Moss-grown

Diſeaſed nature oftentimes breakes forth, / In ſtrange eruptions, oft the teeming earth / Is with a kind of collicke pincht and vext, / By the impriſoning of vnruly wind / Within her vvombe, vvhich for enlargement ſtriuing / Shakes the old Beldame earth, and topples down / Steeples and moſſegrovvn towers.

In theſe lone walls (their days eternal bound) / Theſe moſs-grown domes with ſpiry turrets crown'd, / Where awful arches make a noon-day night, / And the dim windows ſhed a ſolemn light; / Thy eyes diffus'd a reconciling ray, / And gleams of glory brighten'd all the day.

In one spot distinguished by a moss-grown gothic monument, which retained the name of Queen's Standing, Elizabeth herself was said to have pierced seven bucks with her own arrows.

[A]ll these objects were as well known to me as the cold hearth of my deserted home, and every moss-grown wall and plot of orchard ground, alike as twin lambs are to each other in a stranger's eye, yet to my accustomed gaze bore differences, distinction, and a name.

As we pass onward, we catch the amusing incidents by the way, explore the villages, meditate among their grave yards, and pluck the grass away from the moss grown head stones to decypher the names of those who sleep beneath.

Immediately beyond the bridge, on the right-hand side of the road, a rusty iron gate, between solid but mouldy stone pillars, surmounted with mossgrown stone balls, imparted an air of yet lingering importance to what had once been a well-kept walled garden, […]

Stumps and logs, like precious monuments, adorned its two streets, each stump and log, on account of the moist climate, moss-grown and tufted with grass and bushes, but muddy on the sides below the limit of the bogline.

To find one's self suddenly translated from the wild, flowery prairie into the heart of an aged, moss-grown village, of such foreign aspect, withal, was by no means easy to reconcile with one's notions of reality.