The Bronze Statue, or, The Virgin's Kiss — page 29: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

> : al Ys be vee a 1 So * Parad ~ ooo Pa al ’ ae a <a , ._* eo -«y ‘Ty = ~ os ee te ey oe ete THE BRONZE STATUE. oF A the Daughter of Glory, andshe gavemethe! Then Gloria, taking the long white veil name of Gloria.’ in her hands, threw it over her head, and While thus speaking, the beauteous | sinking slowly upon her knees, she crossed creature stretched forth her snow-white | her arms meekly above her bosom. arms and raised her beaming countenance} Thenuns rose from their suppliant pos- towards heaven, as if in invocation of a| ture, and, advancing with measured tread, blessing from that mother, whose spirit had | formed a complete circle about her; while iong ago flitted thither: and as she thus | the priest began to chant a mournful hymn, stood—all grace, all symmetry, and with|the words of which Sir Ernest de Colmar that flood of glowing hair rolling in lus-/ could not catch. trous masses over her shouldersof dazzling} Presently the Lady Abbess, whose coun- whiteness, arrayed, too, in that virgin ves- | tenance was now marked with an ex pres- ture, which fitted close to her shape, and /|sion of the sternest severity—placed her marked all the rich contours of its exquisite | band upon the costly lace veil and gently proportions, she did, indeed, appear a ra-| drew it from Gloria’s head—so that the diant being from another world—a Daugh- | light streaming from the altar, again dis- ter of Glory descended from the skies—a | played all the effulgence of that flood of Child of Light come down upon the earth silken hair. | | Sad cs ; “ odin to bless the eyes of men with her angelic| Deeper and more solemn grew the chant presence. of the priests as the veil was thus being Dazzled, bewildered, and half intoxicated | removed ; and gradually did the soft voices with the spectacle—feeling aa if celestial | of the nuns mingle in the plaintive hymn. rays had shot from those dark and lustrous; But in a few minutes, the chorus was eyes into his very soul, illuminating all its | brought to conclusion—the harmonious most secret recesses and filling it with a| murmurs dying away in the distance like passionate tenderness—Sir Ernest de Col- | the songs of aerial beings, mar gazed upon Gloria with a worship and| Then the Lady Abbess suddenly rent the an adoration which he had never yielded | Veil in halves—and the nuns began to beat before to a human being. It was with inde-| their bosoms again, and give vent to low fnable emotions of fear and awe, mingling | moanings and half-stifled sobs. with his pleasure and satisfaction, that he| Butin the midst of this strange and even nad so recently been pondering in his tent | painful spectacle, Gloria rose slowly from upon the image of Satanais; but it was|her knees, with a radiant expressisn of with an unmixed delight and an ecstatic | triumph and satisfaction upon her angelic rapture that he now dwelt upon the radiant | countenance. creature who stood before him there: an ‘Sinful daughter,’ exclaimed the two whereas some secret warning voice liad ap-| priests simultaneously, and speaking in peared to whisper in his ear that there was | loud sonorous tones,—* henceforth thou art a delicious poison in the bewitching looks | an outcast from the true sheepfold; and we of Satanais—so, on the other hand, did it | abandon thee tothe strange shepherd whom now seem as if a heavenly essence were | thou hast chosen to follow.’ mingled with the intoxicating draughts| ‘Sinful sister, cried the voices of the which his soul was drinking in from the | nuns, swelling in plaintive chorus,—‘ hence- nalo of loveliness and light surrounding the | forth thou art an outcast from the commu- form of Gloria. nity ; and we know thee no longer,’ And there wasa long pause and a dead} The voices ceased abruptly—and the silence after the angelic creature had de- Lady Abbess, raising her hands above the clared that thenceforth she repudiated the | radiant head of Gloria, said in a deep se- monastic denomination of Sister Marietta, | pulchral tone, ‘Woman, I give thee back and resumed the admirably appropriate | thy vows—I restore thee thy pledges which name which a mother’s natural pride and|thou didst make to me, who am the hum- tenderness had bestowed upon her. | ble servitress of heaven. And in thus re- Then, as the words which conveyed this| leasing thee from the bonds which lately announcement died in low echoes along the | bound thee, body and soul, to vaulted aisles, the two priests raised their | At this moment Sir Ernest de Colmar looks mournfully to heaven, and the nuns! was startled by the rustling of a dress, the covered their countenances with their hands| sound of which appeared to come from as ifin deepest sorrow, while satisfaction! amidst the tombs where he himself was gleamed in the eye of the formidable! concealed. He turned his head suddenly, Zitzka, who was leaning upon his sword at | and beheld the tall ficure of a monk, whose a short distance from the altar. countenance was complely enveloped in hus several minutes had passed—and | his cowl, glide rapidly between the monu- at length the organ began to pour forth its | ments at a short distance, and as if about solemn strains once more. to pass into the nave or body of the church, comicbooks.com