Classic Poem

After the battle Count Turneck rode,
By night, to a church, which is God's abode:

It lay in a forest's leafy gloom—
A monarch slept in that chapel's tomb.

Here the Count would alight and rest—
He knew not an arrow had pierced his breast.

The Count alit, and his horse he freed—
“Graze here till I come, my snow-white steed.”

He opened the gate with a hollow sound:
Then a deeper silence reigned around.

The Count groped round by the chilly wall,
Till his fingers fell on a mouldering pall:

“Here can I rest my weary head—
Break not awhile my flinty bed!”

The Count lay down with no thought of fear,
And stretched his limbs on the dead man's bier.

Over the hills the morn shone red:
The Count came not—the Count was dead.

Hundreds of years have winged their flight,
But that steed still waits for the sleeping knight;

And near God's house it still may be seen,
By moonlight grazing on the green!