A monastery; then a feudal hold;
Later a manor, and at last a ruin.
Such knowledge have we of it, vaguely caught
Through whispers fallen from tradition's lip.
This shattered tower, with crenellated top
And loops for archers, alone marks the spot,
Looming forlornly--a gigantic harp
Whereon the invisible fingers of the wind
Its fitful and mysterious dirges play.

Here dwelt, in the last Tudor's virgin reign,
One Richard Wyndham, Knight and Gentleman,
(The son of Rawdon, slain near Calais wall
When Bloody Mary lost her grip on France,)
A lonely wight that no kith had nor kin
Save one, a brother--by ill-fortune's spite
A brother, since 't were better to have none--
Of late not often seen at Wyndham Towers,
Where he in sooth but lenten welcome got
When to that gate his errant footstep strayed.
Yet held he dear those gray majestic walls,
Time-stained and crusted with the sea's salt breath;
There first his eyes took color of the sea,
There did his heart stay when fate drove him thence,
And there at last--but that we tell anon.
Darrell they named him, for an ancestor
Whose bones were whitening in Holy Land,
The other Richard; a crusader name,
Yet it was Darrell had the lion-heart.
No love and little liking served this pair,