BELOW Mount Jura lies a vale Extremely dark and deep and wide, Where once, if we may trust the tale, Good Saint Verena lived and died. A pious damsel, sooth, was she, Who made her lowly life sublime With works of grace and charity; The marvel of her age and clime. To heal the sick, and teach the young, And lead the weak in Virtue's ways, Her daily life, -- and every tongue In all the valley sang her praise, Save one, -- of course the "Evil One," -- Who, being evermore at strife With pious folks, left naught undone To end good Saint Verena's life. Sometimes he turned, the lengends say, A mountain torrent in her path; In vain! dry-shod she held her way, Unhurt, despite the Devil's wrath! And once a murderer, in the night, The fiend employed to take her life; In vain! for when his lantern light Revealed her face, he dropped his knife. And so it fell, the Devil's skill No harm to Saint Verena brought; He failed to work his wicked will, And all his malice came to naught. Enraged, at last he seized a stone, Intent at once to crush her dead, (A rock that weighed at least a ton!) And held it poised above her head. Whereat she turned, and at the sight (Such angel-beauty filled her face) Poor Satan shuddered with affright, And fain had fled the holy place! And in his fear he trembled so He dropped the stone, -- down -- down it goes! To fall on Saint Verena? -- No! It falls instead on Satan's toes! And since that day he limps about, Unable more to leap or run; And, that the story none may doubt, You still may see the very stone; With five deep marks on either side, Which -- so the pious peasant hints, Though wicked skeptics may deride -- Are clearly Satan's finger-prints. |