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The atom darkness in a slow turmoil;

As when of healthful midnight sleep bereft,

Thinking on rugged hours and fruitless toil,

We put our eyes into a pillowy cleft,

And see the spangly gloom froth up and boil : 't made sad Isabella's eyelids ache, And in the dawn she started up awake;

Until her heart felt pity to the core At sight of such a dismal laboring,

And so she kneeled, with her locks all hoar, And put her lean hands to the horrid thing: Three hours they labor'd at this travail sore; At last they felt the kernel of the grave, And Isabella did not stamp and rave.

So that the jewel, safely casketed,
Came forth, and in perfumed leafits spread

His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man; Then takes his lamp, and riseth from his knees, And back returneth, meager, barefoot, wan, Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees:

The sculptured dead, on each side, seem to freeze
Imprison'd in black, purgatorial rails:
Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat'ries,
He passeth by; and his weak spirit fails

To think how they may ache in icy hoods and mails.

III.

Northward he turneth through a little door, And scarce three steps, ere Music's golden tongue Flatter'd to tears this aged man and. poor; But no-already had his death-bell rung; The joys of all his life were said and sung; His was harsh penance on St. Agnes' Eve: Another way he went, and soon among Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve, And all night kept awake, for sinners' sake to grieve

X.

He ventures in: let no buzz'd whisper tell:
All eyes be muffled, or a hundred swords
Will storm his heart, Love's fev'rous citadel.
For him, those chambers held barbarian hordes
Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords,
Whose very dogs would execrations howi
Against his lineage: not one breast affords
Him any mercy, in that mansion foul,

Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul.

XI.

Ah, happy chance! the aged creature came,
Shuffling along with ivory-headed wand,
To where he stood, hid from the torch's flame,
Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond

The sound of merriment and chorus bland:
He startled her: but soon she knew his face,
And grasp'd his fingers in her palsied hand,
Saying, " Mercy, Porphyro! hie thee from this place;
They are all here to-night, the whole bloodthirsty
race!

XII.

"Get hence! get hence! there's dwarfish Hildebrand;

He had a fever late, and in the fit
He cursed thee and thine, both house and land:
Then there's that old Lord Maurice, not a whit
More tame for his gray hairs-Alas me! flit!
Flit like a ghost away."-" Ah, gossip dear,
We're safe enough; here in this arm-chair sit,
And tell me how"-"Good Saints! not here, not
here;

Follow me, child, or else these stones will be thy bier.'

XIII.

He follow'd through a lowly arched way, Brushing the cobwebs with his lofty plume, And as she mutter'd "Well-a-well-a-day!" He found him in a little moonlit room, Pale, latticed, chill, and silent as a tomb. "Now tell me where is Madeline," said he, "O tell me, Angela, by the holy loom Which none but secret sisterhood may see, When they St. Agnes' wool are weaving piously."

XIV.

"St. Agnes! Ah! it is St. Agnes' EveYet men will murder upon holy days: Thou must hold water in a witch's sieve, And be liege-lord of all the Elves and Fays, To venture so: it fills me with amaze To see thee, Porphyro!-St. Agnes' Eve! God's help! my lady fair the conjuror plays This very night: good angels her deceive! But let me laugh awhile, I've mickle time to grieve."

XV.

Feebly she laugheth in the languid moon,
While Porphyro upon her face doth look,
Like puzzled urchin on an aged crone
Who keepeth closed a wondrous riddle-book,
As spectacled she sits in chimney-nook.
But soon his eyes grew brilliant, when she told
His lady's purpose; and he scarce could brook
Tears, at the thought of those enchantments cold,

And Madeline asleep in lap of legends old.