Page:Pleasant Memories of Pleasant Lands.djvu/232

 WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 207

marble of Watts, my first thought should breathe out his simple, maternal melody,

&quot; Hush, my dear ! lie still, and slumber, Holy angels guard thy bed.&quot;

Him of Avon bore to us, on a graven scroll, the glori ous passage that gathered, as in one great sound, the witnessing spirits of all who reposed there,

&quot; The cloud-capp d towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all it doth inherit, shall dissolve, And, like the baseless fabric of a vision, Leave not a rack behind.&quot;

One of the Admirals of England, from the solemn sym bols of a magnificent monument, taught of the time &quot; when the sea shall give up her dead ; &quot; and the Ger man musician, Handel, while apparently listening in delighted abstiaction to the harp of an angel amid clouds, points to the words of the patriarch, embalmed in the strains of his own Messiah,

&quot; I know that my Redeemer liveth.&quot;

The contrast between the meditations that would fain linger amid this receptacle of the illustrious dead and the ceaseless turmoil and pressure of the living throng without, is strikingly and strangely impressive. The restlessness and rush of the people, in the most popu lous parts of London, are among the best aids to a stranger in forming an idea of its magnitude. At first

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