brethren, only those tenanting
the cemetery are left. All else are gone, driven forth, as vagabonds,
with stripes and curses, to seek refuge where they may.

A sad, sad change has come over Whalley Abbey. In the plenitude of its
pride and power has it been cast down, desecrated, despoiled. Its
treasures are carried off, its ornaments sold, its granaries emptied,
its possessions wasted, its storehouses sacked, its cattle slaughtered
and sold. But, though stripped of its wealth and splendour; though
deprived of all the religious graces that, like rich incense, lent an
odour to the fane, its external beauty is yet unimpaired, and its vast
proportions undiminished.

A stately pile was Whalley--one of the loveliest as well as the largest
in the realm. Carefully had it been preserved by its reverend rulers,
and where reparations or additions were needed they were judiciously
made. Thus age had lent it beauty, by mellowing its freshness and toning
its hues, while no decay was perceptible. Without a struggle had it
yielded to the captor, so that no part of its wide belt of walls or
towers, though so strongly constructed as to have offered effectual
resistance, were injured.

Never had Whalley Abbey looked more beautiful than on a bright clear
morning in March, when this sad change had been wrought, and when, from
a peaceful monastic establishment, it had been converted into a menacing
fortress. The sunlight sparkled upon its grey walls, and filled its
three great quadrangular courts with light and life, piercing the
exquisite carving of its cloisters, and revealing all the intricate
beauty and combinations of the arches. Stains of painted glass fell upon
the floor of the magnificent conventual church, and dyed with rainbow
hues the marble tombs of the Lacies, the founders of the establishment,
brought thither when the monastery was removed from Stanlaw in Cheshire,
and upon the brass-covered gravestones of the abbots in the presbytery.
There lay Gregory de Northbury, eighth abbot of Stanlaw and first of
Whalley, and William Rede, the last abbot; but there was never to lie
John Paslew. The slumber of the ancient prelates was soon to be
disturbed, and the sacred structure within which they had so often
worshipped, up-reared by sacrilegious hands. But all was bright and
beauteous now, and if no solemn strains were heard in the holy pile, its
stillness was scarcely less reverential and awe-inspiring. The old abbey
wreathed itse