Chapter 8

The sacred tapers lights are gone.
Gray moss has clad the altar stone,
The holy image is o'erthrown,
The bell has ceased to toll,
The long ribb'd aisles are burst and shrunk,
The holy shrines to ruin sunk,
Departed is the pious monk,
God's blessing on his soul!
REDIVIVA.

The cell of Saint Cuthbert, as it was called, marked, or was supposed
to mark, one of those resting-places, which that venerable saint was
pleased to assign to his monks, when his convent, being driven from
Lindisfern by the Danes, became a peripatetic society of religionists,
and bearing their patron's body on their shoulders, transported him
from place to place through Scotland and the borders of England, until
he was pleased at length to spare them the pain of carrying him
farther, and to choose his ultimate place of rest in the lordly towers
of Durham. The odour of his sanctity remained behind him at each place
where he had granted the monks a transient respite from their labours;
and proud were those who could assign, as his temporary resting-place,
any spot within their vicinity. There were few cells more celebrated
and honoured than that of Saint Cuthbert, to which Roland Graeme now
bent his way, situated considerably to the north-west of the great
Abbey of Kennaquhair, on which it was dependent. In the neighbourhood
were some of those recommendations which weighed with the experienced
priesthood of Rome, in choosing their sites for places of religion.

There was a well, possessed of some medicinal qualities, which, of
course, claimed the saint for its guardian and patron, and
occasionally produced some advantage to the recluse who inhabited his
cell, since none could reasonably expect to benefit by the fountain
who did not extend their bounty to the saint's chaplain. A few rods of
fertile land afforded the monk his plot of garden ground; an eminence
well clothed with trees rose behind the cell, and sheltered it from,
the north and the east, while the front, opening to the south-west,
looked up a wild but pleasant valley, down which wandered a lively
brook, which battled with every stone that interrupted its passage.

The cell itself was rather plainly than rudely constructed--a low
Gothic building with two small apartments, one of which served the
priest for his dwelling-place, the other for his chapel. As there were
few of the secular clergy who durst venture to reside so near the
Border, the assistance of this monk in spiritual affairs had not been
useless to the community, while the Catholic religion retained the
ascendancy; as he could marry, christen, and administer the other
sacraments of the Roman church. Of late, however, as the Protestant
doctrines gained ground, he had found it