e a section of a corridor than
an ostensible entrance, made my way through a spacious doorway into the
body of the church. The church itself was almost circular, the openings
of the four naves being spacious enough to give the appearance of the
interior as a whole, being a huge cross. It was strangely dim, for the
window openings were small and high-set, and were, moreover, filled with
green or blue glass, each window having a colour to itself. The glass
was very old, being of the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Such
appointments as there were--for it had a general air of desolation--were
of great beauty and richness,--especially so to be in a place--even a
church--where the door lay open, and no one was to be seen. It was
strangely silent even for an old church on a lonesome headland. There
reigned a dismal solemnity which seemed to chill me, accustomed as I have
been to strange and weird places. It seemed abandoned, though it had not
that air of having been neglected which is so often to be noticed in old
churches. There was none of the everlasting accumulation of dust which
prevails in places of higher cultivation and larger and more strenuous
work.

In the church itself or its appending chambers I could find no clue or
suggestion which could guide me in any way in my search for the Lady of
the Shroud. Monuments there were in profusion--statues, tablets, and all
the customary memorials of the dead. The families and dates represented
were simply bewildering. Often the name of Vissarion was given, and the
inscription which it held I read through carefully, looking to find some
enlightenment of any kind. But all in vain: there was nothing to see in
the church itself. So I determined to visit the crypt. I had no lantern
or candle with me, so had to go back to the Castle to secure one.

It was strange, coming in from the sunlight, here overwhelming to one so
recently accustomed to northern skies, to note the slender gleam of the
lantern which I carried, and which I had lit inside the door. At my
first entry to the church my mind had been so much taken up with the
strangeness of the place, together with the intensity of wish for some
sort of clue, that I had really no opportunity of examining detail. But
now detail became necessary, as I had to find the entrance to the crypt.
My puny light could not dissipate the semi-Cimmerian gloom of the vast
edifice; I had to throw the feeble gleam into one after anot