At length a massive gate they reach:
Two grisly fantoms there kept watch:
One seem’d a female, one a male;
Their furrow’d cheeks were deadly pale.
Lo! slowly rising from their seat,
They fix the chiefs with earnest gaze;
These halt before the pond’rous gate,
And view those forms in mute amaze.
In shrouds of white the spectres grim,
While ague shakes each gelid limb,