Is this to be dead? Am I not clad in all pontifical splendour? Do I not feel the crosier on my breast? The holy brethren of the Abbey surround me. That which distinguished the Abbot when alive, is even here in collected magnificence. I feel the priestly consequence of the Abbot. Is this then the Chamber of the Dead? The pious monks are weeping. The tears which have flowed before the marble shrine are recalled to weep for a departed brother. The incense is full fragrant. I enjoy the perception of its odour. It dilates in my stiffened nostrils, but it supplies me not the breath of life. I hear the loud Hosanna chanted for a soul which dies in the Lord. I will repeat the strain. No. My voice refuses to fall back upon the ear. Where is my heart that it beats not swelling to the anthem's measure? Cold! cold! cold! Nay; I will rise. I will respond unto the funeral dirge. I will shout. Oh! my trunk is hardened, and my tongue is glued. Silence! they pause. Say, do they hear me? No. Silence, horrible and awful. Hark! they mourn with lamentation on my fate. O, Heaven! must I endure all this? Must the living weep for the dead, and the conscious dead be doomed to dismal silence. Horror! horror! horror! IS THIS TO BE DEAD? * * * * * A convocation! Yes. The holy brothers in assembled synod to elect a brother holier than themselves. Nay, I do forbid. I, the Abbot who have loved ye all, refuse permission to your meeting. Disperse, disperse. Do ye not hear? Is there no charity alive? Who dares usurp my chair, and I not yet entombed? What! is justice driven out where heavenly men should dwell? I see it. I mark it. The leaven of pride is kneaded in the brotherhood. Intriguing hypocrites usurp the House of God. What! brother John, the fat, the corpulent, the lazy! of whom I know ten thousand heinous sins; the least sufficient to condemn a soul. An Abbot, chosen by the holy, is the elect of God. But he--no, no, no. It shall not be. God will forbid it. They put the crosier in his hand. For shame! for shame! Let not the vicious living sit in the chair of virtue that is departed. Why see! he kneels. He kneels before the shrine, where, until now, he never bent to pray. He grasps the crosier with loving firmness. It shall not be. Is there no interposing Deity to slay the sinner in his wickedness? I, I will seize the crosier from his filthy hand. No. My arm lays idly at my side. Is THIS TO BE DEAD? * * * * *