His choicest duty it had been: 
  But this one night it weighed him down. 
  “What work for an immortal soul,
  To feed and clothe some lazy clown! 
  Is there no action worth my mood,
  No deed of daring, high and pure,
  That shall, when I am dead, endure,
  A well-spring of perpetual good?”

    And straight he thought of those great tomes
  With clamps of gold,—­the Convent’s boast,—­
  How they endured, while kings and realms
  Passed into darkness and were lost;
  How they had stood from age to age,
  Clad in their yellow vellum-mail,
  ’Gainst which the Paynim’s godless rage,
  The Vandal’s fire could nought avail: 
  Though heathen sword-blows fell like hail,
  Though cities ran with Christian blood,
  Imperishable they had stood! 
  They did not seem like books to him,
  But Heroes, Martyrs, Saints,—­themselves
  The things they told of, not mere books
  Ranged grimly on the oaken shelves.

    To those dim alcoves, far withdrawn,
  He turned with measured steps and slow,
  Trimming his lantern as he went;
  And there, among the shadows, bent
  Above one ponderous folio,
  With whose miraculous text were blent
  Seraphic faces:  Angels, crowned
  With rings of melting amethyst;
  Mute, patient Martyrs, cruelly bound
  To blazing fagots; here and there,
  Some bold, serene Evangelist,
  Or Mary in her sunny hair: 
  And here and there from out the words
  A brilliant tropic bird took flight;
  And through the margins many a vine
  Went wandering—­roses, red and white,
  Tulip, wind-flower, and columbine
  Blossomed.  To his believing mind
  These things were real, and the soft wind,
  Blown through the mullioned window, took
  Scent from the lilies in the book.

    “Santa Maria!” cried Friar Jerome,
  “Whatever man illumined this,
  Though he were steeped heart-deep in sin,
  Was worthy of unending bliss,
  And no doubt hath it!  Ah! dear Lord,
  Might I so beautify Thy Word! 
  What sacristan, the convents through,
  Transcribes with such precision? who
  Does such initials as I do? 
  Lo!  I will gird me to this work,
  And save me, ere the one chance slips. 
  On smooth, clean parchment I’ll engross
  The Prophet’s fell Apocalypse;
  And as I write from day to day,
  Perchance my sins will pass away.”

    So Friar Jerome began his Book. 
  From break of dawn till curfew-chime
  He bent above the lengthening page,
  Like some rapt poet o’er his rhyme. 
  He scarcely paused to tell his beads,
  Except at night; and then he lay
  And tossed, unrestful, on the straw,
  Impatient for the coming day,—­
  Working like one who feels, perchance,
  That, ere the longed-for goal be won,
  Ere Beauty bare her perfect breast,
  Black Death may pluck him from the sun.