The World of Romance: being Contributions to The Oxford and Cambridge Magazine, 1856Morris, William
Science
The World of Romance: being Contributions to The Oxford and Cambridge Magazine, 1856
Morris, William
Middle Ages -- Fiction; Tales
The next scene is the shrine of some Saint. This same bishop, I suppose,
dead now, after all his building and ruling, and hard fighting, possibly,
with the powers that be; often to be fought with righteously in those
times. Over the shrine sits the effigy of the bishop, with his hand
raised to bless. On the western side are two worshippers; on the
eastern, a blind and a deaf man are being healed, by the touch of the
dead bishop's robe. The deaf man is leaning forward, and the servant of
the shrine holds to his ear the bishop's robe. The deaf man has a very
deaf face, not very anxious though; not even showing very much hope, but
faithful only. The blind one is coming up behind him with a crutch in
his right hand, and led by a dog; the face was either in its first
estate, very ugly and crabbed, or by the action of the weather or some
such thing, has been changed so.
So the bishop being dead and miracles being wrought at his tomb, in the
division above comes the translation of his remains; a long procession
taking up the whole of the division, which is shorter than the others,
however, being higher up towards the top of the arch. An acolyte bearing
a cross, heads the procession, then two choristers; then priests bearing
relics and books; long vestments they have, and stoles crossed underneath
their girdles; then comes the reliquary borne by one at each end, the two
finest figures in this division, the first especially; his head raised
and his body leaning forward to the weight of the reliquary, as people
nearly always do walk when they carry burdens and are going slowly; which
this procession certainly is doing, for some of the figures are even
turning round. Three men are kneeling or bending down beneath the shrine
as it passes; cripples, they are, all three have beautiful faces, the one
who is apparently the worst cripple of the three, (his legs and feet are
horribly twisted), has especially a wonderfully delicate face, timid and
shrinking, though faithful: behind the shrine come the people, walking
slowly together with reverent faces; a woman with a little child holding
her hand are the last figures in this history of St. Honore: they both
have their faces turned full south, the woman has not a beautiful face,
but a happy good-natured genial one.
The cornice below this division is of plain round-headed trefoils very
wide, and the spandrel of each arch is pierced with a small round
trefoil, very sharply cut, looking, in fact, as if it were cut with a
punch: this cornice, simple though it is, I think, very beautiful, and in
my photograph the broad trefoils of it throw sharp black shadows on the
stone behind the worshipping figures, and square-cut altars.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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