The stone crown of the cathedral was all in dark outline; a faint light shone through the large stained window at the east end, and the tapers flickered at the shrine of Our Lady that stood close by. Save these, all the vast church, with its rows of massive buttresses and pointed windows, was immersed in gloom, though the moonlight silvered the edges of the crocketed pinnacles. Suddenly a volume of light burst over the whole; the ball of fire which had been burning steadily, threw out a million of sparkles which fell like a haze of brilliance over the arches of the spire, lighting up the diminutive lamps in rapid succession, until the whole structure seemed bathed in one broad sheet of coloured flame. The groined arches, the carved pinnacles, and all the airy tracery of the spire, were as plainly visible in their beautiful and grotesque detail as if the beholders had been close to them, instead of being a hundred and sixty feet below; while the lamps of variegated glass produced the most extraordinary variety of light and shadow. The devils, dragons, and other stone chimeras that projected from the battlements of the clerestory were all tipped with fiery red or ghastly blue light, and seemed to be vomiting flames; every pinnacle and tower of the cathedral stood forth in strong outline, one half being bathed in brilliant light, and the other sunk in black shadow, while a myriad prismatic hues were thrown upon the upturned and countless faces of the gaping crowds who occupied the streets below and the windows around. Into the far depths of many a close and wynd, on the square tower of St. Mary-in-the-Field, on the clustered Bastelhouses of the castle, on the spire of the Netherbow, and square belfreys of the Holy Cross, on all the countless roofs and chimneys of the town, the light fell full and redly, scaring even the coot and the swan among the sedges of the Burghloch, and the eagle and the osprey on the lofty craigs of Salisbury. Cries of astonishment and delight were heard from time to time, mingled with the murmurs of the wondering and the fearful, who, in accordance with the taste and superstition of the age, were, as usual, inclined to attribute the taste and skill which dictated this illumination to sorcery, simply because it was beyond their comprehension. "Ye say true, my lord abbot," said a voice near Roland; "I have had mine own suspicions anent the fact." "I have always secretly suspected this Father St. Bernard was a sorcerer; he studied at Padua and Salamanca, where there is more kenned of develrie than theologie." "He is confessor of the Countess of Ashkirk." "Who hath a familiar, in the shape of a black page, anent whilk my lord advocate and I have had several conferences--but hush!" Roland did not hear these last observations, which passed between the Abbot of Kinloss and one of the ten advocates of the new court.