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1 May 1997: Angel holding
a cross.
Sir Walter Scott's poem "The Lay of the Last
Minstrel" includes the following about Rosslyn Chapel and the Sinclair
knights buried there beneath the chapel in their full armor:
"O'er Roslin all that dreary night
A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam;
'Twas broader than the watch-fire light,
And redder than the bright moonbeam.
It glared on Roslin's castled rock,
It ruddied all the copse-wood glen;
'Twas seen from Dryden's groves of oak,
And seen from caverned Hawthornden.
Seemed all in fire that chapel proud,
Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffined lie;
Each Baron for a sable shroud,
Sheathed in his iron ponoply.
Seemed all on fire within, around,
Deep sacristy and altar pale;
Shone every pillar foliage bound,
And glimmered at the dead man's mail.
Blazed battlement and pinnet high,
Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair --
So still they blaze when fate is nigh,
The lordly line of high St. Clair.
There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold,
Lie buried in that proud chapelle;
Each one the holy vault doth hold --
But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle.
And each St. Clair was buried there,
With candle, with book, and with knell;
But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung,
The dirge of Lovely Rosabelle."
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