Legends of the Saxon Saints Part 4

Once again She mused, and then continued, 'Truth and Love Are gifts too great to give themselves for nought; Exacting G.o.ds. Within man's bleeding heart, If e'er to man conceded, both shall lie Crossed, like two swords-- Behold thine image, crowned Humanity!

Better such dower than life exempt from woe: Our Fathers knew to suffer; joyed in pain; They knew not this--how deep its root!'

Once more The Prophetess was mute: again she spake: 'How named thy guest his G.o.d?' The King replied: 'The Warrior G.o.d, Who comes to judge the world; The Lord of Love; the G.o.d Who wars on Sin, And ceases not to war.' 'Ay, militant,'

Heida rejoined, with eyes that shone like stars: 'The Persian knew Him. Ormuzd was His name: Unpitying Light against the darkness warred; Against the Light the Darkness. Could the Light Remit, one moment's length, to pierce that gloom, Himself in gloom were swallowed.'

Yet again In silence Heida sat; then cried aloud, 'Odin, and all his radiant aesir G.o.ds Forth thronging daily from the golden gates Of Asgard City, their supernal house, War on that giant brood of Jotunheim, Lodged 'mid their mountains of eternal ice Which circles still that sea surrounding earth, Man's narrow home. I know that mystery now!

That warfare means the war of Good on Ill: We shared that warfare once! This day, depraved, Warring, we war alone for rage and hate; Men fight as fight the lion and the pard: For them the sanct.i.ty of war is lost, Lost like the kindred sanct.i.ty of Love, Our household boast of old. The Father-G.o.d Vowed us to battle but as Virtue's proof, High test of softness scorned. His warrior knew 'Twas Odin o'er the battle field who sent Pure-handed maiden G.o.ddesses, the Norns, Not vulture-like, but dove-like, mild as dawn, To seal the foreheads of his sons elect, Seal them to death, the bravest with a kiss: His warrior, arming, cried aloud, "This day I speed five Heroes to Valhalla's Hall: To-morrow night in love I share their Feast!"

He honoured whom he slew.'

To her the King: 'That Stranger with severer speech than thine, Sharp flail and stigma, charged the world with sin, The vast, wide world, and not one race alone: Each nation, he proclaimed, from Man's great stem Issuing, had with it borne one Word divine Rapt from G.o.d's starry volume in the skies, Each word a separate Truth, that, angel-like, Before them winging, on their faces flung Splendour of destined morn, and led man's race Triumphant long on virtue's road. Themselves Had changed that True to False. The Judge had come; That Power Who both beginning is and end Had stooped to earth to judge the earth with fire; A fire of Love, He came to cleanse the just; A fire of Vengeance, to consume the impure: His fan is in His hand: the chaff shall burn; The grain be garnered. "Fall, high palace roofs,"

He cried, "for ye have sheltered dens of sin: Fall, he that, impious, scorned the First and Last; Fall, he that bowed not to the h.o.a.ry head; Fall, he that loosed by fraud the maiden zone; Fall, he that l.u.s.ted for the poor man's field; Fall, rebel Peoples; fall, disloyal Kings; And fall"--dread Mother, is the word offence?-- "False G.o.ds, long served; for G.o.d Himself is nigh."'

The monarch ceased: on Heida's face that hour He feared to look; but when she spake, her voice Betrayed no pa.s.sion of a soul perturbed: Austere it was; not wrathful; these her words: 'Son, as I hearkened to thy tale this day, Memory returned to me of visions three That lighted three great junctures of my life: And thrice thy words were echoes strange of words That shook my tender childhood, slumbering half, Half-waked by matin beams--"The G.o.ds must die."

Three times that awful sound was in mine ear: Later I learned that voice was nothing new.

My Son, the earliest record of our Faith, So sacred that on Runic stave or stone None dared to grave it, lore from age to age Transmitted by white lips of trembling seers, Spared not to wing, like arrow sped from G.o.d, That word to man, "Valhalla's G.o.ds must die!"

The G.o.ds and Giant Race that strove so long, Met in their last and mightiest battle field, Must die, and die one death. That prophet-voice The G.o.ds have heard. Therefore they daily swell Valhalla's Hall with heroes rapt from earth To aid them in that fight.'

On Heida's face At last the King, his head uplifting, gazed:-- There where the inviolate calm had dwelt alone A million thoughts, each following each, on swept, That calm beneath them still, as when some grove, O'er-run by sudden gust of summer storm, With inly-working panic thrills at first, Then springs to meet the gale, while o'er it rush Shadows with splendours mixed. Upon her breast Came down the fire divine. With lifted hands She stood: she sang a death-song centuries old, The dirge prophetic both of G.o.ds and men:

'The iron age shall make an iron end: The men who lived in hate, or impious love, Shall meet in one red battle field. That day The forests of the earth, blackening, shall die; The stars down-fall; the Winged Hound of Heaven, That chased the Sun from age to age, shall close O'er it at last; the Ash Tree, Ygdrasil, Whose boughs o'er-roof the skies, whose roots descend To h.e.l.l, whose leaves are lives of men, whose boughs The destined empires that o'er-awe the world, Shall drop its fruit unripe. The Midgard Snake, Circling that sea which girds the orb of earth, Shall wake, and turn, and ocean in one wave O'er-sweep all lands. Thereon shall Naglfar ride, The skeleton ship all ribbed with bones of men, Whose sails are woven of night, and by whose helm Stand the Three Fates. When heaves that ship in sight, Then know the end draws nigh.'

She ceased; then spake: 'If any doubt, the Voluspa tells all, The song the mystic maiden, Vola, sang; Our first of prophets she, as I the last: She sang that song no Prophet dared to write.'

But Sigebert made answer where he knelt, Old Faith back rushing blindly on his heart: 'Though man's last nation lay a wreath of dust, Though earth were sea, not less in heaven the G.o.ds Would hold their revels still; Valhalla's Halls Resound the heroes' triumph!'

Once again Heida arose: once more her pallid face Shone lightning-like, wan cheeks and flashing eyes; Once more she sang: 'The Warder of the G.o.ds, Soundeth the Gjallar Trumpet, never heard Before by G.o.ds or mortals: from their feast The everlasting synod of the G.o.ds Rush forth, gold-armed, with chariot and with horse: First rides the Father of the flock divine, Odin, our King, and, at his right hand, Thor Whose thunder hammer splits the mountain crags And level lays the summits of the world; Heimdall and Bragi, Uller, Njord, and Tyr, Behind them throng; with these the concourse huge Of lesser G.o.ds, and Heroes s.n.a.t.c.hed from earth, Since man's first battle, part to bear with G.o.ds In this their greatest. From their halls of ice To meet them stride the mighty Giant-Brood, The moving mountains of old Jotunheim, Strong with all strengths of Nature, flood or fire, Glacier, or stream volcanic from red hills Cutting through gra.s.s-green billows;--on they throng Topping the clouds, and, leagues before them, flinging Huge shade, like shade of mountains cast o'er wastes When sets the sun.' A little time she ceased; Then fiercelier sang: 'Flanking that Giant-Brood I see two Portents, terrible as Sin:-- The Midgard Snake primeval at the right, With demon-crest as haughtily upheaved As though all ocean curled into one wave:-- A million rainbows braid that glooming arch; And Death therein is mirrored. At the left, On moves that brother Terror, wolf in shape, Which, bound till now by craft of prescient G.o.ds, Weltered in h.e.l.l's abyss. Till came the hour A single hair inwoven by heavenly hand Sufficed to chain that monster to his rock;-- His fast is over now; his dusky jaws At last the Eternal Hunger lifts distent As far as heaven from earth.'

The Prophetess One moment pressed her palms upon her eyes, Then flung them wide. 'The Father of the G.o.ds, Our Odin, at that Portent hurls his lance; And Thor, though bleeding fast, with hammer raised Deals with that Serpent's scales.'

'The G.o.ds shall win,'

Shouted the King, forgetting at that hour All save the strife, while on his brow there burned Hue of the battle at the battle's height When no man staunches wound. With voice serene (The storm had left her) Heida made reply: 'If any doubt, the Voluspa tells all.

Ere yet Valhalla's lower heaven was shaped Muspell, the great Third Heaven immeasurable, Above it towered, throne of that G.o.d Supreme, Who knew beginning none, and knows no end: High on its southern cliff that dread One sits, Nor ever from the South withdraws His gaze, Nor ever drops that bright, sky-pointing Sword Whose splendour dims the noontide sun. That G.o.d-- He, and the Spirit-Host that wing His light, When shines the Judgment Sign, shall stand on earth, And judge the earth with fire. Nor men nor G.o.ds Shall face that fire and live.'

As Heida spake The broad full moon above the forest soared, And changed her form to light. With hands out-stretched She sang her last of songs: 'The Hour is come: Bifrost, the rainbow-bridge 'twixt heaven and earth Shatters; the crystal walls of heaven roll in: Above the ruins ride the Sons of Light.

That dread One first-- Forth from His helm the intolerable beam Strikes to the battle-field; the Giant-Brood Die in that flame; and Odin, and his G.o.ds: Valhalla falls, and with it Jotunheim, Its ice-piled mountains melting into waves: In fire are all things lost!'

Then wept the King: 'Alas for Odin and his brethren G.o.ds That in their great hands stayed the northern land!

Alas for man!' But Heida, with fixed face Whereon there sat its ancient calm, replied: 'Nothing that lived but shall again have life, Such life as virtue claims. Ill-working men With Loki and with Hela, evil G.o.ds, Shall dwell far down in Nastrond's death-black pile Compact of serpent scales, whose thousand gates Face to the North, blinded by endless storm: But from the sea shall rise a happier earth, Holier and happier. There the good and true Secure shall gladden, and the fiery flame Harm them no more. Another Asgard there Where stood that earlier, ere our fathers left Their native East, shall lift sublimer towers Dawn-lighted by a loftier Ararat: Just men and pure shall pace its palmy steeps With him of race divine yet human heart, Baldur, upon whose beaming front the G.o.ds Gazing, exulted; from whose lips mankind Shall gather counsel. Hand in hand with him Shall stand the blind G.o.d, Hodur, now not blind, That, witless, slew him with the mistletoe, Yet loved him well. Others, both men and G.o.ds, That dread Third Heaven attained, shall make abode With Him Who ever is, and ever was, Enthroned like Him upon its southern cliff, Drinking the light immortal. From beneath, Like winds from flowery wildernesses borne, The breath of all good deeds and virtuous thoughts, Their own, or others', since the worlds were made, All generous sufferings, o'er their hearts shall hang, Fragrance perpetual; and, where'er they gaze, The Vision of their G.o.d shall on them shine.'

Thus Heida spake, and ceased; then added, 'Son, Our Faith shall never suffer wreck: fear nought!

Fulfilment, not Destruction, is its end.

But thou return, and bid thy herald guest Who sought thee, wandering from his westward Isle, Approach my gates at dawn, and in mine ear Divulge his message to this land. Farewell!'

Then from his knees the monarch rose, and took Through the huge moonlit woods his homeward way.

_KING SIGEBERT OF ESs.e.x, OR A FRIEND AT NEED._

Sigebert, King of Ess.e.x, labours with Cedd the Bishop for the conversion of his people; but he feasts with a certain impious kinsman; and it is foretold to him that for that sin, though pardoned, he shall die by that kinsman's hand. This prophecy having been accomplished, Cedd betakes himself to Lastingham, there to pray with his three brothers for the king's soul. His prayer is heard, and in a few days he dies. Thirty of Cedd's monks, issuing from Ess.e.x to pray at his grave, die also, and are buried in a circle round it.

'At last resolve, my brother, and my friend!

Fling from you, as I fling this cloak, your G.o.ds, And cleave to Him, the Eternal, One and Sole, The All-Wise, All-Righteous and Illimitable, Who made us, and will judge.' Thus Oswy spake To Sigebert, his friend, of Ess.e.x King, Ess.e.x once Christian. Royal Sebert dead, The Church of G.o.d had sorrow by the Thames: Three Pagan brothers in his place held sway: They warred upon G.o.d's people; for which cause G.o.d warred on them, and by the Wess.e.x sword In one day hewed them down. King Sigebert, Throned in their place, to Oswy thus replied: 'O friend, I saw the Truth, yet saw it not!

'Twas like the light forth flashed from distant oar, Now vivid, vanished now. Not less, methinks, Thy Christ ere now had won me save for this; I feared that in my bosom love for thee, Not Truth alone, prevailed. I left thy court; I counselled with my wisest; by degrees, Though grieving thus to outrage loyal hearts, Reached my resolve: henceforth I serve thy G.o.d: My kingdom may renounce me if it will.'

Then came the Bishop old, and nigh that Wall Which spans the northern land from sea to sea Baptized him to the G.o.d Triune. At night The King addressed him thus: 'My task is hard; Yield me four priests of thine from Holy Isle To shape my courses.' Finan gazed around And made election--Cedd and others three; He consecrated Cedd with staff and ring; And by the morning's sunrise Sigebert Rode with them, face to south.

The Spring, long checked, Fell, like G.o.d's Grace, or fire, or flood, at once O'er all the land: it swathed the hills in green; It fringed with violets cleft and rock; illumed The stream with primrose tufts: but mightier far That Spring which triumphed in the monarch's breast, All doubt dispelled. That smile which knew not cause Looked like his angel's mirrored on his face: At times he seemed with utter gladness dazed; At times he laughed aloud. 'Father,' he cried, 'That darkness from my spirit is raised at last: Ah fool! ah fool! to wait for proof so long!

Unseal thine eyes, and all things speak of G.o.d: The snows on yonder thorn His pureness show; Yon golden iris bank His love. But now I marked a child that by its father ran: Some mystery they seemed of love in heaven Imaged in earthly love. 'With sad, sweet smile The old man answered: 'Pain there is on earth-- Bereavement, sickness, death.' The King replied: 'It was by suffering, not by deed, or word, G.o.d's Son redeemed mankind.' Then answered Cedd: 'G.o.d hath thee in His net; and well art thou!

That Truth thou seest this day, and feelest, live!

So shall it live within thee. If, more late, Rebuke should come, or age, remember then This day-spring of thy strength, and answer thus, "With me G.o.d feasted in my day of youth: So feast He now with others!"'

Years went by, And Cedd in work and word was mighty still, And throve with G.o.d. The strong East Saxon race Grew gentle in his presence: they were brave, And faith is courage in the things divine, Courage with meekness blent. The heroic heart Beats to the spiritual cognate, paltering not Fraudulent with truth once known. Like winds from G.o.d G.o.d's message on them fell. Old bonds of sin, Snapt by the vastness of the growing soul, Burst of themselves; and in the heart late bound Virtue had room to breathe. As when that Voice Primeval o'er the formless chaos rolled, And, straight, confusions ceased, the greater orb Ruling the day, the lesser, night; even so, Born of that Bethlehem Mystery, order lived: Divine commandments fixed a firmament Betwixt man's lower instincts and his mind: From unsuspected summits of his spirit The morning shone. The nation with the man Partook the joy: from duty freedom flowed; And there where tribes had roved a people lived.

A pathos of strange beauty hung thenceforth O'er humblest hamlet: he who pa.s.sed it prayed 'May never sword come here!' Bishop and King Together laboured: well that Bishop's love Repaid that royal zeal. If random speech Censured the King, though justly, sudden red Circling the old man's silver-tressed brow Showed, though he spake not, that in saintly breast The human heart lived on.

In Ithancester He dwelt, and toiled: not less to Lindisfarne, His ancient home, in spirit oft he yearned, Longing for converse with his G.o.d alone; And made retreat there often, not to shun Labour allotted, but to draw from heaven Strength for his task. One year, returning thence, Deira's King addressed him as they rode: 'My father, choose the richest of my lands And build thereon a holy monastery; So shall my realm be blessed, and I, and mine.'

He answered: 'Son, no wealthy lands for us!

Spake not the prophet: "There where dragons roamed, In later days the gra.s.s shall grow--the reed"?

I choose those rocky hills that, on our left, Drag down the skiey waters to the woods: Such loved I from my youth: to me they said, "Bandits this hour usurp our heights, and beasts c.u.mber our caves: expel the seed accurst, And yield us back to G.o.d!"'

The King gave ear; And Cedd within those mountains pa.s.sed his Lent, Driving with prayer and fast the spirits accurst With ignominy forth. Foundations next He laid with sacred pomp. Fair rose the walls: All day the March sea blew its thunder blasts Through wide-mouthed trumpets of ravine or rift On winding far to where in wooden cell The old man prayed, while o'er him rushed the cloud Storm-borne from crag to crag. Serener breeze, With alternation soft in Nature's course, Following ere long, great Easter's harbinger, Thus spake he: 'I must keep the Feast at home; My children there expect me.' Parting thence, He left his brothers three to consummate His work begun, Celin, and Cynabil, And Chad, at Lichfield Bishop ere he died.

Thus Lastingham had birth.

Beside the Thames Meantime dark deeds were done. There dwelt two thanes, The kinsmen of the King, his friends in youth, Of meanest friend unworthy. Far and wide They ravined, and the laws of G.o.d and man Despised alike. Three times, in days gone by, A warning hand their Bishop o'er them raised; The fourth like bolt from heaven on them it fell, And clave them from G.o.d's Church. They heeded not; And now the elder kept his birthday feast, Summoning his friends around him, first the King.

Doubtful and sad, the o'er-gentle monarch mused: 'To feast with sinners is to sanction sin, A deed abhorred; the alternative is hard: Must then their sovereign shame with open scorn Kinsman and friend? I think they mourn the past, And, were our Bishop here, would pardon sue.'

Boding, yet self-deceived, he joined that feast: Thereat he saw scant sign of penitence: Ere long he bade farewell.

That self-same hour Cedd from his northern pilgrimage returned; The monarch met him at the offenders' gate, And, instant when he saw that reverend face, His sin before him stood. Down from his horse Leaping, he told him all, and penance prayed.

Long time the old man on that royal front Fixed a sad eye. 'Thy sin was great, my son, Shaming thy G.o.d to spare a sinner's shame: That sin thy G.o.d forgives, and I remit: But those whom G.o.d forgives He chastens oft: My son, I see a sign upon thy brow!

Ere yonder lessening moon completes her wane Behold, the blood-stained hand late clasped in thine Shall drag thee to thy death.' The King replied: 'A Sigebert there lived, East Anglia's King, Whose death was glorious to his realm. May mine, Dark and inglorious, strengthen hearts infirm, And profit thus my land.'

A time it was When Christian mercy, judged by Pagan hearts, Not virtue seemed but sin. That sin's reproach The King had long sustained. Ere long it chanced That, near the stronghold of that impious feast, A vanquished rebel, long in forests hid, Drew near, and knelt to Sigebert for grace, And won his suit. The monarch's kinsmen twain, Those men of blood, forth-gazing from a tower, Saw all; heard all. Upon them fury fell, As when through cloudless skies there comes a blast From site unknown, that, instant, finds its prey, Circling some white-sailed bark, or towering tree, And, with a touch, down-wrenching; all things else Unharmed, though near. They s.n.a.t.c.hed their daggers up, And rushed upon their prey, and, shouting thus, 'White-livered slave, that mak'st thy throne a jest, And mock'st great Odin's self, and us, thy kin, To please thy shaveling,' struck him through the heart; Then, spurring through the woodlands to the sea, Were never heard of more.

Throughout the land Lament was made; lament in every house, As though in each its eldest-born lay dead; Lament far off and near. The others wept: Cedd, in long vigils of the lonely night, Not wept alone, but lifted strength of prayer And, morn by morn, that Sacrifice Eterne, Mightier tenfold in impetrative power Than prayers of all man's race, from Adam's first To his who latest on the Judgment Day Shall raise his hands to G.o.d. Four years went by: That mourner's wound they staunched not. Oft in sleep He murmured low, 'Would I had died for thee!'

And once, half-waked by rush of morning rains, 'Why saw I on his brow that fatal sign?-- He might have lived till now!' Within his heart At last there rose a cry, 'To Lastingham!

Pray with thy brothers three, for saints are they: So shall thy friend, who resteth in the Lord With perfect will submiss, the waiting pa.s.sed, Gaze on G.o.d's Vision with an eye unscaled, In glory everlasting.' At that thought Peace on the old man settled. Staff in hand Forth on his way he fared. Nor horse he rode Nor sandals wore. He walked with feet that bled, Paying, well pleased, that penance for his King; And murmured ofttimes, 'Not my blood alone!-- Nay, but my life, my life!'

Yet penance pain, Like pain of suffering Souls at peace with G.o.d, Quelled not that gladness which, from secret source Rising, o'erflowed his heart. Old times returned: Once more beside him rode his King in youth Southward to where his realm--his duty--lay, Exulting captive of the Saviour Lord, With face love-lit. As then, the vernal prime Hourly with ampler respiration drew Delight of purer green from balmier airs: As then the sunshine glittered. By their path Now hung the woodbine; now the hare-bell waved; Rivulets new-swoll'n by melted snows, and birds 'Mid echoing boughs with rival rapture sang: At times the monks forgat their Christian hymns, By humbler anthems charmed. They gladdened more Beholding oft in cottage doors cross-crowned Angelic faces, or in lonely ways; Once as they pa.s.sed there stood a little maid, Some ten years old, alone 'mid lonely pines, With violets crowned and primrose. Who were those, The forest's white-robed guests, she nothing knew; Not less she knelt. With hand uplifted Cedd Signed her his blessing. Hand she kissed in turn; Then waved, yet ceased not from her song, 'Alone 'Two lovers sat at sunset.'

Every eve Some village gave the wanderers food and rest, Or half-built convent with its church thick-walled And polished shafts, great names in after times, Ely, and Croyland, Southwell, Medeshamstede, Adding to sylvan sweetness holier grace, Or rising lonely o'er mora.s.s and mere With bowery thickets isled, where dogwood brake Retained, though late, its red. To Boston near, Where Ouse, and Aire, and Derwent join with Trent, And salt sea waters mingle with the fresh, They met a band of youths that o'er the sands Advanced with psalm, cross-led. The monks rejoiced, Save one from Ireland--Dicul. He, quick-eared, Had caught that morn a war-cry on the wind, And, sideway glancing from his Office-book, Descried the cause. From Mercia's realm a host Had crossed Northumbria's bound. His thin, worn face O'er-flamed with sudden anger, thus he cried: 'In this, your land, men say, "Who worketh prays;"

In mine we say, "Well prays who fighteth well:"

A Pagan race treads down your homesteads! Slaves, That close not with their throats!'

Advancing thus, On the tenth eve they came to Lastingham: Forth rushed the brethren, watching long far off, To meet them, first the brothers three of Cedd, Who kissed him, cheek and mouth. Gladly that night Those foot-worn travellers laid them down, and slept, Save one alone. Old Cedd his vigil made, And, kneeling by the tabernacle's lamp, Prayed for the man he mourned for, ending thus: 'Thou Lord of Souls, to Thee the Souls are dear!

Thou yearn'st toward them as they yearn to Thee; Behold, not prayer alone for him I raise: I offer Thee my life.' When morning's light In that great church commingled with its gloom, The monks, slow-pacing, by that kneeler knelt, And prayed for Sigebert, beloved of G.o.d; And lastly offered Ma.s.s: and it befell That when, the Offering offered, and the Dead Rightly remembered, he who sang that Ma.s.s Had reached the 'n.o.bis quoque famulis,'

There came to Cedd an answer from the Lord Heard in his heart; and he beheld his King Throned 'mid the Saints Elect of G.o.d who keep Perpetual triumph, and behold that Face Which to its likeness hourly more compels Those faces t'ward It turned. That function o'er, Thus spake the Bishop: 'Brethren, sing "Te Deum;"'

They sang it; while within him he replied, 'Lord, let Thy servant now depart in peace.'

A week went by with gladness winged and prayer.

In wonder Cedd beheld those structures new From small beginnings reared, though many a gift, Sent for that work's behoof, had fed the poor In famine time laid low. Moorlands he saw By cornfields vanquished; marked the all-beauteous siege Of pasture yearly threatening loftier crags Loud with the bleat of lambs. Their shepherd once Had roved a bandit; next had toiled a slave; Now with both hands he poured his weekly wage Down on his young wife's lap, his pretty babes Gambolling around for joy. A hospital Stood by the convent's gate. With moistened eye, Musing on Him Who suffers in His sick, The Bishop paced it. There he found his death: That year a plague had wasted all the land: It reached him. Late that night he said, ''Tis well!'

In three days more he lay with hands death cold Crossed on a peaceful breast.

Like winter cloud Borne through dark air, that portent feared of man, Ill tidings, making way with mystic speed, Shadowed ere long the troubled bank of Thames, And spread a wailing round its Minsters twain, Saint Peter's and Saint Paul's. Saint Alban's caught That cry, and northward echoed. Southward soon Forlorn it rang 'mid towers of Rochester; Then seaward died. But in that convent pile, Wherein so long the Saint had made abode, A different grief there lived, a deeper grief, That grief which part hath none in sobs or tears-- Which needs must act. There thirty monks arose, And, taking each his staff, made vow thenceforth To serve G.o.d's altar where their father died, Or share his grave. Through Ithancestor's gate As forth they paced between two kneeling crowds, A little homeless boy, who heard their dirge (Late orphaned, at its grief he marvelled not), So loved them that he followed, shorter steps Doubling 'gainst theirs. At first the orphan went That mood relaxed: before them now he ran To pluck a flower; as oft he lagged behind, The wild bird's song so aptly imitating That, by his music drawn, or by his looks, That bird at times forgat her fears, and perched Pleased on his arm. As flower and bird to him Such to those monks the child. Better each day He loved them; yet, revering, still he mocked, And though he mocked, he kissed. The westering sun On the eighth eve from towers of Lastingham Welcomed those strangers. In another hour, Well-nigh arrived, they saw that grave they sought Sole on the church's northern slope. As when, Some father, absent long, returns at last, His children rush loud-voiced from field to house, And cling about his knees; and they that mark-- Old reaper, bent no more, with hook in hand, Or ploughman, leaning 'gainst the old blind horse-- Beholding wonder not; so to that grave Rushed they; so clung. Around that grave ere long Their own were ranged. That plague which smote the sire Spared not his sons. With ministering hand From pallet still to pallet pa.s.sed the boy, Now from the dark spring wafting colder draught, Now moistening fevered lips, or on the brow Spreading the new-bathed cincture. Him alone The infection reached not. When the last was gone He felt as though the earth, man's race--yea, G.o.d Himself--were dead. Around he gazed, and spake, 'Why then do I remain?'

From hill to hill (The monks on reverend offices intent) All solitary oft that boy repaired, From each in turn forth gazing, fain to learn If friend were t'wards him nighing. Many a hearth More late, bereavement's earlier anguish healed, Welcomed the creature: many a mother held The milk-bowl to his mouth, in both hands stayed, With smile the deeper for the draught prolonged, And lodged, as he departed, in his hand Her latest crust. With children of his age Seldom he played. That convent gave him rest; Nor lost he aught, surviving thus his friends, Since childhood's sacred innocence he kept, While life remained, unspotted. When mature Five years he lived there monk, and reverence drew To that high convent through his saintly ways; Then died. Within that cirque of thirty graves They laid him, close to Cedd. In later years, Because they ne'er could learn his name or race, Nor yet forget his gentle looks, the name Of Deodatus graved they on his tomb.

_KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA, OR THE BRITON'S REVENGE._

Northumbria having been subdued by Pagan Mercia, Oswald raises there again the Christian standard. Penda wages war against him, in alliance with Cadwallon, a Cambrian prince who hates the Saxon conquerors the more bitterly when become Christians. Encouraged by St. Columba in a vision, Oswald with a small force vanquishes the hosts of Cadwallon, who is slain. He sends to Iona for monks of St.

Columba's order, converts his country to the Faith, and dies for her. The earlier British race expiates its evil revenge.

The agony was over which but late Had shook to death Northumbrian realm new-raised By Edwin, dear to G.o.d. The agony At last was over; but the tear flowed on: The Faith of Christ had fallen once more to dust, That Faith which spoused with golden marriage ring The land to G.o.d, when Coiffi, horsed and mailed, Chief Priest himself, hurled at the Temple's wall His lance, and quivering left it lodged therein.

The agony had ceased; yet Rachael's cry Still pierced the childless region. Penda's sword Had swept it, Mercia's Christian-hating King; Fiercelier Cadwallon's, Cambria's Christian Prince, Christian in vain. The British wrong like fire Burned in his heart. Well-nigh two hundred years That British race, they only of the tribes By Rome subdued, sustained unceasing war 'Gainst those barbaric hordes that, nursed long since 'Mid Teuton woods, when Rome her death-wound felt, And '_Habet_' shrilled from every trampled realm, Rushed forth in ruin o'er her old domain:-- That race against the Saxon still made head; Large remnant yet survived. The Western coast Was theirs; old sea-beat Cornwall's granite cliffs, And purple hills of Cambria; northward thence Strathclyde, from towered Carnegia's winding Dee To Morecombe's shining sands, and those fair vales, Since loved by every muse, where silver meres Slept in the embrace of yew-clad mountain walls; With tracts of midland Britain and the East.

Remained the memory of the greatness lost; The Druid circles of the olden age; The ash-strewn cities radiant late with arts Extinct this day; bath, circus, theatre Mosaic-paved; the Roman halls defaced; The Christian altars crushed. That last of wrongs The vanquished punished with malign revenge: Never had British priest to Saxon preached; And when that cry was heard, 'The Saxon King Edwin hath bowed to Christ,' on Cambrian hills Nor man nor woman smiled.

They had not lacked The timely warning. From his Kentish sh.o.r.es Augustine stretched to them paternal hands: Later, he sought them out in synod met, Their custom, under open roof of heaven.

'The Mother of the Churches,' thus he spake, 'Commands--implores you! Seek from her, and win The Sacrament of Unity Divine!

Thus strengthened, be her strength! With her conjoined, Subdue your foe to Christ!' He sued in vain.

The British bishops hurled defiance stern Against his head, while Cambrian peaks far off Darkened, and thunder muttered. From his seat, Slowly and sadly as the sun declined At last, though late, that Roman rose and stretched A lean hand t'ward that circle, speaking thus: 'Hear then the sentence of your G.o.d on sin!