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length upon the crowning towers were placed The topmost stones, and the cathedral fair

Rose in its carven beauty, interlaced

With wreathed flowers and arches light as air;

And with its wise, majestic oriel faced

The rising sun, and seemed as standing there

Worthy, almost, an offering to be made

To Him who once was in a manger laid.

Dense vines and branches cluster round its base, Dark, seamed and weather-stained, while further on Green mosses cling; then for a little space The stones are bare, and further, one by one The lines drawn by the years still mark the place Where toiled each life until its sands were run; The tide-marks left by generations spent Rearing the glory of this monument.

And he whose lot came last was striving now To add the final grace, that ere the day When they should rear upon the pavement low The sacred altar, all that marble gray Might with new, myriad-tinted sunbeams glow; And there where now the shameless daylight lay, Thro' his rich window's softened air might fall A halo o'er that holiest spot of all.

With lavish hands he wrought the colors rare,

High screened among the traceries of stone;

And as the glittering fragments here and there,

Fell from his hand while toiling on alone,

A young apprentice gleaned them up with care,

And half afraid and to the rest unknown,

Wove them in figures strange, and all unseen

Fixed them behind a vacant window's screen.

And as these two thus labored on, at last

Came that great day whereon to consecrate

With ceremonial high and prayer and fast,

This holy church; came dignitaries great,

And priest and prelate in procession passed,

With incense sweet and perfume delicate,

And moving down the flower-strewn pathway's bloom

Entered the dim cathedral's sombre gloom.

And the proud master stood exultingly,

To mark when they should on the altar gaze, The flaming glory of his window see,

And smiled within himself at their amaze

To think that such the work of man could be;

Then the low-breathing organ softly plays,

And as its throbbing voices fill the air,

All kneel upon the marble floor in prayer.

But when again they rise all eyes are turned,

Not where the eager master's loved to dwell—

Where high amid the pointed arches burned

The colors that his hand had wrought so well,

But to that corner which his pride had spurned—

Where softly now a mellow radiance fell,

So beautiful that his fierce pride of heart

Vanished before the glory of his art.

Upon no sacred cross its light is thrown,

But the worn pavement and the crumbling tomb

Are flooded with a glory all their own;

While the vast shadows of the chancel loom

Dim 'round that place of light, as shadowed down

Over that greatest tragedy the gloom

That veiled the grief, the anguish, the despair,

But not the love divine that suffered there.

And the robed prelate turned, and smiling, said:

"'T is strangely beautiful, and it were meet

Rather that to such scene our steps were led,

To bow ourselves low at the Saviour's feet,

And as we pray behold that thorn-crowned head,

Than 'mid yon blazoned throng and incense sweet;

For ne'er too oft do we when kneeling down,

For thought of that sad cross forget the crown."

Burst forth the master, "Father, 't is but nought;

'T is only from the meanest fragments made

That fell from out my hand there as I wrought;

There is the altar, see the saints arrayed

In colors of the light, and gold, I thought

To touch them with a lustre ne'er to fade."

But on the youth who stood with low-bowed head

The father, turning, laid his hands and said:

"From thy low place thou hast above us all

Risen and taught us; may'st thou ever be

With such small fragments as thou seest fall

Ready to labor long and patiently,

Knowing that so a voice one day will call

And say, 'Well, done,' and thou as here shall see

Thy works of worth and fair. Our lesson brings

Us this: Scorn not the day of smallest things."

L. D. B.