[Illustration: Melrose Abbey.]
(_From a finished sketch, by a Correspondent_.)
These venerable ruins stand upon the southern bank of the Tweed, in
Roxburghshire. The domestic buildings of the monastery are entirely
gone; but the remains of the church connected with, as seen in the above
Engraving, are described by Mr. Chambers[1] as "the finest specimen of
Gothic architecture and Gothic sculpture of which this country
(Scotland) can boast. By singular good fortune, Melrose is also one of
the most entire, as it is the most beautiful, of all the ecclesiastical
ruins scattered throughout this reformed land. To say that it is
beautiful, is to say nothing. It is exquisitely--splendidly lovely. It
is an object of infinite grace and immeasurable charm; it is fine in its
general aspect and in its minutest details; it is a study--a glory." We
confess ourselves delighted with Mr. Chambers's well-directed
enthusiasm.
[1] Picture of Scotland, vol. i.
A page of interesting facts towards the history of the Abbey will be
found appended to the "Recollections" of a recent visit by one of our
esteemed Correspondents, in _The Mirror_, vol. x., p. 445. In the
present view, the ornate Gothic style of the building is seen to
advantage, but more especially the richness of the windows, and the
niches above them: the latter, from drawings made "early in the reign of
King William," were originally filled with statues; and, connected with
the destruction of some of them, Mr. Chambers relates the following
anecdote "told by the person who shows Melrose:"
"On the eastern window of the church, there were formerly thirteen
effigies, supposed to represent our Saviour and his apostles. These,
harmless and beautiful as they were, happened to provoke the wrath of a
praying weaver in Gattonside, who, in a moment of inspired zeal, went up
one night by means of a ladder, and with a hammer and chisel, knocked
off the heads and limbs of the figures. Next morning he made no scruple
to publish the transaction, observing, with a great deal of exultation,
to every person whom he met, that he had 'fairly stumpet thae vile
paipist dirt _nou!_' The people sometimes catch up a remarkable word
when uttered on a remarkable occasion by one of their number, and turn
the utterer into ridicule, by attaching it to him as a nickname; and it
is some consolation to think that this monster was therefore treated
with the sobriquet of 'Stumpie,' and of course carried it about with him
to his grave."
The exquisite beauty and elaborate ornament of Melrose can, according to
the entertaining work already quoted, be told only in a volume of prose;
but, as compression is the spirit of true poetry, we quote the following
descriptive lines:
If thou would'st view fair Melrose aright,
Go visit it by the pale moonlight;
For the gay beams of lightsome day
Gild but to flout the ruins gray.
When the broken arches are dark in night,
And each shafted oriel glimmers white;
When the cold light's uncertain shower
Streams on the ruin'd central tower;
When buttress and buttress, alternately,
Seem framed of ebon and ivory;
Wnen silver edges the imagery,
And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die;
When distant Tweed is heard to rave,
And the howlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave,
Then go--but go alone the while--
Then view St. David's[2] ruined pile;
And, home returning, soothly swear,
Was never scene so sad and fair.
* * * * *
By a steel-clench'd postern door,
They enter'd now the chancel tall;
The darken'd roof rose high aloof
On pillars, lofty, light, and small;
The key-stone, that lock'd each ribbed aisle,
Was a fleur-de-lys or a quatre-feuille;
The corbells[3] were carved grotesque and grim;
And the pillars, with cluster'd shafts so trim,
With base and capital furnish'd around,
Seem'd bundles of lances which garlands had bound.
* * * * *
The moon on the east oriel shone,
Through slender shafts of shapely stone,
By foliated tracery combined;
Thou would'st have thought some fairy's hand
'Twixt poplars straight the osier wand
In many a freakish knot had twined;
Then framed a spell, when the work was done,
And changed the willow-wreaths to stone.[4]
[2] Built by David I. in 1136.
[3] Corbells, the projections from which the arches spring,
usually cut in a fantastic face, or mask.
[4] Sir Walter Scott's "Lay of the Last Minstrel."
The monks of Melrose were caricatured for their sensuality at the
Reformation. Their Abbey suffered in consequence; for the condemnator,
out of the ruins, built himself a house, which may still be seen near
the church. "The regality," says Mr. Chambers, "soon after passed into
the hands of Lord Binning, an eminent lawyer, ancestor to the Earl of
Haddington; and about a century ago, the whole became the property of
the Buccleuch family."
* * * * *