What hardly a sense of my soul believes--
A mold-stained package of parchment leaves!
A hideous bat flapped into my face!
O'ercome with horror, I fled the place,
And stood again with my curious guide
On the solid floor, at the chancel's side.
But, lo! in a moment the age-bowed seer
Was a darkly frowning cavalier,
Gazing no longer in woeful trance,
Vengeance blazed in his every glance.
Then a mocking laugh rang the Mission o'er,
And I stood alone by the chapel door;
And, save for the mold-stained parchment leaves,
I had thought it the vision that night-mare weaves.
Hardly a sense of my soul believes,
Yet I held in my hand the parchment leaves.
Careful I noted them, one by one,
Each was a letter in rhyming run,
Written over and over, in tenderest strain,
By fingers that never will write again.
I strung them together, a tale to tell,
And named it "The Mystery of Carmel."
And these are the letters I found that day,
In the mission ruin, old and gray--
The Mission Carmel of Monterey:




TO THE HOLY FATHER SANSON