Geraldus the Abbot sat bolt upright,
Bolt upright, in his great arm-chair,
He ground his teeth, and his beard beneath
Seemed crêpé with anger every hair;
And every hair, whether grizzled or white,
On his head stood erect (as so often the case is,
Whene’er fury or fear better feeling effaces).
Thus encircling his tonsure, which same a smooth space is,
In the desert of scalp a monastic oasis!
Geraldus the Abbot his temper had lost,