And Oswy, now an old king, glory-crowned, His country from the Mercian thraldom loosed And free from north to south, in heart resolved A pilgrim, Romeward faring with bare feet, To make his rest by Peter's tomb and Paul's. God willed not thus: within his native realm The sickness unto death clasped him with hold Gentle but firm. Long sleepless, t'ward the close Amid his wanderings smiling, from the couch He stretched a shrivelled hand, and pointing said, 'Who was it fabled she had died in age? In all her youthful beauty holy and pure, Lo, where she kneels upon the wintry ground, The snow-flakes circling round her, yet with face Bright as a star!' so spake the king, and taking Into his heart that vision, slept in peace. His daughter, abbess then on Whitby's height, Within her church interred her father's bones Beside her grandsire's, Edwin. Side by side They rested, one Bernicia's king, and one Deira's--great Northumbrian sister realms; Long foes, yet blended by that mingling dust. _THE VENGEANCE OF THE MONKS OF BARDENEY_. Osthryda, Queen of Mercia, translates the relics of her uncle, Oswald of Northumberland, to the Abbey of Bardeney. The monks refuse them admittance because King Oswald had conquered and kept for one year Lindsay, a province of Mercia. Though hourly expecting the destruction of their Abbey, they will yield neither to threats nor to supplications, nor even to celestial signs and wonders. At last, being convinced by the reasoning of a devout man, they repent of their anger.