Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/250

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76
OF ALEXIUS.

ward and cried, "Thou, miserable! what then am I? Woe is me! to-day I am desolate; to-day I am all a widow! Now, there is none for whom I may look—none, whom I may yet expect, although he come not. Where shall mine eye see gladness? The glass of my joy is broken[1]—shivered—shivered: my hope is extinct; and grief is all the portion of my widowhood." The multitude, penetrated by the various calamities of which they were witnesses, sympathized with the sufferers, and wept aloud.

By command of the pontiff and the two emperors, the body was deposited on a sumptuous bier, and brought into the middle of the city. Proclamation was made, that the man of God was discovered, whom they had before sought in vain: and every one crowded to the bier. Now, if any infirm person touched the hallowed corpse, instantly he was strengthened. The blind received their sight; those who were possessed of devils were set free, and all the sick, be the disorder what it might,

  1. The monk is not often so poetical.