It was then that the Earl first became aware he was not alone. Beside his couch stood a form in white—was it the vision of a troubled mind? was it some horrid dream? He rubbed his eyes—the figure still stood there, motionless as a statue! In an instant he recognized Augusta: he tried to speak—the words froze on his lips, and in speechless terror he gazed on the apparition. Hunger and distress had not robbed her eye of its light, nor her face of its strange beauty; but there was something weird in her glance,—something ghostly in her pale brow,—something unearthly in her whole appearance. Her hair was dishevelled by the wind, and dripping with the rain; her mantle torn and soiled; her small white foot bleeding and cut by the rough paths she had trod. She raised her hand to heaven, and her look was one of intense earnestness and beseeching woe, strangely blended with proud hauteur and offended majesty. She beheld him earnestly till another pause in the storm, and, in the hush that followed the blast, sung mournfully these lines:—
Unhappy! you deem you are safe;
Secure in your ill-gotten towers,
And the storms which around thee now chafe
Shall sink with life's evening hours!
You deem that in guerdon for this
High mansions above shall be given,
That yours is a lifetime of bliss,
An endless rejoicing in heaven.
You err, oh! how deeply you err!
This night hath your dark doom been spoken;
And vainly you strive to deter
Heaven's vengeance, whose laws you have broken.
And the portals of heaven are closed,
And vain are the hopes that you cherish,
Hopes in which you too long have reposed—
Your soul shall eternally perish!
And not only this, but your sons
Shall suffer in you, and your daughters,
Their lives shall be desolate ones,
Acquainted with suffering and slaughters;
Cut off in the bloom of their youth,
In the beautiful hour of life's morning,
Oh! hearken—these tidings are truth,
Oh! listen—and heed my dread warning.
But Heaven is merciful yet,
Her blasting may turn to a blessing:
Thine errors she longs to forget,
Thy bloodshed her spirit distressing!
Repent of each murderous deed,
My tongue is still filled with glad tidings!
Return to your desolate creed,
And weep o'er your fatal backslidings.
Then your flocks and your barns shall increase,
Your name shall be famous in story,
The terrors of war sink to peace,
Your sons change from glory to glory!
And Heaven's glad song thou shalt learn
In mansions more splendid and spacious.
Return, oh! my brother, return!
Heaven is waiting—still waits—to be gracious!
The sound ceased, and again the voice of the storm rose high; clouds shrouded the lady of the night, and darkness sank in treble deepness. Still something undefined, but dimly bright, shone near the renegade's bedside, and made him aware that the Abbess awaited his reply: but, like another renegade, a modern poet has so finely drawn,—
"His heart was swollen, and turned aside
By deep, interminable pride.
* * * he be dismayed
By wild words of a timid maid?"
"No. Be thou living form, or fleshless spirit," he answered, "I have but one reply: I will not return like the sow to her wallowing in the mire. Having once shaken off the trammels of Rome, I will not lightly bear again her yoke, which is neither easy nor light; nay, fair cousin, methinks I have been but too merciful: to-morrow, God help me, will I raze the altar of Baal with the ground, unless this storm saves me the labour." He looked to see the effect of his reply—the dim light was gone; he only heard the wild wind.
Early next morning he rose to fulfil his threat. It was one of those beautiful mornings after a night of rain and tempest, and the sun shone brightly on the wreck left by the gale. Not a breath was stirring, and it was a strange sight to see the uprooted trees, the ruins of part of the chapel thrown down in the night, and the debris left by the Wye, which had nearly sunk to its wonted bed, lying in disjointed heaps on the sward. The silence was only broken by the robin's note, or the rush of the subsiding river, when the Earl proceeded to demolish the high altar. Rough as his soldiery were, they were not entirely freed from old superstitions, and there was not one hardy enough to obey his behest; so, after censuring them for lukewarmness in a blessed cause, he himself seized a sledgehammer from a bystander, and prepared to perform the sacrilegious act. He was a tall, stout man, of about thirty-five years, in the full strength of manhood, and he whirled the heavy instrument round his head as if it had been a withe; it descended on the altar with tremendous force, and in a moment brought down in dire destruction the marble shrine and image of the Virgin. Again he swung the hammer high—his face was red with passion, and his eye unnaturally bright. Suddenly a mortal paleness suffused his features, his powerful arm dropped down as if broken, and he fell heavily to the earth. Extreme passion had so excited him that a large blood-vessel burst, and as he lay on the earth, the red blood bubbled from his mouth. There were those who saw in his fate the retributive punishment of God for his cousin's death! He never spoke again, and after lingering some hours in great suffering, his spirit passed away, a few hours after his great chieftain's demise.