Chapter L: M. C

I have more fully expressed my admiration and regard for Lydia
Maria Child in the biographical introduction which I wrote for the
volume of Letters, published after her death.

We sat together, last May-day, and talked Of the dear friends who walked Beside us, sharers of the hopes and fears Of five and forty years,

Since first we met in Freedom's hope forlorn, And heard her battle-horn Sound through the valleys of the sleeping North, Calling her children forth,

And youth pressed forward with hope-lighted eyes, And age, with forecast wise Of the long strife before the triumph won, Girded his armor on.

Sadly, ass name by name we called the roll, We heard the dead-bells toll For the unanswering many, and we knew The living were the few.

And we, who waited our own call before The inevitable door, Listened and looked, as all have done, to win Some token from within.

No sign we saw, we heard no voices call; The impenetrable wall Cast down its shadow, like an awful doubt, On all who sat without.

Of many a hint of life beyond the veil, And many a ghostly tale Wherewith the ages spanned the gulf between The seen and the unseen,

Seeking from omen, trance, and dream to gain Solace to doubtful pain, And touch, with groping hands, the garment hem Of truth sufficing them,

We talked; and, turning from the sore unrest Of an all-baffling quest, We thought of holy lives that from us passed Hopeful unto the last,

As if they saw beyond the river of death, Like Him of Nazareth, The many mansions of the Eternal days Lift up their gates of praise.

And, hushed to silence by a reverent awe, Methought, O friend, I saw In thy true life of word, and work, and thought The proof of all we sought.

Did we not witness in the life of thee Immortal prophecy? And feel, when with thee, that thy footsteps trod An everlasting road?

Not for brief days thy generous sympathies, Thy scorn of selfish ease; Not for the poor prize of an earthly goal Thy strong uplift of soul.

Than thine was never turned a fonder heart To nature and to art In fair-formed Hellas in her golden prime, Thy Philothea's time.

Yet, loving beauty, thou couldst pass it by, And for the poor deny Thyself, and see thy fresh, sweet flower of fame Wither in blight and blame.

Sharing His love who holds in His embrace The lowliest of our race, Sure the Divine economy must be Conservative of thee!

For truth must live with truth, self-sacrifice Seek out its great allies; Good must find good by gravitation sure, And love with love endure.

And so, since thou hast passed within the gate Whereby awhile I wait, I give blind grief and blinder sense the lie Thou hast not lived to die! 1881.

IN MEMORY.

JAMES T. FIELDS.

As a guest who may not stay Long and sad farewells to say Glides with smiling face away,

Of the sweetness and the zest Of thy happy life possessed Thou hast left us at thy best.

Warm of heart and clear of brain, Of thy sun-bright spirit's wane Thou hast spared us all the pain.

Now that thou hast gone away, What is left of one to say Who was open as the day?

What is there to gloss or shun? Save with kindly voices none Speak thy name beneath the sun.

Safe thou art on every side, Friendship nothing finds to hide, Love's demand is satisfied.

Over manly strength and worth, At thy desk of toil, or hearth, Played the lambent light of mirth,--

Mirth that lit, but never burned; All thy blame to pity turned; Hatred thou hadst never learned.

Every harsh and vexing thing At thy home-fire lost its sting; Where thou wast was always spring.

And thy perfect trust in good, Faith in man and womanhood, Chance and change and time, withstood.

Small respect for cant and whine, Bigot's zeal and hate malign, Had that sunny soul of thine.

But to thee was duty's claim Sacred, and thy lips became Reverent with one holy Name.

Therefore, on thy unknown way, Go in God's peace! We who stay But a little while delay.

Keep for us, O friend, where'er Thou art waiting, all that here Made thy earthly presence dear;

Something of thy pleasant past On a ground of wonder cast, In the stiller waters glassed!

Keep the human heart of thee; Let the mortal only be Clothed in immortality.

And when fall our feet as fell Thine upon the asphodel, Let thy old smile greet us well;

Proving in a world of bliss What we fondly dream in this,-- Love is one with holiness! 1881.

WILSON

Read at the Massachusetts Club on the seventieth anniversary the
birthday of Vice-President Wilson, February 16, 1882.

The lowliest born of all the land, He wrung from Fate's reluctant hand The gifts which happier boyhood claims; And, tasting on a thankless soil The bitter bread of unpaid toil, He fed his soul with noble aims.

And Nature, kindly provident, To him the future's promise lent; The powers that shape man's destinies, Patience and faith and toil, he knew, The close horizon round him grew, Broad with great possibilities.

By the low hearth-fire's fitful blaze He read of old heroic days, The sage's thought, the patriot's speech; Unhelped, alone, himself he taught, His school the craft at which he wrought, His lore the book within his, reach.

He felt his country's need; he knew The work her children had to do; And when, at last, he heard the call In her behalf to serve and dare, Beside his senatorial chair He stood the unquestioned peer of all.

Beyond the accident of birth He proved his simple manhood's worth; Ancestral pride and classic grace Confessed the large-brained artisan, So clear of sight, so wise in plan And counsel, equal to his place.

With glance intuitive he saw Through all disguise of form and law, And read men like an open book; Fearless and firm, he never quailed Nor turned aside for threats, nor failed To do the thing he undertook.

How wise, how brave, he was, how well He bore himself, let history tell While waves our flag o'er land and sea, No black thread in its warp or weft; He found dissevered States, he left A grateful Nation, strong and free!

THE POET AND THE CHILDREN.

LONGFELLOW.

WITH a glory of winter sunshine Over his locks of gray, In the old historic mansion He sat on his last birthday;

With his books and his pleasant pictures, And his household and his kin, While a sound as of myriads singing From far and near stole in.

It came from his own fair city, From the prairie's boundless plain, From the Golden Gate of sunset, And the cedarn woods of Maine.

And his heart grew warm within him, And his moistening eyes grew dim, For he knew that his country's children Were singing the songs of him,

The lays of his life's glad morning, The psalms of his evening time, Whose echoes shall float forever On the winds of every clime.

All their beautiful consolations, Sent forth like birds of cheer, Came flocking back to his windows, And sang in the Poet's ear.

Grateful, but solemn and tender, The music rose and fell With a joy akin to sadness And a greeting like farewell.

With a sense of awe he listened To the voices sweet and young; The last of earth and the first of heaven Seemed in the songs they sung.

And waiting a little longer For the wonderful change to come, He heard the Summoning Angel, Who calls God's children home!

And to him in a holier welcome Was the mystical meaning given Of the words of the blessed Master "Of such is the kingdom of heaven!" 1882

A WELCOME TO LOWELL

Take our hands, James Russell Lowell, Our hearts are all thy own; To-day we bid thee welcome Not for ourselves alone.

In the long years of thy absence Some of us have grown old, And some have passed the portals Of the Mystery untold;

For the hands that cannot clasp thee, For the voices that are dumb, For each and all I bid thee A grateful welcome home!

For Cedarcroft's sweet singer To the nine-fold Muses dear; For the Seer the winding Concord Paused by his door to hear;

For him, our guide and Nestor, Who the march of song began, The white locks of his ninety years Bared to thy winds, Cape Ann!

For him who, to the music Her pines and hemlocks played, Set the old and tender story Of the lorn Acadian maid;

For him, whose voice for freedom Swayed friend and foe at will, Hushed is the tongue of silver, The golden lips are still!

For her whose life of duty At scoff and menace smiled, Brave as the wife of Roland, Yet gentle as a Child.

And for him the three-hilled city Shall hold in memory long, Those name is the hint and token Of the pleasant Fields of Song!

For the old friends unforgotten, For the young thou hast not known, I speak their heart-warm greeting; Come back and take thy own!

From England's royal farewells, And honors fitly paid, Come back, dear Russell Lowell, To Elmwood's waiting shade!

Come home with all the garlands That crown of right thy head. I speak for comrades living, I speak for comrades dead! AMESBURY, 6th mo., 1885.

AN ARTIST OF THE BEAUTIFUL.

GEORGE FULLER

Haunted of Beauty, like the marvellous youth Who sang Saint Agnes' Eve! How passing fair Her shapes took color in thy homestead air! How on thy canvas even her dreams were truth! Magician! who from commonest elements Called up divine ideals, clothed upon By mystic lights soft blending into one Womanly grace and child-like innocence. Teacher I thy lesson was not given in vain. Beauty is goodness; ugliness is sin; Art's place is sacred: nothing foul therein May crawl or tread with bestial feet profane. If rightly choosing is the painter's test, Thy choice, O master, ever was the best. 1885.

MULFORD.

Author of The Nation and The Republic of God.

Unnoted as the setting of a star He passed; and sect and party scarcely knew When from their midst a sage and seer withdrew To fitter audience, where the great dead are In God's republic of the heart and mind, Leaving no purer, nobler soul behind. 1886.

TO A CAPE ANN SCHOONER

Luck to the craft that bears this name of mine, Good fortune follow with her golden spoon The glazed hat and tarry pantaloon; And wheresoe'er her keel shall cut the brine, Cod, hake and haddock quarrel for her line. Shipped with her crew, whatever wind may blow, Or tides delay, my wish with her shall go, Fishing by proxy. Would that it might show At need her course, in lack of sun and star, Where icebergs threaten, and the sharp reefs are; Lift the blind fog on Anticosti's lee And Avalon's rock; make populous the sea Round Grand Manan with eager finny swarms, Break the long calms, and charm away the storms. OAK KNOLL, 23 3rd mo., 1886.

SAMUEL J. TILDEN.

GREYSTONE, AUG. 4, 1886.

Once more, O all-adjusting Death! The nation's Pantheon opens wide; Once more a common sorrow saith A strong, wise man has died.

Faults doubtless had he. Had we not Our own, to question and asperse The worth we doubted or forgot Until beside his hearse?

Ambitious, cautious, yet the man To strike down fraud with resolute hand; A patriot, if a partisan, He loved his native land.

So let the mourning bells be rung, The banner droop its folds half way, And while the public pen and tongue Their fitting tribute pay,

Shall we not vow above his bier To set our feet on party lies, And wound no more a living ear With words that Death denies?

1886