Beating the walls of a mute despair.
Doom, all doom--nay then, not all doom!
Rises a hope from the fast-closed tomb.
Write not "Lost," with its grinding bans,
On life, or the Bridge of the Hundred Spans.

See, on the canon's western ridge,
There stands a girl! She beholds the bridge
Smitten and broken; she sees the need
For a warning swift, and a daring deed.
See then the act of a simple girl;
Learn from it, thinker, and priest, and churl.
See her, the lantern between her teeth,
Crossing the quivering trap of death.
Hand over hand on a swaying rail,
Sharp in her ears and her heart the wail
Of a hundred lives; and she has no fear
Save that her prayer be not granted her.
Cold is the snow on the rail, and chill
The wind that comes from the frozen hill.
Her hair blows free and her eyes are full
Of the look that makes Heaven merciful--
Merciful, ah! quick, shut your eyes,
Lest you wish to see how a brave girl dies!
Dies--not yet; for her firm hands clasped
The solid bridge, as the breach out-gasped,
And the rail that had held her downward swept,
Where old Carew in his snow-grave slept.

Now up and over the steep incline,