The Three Kings knelt with gifts, behold!
By three times thirty steps, the shrine
The pilgrim gains--and faint, and dim,
And dizzy with the height, divine
Strength on the sudden springs to him!

"Yawns wide within that holy steep
A mighty cavern dark and deep--
By blessed sunbeam never lit--
Rank foetid swamps engirdle it;
And there by night, and there by day,
Ever at watch, the fiend-worm lay,
Holding the Hell of its abode
Fast by the hallow'd House of God.
And when the pilgrim gladly ween'd
His feet had found the healing way,
Forth from its ambush rush'd the fiend,
And down to darkness dragg'd the prey.

"With solemn soul, that solemn height
I clomb, ere yet I sought the fight--
Kneeling before the cross within,
My heart, confessing, clear'd its sin.
Then, as befits the Christian knight,
I donn'd the spotless surplice white,
And, by the altar, grasp'd the spear:--
So down I strode with conscience clear--
Bade my leal squires afar the deed,
By death or conquest crown'd, await--
Leapt lightly on my lithesome steed,