CHAPTER XX
When autumn nights were long and drear,
And forest walks were dark and dim,
How sweetly on the pilgrim’s ear
Was wont to steal the hermit’s hymn
Devotion borrows Music’s tone,
And Music took Devotion’s wing;
And, like the bird that hails the sun,
They soar to heaven, and soaring sing.
The Hermit of St Clement’s Well
It was after three hours’ good walking that the servants of Cedric, with their mysterious guide, arrived at a small opening in the forest, in the centre of which grew an oak-tree of enormous magnitude, throwing its twisted branches in every direction. Beneath this tree four or five yeomen lay stretched on the ground, while another, as sentinel, walked to and fro in the moonlight shade.
Upon hearing the sound of feet approaching, the watch instantly gave th
