The Baron's Yule Feast

Right beautiful is Torksey's hall,[1]
Adown by meadowed Trent;
Right beautiful that mouldering wall,
And remnant of a turret tall,
Shorn of its battlement.

For, while the children of the Spring
Blush into life, and die;
And Summer's joy-birds take light wing
When Autumn mists are nigh;
And soon the year--a winterling--
With its fall'n leaves doth lie;
That ruin gray--
Mirror'd, alway,
Deep in the silver stream,
Doth summon weird-wrought visions vast,
That show the actors of the past
Pictured, as in a dream.

Meseemeth, now, before mine eyes,
The pomp-clad phantoms dimly rise,
Till the full pageant bright--
A throng of warrior-barons bold,
Glittering in burnished steel and gold,
Bursts on my glowing sight.