318
JOAN OF ARC.
And rusted trophies; and amid the heap
Some monument's defaced legend spake,
All human glory vain.
The loud blast roar'd
Amid the pile; and from the tower the owl
Scream'd as the tempest shook her secret nest. 90
He, silent, led her on, and often paus'd,
And pointed, that her eye might contemplate
At leisure the drear scene.
He dragged her on
Thro' a low iron door, down broken stairs;
Then a cold horror thro' the Maiden's frame 95
Crept, for she stood amid a vault, and saw,
By the sepulchral lamp's dim glaring light,
The fragments of the dead.
"Look here!" he cried,
"Damsel, look here! survey this house of Death;
O soon to tenant it! soon to increase 100
These trophies of mortality! for hence
Is no return! Gaze here! behold this skull!
Some monument's defaced legend spake,
All human glory vain.
The loud blast roar'd
Amid the pile; and from the tower the owl
Scream'd as the tempest shook her secret nest. 90
He, silent, led her on, and often paus'd,
And pointed, that her eye might contemplate
At leisure the drear scene.
He dragged her on
Thro' a low iron door, down broken stairs;
Then a cold horror thro' the Maiden's frame 95
Crept, for she stood amid a vault, and saw,
By the sepulchral lamp's dim glaring light,
The fragments of the dead.
"Look here!" he cried,
"Damsel, look here! survey this house of Death;
O soon to tenant it! soon to increase 100
These trophies of mortality! for hence
Is no return! Gaze here! behold this skull!
These
