Morning journal and courier., 1888-07-04
lurch grew dark and the silence seemed t

church grew dark and the silence seemed to deepen in the dusk of the gathering night.
 It is one hundred years ago the 22d of January since he was born, and seventy-six years ago the 29th of February since the first half of that great poem was published; ]; and If the conviction, throughout the world, of men and women who think can be accept ed as an authority, no name in the long an- nals of English literature is more certain of immortality than the name of Byron. Peo- pie mention the poetry of Spencer and Cow ley, and Dryden and Cowper, but the poetry of Byron they read. His reputation can af> ford the omission of all memorial to him in Westminster Abbey, and it can endure even the neglect and cenBure of the precinct of Nottingham. That city rejoices in stately castle throned upon rock, and persons who admire the Stuarts may exu1t in the reco1- lection that here the standard of Charles was first unfurled in his great war with the Par lament and people of England; but all that really hallows it for the stranger of to-day and for posterity is it's association with the name of Byron. You will look in vain, however, for any sign of his past presence in that dismal place. 1t is difficult even to find prints or photographs of the Byron localities in the shops of Nottingham. One dealer, from whom bought all the Byron pictures situation in one expressive sentence: 'tMuch more ought to be done here about Lord By ron's memory, and that is the truth; but the fact is the first families of the country don't approve of him."
 When we came again into the church. yard, with it's many scattered graves and it's quaint stones and crosses leaning every way and huddled in strange kind of orderly oonfu- sion, the great dark tower stood out bold and solitary in the gloaming, and chill wind of evening had begun to moan around its little spires, and through it's mysterious belfry win dows and in the few trees near by, which gave forth 8 mournful whisper. It was hard to leave the place, and for long time we stood near the chapel, just above the outer wall of the Byron vault. And here the sex ton told us the story of the White Lady pointing as he spoke to 8 cottage abutting on the churchyard, one window in which com mands an easy view of the place of Byron's grave. ''There she ived," he said, "and there she died, and there" (pointing to an unmarked grave near the pathway, about thirty feet from the Byron vault), 'I buried her." It is impossible to give all his words, or to indicate his earnest, solemn manner. In brief this lady, whose story no one knew, had taken up her residence in this cottage long subsequent to the burial of Byron, and had remained there until she died. She was very pale and thin, quite handsome, and she always wore white garments Her face was often to be seen at that window, whether by night or day, and she seemed to be watching the tomb. Once. when masons were repair ing the church wall, she was enabled to de- scend into that vault, and therefrom she ob- tained skull, which she declared to be Lord Byrons, and which she scraped and polished and made perfectly white, and kept always beneath her pillow. It was her request, oft en made to the sexton, that she might be buried in the chuIchyard close to the wall of the poets tomb. "When at last she died" said John Brown, s'they brought that skull to me, and I buried it up there in the ground. It was one of the loose skulls from the old vault. She thought it was Byron's, and it pleased her to think so. might have laid her close to this wall. I don't know why didn't"
 In those words the sexton's story ended. It was only one more of the myriad hints of that romance which the life and poetry of Byron have so widely created ard difused. glanced around for some relic of the place that might properly be taken away; there was neither an ivy leaf blooming upon the wall nor single flower growing iR all that ground; but into crevice of the rock, just above his tomb, the wind had at some time blown little earth, and in this few blades of grass were thinly rooted. These I gath- cred and still possess as a memento of an aveniup at RvF0n9s crave