"There once the steel-clad knight reclined,
His sable plumage tempest-tossed:
And as the _death-bell_ smote the wind,
From towers long fled by human kind,
His brow the hero crossed."
When ships go down at sea during a terrible tempest, it is said the
"death-bell" is often distinctly heard amid the storm-wind. And in tales of
what is called Gothic superstition, it assists in the terrors of the
supernatural.
Sir W. Scott perhaps alluded to the superstition in the lines:
"And the kelpie _rang_,
And the sea-maid sang
The dirge of lovely Rosabelle."