prejudices? If one combats them, they get strength
from opposition; if one leaves them alone, they
root themselves deeper and deeper in the soul.
"What can we do but walk steadily along that
broad central path—that crown of the causeway
—which I hold to be the noblest strip in all
the road, looking lovingly on the golden fields
and mellow harvests lying beyond the ruts
on either side, and hopefully to the great
temple of truth whose spires flash in the
sunlight oil the distant horizon, and in the
inner court of which, let us pray, all ways
may converge and be united? If we are so
minded, we can get good even out of our
neighbours' prejudices, learning at least what
to avoid, if not what to imitate. Wherefore,
here is a hand of brotherhood to the
French, in spite of the frowns of my four
dissentient friends, and a decided preference for
rose-water and honey to vinegar and gall.
What do you say, neighbour?

DRIFT.

WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

EDWARD THE CONFESSOR, during his exile in
Normandy, made a vow he would make a
pilgrimage to Rome, in honour of St. Peter, should
he be restored to his kingdom. But as his clergy
and nobles refused their consent to his going,
when he was safely on his throne, a dispensation
releasing the king from his vow was obtained
from the Pope (Leo IX.), on condition that a
monastery be built in honour of St. Peter. The
king then began the restoration of the
WESTMINSTER of London, in the year 1050, or
thereabouts, and the church was said to have been
the first church in the shape of a cross in
England. One of the MSS. of the time of Henry
III., in Mr. Luard's Lives of Edward the
Confessor, gives an elaborate description of the
building, The extract touching the Abbey is
in the curious Norman French called the Langue
d'oïl, and the translation which here accompanies
it corresponds line by line with the original text:

Atant ad fundé sa iglise
De grantz quareus de pere bise;
A fimdement le e parfund,
Le frunt vers orient fait rund,
Li quarrel sunt mut fort e dur,
En miliu dresce une tur,
E deus en frunt del occident,
E bons seinz e grantz i pent;
Li piler e li tablementz
Sunt reches defers e dedenz,
A basses e a chapitraus
Surt l'ovre grantz e reaus,
Entaileez sunt les peres
E aestoirés les vereres,
Sunt faites tutes a mestrie
De bone e leau menestrancie;
E quant a acheve le ovre,
De plum la iglise ben covere,
Cloistre i fait, chapitre a frund,
Vers orient, vouse e rund,
U si ordene ministre
Teignent lur secret chapitre;
Relaitur e te dortur,
E les ofticines en tur.
Bons maneres, terres, e bois,
Dune, cunferme denlanois,
E sulum sun grant s'en devise
A sun muster reau franchise;
Moinnes i fait acuiller,
Ki bon quor i unt de Deu servir,
E met l'ordre en bon estat,
Suz seint e ordeine prelat,
E numbre de cuvent receit
Sulum l'ordre de Seint Beneit.

NOW he laid the foundations of the church
With large square blocks of grey stone;
Its foundations are deep,
The front towards the east he makes round,
The stones are very strong and hard,
In the centre rises a tower,
And two at the western front,
And fine and large bells he hangs there;
The pillars and entablature
Are rich without and within,
At the bases and capitals
The work rises grand and royal,
Sculptured are the stones
And storied the windows,
All are made with the skill
Of a good and loyal workmanship;
And when he finished the work,
With lead the church completely he covers,
He makes there a cloister, a chapter-house in front,
Towards the east, vaulted and round,
Where his ordained ministers
May hold their secret chapter;
Refectory and dormitory,
And the offices in the tower.
Splendid manors, lands, and woods,
He gives, confirms the gift at once,
And according to his grant he intends
For his monastery royal freedom;
Monks he causes there to assemble,
Who have a good heart there to serve God,
And puts the order in good condition,
Under a holy and ordained prelate,
And receives the number of the convent
According to the order of St. Benedict.

So desirous was Edward of rendering the
Abbey almost unique in its attractions, that he
endowed it with relics, in those days beyond all
price. Among these were to be noted: "part
of the place and manger where Christ was born,
and also of the frankincense offered to him by
the Eastern Magi; of the table of Our Lord;
of the bread which he blessed; of the seat
where he was presented in the Temple; of the
wilderness where he fasted; of the gaol where
he was imprisoned; of his undivided garment;
of the sponge, lance, and scourge with which
he was tortured; of the sepulchre, and cloth
that bound his head; and of the mountains
Golgotha and Calvary; great part of the Holy
Cross, enclosed in a certain one, particularly
beautified and distinguished, with many other
pieces of the same, and great part of one of
the nails belonging to it; and likewise the cross
that floated against wind and wave over sea from
Normandy hither with that king. Many pieces
of the vestments of the Virgin Mary; of the
linen which she wore; of the window in which
the angel stood when he saluted her; of her
milk, of her hair, of her shoes, and of her bed;