 
 To the believer's thought ! And when he rose, 
 
 Musing upon the enormous waste which lay 
 
 'Twixt him and home, whither, his brave work done, 
 
 His longing eyes were turned, his weary heart 
 
 Fainted within him, and he looked no more 
 
 To press the hands he loved. Hopeless he fared 
 
 On his last journey. 'Neath the fabled peak 
 
 Of Ararat he stayed awhile, to rest 
 
 In the hushed convent with the Armenian monks, 
 
 A cheerful guest. And then again the grip 
 
 Of fever clutched him, and depressed his soul 
 
 With sad forebodings. Yet he struggled still 
 
 Towards Stamboul, though the plague slew day by day 
 
 Its thousands, and the affrighted tribes around 
 
 Fled the advancing Death. ' Thy will be done 3 
 
 Living or dying, oh, remember me ! ' 
 
 Thus writes the dying saint. And then long days ^
 
 252 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of misery, which his languid hand records, 
 
 When now a fire consumed l:im, now the cold 
 
 Of palsy left him ice. Laid on the ground. 
 
 His soul was filled with God, his Company, 
 
 His Friend, his Comforter. ' Oh, when shall Time 
 
 Be done, and that new Heaven and Earth appear 
 
 Where dwelleth Righteousness ? ' Thus his hand traced 
 
 Its last pure words. Then but a few brief hours, 
 
 And he unfriended, far from help and home, 
 
 Alone, but having Christ, with no kind hand 
 
 To close the eyes which saw the joys unseen 
 
 And vision of the blest, worn out, in pain — 
 
 Whether of fever or the deadly force 
 
 Of pestilence, none knoweth — breathed his last, 
 
 And bore the martyr's palm." 
 
 And then once more 
 I seemed to hear a voice, — was it my guide,
 
 Henry Martyn. 253 
 
 Or my own soul ? — discourse : 
 
 " Shall any ask, 
 Was all thy suffering naught, because the strength 
 Of Error still bears sway ? Ah ! too brief life. 
 So jealous of each hour, and counting lost 
 Each day not vowed to Heaven. What, hadst thou known 
 Thy labour thus in vain ? Fourscore long years 
 Have passed since thou, like kindred souls to-day, 
 Diedst for the Truth ; the long, slow, barren years 
 Mock us and all our toil. Hadst thou done well 
 To reap a little while thy well-earned meed 
 Of Thought in lettered ease ? Hadst thou done well 
 To give thee to the pleader's art, and strive 
 To make the Wrong seem Right, and sink at last 
 To wealth and praise of men, seeking, a judge 
 Scorning the graceless sophistries of old. 
 To cure thy former ill — thou whose keen brain 
 Had doubtless borne thee far? Hadst thou done well 
 To doze slow hours, sunk deep in mitred ease,
 
 2 54 ^ Vision of Saints. 
 
 Soothed by sweet chants, lost in the vaporous grey ; 
 
 Or, a great preacher, mark the moistened eyes, 
 
 Flushed cheeks, and quick-drawn breaths thy facile tongue 
 
 Had stirred, thyself unmoved ; or shine a light 
 
 Of the Senate, till thy peers in high debate 
 
 Bowed to thy eloquent speech, and thou shouldst guide 
 
 The helm of our great England ? Was it well 
 
 To hold this strange Twin-Nature of our Race, 
 
 Which soars so high and sinks so low, as thou, 
 
 Unutterably vile in thought, in will, 
 
 In every action vile, trampling thy soul 
 
 In dust before thy God, who made thee too, 
 
 And all things, and has left us free to take 
 
 The path we would, to Heaven or hell, and knows 
 
 His work not wholly base, nor framed too fine 
 
 For this our place of trial ? Nay, I know 
 
 How many ways of safety He displays 
 
 To the awakened soul — the way thou trodd'st, 
 
 The way of San Francesco's blessed cell,
 
 Henry Martyn. 255 
 
 The honourable trivial road which leads 
 By silent saintly liturgies of home 
 Up to the selfsame Heaven. But this I know 
 Is certain, that thy lifelong sacrifice 
 AVas best for thee, and best the voice which called 
 From love and friendship, ay, from all good things 
 Which make life happy, to the burning plains 
 Where thou shouldst spend thy few and evil days 
 Of toil and suffering, pouring forth thy life 
 Like water for the Faith, shedding thy blood 
 As did of old the Martyrs, drop by drop. 
 Upon the ungrateful sand of heathen hearts."
 
 256 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And then I saw a stately figure come, 
 
 Which seemed to wear the quaint and doveUke robe 
 
 Of silver-grey, the lawn that hid the hair, 
 
 The modest decent garb they love who vow 
 
 Their lives to Heaven, albeit no cloistered bars 
 
 Withdraw them from the world, but build around 
 
 A nunnery, and, 'mid the noise and din 
 
 Of all the sensual and wrongful world, 
 
 An oratory where the Spirit may dwell 
 
 And, long-awaited, claim its own ; the band 
 
 Who struck the fetters from the slave, who tend 
 
 The halt and sick, and spend themselves in works 
 
 Of mercy for the prisoners who lie bound 
 
 In chains their sins have forged ; and straight my eyes
 
 Elizabeth Fry. 257 
 
 Knew whom it was they saw, before my guide, 
 With grave voice softening as it went, replied 
 To my unspoken thought. 
 
 " A hundred years 
 Have passed since she thou seest, on the earth 
 Came first, of gentle birth and wealth'and ease, 
 Where the grey Anglian city in the east 
 Broods round its central spire. A blooming girl, 
 In her gay youth she trod with eager feet 
 The path of innocent pleasure ; none more blithe 
 At chase or festal than the lithe young form 
 Who in her scarlet habit loved to fly 
 Across the rushing fields, or listen rapt 
 To stirring martial melodies, or tread 
 The giddy measures of the dance, and take. 
 With her young motherless sisters, what delight 
 Beseemed their youth. Then, in her budding age^, 
 When only seventeen summers smiled on her, 
 
 s
 
 258 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 The joys she scarce had known began to pall, 
 
 And she reproached herself with every thought 
 
 Which stole her hours from Heaven. Blind dreams of 
 
 good, 
 Yearnings for something higher than she knew, 
 Took her, and, knowing this perplexed world 
 Moves towards the best, she felt her drifting life 
 A hapless bark which fronts the gathering storm 
 Without a pilot's skill. But the great Hand 
 Was with her not the less, though yet unseen, 
 And soon the pleading of a kindred soul 
 Sent over seas woke in her inmost depths 
 Assurance mixt with tears, and presently 
 The dull world faded from her, and she gave 
 Her all to Heaven. Then all her costly robes 
 She left, and took the habit of a Friend 
 And their plain speech — slowly, and half ashamed. 
 Lest those who knew her scoffed ; but not the less 
 She was convinced, and held the Faith to the end.
 
 Elizabeth Fry. 259 
 
 Thence through her long sweet life, her own hand writes 
 Her daily story. Through what deeps of doubt 
 And self-distrust, high yearnings, often dashed 
 By that o'erwhelming sense of grave offence 
 Which takes the saints alone, and oftentimes 
 What high and glorious certitudes of faith, 
 The heavens standing open, and the Lord 
 With gracious beckoning hand, they know who read 
 The story of her days. Love came to her, 
 And happy wedlock, and unclouded years, 
 And fair-grown offspring. All good things to hold. 
 Honour and high obedience, troops of friends, 
 A heart which turned to Heaven and dwelt with God- 
 All these were hers. Ofttimes she spake the Word, 
 Spurning the conscious weakness of her sex 
 And her own shrinking modesty ; ofttimes 
 She nursed the sick, and did relieve with alms 
 The needy, works of mercy and of faith
 
 2 6o A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Filling her life. And yet, not all-content 
 
 With such high duty, still her yearning soul. 
 
 Which not the weight of daily household care, 
 
 Nor love of spouse or children, satisfied, 
 
 Panted for more, and hastened to the work 
 
 Which keeps her memory green, and crowns her Saint, 
 
 And raised her to the skies. 
 
 'Twas in the foul 
 And crowded prison wards her pitying heart 
 Found its own work. Three hundred hapless lives 
 Huddled together, starving, naked, vile — ■ 
 The innocent and guilty, the poor soul 
 Who stepped a foot-pace from the path of good, 
 Mewed side by side within that narrow jail 
 With those who had put off, for desperate years, 
 The last thin rags of shame ; a dreadful band. 
 Brutal, unclean, without a bed to rest 
 Their miserable limbs, save the damp floor 
 Of the foul, reeking dungeon. Frenzied cries
 
 Elizabeth Fry, 261 
 
 Of rank offence, blaspheming God and man, 
 
 Worse than of madness, smote the shrinking ear ; 
 
 And 'mid the dreadful throng, more piteous still. 
 
 The teeming ranks of children, the shrill note 
 
 Of childish voices trained in all the lore 
 
 Of wickedness, to beg, to sot, to steal, 
 
 To curse. Each sight and sound that had made Hell 
 
 More dreadful than before, the sight of lives 
 
 Which had been innocent once, now doomed and damned. 
 
 Forlorn of men, and quite forgot by God ! 
 
 Nay, not forgotten ! Since one human heart 
 Felt pity for them still. The faithful soul 
 Of that good nursing-mother blazed afire, 
 Hearing and seeing, and her inmost depths 
 Were kindled into flame. But not at once 
 Might she begin her life-work. Birth and Death, 
 Young lives that came and went, the loss of friends 
 And brethren, that strange hush and chill which comes
 
 262 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 To every home when first the young flock dares 
 To spread weak wings and tempt the perilous air 
 Far from the nest— these held her three long years 
 Far from the work she loved. 
 
 And then one day 
 She found her footsteps free, and took her way 
 To the grim prison where that hapless crowd 
 Rotted in sin. Alone, with none to aid, 
 Like the old seer among the ravening jaws, 
 Or that diviner Figure which beamed hope 
 To the poor prisoned spirits waiting long 
 The Beatific End, she passed and brought 
 The light of fuller Day, with mild eyes filled 
 With gentle pity for their sin, with voice 
 So clear, so soft, so musical, the tongue 
 As of an angel. 'Mid the noise, the din 
 Of blasphemy, and rank offence, she spake 
 And hushed all other sound, except the noise 
 Of weeping from repentant hearts, and told
 
 Elizabeth Fry. 26 
 
 1 
 
 How, even at the eleventh hour, the Lord 
 
 Was strong to save, telHng of Him she served, 
 
 Whose name they knew not yet ; and on the depths 
 
 Of those poor rayless souls, sunk deep in ill, 
 
 Shone with some pure reflected light of Heaven, 
 
 And touched — a mother herself — the mothers' hearts 
 
 With pity for the children who should come 
 
 To ill as they did, till the spark Divine, 
 
 Which never dies out quite, shone out once more, 
 
 And once again, from out the sloughs of sin, 
 
 Uprose toward Heaven some faint fair flower of good. 
 
 Thus she, and with her a devoted band 
 Of women, strove for God. With instant prayer 
 She pleaded with them ; clothing, shelter, food 
 She gained for them, and tidings of the Word. 
 And for those hapless childish Hves she found 
 Fit teaching ; those poor souls the pitiless law 
 Doomed to the felon's end, she fortified,
 
 264 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 As did of old S. Catharine, with her prayers 
 Even at the gate of Death. 
 
 Nor could her pity 
 Stay here, nor bear the intolerable load 
 Of the uncaring law which played with life 
 As might a tiger, stern, exacting blood 
 For every trivial ill. With those vile powers 
 Unfaith and selfishness, which ruled the world 
 And mar it yet and will, she strove with might, 
 And did at last prevail ; and ere she died. 
 No more the shameless wickedness was done 
 Which from all time had shed the innocent blood 
 In the pure name of Law, staking a life 
 Against each venial wrong. Oh, clear-eyed soul. 
 That saw the Right undimmed, above the mists 
 That bUnded worldly eyes, because it knew 
 The rule of Right, one with the Law of God ! 
 
 But not alone her works of mercy touched
 
 Elizabeth Fry. 265 
 
 The prisoner in his cell. When to their doom 
 
 Of slavery, worse than death, the senseless law 
 
 Had sent those hapless lives, over wide seas, 
 
 To the far underworld, it prisoned them 
 
 Mixed as of yore, the felon old in sin, 
 
 The almost innocent, and the young lives 
 
 Of children mewed together, month on month 
 
 Festering between the crowded decks, till came 
 
 The day when they were flung upon the shore 
 
 Of a new land, helpless, unclothed, unfed, 
 
 Tainted by forced companionship with ill. 
 
 To die of want or only live by sin. 
 
 These wrongs her prescient eye foresaw and gave 
 
 Her thought to mend. The young lives new to wrong 
 
 She from the guiltier set apart, and all, 
 
 When the new world loomed on their wondering gaze, 
 
 Found hands of welcome. Oft, in some frail sl^^iff 
 
 Daring the wintry Thames, ere the sad ship 
 
 Sailed with its load, her soft imploring voice
 
 2 66 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Rose high for all, commending them to Heaven, 
 And pleading with such gentle words and pure, 
 Their hard hearts melted, and the flowing tears 
 Relieved their pain ; and on the deck around 
 The rude rough seamen heard, without a word, 
 The saint's high message and the sweet clear tones, 
 And grew ashamed to scoff, while as she knelt 
 The helpless women checked their gathering tears, 
 In silence till the dark boat on the stream 
 Was lost in night, and took their only friend. 
 
 Thus throughout all the land, year after year. 
 She cleansed each teeming prison. The chill North 
 She traversed, and the melancholy West, 
 And by the perilous seas which welter round 
 The still-vexed Channel Isles, thence to fair France, 
 Still seeking what of help she could for those 
 Whom their sin prisoned fast, and the low plains 
 Of deep-sunk Holland. Where her footsteps turned
 
 Elizabeth Fry. 267 
 
 She left a blessing. From the Russian snows 
 
 Came news of those her high example drew 
 
 To kindred deeds of mercy. Courts and Thrones 
 
 Paid fitting honour to her work, and she, 
 
 Amid the felons now, now set on high 
 
 With Queens to do her honour, kept unchanged 
 
 Her humble heart, breathing the self-same prayer : 
 
 ' By any ways, by any paths Thou wilt. 
 
 So men may come to knowledge of Thy Truth.' 
 
 But not the less the changing, chanceful world 
 Pressed on her, than on those blest souls of old. 
 The wealth she only prized because it gave 
 Power to do good ; which gathers day by day 
 To crush the miser with its load, from her 
 Was taken for no fault ; her stately home 
 She left a blameless exile. Time and Death 
 Knocked loudly at her doors. The saintly band, 
 Brothers and sisters, thinned ; the loving eyes
 
 268 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Of children closed untimely ; the young lives 
 Of children's children went, leaving her age 
 To mourn them. Fever coming swept the home 
 Of her dear son, and took him, the strong stay 
 Of his young flock. Who reads her story knows 
 A gathering tale of loss, to which each year 
 Brought its own added sum. Her natural force, 
 Before the allotted span, grew faint and weak, 
 And, spent with pain, month after month she lay 
 In suffering, till she prayed, if twere' God's will. 
 That she might be at rest ; and sometimes, weak 
 And sore beset, her saintly humbleness 
 Was dashed with self-distrust, and she who felt 
 The Everlasting Arms beneath her, knew 
 The natural fear which ofttimes vexes less 
 The sinner than the saint. 
 
 So when her hour 
 Was come, her children round her, she prepared 
 To meet the Lord she loved. She whose long life
 
 Elizabeth Fry. 269 
 
 Was lived for Him ; whose earliest waking thought 
 Was every morn for Him ; whose gathering years 
 ^Vere crowned with deeds of mercy ; whose dear name, 
 In every clime, thousands of rescued souls 
 Uttered with tremulous lips and full of praise ; 
 Whose thought was always how to raise to hope 
 The poor, the sick, the fallen ; how to strike 
 The fetters from the prisoner and the slave ; 
 And save the piteous childish lives the State 
 Had left to certain ruin — she no less 
 Knew the Divine despondency which marks 
 The saintly soul. * Pray for me,' said her voice ; 
 ' It is a strife, but I am safe.' " 
 
 " Dear saint, 
 Ay, thou wert safe," I cried, " because thy heart 
 Was humble ! To what heiglits of purity, 
 What inaccessible awful precipices 
 Of duty, didst thou turn thy gaze whose soul
 
 270 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Knew this diviner failure ? To what depths 
 
 Of inner heaven, to what perfectness 
 
 Of Him thy Great Exemplar, didst thou strain ? 
 
 Not only in the cloister the rapt soul 
 
 Dwells with Him, or beneath the midnight stars 
 
 Mingles with Him and bears the sacred wounds 
 
 Of the Passion, but along the well-trod road 
 
 Of daily trivial life the race is run 
 
 To where the crown awaits them, and the palm. 
 
 Who loves the Right, loves Him who taught it too ; 
 
 And whoso loves his brother, loves his Lord."
 
 Father Damien. 2 7 1 
 
 And then there came, last risen to the skies, 
 The newest of the saints I marked, who went 
 Only one brief year since to bear the palm 
 And wear the crown, a priest whose comely youth, 
 Dark kindly eyes, and broad and thoughtful brow 
 Showed still to haunting fancy marks of care, 
 Sobering its new-found joy. The gentle gaze 
 Lighted the gracious face, no longer scarred 
 By fell disease, that was his cross, his crown ; 
 And with a double tenderness my guide ' 
 Made answer softly to my silent quest. 
 
 " From the long wave of the Pacific Sea 
 Rise the enchanted islands of the West.
 
 2/2 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 There the green surge, translucent, flowered with foam, 
 
 Breaks creaming on the strand beneath the pahiis ; 
 
 But from its tepid waters came no sound 
 
 Of ripphng mirth, nor more the fair brown forms, 
 
 Half heathen, naked, joyous, crowned with flowers, 
 
 Floated as erst on the caressing wave, 
 
 Because some strange immedicable hurt 
 
 Consumed them, and they pined in hopeless pain, 
 
 Despairing, till a servant of the Lord 
 
 Was sent to them with succour for their need, 
 
 And cleansed the desperate lives, which, struck by 
 
 doom, 
 Cursing their fate, turned them to reckless ill ; 
 And gave his life to serve them, till he died, 
 A leper in their midst. 
 
 At Tremeloo, 
 Upon the far-off Belgian plain, was bom 
 He whom the admiring tongues of half the world 
 Call Damien. All the story of his days
 
 Father Daviicn. 273 
 
 Is full of pureness. A strange child, engrossed 
 
 In musing thought, he with the shepherds loved 
 
 To drive afield ere now the opening marn, 
 
 Loosed from its flood-gates in the illumined east, 
 
 O'erilowed the slumbering plains. There all day long, 
 
 A lamb amid the innocent lambs, in play 
 
 He whiled away the hours, till all his kin 
 
 And kindly neighbours knew his childish name, 
 
 ' The Little Shepherd ; ' and the lessons learnt 
 
 From solitary musings, with the broad 
 
 Still plain around, and the unbounded vault 
 
 Of Heaven above him, and no sound of life 
 
 Save bleating flocks and humming bees and songs 
 
 Of mounting larks, inspired his brooding thought 
 
 With visions not of earth, and framed his lips 
 
 To an unspoken praise ; and when he heard 
 
 The ' Angelus ' thrill o'er the twilight fields, 
 
 His childish soul rejoiced, and his young knees 
 
 Were bent in prayer, till all the country side 
 
 T
 
 2/4 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Cherished the strange grave child. 
 
 And once, men tell, 
 At Whitsuntide, the holy feast, there was 
 A neighbouring fair of simple revelry, 
 And since the dawn none saw him. When they searched 
 The crowded village streets, they found no trace 
 Of the young truant ; but his grandsire went, 
 Knowing his faith, to seek him, and, indeed, 
 He was not 'mid the careless peasent throng, 
 Nor jovial haunts of rustic merriment. 
 But in the church ; for in the darkling aisles 
 They found the young child kneeling, rapt, alone, 
 Breathing some simple prayer. For all his soul 
 Was full of the Unseen, and all his heart 
 Turned heavenward as the sunflower to the sun. 
 
 But when his childish days were past, and now 
 
 Youth blossomed in him, youth with dim grave thoughts 
 
 And scarce confessed designs, he would not take
 
 Father Damien, 275 
 
 Thought of the priestly office yet, but spent 
 His ardent, eager life in wholesome cares 
 Fitting his budding age. Yet was his soul 
 Maiden and pure, and all who knew the boy 
 Praised his white life. Till one day, when his years 
 Touched close on manhood, in a church he knelt, 
 Where some strong Preacher, fired with faith in good, 
 Spake burning words ; and straight his ardent heart 
 Kindled, and all night long he knelt and prayed 
 For guidance, and Heaven came to him and rapt 
 That yearning soul, so that he would no more 
 Do his own work, but God's. 
 
 And so he took 
 The priestly office, and there came command — 
 The priest, his brother, lying like to die — 
 He in his stead should bear the lamp of Faith 
 To the far isles of the Pacific Sea, 
 Across the world, alone. And when he heard, 
 His glad heart leapt within him, for he knew
 
 2/6 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 That thus he best should do God's will and work 
 His work upon the earth. 
 
 After long months 
 Of storm- tost days and perilous, with the spring, 
 Upon the day of his good patron saint, 
 S. Joseph, to his fated shore he came, 
 Hawaii, where he laboured year by year 
 In happiness, doing his Master's work 
 With ceaseless toil. Once on a mountain side 
 He paused, knowing that somewhere nigh lay hid 
 A Christian village, where the hungry souls 
 Waited their coming priest. When, with great toil 
 Of hand and foot, on the precipitous steep 
 Climbing, he gained the summit, lo ! beneath 
 A cavernous chasm yawned ; but nowhere saw he 
 Traces of men. Yet, without thought of doubt. 
 He, by new difficult crags ascending, spied 
 Another loftier hill, and climbed again 
 And reached the summit ; but again no trace
 
 Fat he J' Damicn. 277 
 
 Of men or dwellings, but a lonely plain, 
 And then again a hill ; and so at last, 
 After long toil, spent, bleeding hand and foot. 
 Calling to mind the sufferings on the Tree, 
 And that for those poor souls his Master died. 
 Tottering he found his people, and confirmed 
 Their faith, and was rewarded for his toil. 
 
 But while his long laborious days he spent 
 
 In service of his Lord, his pitying eyes 
 
 Took many a sight of grievous misery 
 
 Which nought might heal. For on those blessbd isles, 
 
 Where sea and sky wear a perpetual smile. 
 
 And all the lavish earth with flower and fruit 
 
 Laughs always, and from out the odorous gloom 
 
 Of blossomed trees a myriad creepers hang 
 
 Laden with perfume, and the feathery fronds 
 
 Of giant ferns spring upward twice the height 
 
 Of a man's stature, and bright birds flash by
 
 278 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 On jewelled wings, a thousand brilliant hues, 
 
 Flower-like, among the flowers, and the clear sea 
 
 Holds in its azure deeps a thousand lights 
 
 Of sapphire scales, or gold, or glowing red, 
 
 Or tints which match the rainbow's all in one, 
 
 Brighter than any which the cunning skill 
 
 Of painter limns ; and, 'midst the tropic wealth 
 
 Of lustrous blossoms strange to Northern eyes, 
 
 Sweet roses blush, and lilies veined with gold 
 
 Droop their fair heads, and starry myrtles wake 
 
 Memories of classic grace ; — amidst all these 
 
 And the poor joyous lives which, crowned with flowers. 
 
 Like the old careless gods of Pagan eld, 
 
 Let the hours pass, and were content, nor knew 
 
 Our Northern cares, nor thought of hell or Heaven, 
 
 Nought but delight ; there came long years ago. 
 
 Brought from the teeming East, a dreadful ill, 
 
 Which nought might cure, and seized those hapless limbs, 
 
 And rotted them away, mere death in life.
 
 Father Damien. 279 
 
 Maimed horribly, and losing human form 
 
 And semblance, till at last the wretched spirit 
 
 Released itself and fled. And since the touch 
 
 Of hand or robe was thought to take with it 
 
 The dread contagion, from the land they chased 
 
 Those hapless sufferers, to where there rose 
 
 Sheer from the Southern Sea the frowning cliffs 
 
 Of Molokai, On its northern edge 
 
 The island rises into purple peaks, 
 
 With soaring heads veiled in a fleece of white, 
 
 And down each steep precipitous gorge the gleam 
 
 Of leaping waters issuing from the clouds 
 
 Lights the dark cliffs, and, where a sunbeam strikes. 
 
 Sparkles in rainbow mists \ and at the foot 
 
 Of those great walls, just raised above the surge, 
 
 Stretches an emerald plain, white with the homes 
 
 Of lepers, none beside. Thither, when now 
 
 The unerring symptoms of that dreadful ill 
 
 Had shown in them, the hapless exiles sailed.
 
 2 8o A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Bidding a last farewell to home and kin, 
 And love and life, till the slow-working plague 
 Consumed their limbs away. No hope was theirs, 
 Nor fear of God or man ; only their doom, 
 Fixed on them undeserving, filled their souls 
 With horror and despair, and careless hate 
 Of Heaven, and utter recklessness of ill, 
 Smce doomed they were, and an unchecked desire 
 To enjoy, since die they must. And so it. came 
 That these poor lives, pining in misery, 
 Blasphemed their fate and lived in present hell. 
 Yet, since no more they might return, nor those 
 Who tended them, long time they pined with none 
 To care for them, till one day, when the ship 
 Sailed with its fatal load, and the saint took 
 His last farewells with tears, the fire of Faith 
 Flamed up within his heart. Without a word 
 To friends, or care for clothing or for food, 
 Of a sudden Damien leapt on board, and went
 
 Father Daruien. 28 1 
 
 Joyful to meet his doom of pain and death, 
 Like the brave saints of old ; and for our age, 
 Our weakling age, sick of a deadly, doubt, 
 Renewed the primal ecstasy of Faith ! 
 
 There, sixteen years among those hapless folk, 
 He laboured. Long, beneath no sheltering roof 
 But open to the winds and rains of heaven 
 He slept, when sleep he might ; for all his hours 
 Were spent to bring to God the perishing souls 
 Their great despair corrupted. Everywhere 
 His cheerful smile and faithful words allured 
 The lives his hands relieved, and everywhere 
 The people, struggling back to love and right, 
 Left the old vices of despair, the drink 
 That brought oblivion, and the sensual depths 
 Wherein they wallowed late, devoid of hope, 
 Forlorn of God ; and day by day the sound 
 Of prayer and praise arose where blasphemies
 
 282 A Vision of Saints, 
 
 Had rent the shuddering air. And since the power 
 
 Of lustral waters oftentimes works out 
 
 A miracle upon the tainted soul 
 
 As on the body, and what cleanses this 
 
 Makes pure the other ; from a clear cold pool 
 
 High on the mountain, fed by rain and cloud. 
 
 He led the full stream's salutary flow 
 
 To every hut where lay those hopeless lives ; 
 
 And straight those wretched lairs grew clean, the plague 
 
 Lightened, and with it pain, and their lips blessed 
 
 The saint who succoured them, and, through him, God, 
 
 And sinned no more, and hope reviving wrought 
 
 Its precious spell, and happy flower-set homes 
 
 Rose where the lepers huddled ere he came, 
 
 Rotting in misery, and the pious care 
 
 Of brethren far away, learning his need. 
 
 Sent food and money for his aid, and all 
 
 Was of his hand. And eager helpers came. 
 
 Nor of his Church alone, though of his Lord —
 
 Father D ami en. 283 
 
 Brothers and sisters brave, who work to-day 
 His blessed work, though he is dead and gone. 
 
 Likewise he built a hospice, where the sick 
 Were gently tended. There, through every day, 
 He laboured in their midst, spake words of hope, 
 Dressed their sad wounds, brought them what delicate 
 
 food 
 His means supplied, and when they came to die 
 Paid the last rites, and with his own hands laid 
 The dead in earth ; and when the plague had rapt 
 Their hapless parents, 'twas his fostering hand 
 Cared for the orphans, doomed, maybe, to die 
 The same dread death, and pine meanwhile m pain. 
 And as faith's tide rose higher in their souls 
 He, with his own hands, planned and built a shrine 
 For long processions, and the solemn Mass 
 Served upon purest gold. So the swift days 
 Passed, and amid the misery around,
 
 284 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 As one who bore a charmed life, the saint 
 Laboured unscathed for twelve long toilsome yearr, 
 A father to the orphan, to the sick 
 A kind physician, to the suffering soul 
 A priest in every strait, and, when the end- 
 Was come, a reverent hand to close the eyes 
 And smooth the maimed limbs, and lay in earth 
 The poor dead clay whose life was hid with God. 
 
 Thus toiled he long contented years ; and then 
 
 The creeping numbness took him, and he knew, 
 
 Though with no bodily sign as yet, nor scar. 
 
 Nor strength diminished, that the common doom 
 
 Waited him too. He did not quail, nor pine 
 
 That those long happy, useful years had reached 
 
 Their sure approaching term — the hand of God 
 
 Was over all, health, sickness, life and death — 
 
 ' Fiat voluntas tua ; ' and he toiled 
 
 With scarce diminished strength, and zeal which knew
 
 Father D antic n. 28' 
 
 No shadow of abatement, through long years, 
 A leper like the rest. And when he preached, 
 And when he toiled among the sick, or gave 
 His Church's solemn office, all his words 
 Were of ' us lepers,' glorying in the load 
 ■ The will of Heaven assigned to him, and proud, 
 Even as his dear Lord touched with healing hand 
 The lepers of old time and made them whole, 
 To be as these he loved in life and death. 
 
 And when his fading forces sank, there came 
 A band of helpers, priests and brethren true, 
 And ministering women, round his bed ; 
 And there among his sick they labour still. 
 With others whom his bright example since 
 Inspired, lives dedicate like his to Heaven 
 And all the struggling suffering Race of men, 
 Working his work of mercy to the end.
 
 2 86 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Last, when, a year ago, his failing strength 
 Laid him upon his bed, keeping the use 
 Of his great Church, first v/ould the good man make 
 Confession of his sins, and thanksgiving 
 Because the Lord had spared his hfe so long 
 To do his work. And round his dying bed 
 His people whom he succoured, a great throng 
 Of maimed forms, swollen and scarred and bent 
 Out of all human semblance, came and wept, 
 And raised their poor hoarse voices in the hymns 
 He loved, and made a music dearer far 
 To the All-hearing Ear than any strain 
 Which skilful voices soaring to the vaults 
 Of dim cathedrals raise ; and when at last,. 
 After long weeks of suffering lit with prayer,. 
 He gave his spirit back to God, and went 
 To be, at Easter, as he hoped, with Him 
 Who rose before, and the low passing bell
 
 Father Damien. 287 
 
 Was heard, there went from that poor leprous throng 
 A solemn wailing, as from those who know 
 That they loved well and now had lost a friend." 
 
 Even as he ceased my soul within me leapt 
 
 In praise and thankfulness, and these her words : 
 
 "Ah ! blessed life which finds its happiness 
 
 In succouring others, with what store of good — 
 
 Good thoughts, good deeds, merciful energies — 
 
 Didst thou ascend to Heaven, and take thy rest ! 
 
 I count not all, thy pangs of pain, or sense 
 
 Of natural loathing overcome by love, 
 
 Or the short years which brought their certain doom. 
 
 These, saintly lives lit by the sun of Faith, 
 
 Despise : but to know failure in thy work, 
 
 As thou didst oft ; the souls which thou didst love 
 
 Unfaithful, and the hiss of slander mock 
 
 Thy purpose and thyself; to hear no voice 
 
 Of praise save that within thee sent from Heaven
 
 288 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Or some low faint applause of kindred souls, 
 
 Far off almost as from a separate star, 
 
 Whisper across the world, while the base din 
 
 Of loud detraction smote men's ears ; to long 
 
 For home and feel thy own act banish thee. 
 
 And know inexorable Nature lurk 
 
 Behind thee, a deaf Fury pitiless, 
 
 Wielding a scourge of fire ; to ask sometimes 
 
 In deep depression, as thy Master asked, 
 
 ' Hast Thou forsaken me ?' and find no voice 
 
 To answer thee, nor pity, nor reprieve 
 
 For all thy sacrifice, nor favouring word — 
 
 A martyrdom of years ; — this were, indeed, 
 
 Too hard to bear for any but a soul 
 
 Fired as thine was, nay is, with love immense 
 
 As Heaven itself, stronger than Life or Death — 
 
 The love of God through weak and suffering man. 
 
 The love of man through his Creator, God."
 
 A Vision of Saiiits. 289 
 
 But many a saintly form I knew, and passed 
 
 Without a word, because no vision long 
 
 Endures, and that for all no mortal life 
 
 Might well suffice. Did I not note thy fair 
 
 Nude youthful grace, Sebastian — beautiful 
 
 As young Apollo on the Olympian hill. 
 
 Or Marsyas, his victim — fettered fast 
 
 And pierced by rankling shafts while thou didst raise 
 
 Thy patient eyes to Heaven ? Saw I not thee, 
 
 Oh sainted childlike Agnes, with thick locks 
 
 Of gold, which, grown miraculously long, 
 
 Guarded thy maiden modesty ; or thee, 
 
 S. Agatha, with thy white wounded breast — 
 
 Martyrs and saints ? Or thee of recent days, 
 
 u
 
 290 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 S. Vincent, who thy late-enfranchised years, 
 
 Free from the prison bonds thou long hadst borne. 
 
 Didst spend in works of mercy, and didst care, 
 
 As miglit a father, for the childish lives 
 
 Forlorn which no man heeded ? Saw I not 
 
 Thee, saintly Jeremy, whose daily feet 
 
 Paced 'neath the long-armed oaks of Golden Grove, 
 
 Above our winding Towy ; or thy mild, 
 
 Benevolent gaze, good Howard, who didst die, 
 
 Christ-like, for souls in prison ? Saw I not, 
 
 Blessing our land, thy apostolic form, 
 
 Dear Wesley, through whose white soul Love Divine 
 
 Shone unrefracted, whose pure life was full 
 
 Of love for God and man, whose faithful hand 
 
 Relit the expiring fire, which sloth and sense 
 
 And the sad world's unfaith had wellnigh quenched 
 
 And left in ashes ; or thy saintly friend, 
 
 Fletcher of Madeley, clean consumed of faith 
 
 And ruth for perishing souls ; or thee, whose zeal
 
 A Vision of Saints. 291 
 
 Laid all thy learning at His feet who gave it, 
 
 Eliot, apostle to the dying race 
 
 Of the Red Indian, on their trackless plains 
 
 Preaching in their own tongue the gracious news 
 
 Thy learning opened ; or thy comely form, 
 
 Brave Dorothy, who thy abounding life, 
 
 'Neath smoke-stained skies, 'mid coarse and brutal 
 
 souls, 
 Gavest to the maimed and sick, content to be 
 A happy life-long martyr, and didst die 
 Alone at last of hopeless torture, pains 
 Incurable, yet cheerful barest thy cross 
 Even to the end ; or ye, oh priceless lives ! 
 After long years of terror, day and night, 
 Till death itself seemed better than your dread, 
 Shed for the Faith by many a savage isle 
 Of the Pacific seas ; or ye whose graves 
 'Mid fever-swamps or silent forest depths 
 The Moslem slaver mocks, sent to sure death 
 For Africa. Nay, nay, I marked ye all,
 
 292 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 But might not tarry more, so vast has grown, 
 Lost in dim eld, and longer, hour by hour, 
 The ever-lengthening pageant of the Blest. 
 
 And then there came no other name men know, 
 For now we passed along the close-set files 
 Of saints and martyrs, bearing each the palm. 
 Though marked no more by robes antique, or mien, 
 Or speech, but of the modern centuries, 
 And as we live to-day. So thick they rose 
 Streaming from earth, as when the autumnal year 
 Sheds its fair throng of meteors on the sky. 
 So those pure souls, white with a glittering train 
 Of light, flashed upward, till I might not take 
 Count of their number, for of every race 
 And hue and creed they came, of every age, 
 Both young and old — all to the heavens above 
 Rose upward ; and an infinite thankfulness 
 Took me, and joy, because our day, that seems
 
 A Vision of Saints. 293 
 
 To some so void of faith, so full of pain 
 
 And chilled with deadly doubt, not less than those 
 
 The faithful ages niight, sent forth its tale 
 
 Of victories of the Faith. Nor bore they all 
 
 The name of Christ, but some there were who held 
 
 The old unchanging Faith from whence He came 
 
 Whom yet their fathers slew, and some who called 
 
 On that ascetic Prince who draws the East 
 
 With some faint law of Mercy and of Love 
 
 For all created essences, one hope 
 
 To be with God, even though Man's nature rush 
 
 To His as doth the river to the sea, 
 
 Absorbed in Him for ever ; and of those 
 
 To whom the fierce false Prophet calling, taught, 
 
 Though stained with fanatic zeal and grovelling sense. 
 
 Amid the noise of base idolatries, 
 
 The unity of God, the pure, the wise, 
 
 Who sits to judge the world ; there came who left 
 
 The sensual stye and rose above the din
 
 294 ^ Vision of Sai^its. 
 
 Of the world's wranglings, and who were indeed 
 His saints, though Him they knew not. 
 
 But of all 
 The most part were of Him, each Christian race 
 Sending its cloud of witnesses to swell 
 The innumerable host. There, came the thralls 
 Of Duty, willing servants old and young, 
 Who kiss the chain that binds them, knowing well 
 That 'tis true freedom ; men who toil enchained 
 Of household care, knowing not rest nor ease, 
 For those they love, and live their briefer lives 
 For Duty ; or grave statesmen who toil on 
 To the laborious end, though life sink low, 
 Whom natural rest allures, but strive on still 
 While the sharp tooth of slander gnaws their souls. 
 Or women who have given their ease, their life, 
 To weary cares, nor heed them if they know 
 Their children happy ; or who from the hush 
 Of cloistered convents serve with prayer and praise ;
 
 A Vision of Saints. 295 
 
 Or who amid the poor and lowly folk 
 
 Of all the Churches, as their Master erst, 
 
 Toil amid sin and pain, and are content 
 
 To live compassionate days and ask no more 
 
 Of wages for their service, but, consumed 
 
 Of pity, give their lives to save the lost 
 
 And hopeless ; or who love to minister, 
 
 Spurning the weakness of their sex, the bloom 
 
 Of delicate ease, and grace and luxury, 
 
 And, 'mid the teeming homes of healing, bend 
 
 To succour bodily ill, while night by night 
 
 The sick and maimed, in restless slumbers tost, 
 
 Lie groaning till the dawn, and cries of pain 
 
 Wring the soft hearts whose duty binds them fast, 
 
 While the gay festive hearths of friends or home 
 
 Thrill with sweet music and the rhythmic feet 
 
 Of careless youth and joyance, and the rose 
 
 And lily of their gentle girlhood wait . 
 
 Their coming, but in vain, till youth is past,
 
 296 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 And with it earthly love. All these fair souls 
 In one incessant effluence of liafht 
 Soared from the earth, the army of the saints 
 Who in all time have set themselves to work 
 The Eternal Will. 
 
 And yet not all of pain 
 And suffering were they, that thus leaving earth, 
 Soared to high Heaven. To some, high sacrifice 
 Is joy, not pain. For some, from youth to age. 
 The even current of their lives flows on. 
 Broken by scarce a ripple, scarce a cloud 
 Veiling tlie constant blue — the daily use 
 Of humble dut}', the unchanging round 
 Of homely life ; the father's work, who toils 
 Ungrudging day by day, from year to year, 
 To keep the lives he loves, and dies too soon, 
 His children round his bed, nor knows at all 
 The tremours of the saint ; the lowly tasks 
 Which fill the daily round of busy lives,
 
 A Vision of Saints. 297 
 
 And keep them pure ; the willing, cheerful care 
 
 Of mothers. Wert thou not among the throng, 
 
 Dear life long fled, who, after tranquil years 
 
 Unbroken and unclouded by great griefs 
 
 Or bodily pains, on the sad year's last day 
 
 Wentest from us : who threescore years and ten 
 
 Didst wear thy children's love ; whose pitying hand 
 
 Was always open ; whose mild voice and eye 
 
 Drew rich and poor alike, a love that soared 
 
 Not on great sacrifice, indeed, or high 
 
 And saintly pains, but trod life's level plain 
 
 As 'twere high snows, and daily did inform 
 
 Earth with some hue of Heaven ; on whose loved tomb 
 
 No word is graven, save thy name and date 
 
 Of birth and deaths because it seemed that none 
 
 Might fit the gracious life and beautiful, 
 
 Whose glory was its humbleness, whose work. 
 
 Built of sweet acts and precious courtesies, 
 
 The exemplar of a home ? Nay, well I know
 
 298 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 High Heaven were not Heaven, wanting thee 
 And such as thou. Within the gates of God 
 Are many mansions, and each saintly soul 
 Treads its own path, fills its own place, but all 
 Are perfected and blest. 
 
 And yet how few 
 Of that great congress saw I. He who spends 
 Lone vigils with the stars notes on night's face 
 Some ghostly, scarce-suspected vapour gleam, 
 And turns his optic-glass to it ; and, lo ! 
 A mist of suns ! wherefrom the sensitive disc 
 Fixes the rays, first scattered, then more dense 
 With longer time, star after hidden star 
 Steahng from out the unimagined void 
 And twinkling into light, till on its face 
 Those dark unplumbed abysses show no speck 
 Of vacant gloom, a white and shining wall 
 Of glomerated worlds, broad as the bound 
 Which feeble fancy, yearning for an end,
 
 A Vision of Saints. 299 
 
 Builds round the verge of Space. So that bright throng 
 Grew denser as I gazed, till Heaven was full 
 Of the white cloud of witnesses, who, still, 
 As always since the worlds and Time began, 
 Stand round the throne of God. 
 
 Then while I gazed, 
 As in that vision fair which filled the eyes 
 Of the blest seer of Patmos, suddenly 
 The angels with veiled faces cast them down 
 Prostrate, and then a peal of glorious sound, 
 Mightier than any sound of earth, which chased 
 My dream, and well-remembered words I heard : 
 " Blessing and Glory, Wisdom, Thanksgiving, 
 Honour, and Power, and Might be unto Thee 
 For ever and for ever," 
 
 Then methought 
 My soul made answer : 
 
 " Yea, and victory 
 Over Thy Evil. Not Thy saints alone
 
 300 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Are Thine, and if one soul were lost to Thee, 
 
 Thine arm were shortened. All the myriad lives 
 
 Which are not here, but pine in bitter dole, 
 
 Do Thou redeem at last, after what toils 
 
 Thou wilt, in Thine own time, of Thine own will, 
 
 Purged, if Thou wilt, by age-long lustral pain. 
 
 Banished for long. Yet through new spheres untried 
 
 Of Being let them rise, sinner and saint. 
 
 Higher and higher still, till all shall move 
 
 In harmony with Thee and Thy great Scheme, 
 
 Which doth transcend the bounds of Earth and Time ; 
 
 Still let them work Thy work. Yet bring them home ; 
 
 Let none be lost ! For see how far thy Heavens 
 
 Are higher than our earth, how brief the tale 
 
 Of little years we live, how low and small 
 
 Our weak offence, transgression of a child 
 
 Grown petulant, on whom the father looks 
 
 With pity, not with wrath. On those dead souls 
 
 Which unillumined in the outer depths
 
 A Vision of Saints^ 301 
 
 Lie yet, too gross for Heaven, send Thou a beam 
 From Thy great Sun, and, piercing through them, 
 
 wake 
 The good that slept on earth : and, Hke the throb 
 Of radiant hght which pulses through the mist 
 With which Thy Space is sown, and wakes new 
 
 worlds, 
 Atom by atom drawn or else repelled ; 
 Or as the vibrant subtle note which thrills 
 Upon the sensitive film, and traces on it 
 Figure on figure, curve with curve inlaced 
 Into some flawless flower ; so do Thou, Lord, 
 Sound with Thy light and voice the dark dumb depths 
 And, working on the unnumbered souls which lie 
 Far from Thee, shine and call, and, waking in them 
 A latent order, purge them. Make their will 
 Harmonious with the Will which governs all, 
 And orb into some higher form, and start 
 As Thy new worlds to life, till all Thy skies
 
 302 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Shine with recovered souls. Then shall it be 
 As those great voices would, and Thou fulfilled 
 Alike in Earth and Heaven." 
 
 But as I woke 
 To this poor world again, almost with tears, 
 Not wholly did the vision fade, but still 
 Those high processions lingering with me seemed 
 To purify my soul. What was the world, 
 Its low designs and hopes, its earth-born joys. 
 Base grovelling pleasures, and unfruitful pains, 
 To those and such as they — those eyes that saw 
 Not earth, but Heaven ; those stainless feet that trod 
 Through lilied meads of saintly sacrifice 
 And strange unearthly snows ? Surely 'twas well
 
 A Vision of Saints. 303 
 
 To have seen them clearer than the mists of earth 
 Allow to waking hours. Come thou again, 
 Fair dream, and often, till thou art a dream 
 No more, but waking. March to victory. 
 Great army, from the legendary Past, 
 Through the brief Present, where Life's pilgrims toil 
 To-day, and rise triumphant, or fall prone, 
 Prest by their load ; through that unnoted tract 
 Of the dim Future which our thought pourtrays. 
 Far fairer than the world's sad Past ; which yet 
 Shall have its struggles too, its sins, its wrongs, 
 Its saints, its martyrs ! 
 
 March in stainless line. 
 Lengthening the ranks of those who, gone before, 
 Are now triumphant, till the End shall come. 
 Which hushes all our lower strifes, attunes 
 Discords to harmonies, rounds and makes complete 
 The cycles of our Lives ; till Sacrifice 
 And Pain are done, and Death, and the Dread Dawn
 
 304 A Vision of Saints. 
 
 Breaks which makes all things new, and the great Sun 
 
 Rising upon the worlds, dispels the Night 
 
 Of Man's sad Past, and routs the gathered clouds 
 
 Of Evil, and ascends a Conqueror, 
 
 Wielding full splendours of unwaning Day 
 
 For ever ! 
 
 THE END. 
 
 PRINTED liY WILHAIM CLOWES AND SUNS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCI.ES.
 
 SELECTIONS FROM THE NOTICES 
 
 OF THE 
 
 POETICAL WORKS 
 
 OF 
 
 LEWIS MORRIS.
 
 SONGS OF TWO WORLDS. 
 
 FIRST SERIES. 
 
 " The chief poem of the book is an allegory of the modern 
 soul. It is like both an ' Od3'ssey ' and a ' Faust,' but being 
 within the compass of forty-four pages, of course runs chiefly 
 over the surface of these vast problems and searching experiences. 
 Yet it seizes the point of successive phases of the spirit's effort 
 and craving in a remarkable way." — Fortnightly Review, July 
 15th, 1872. 
 
 " In 'The Wanderer,' the verse describing Socrates has that 
 highest note of critical poetry, that in it epigram becomes vivid 
 with life, and life reveals its inherent paradox. It would be dif- 
 ficult to describe the famous irony of Socrates in more poetical 
 and more accurate words than by saying that he doubted men's 
 doubts away." — Spectator, February 17th, 1872. 
 
 SECOND SERIES. 
 
 "In earnestness, sweetness, and the gift of depicting nature, 
 the writer may be pronounced a worthy disciple of his compatriot, 
 Henry Vaughan, the Silurist. Several of the shorter poems are 
 instinct with a noble purpose and a high ideal of life. The most 
 noteworthy poem is the ' Ode on a Fair Spring Morning,' which 
 has somewhat of the charm and truth to nature of ' L'Allegro ' 
 and ' II Penseroso.' It is the nearest approach to a master-piece 
 in the volume." — Saturday Review, May 30th, 1874.
 
 4 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 "This volume contains at least one poem of great originality, 
 as well as many of much tenderness, sweetness, and beauty, 
 ' The Organ-Boy ' we have read again and again, with fresh 
 pleasure on every reading. It is as exquisite a little poem as 
 we have read for many a day." — Spectator, June 13th, 1874. 
 
 THIRD SERIES. 
 
 "Not unworthy of its predecessors. It presents the same 
 command of metre and diction, the same contrasts of mood, the 
 same grace and sweetness. It cannot be denied that he has won 
 a definite position among contemporary poets." — Times, October 
 l6th, 1875. 
 
 " 'Evensong' shows power, thought, and courage to grapple 
 with the profoundest problems. In the ' Ode to Free Rome ' 
 we find worthy treatment of the subject and passionate expres- 
 sion of generous sympathy."- — Saturday Revieiv, July 31st, 1875. 
 
 " More perfect in execution than either of its predecessors. 
 . . . The pure lyrics are sweeter and richer. In the ' Birth 
 of Verse ' every stanza is a little poem in itself, and yet a part of 
 a perfect whole." — Spectator, May 22nd, 1875. 
 
 THE EPIC OF HADES. 
 
 BOOK II.* 
 
 ' ' Fresh, picturesque, and by no means deficient in intensity ; but 
 the most conspicuous merits of the author are the judgment and 
 moderation with which his poem is designed, his self-possession 
 within his prescribed limits, and the unfailing elegance of his 
 
 * Book II. was issued as a separate volume prior to the publication of 
 Books I. and III. and of the complete work.
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. i 
 
 composition, which shrinks from obscurity, exuberance, and rash 
 or painful effort as religiously as many recent poets seem to 
 cultivate such interesting blemishes. . . ." — Pall Mall Gazette, 
 March loth, 1876. 
 
 " ' Marsyas' is full of fine fancy and vivid description. His 
 'Andromeda ' has to us one recommendation denied to Kingsley's 
 — a more congenial metre ; another is its unstrained and natural 
 narrative." — Saturday Review^ May 20th, 1876. 
 
 " The passage in which Apollo's victory over Marsyas and its 
 effect are described is full of exquisite beauty. It is almost as 
 fine as verse on such a subject could be. . . . From the first 
 line to the last, the high and delicate aroma of purity breathes 
 through the various spiritual fables. " — Spectator, May 27th, 1876. 
 
 "The writer has shown himself more critical than his friends. 
 . . . This long passage studded with graces." — Academy, April 
 29th, 1876. 
 
 BOOKS I. and III. and the COMPLETE WORK. 
 
 "Not only ambitious, but audacious, for it necessarily awakens 
 reminiscences of Dante. Not unfrequently he is charmingly 
 pathetic, as in his Helen and Psyche. There is considerable 
 force and no small imagination in the description of some of 
 the tortures in the ' Tartarus. ' There is genuine poetical feeling 
 in the 'Olympus.' . . . But it is more easy to give honest 
 general praise than to single out particular extracts." — Times, 
 February 9th, 1877. 
 
 " The whole of this last portion of the poem is exceedingly 
 beautiful. . . . Nor will any, except critics of limited view, 
 fail to recogTiize in the Epic a distinct addition to their store of 
 those companions of whom we never grow tired." — Athencsum, 
 March 3rd, 1877.
 
 6 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 " One of the most considerable and original feats of recent 
 English poetry." — Saturday Review, March 31st, 1877. 
 
 " Will live as a poem of permanent power and charm. It will 
 receive high appreciation from all who can enter into its meaning, 
 for its graphic and liquid pictures of external beauty, the depth 
 and truth of its purgatorial ideas, and the ardour, tenderness, 
 and exaltation of its spiritual life." — Spectator, May 5th, 1877. 
 
 " I have lately been reading a poem which has interested me 
 very much, a poem called 'The Epic of Hades.' It is, as I view 
 it, another gem added to the wealth of the poetry of our lan- 
 guage. " — Mr. Bright' s speech on Cobden, at Bradford, July 25th, 
 1877. 
 
 " I have read the ' Epic of Hades,' and find it truly charming. 
 Its pictures will long remain with me, and the music of its 
 words." — Oliver Wendell Holmes, April, 1884. 
 
 THE EPIC OF HADES. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED QUARTO EDITION. 
 
 "Of Mr. Chapman's illustrations it is pleasant to be able to 
 speak with considerable admiration, not only because they are 
 a fortunate echo of the verse, and represent the feelings and 
 incidents of the ' Epic,' but because of their intrinsic merits. 
 There is in them a fine and high inspiration of an indefinite 
 sort." — AthencEiim, March 29th, 1879. 
 
 " ' The Epic of Hades ' is certainly one of the most remarkable 
 works of the latter half of the nineteenth century. Here is an 
 idition de luxe which may possibly tempt the unthinking to 
 search for the jewel within the casket." — I'Vorld, February 
 I2th, 1879.
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 7 
 
 " The author has been most fortunate in his iUustrator. The 
 designs are gems of drawing and conception, and the mezzotint 
 is admirably adapted to the style of drawing and subject." — 
 Art Jourtial, April, 1879. 
 
 " 'The Epic of Hades' has already won a place among the 
 immortals. These designs are noteworthy for their tenderness 
 of sentiment and their languid grace." — Daily News, April 
 2nd, 1879. 
 
 GWEN: 
 
 A DRAMA IN MONOLOGUE. 
 
 "The charm of this beautiful little poem is its perfect sim- 
 plicity of utterance ; its chastened and exquisite grace. The 
 genius of the author has closed an idyll of love and death with 
 a strain of sweet, sad music in that minor key which belongs 
 to remembrance and regret." — Daily A^ews, January 22nd, 1879. 
 
 "Few among the later poets of our time have received such 
 a generous welcome as the author. He has been appreciated 
 not by critics alone, but by the general public. . . . The charm 
 of ' Gwen ' is to be found in the limpid clearness of the versifica- 
 tion, in the pathetic notes which tell the old story of true love 
 wounded and crushed." — Pall Mall Gazette, October 8th, 1879. 
 
 "The writer has gained inspiration from themes which 
 inspired Dante ; he has sung sweet songs and musical lyrics ; 
 and whether writing in rhyme or blank verse, has proved him- 
 self a master of his instrument." — Spectator, July 26th, 1879.
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 THE ODE OF LIFE. 
 
 "The 'Ode of Life' ought to be the most popular of all the 
 author's works. People flock to hear great preachers, but in this 
 book they will hear a voice more eloquent than theirs, dealing 
 with the most important subjects that can ever occupy the 
 thoughts of man." — Westminster Review, July, 1 880. 
 
 " The author is one of the few real poets now living. Any- 
 thing at once more sympathetic and powerful it would be 
 difficult to find in the poetry of the present day." — Scotsman, 
 May nth, 1880. 
 
 "A high devout purpose and wide human sympathy ennoble 
 all the writer's work, and his clear language and quiet music 
 will retain his audience." — Alneteenth Centmy, August, 1880. 
 
 "Any notice of recent poetry would be inadequate without a 
 reference to the ' Ode of Life. ' The only fault we have to find 
 with this really remarkable effort — a sort of expansion of Words- 
 worth's famous Ode — is that it is rather too long for its ideas ; 
 but it possesses power, sweetness, occasional profundity, and 
 unmistakable music." — Contemporary Review, February, 1881. 
 
 SONGS UNSUNG. 
 
 " Some of the more important pieces make almost equal and 
 very high demands alike on my sympathy and my admiration." 
 — Mr. Gladstone, November, 1883. 
 
 "The reader of his former work will probably commence 
 this volume with considerable expectations. Nor will he be
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 9 
 
 altogether disappointed, although he will probably wish that 
 Mr. Morris had given the world more of his exquisite classical 
 workmanship." — Fortnightly Revieiv, November, 1883. 
 
 "'The New Creed' is, in some respects^ his most striking 
 achievement. The poem is one well suited to his mind, but 
 we are not aware that he has ever before written anything 
 at once so impressive, so solemn, and so self-restrained. The 
 last two lines have all the happy energy of the highest poetry." — 
 Spectator, November loth, 1883. 
 
 "In reading it one feels constantly 'How worthy this book 
 would be of beautiful illustrations I ' " — Academy, November 
 24th, 1S83. 
 
 "For ourselves we dare hardly say how high we rank Mr. 
 Morris. This last volume is deserving of highest praise. In 
 some of its contents no living poet, to our mind, can surpass 
 him." — Oxford University Herald, March 8th, 1884. 
 
 " In one sense * Songs Unsung ' is more typical of Mr. Morris's 
 genius than any of his previous works. There is in them the 
 same purity of expression, the same delicate fancy, the same 
 mastery of technique, and withal the same loftiness of concep- 
 tion." — Scotsman, December 22nd, 1S83. 
 
 ' ' In some respects we must award him the distinction of hav- 
 ing a clearer perception of the springs of nineteenth-century 
 existence than any of his contemporaries. . . . What could be 
 more magnificent than the following conception of the beginning 
 of things. . . ." — Whitehall Review, October, 1883. 
 
 "We have quoted enough to show that this book has genuine 
 merit in it, merit in poetry, merit in philosophy, and, we may 
 add, merit in religion. There are living poets greater than 
 Lewis Morris, but of the younger race of poets he is foremost." 
 — The Inquirer, April 5th, 1884.
 
 1° OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 "This volume is likely to add to his reputation. It is healthy 
 in tone, and shows no decline of the varied qualities to which 
 the author owes his widespread reputation." — Times, Tune o 
 1884. 
 
 GYCI A. 
 
 " ' Gycia' abounds in powerful dramatic situations, while the 
 intricate evolutions of a double plot in love and statecraft pro- 
 voke perpetual curiosity, which is only fully satisfied at the end. 
 The heroine, in her single-minded patriotism and her undeviating 
 devotion to duty, rises to the level of the loftiest feminine con- 
 ceptions of the old Greek dramatists. And she is finely con- 
 trasted with her generous and impulsive husband, who has 
 neither her sternness of principle nor her steadiness of purpose. 
 The form of the verse is so picturesque, and the flow is so free, 
 that we should say, if effectively delivered, it must command an 
 appreciative audience. It would have been difficult for any 
 poet to do full justice to the thrilling scene where Gycia de- 
 nounces the treason of her husband and his countrymen to the 
 chief magistrates of the State. Yet Mr. Morris has done it well. 
 Nearly as stirring, and even more pathetic, is the scene where 
 the pair are seated side by side in state, with anguished hearts 
 and smiling faces, at the banquet, which, as each knows well, is 
 to end with a horrible catastrophe."— 7>wt'i', October i8th, 1886. 
 
 "The dramatis persona have life and individuality; the situa- 
 tions are for the most part strong and rich in really dramatic 
 effects ; the architecture of the plot is simple, harmonious, and 
 symmetrical, without any of that obtrusive artificiality which 
 often accompanies symmetry ; and the action never drags, but 
 is always in determinate progressive movement. A drama of 
 which these things can be truthfully said is not merely good as 
 drama, but has that element of popularity which is of more
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. ii 
 
 practical value than the absolute goodness of which only critics 
 take account. The verse is, throughout, strong, fluent, rich, 
 variously expressive, and adequate with that adequacy which 
 satisfies without drawing attention to itself." — Mr. J. A. Noble, 
 in the Academy, November 20th, 1886. 
 
 " Throughout there is the artistic contrast and striving between 
 the spirit of liberty and tyranny, between Republican simplicity 
 and patrician form and ceremony, and a great political lesson is 
 taught. It is hardly necessary to praise the nobility and the 
 dignity, the sweetness and the strength, of Mr. Morris's verse. 
 ' Gycia ' will add to his already firmly founded reputation as a 
 dramatic poet and writer of noble blank verse. It is one of the 
 few works by recent English poets that seem capable of thrilling 
 an audience upon the stage, as well as enchaining the mind of 
 the student in the chamber." — Scotsman, November loth, 18S6. 
 
 "I have lost no time in reading your tragedy. I perused it 
 with great interest, and a sense throughout of its high poetic 
 powers." — Mr. Gladstone, October 20th, 1886. 
 
 "Notwithstanding all drawbacks, we think that 'Gycia' is 
 by very much the best contribution that Mr. Morris has yet 
 made to literature. It is full of solid work, and has a strong 
 current of interest. It might be remodelled into a very fine 
 stage play." — Liverpool Mercury, 'iiowQmbtx ?>ih, 1886. 
 
 "Want of space prevents us from entering into any close 
 criticism, and also from giving specimens of passages of poetic 
 merit in which Mr. Morris has done himself justice, and which 
 will be read with pleasure. Such passages are plentiful in 
 'Gycia.'" — AthcnccHm, December i8th, 1886. 
 
 "To take up 'Gycia' is not to lay it aside again until you 
 have read it through to the last page. It possesses all the 
 requisites for a good play. Whether it succeed on the stage or 
 not, and we heartily wish it success, it will ever be read with
 
 '2 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 pleasure by those who can appreciate what there is of refined 
 and beautiful, noble and true in literature, or art, or higher 
 things i\:\\\:'— The Month, January, 1887. 
 
 "In its tragic ending, mournful though it is, there is true 
 poetic justice, and no one can close the book without having 
 been interested and often touched and thrilled by the true magic 
 of the poetic spell."— ^«^//ca« Church Magazine. 
 
 SONGS OF BRITAIN. 
 
 " Mr. Morris has done well to incorporate in his new volume 
 three stories of Wild Wales, which are its most important por- 
 tion. They are told with spirit and charm of local colour. In 
 his treatment of subjects already free of Parnassus, he" has a 
 happy way of hitting off" charming pictures and felicitous modes 
 of expression." — Athenceum, April 30th, 1887. 
 
 "Mr. Morris's new book strikes us as being by much the 
 most popular that he has yet put forth, and its most popular 
 portions are the poems founded on old Welsh peasant tradition, 
 ' Llyn y Morwynion ' is a beautiful legend of love and death. 
 But by far the most beautiful of these legends of Wild Wales is 
 that which he calls 'The Physicians of Myddfai.' In telhng 
 these legends, Mr. Morris displays greater poetic quality than 
 he has ever before shown. His verse is richer, fuller, and more 
 melodious, but, better than this, his feeling for his subject is well- 
 nigh perfect. Such lightness of touch and such sympathy he has 
 never before shown. It is easy to mar the exquisite beauty of 
 such gossamer things as these old traditions, but he has not done 
 so by so much as a jarring word. Softly, sweetly, tenderly, the 
 story glides along, and not until the last word is reached is the 
 spell broken. Mr. Morris has here cut his highest niche as a 
 poet." — Liverpool Mercury, April 30th, 1887.
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 13 
 
 " Upon these beautiful Welsh poems we very heartily con- 
 gratulate Mr. Morris. If Wales has many more such entrancing 
 stories as these to tell, he may find his surest title to lasting fame 
 in marrying them to melodious verse." — Liverpool Daily Post, 
 May i6th, 1887. 
 
 " Mr. Lewis Morris gained his place years ago in the higher 
 rank of contemporary poets. In the preludes to these romantic 
 tales he sketches both tenderly and truthfully the present aspects 
 of local scenery, and the manners of the Welsh people. But 
 the finest piece in this volume is one belonging to Greater 
 Britain, 'A Song of Empire for the Queen's Jubilee Year.' 
 It merits to be the inaugural ode of the Imperial Institute." — 
 Illustrated N'eivs, May 14th, 1887. 
 
 " Mr. Morris's new volume exhibits those qualities to which 
 are due his well-earned distinction and widespread popularity. 
 Choice and dainty language, good taste, natural feeling, not 
 passionately strong, indeed, but sincere and unaffected, and a 
 considerable sense of beauty make his writing generally good 
 reading, and do not fail us in this instance." — Christian IVorld, 
 April 28th, 1887. 
 
 " Mr. Morris is not a profound thinker, nor has he anything 
 very momentous to say which we have not heard long ago. As 
 to technical form and diction, his fame will rest on his blank 
 verse, which is remarkably lucid, even, and sustained, often 
 powerful, and sometimes highly beautiful. He composes fine 
 pictures, and paints them well and strongly with a certain 
 mannerism — the manner of Tennyson at his best. In the 
 beautiful poem, ' In Pembrokeshire, 1886,' and elsewhere, he 
 gives us the perfect atmosphere and sentiment of scenery, but 
 then so many of the moderns have caught this art." — Pall Mall 
 Gazette, May 23rd, 1887. 
 
 " Delicacy of feeling and a deep sense of the beauty of 
 nature characterize these poems. Those inspired by ' Wild
 
 14 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Wales ' are remarkable for lyrical strength and vivid descriptive 
 power." — Morning Post, May 2nd, 1887. 
 
 " This charming volume, . . . while it fails to augment to 
 any appreciable degree its author's fame, worthily sustains the 
 poetic reputation which he has so honourably won." — Leeds 
 Mercury, May 31st, 1887. 
 
 " The most striking poems in the volume, rising highest in 
 purpose and sustained with intellectual force and imaginative 
 energy, are the three that embody legends of Wild Wales. 
 Here Mr. Morris has struck a prolific and valuable vein. . . . 
 His poetic discrimination, suggestive observant bias, delight in 
 rural scenery, elevation of purpose, and strong moral sense are 
 all here as of old. . . . A volume that all lovers of poetry will 
 cherish as a precious possession." — Scottish News, June 14th, 
 1887. 
 
 "These lines are quite up to the standard of the 'Epic of 
 Hades,' and it would be hard to find anywhere a more beautiful 
 image than that of the 'white birds swooping down.'" — 
 Literary IVoild, June 1 6th, 1887.
 
 ,^i^