ST. Anthony's chapel. — st. Leonard's craigs. 113 



left the chapsl what it now appears — with the exception of some recent repairs 

 — one of the most beautiful and picturesque ruins in Scotland. 



Here sleeps the sovereign in his shroud— the warrior in his mail — 



The saint to holy vigils vowed — the faithful and the frail ! 



There, though the weeds have warped the shrine, the Rose of Guelder prayed 



There, daughter of St. Louis' line, thy bridal couch was made 1 — 



The virgin's blush — the mother's joy— the royal widow's wail. 



And earthly pomp, and earth's alloy, have here their varied tale 



And there is she — a gliding ghost — where, as the moon-beam falls, 



Yon frantic maiden keeps her post 'neath its sepulchral walls . . . 



And long she watched, and wept, and sung strange ditties to the gloom — 



Long to the senseless marble clung that closed her hero's tomb ! 



At night, as wont, her voice was heard in wild complaint and prayer ; 



But, mute at morn, no echo stirred — no mourner sorrowed there ! 



They found her drooping, cold, and dead ! — and, scattered where she lay, 



The last wild flowers her hand had shed upon her lover's clay. — MS. 



The legend connected with the foundation of this monastery is thus gravely 

 narrated by Scottish historians. King David, while hunting in the forest of 

 Drumselch, now Drumseuch, in the immediate vicinity of Edinburgh, was 

 attacked by an enraged stag, and dismounted. In this position he commended 

 himself to heaven ; whereat, a cross or rood descended from the sky, with which 

 miraculous emblem in his hand, the monarch, springing to his feet with 

 the courage of a second Constantine, put the antlered savage to flight. Full 

 of gratitude for his deliverance, he founded the monastery of Holy-Rood, and 

 ensured its prosperity by many rich endowments. Among other specific 

 privileges, he conferred upon it those of trial by duel, and the ordeal by fire 

 and water— execrable rites— which continued in force tiU abolished by the 

 progress of reformation. 



The King's Park, which surrounds the abbey, and includes the hilly ground 

 in the immediate vicinity, was first enclosed by James V. as a pleasure 

 demesne for the new palace. A more striking combination of the beautiful 

 and romantic in landscape it would be difficult to imagine. Witlun a few 

 minutes' walk of the palace, the pedestrian finds himself in as much apparent 

 seclusion firom the world as if in the centre of a Highland glen — with not a human 

 habitation nor a trace of human industry around him. But let him shift his 

 position for only a few steps, and the Canongate lies stretched at his feet — the 

 castle soars in all its strength and stateliness — the bay extends before him 

 studded with ships — the richly cultivated gardens on the shore, and the 

 " golden-fringed coast of Fife," reverse the picture, and transport him from 

 a seeming desert to the riches of Nature, and the busiest haunts of industry. 



G G 



