1

Lines.

The sweeping theatre of hanging woods !
The incessant roar of headlong tumbling floods.

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Verses

ON AN EVENING VIEW OF THE RUINS OF

LINCLUDEN ABBEY.

Ye holy walls, that, still sublime,
Resist the crumbling touch of time;
How strongly still your form displays
The piety of ancient days !
As through your ruins, hoar and gray-
Ruins yet beauteous in decay-
The silvery moonbeams trembling fly,
The forms of ages long gone by
Crowd thick on Fancy's wondering eye,
And wake the soul to musings high.
Even now, as lost in thought profound,
I view the solemn scene around,
And, pensive, gaze with wistful eyes,
The past returns, the present flies;
Again the dome, in pristine pride,
Lifts high its roof and arches wide,
That, knit with curious tracery,
Each Gothic ornament display.
The high-arch'd windows, painted fair,
Show many a saint and martyr there.

Lincluden abbey.

As on their slender forms I gaze,
Methinks they brighten to a blaze!
With noiseless step and taper bright,
What are yon forms that meet my sight?
Slowly they move, while every eye
Is heavenward raised in ecstasy.
'Tis the fair, spotless, vestal train,
That seek in prayer the midnight fane.
And, hark! what more than mortal sound
Of music breathes the pile around ?
'Tis the soft-chanted choral song,
Whose tones the echoing aisles prolong;
Till, thence return'd, they softly stray
O'er Cluden's wave, with fond delay;
Now on the rising gale swell high,
And now in fainting murmurs die.
The boatmen on Nith's gentle stream,
That glistens in the pale moonbeam,
Suspend their dashing oars to hear
The holy anthem, loud and clear;
Each worldly thought a while forbear,
And mutter forth a half-form'd prayer.
But, as I gaze, the vision fails,
Like frost-work touch'd by southern gales ;
The altar sinks, the tapers fade,
And all the splendid scene's decay'd ;
In window fair the painted pane
No longer glows with holy stain,

Lincluden Abbey.

But through the broken glass the gale
Blows chilly from the misty vale;
The bird of eve flits sullen by,
Her home these aisles and arches high !
The choral hymn, that erst so clear
Broke softly sweet on Fancy's ear,
Is drown'd amid the mournful scream
That breaks the magic of my dream!
Roused by the sound, I start and see
The ruin'd sad reality!

Now Nature hangs her mantle green

On every blooming tree, And spreads her sheets o' daisies white

Out o'er the grassy lea :
Now Phæbus cheers the crystal streams,

And glads the azure skies ;
But nought can glad the weary wight

That fast in durance lies.