The great Abbey of Westminster was approaching its completion; an army of masons and labourers swarmed like bees upon and around it, and although differing widely in its massive architecture, with round Saxon windows and arches, from the edifice that was two or three generations later to be reared in its place, -to serve as a still more fitting tomb for the ashes of its pious founder, -it was a stately abbey, rivalling the most famous of the English fanes of the perio