Page:The New Life (Rossetti 1899) Siddal ed.djvu/157

⁠They wept till they are circled now by Love
With a red circle in sign of martyrdom.
These musings, and the sighs they bring from me,
⁠Are grown at last so constant and so sore
⁠That love swoons in my spirit with faint breath;
Hearing in those sad sounds continually
⁠The most sweet name that my dead lady bore,
⁠With many grievous words touching her death.

About this time, it happened that a great number of persons undertook a pilgrimage, to the end that they might behold that blessed portraiture bequeathed unto us by our Lord Jesus Christ as the image of His beautiful countenance,^[1] (upon which countenance my dear lady now looketh continually). And certain among these pilgrims, who seemed very thoughtful,

1. The Veronica (Vera icon, or true image); that is, the napkin with which a woman was said to have wiped our Saviour's face on His way to the cross, and which miraculously