And here the reader doubtless expects, if not a full description of the ceremony of canonisation, at least an accurate detail of the various steps of the process by which it was effected; but, as we have stated above, the incubation had been completed six weeks before in a private Eccaleiobion, and the pageant to-day was merely to give publicity to the metamorphosis--to read in, and to enrol among the saints the Beata Francesca. As we cannot give a particular account of the _funzione_, we give a general one of all masses:--
High mass! The stall'd and banner'd quire-- White canons--priests in quaint attire-- The unfamiliar prayer: The fumes that practised hands dispense, The tinkling bells, the jingling pence, The tax'd but welcome chair: The beams from ruby panes that glow, Of rhythmal chant the ebb and flow: The organ, that from boundless stores Its trembling inspiration pours O'er all the sons of care; Now joyous as the festal lyre, When torch and song and wine inspire; Now tender as Cremona's shell, When hush'd orchestras own the spell And watch the ductile bow-- Now rolling from its thunder-cloud, Dark peals o'er that retiring crowd, And now has ceased to blow.
CRIMES AND REMARKABLE TRIALS IN SCOTLAND.
INCIDENTS OF THE EARLIER REIGNS--AN INQUIRY INTO THE CHARACTER OF MACBETH.