Then came Imagination, Maid Divine, And forthwith, wakened from its resting-place, The Past arose, till pictured line on line The Abbey stood in all its ancient grace. Awestruck, they gazed upon that House of Prayer, Then silently went in, and worshipped there. Thus, in the places waste and desolate, Where saintly spirits struggled through the night, In ages past, you still may find the Gate Of Heaven open, letting down the light; Still find on Yniswitrin's altars, pale, The gleaming vision of the Holy Grail. JOHN ALLEYNE. 1917. [Illustration: PLATE III. GLASTONBURY ABBEY. Conjectural reconstruction of interior (drawn in 1908) as seen from the north transept, looking towards the Quire. N.B.--The arch in the foreground, communicating with a supposed western aisle, is an artistic license. _Frontispiece to Part II._] THE CHILD OF NATURE Johannes--who is he? The child of our dreams? Or a name inscribed in the great roll of those who were, and now are not? No previous knowledge of surname or circumstance, either in history or fiction, can be traced as a source of the idea underlying this dramatisation of a personality in many respects so sympathetic and so true to nature. Yet again and again he speaks, or is spoken for, in the writings, and his simplicity of character is maintained. And he became to us more than a name, one vested with reality, even as it is said of a well-known author, that his characterisations dwelt in his consciousness as living folk. And we never knew when his advent might be expected, nor what sort of message he would have for us. Frequently it happened that in sitting down to writing some expectation or desire would be expressed for information on certain lines, but the script would negative this expectation, and either give us something new and quite unexpected, or else, as often happened, take up the thread of a previous communication broken off several days, or even months before. "... He ever loved the woods and the pleasant places which lie without our house. It was good, for he learnt in the temple of nature much that he would never hear in choro. His herte was of the country and he heard it calling without the walls and the Abbot winked at it for he knew full well that it was good for him. He went a-fishing, did Johannes, and tarried oft in lanes to listen to the birds and to watch the shadows lengthening over all the woods of Mere. "He loved them well, and many times no fish had he, for that he had forgot them ... but we cared not, for he came with talk and pleasant converse, as nutbrown ale, and it was well. "And because he was of nature his soul was pure and he is of the Company that doth watch and wait for the glories to be renewed." It was in the fourth sitting that Johannes, instead of being the spokesman, was spoken for.