Chapter III: Front Matter (3)

. . . Grand, heroic, true,
Faithful and brave thine earnest work to do,
O glorious present! we rejoice in thee,
Thou noble nurse of great deeds yet to be!
Hast thou not shown us that our mother Earth
Still, in exultant joy, gives heroes birth?
Do not the old romances that our youth,
Revered and honored as the truest truth,
Grow pale and dim before the facts sublime
Thy pen has written on the scroll of Time?
Ah! never yet did poet’s tongue,
Though like a silver bell it rung;
Or minstrel, o’er his sounding lyre
Breathing the old, prophetic fire;
Or harper, in the storied walls
Of Scotia’s proud, baronial halls—
Where mail-clad men with sword and spear
Waited entranced the song to hear,
That through the stormy midnight hour
Fast held them in its spell of power—
Ah! never yet did they rehearse,
In flowing rhyme or stately verse,
The praise of deeds more nobly done,
Or tell of fields more grandly won!
We laud thee, we praise thee, we bless thee to-day!
At thy feet, lowly bending, glad homage we pay!
Thou hast taught us that men are as brave as of yore;
That the day of great deeds and great thought is not o’er;
That the courage undaunted, the far-reaching faith,
The strength that unshaken looks calmly on death,
The self-abnegation that hastens to lay
Its all on the altar, have not passed away.
Thou hast taught us that “country” is more than a name;
That honor unsullied is better than fame;
Thou hast proved that while man can still battle for truth,
Even boyhood can give up the promise of youth,
And, yielding its life with a smile and a sigh,
Say, “’Tis sweet for my God and my country to die.”
O heart-searching Present, thy sons have gone down
To the night of the grave in their day of renown!
Thy daughters have watched by the hearth-stone in vain
For the loved and the lost that returned not again.
No Spartans were they—yet with tears falling fast,
Their faith and their patience endured to the last;
And God gave them strength to their dearest to say,
“Go ye forth to the fight, while we labor and pray!”
Thou hast opened thy coffers on land and on sea,
And broad-handed Charity, noble and free,
Has lavished thy bounties on friend and on foe,
Like the rain that, descending, falls softly and slow
On the just and the unjust, and never may know
The one from the other. When thy story is told
By some age that looks backward and calls thee “the old,”
It shall puzzle its sages, all great as thou art,
To tell which was greatest, thy head or thy heart!
Mighty words thy lips have spoken—
Strongest fetters thou hast broken—
And in tones like those of thunder,
When the clouds are rent asunder,
Thou hast made the Nations hear thee—
Thou hast bade the Tyrants fear thee—
And our hearts to-day proclaim thee,
As they oft have done before,
Fit to lead the glorious legions
Of the glorious days of yore!
Yet still, we pray thee, veil awhile
Thy splendor from our dazzled eyes
And hide the glory of thy smile,
Lest our souls wake to new surprise!
Bear with us while our feet to-day
Retrace a dim and shadowy way,
In search of what, it well may be,
Shall help to make us worthier thee!

* * * * *

And now, O, spirit of the Past, draw near,
And let us feel thy blessed presence here!
With reverent hearts and voices hushed and low,
We wait to hear thy garments’ rustling flow!
From all the conflicts of our busy life,
From all its bitter and enduring strife,
Its eager yearnings and its wild turmoil,
Its cares, its joys, its sorrows and its toil,
Its aspirations, that too often seem
Like the remembered phantoms of a dream,
We turn aside. This hour is thine alone,
And none shall share the grandeur of thy throne.
Ah! thou art here! Beneath these whispering trees
Thy breath floats softly on the passing breeze;
We feel the presence that we cannot see,
And every moment draws us nearer thee.
Could we but see thee with thy solemn eyes,
In whose rare depths such wondrous meaning lies—
Thy dark robes sweeping this enchanted ground—
Thy midnight hair with purple pansies crowned—
Thy lip so sadly sweet, thy brow serene!
There is no expectation in thy mien,
For thou hast done with dreams. Nor joy nor pain
Can e’er disturb thy placid calm again.
What is this veil that hides thee from our sight?
Breathe it away, thou spirit darkly bright!
It may not be! Our eyes are dim,
Perhaps with age, perhaps with tears;
We hear no more the choral hymn
The angels sing among the spheres.
Weary and worn and tempest-tossed,
Much have we gained—and something lost—
Since in the sunbeams golden glow,
The rippling river’s silvery flow,
The song of bird or murmuring bee,
The fragrant flower, the stately tree,
The royal pomp of sunset skies,
And all earth’s varied harmonies,
We saw and heard what nevermore
Can Earth or Heaven to us restore,
And felt a child’s unquestioning faith
In childhood’s mystic lore!

* * * * *

Yet could our voices reach the slumbering dead
Who rest so calmly in yon grass-grown bed,
This truth would seem with greatest wonder fraught—
_That they are heroes to our eyes and thought_.
For they were men who never dreamed of fame:
They did not toil to make themselves a name;
They little fancied that when years had passed,
And the long century had died at last,
Another age should make their graves a shrine,
And humble chaplets for their memory twine.
They simply strove, as other men may strive,
Full, earnest lives in sober strength to live;
They did the duty nearest to their hand;
Subdued wild nature as at God’s command;
Laid the broad acres open to the sun,
And made fair homes in forests dark and dun;
Built churches, founded schools, established laws,
Kindly and just and true to freedom’s cause;
Resisted wrong, and with stout hands and hearts,
In war, as well as peace, played well their parts.
Their men were brave; their women pure and true;
Their sons ashamed no honest work to do;
And while they dreamed no dreams of being great,
They did great deeds, and conquered hostile Fate.
We laud them, we praise them, we bless them to-day;
At their graves, as their right, tearful homage we pay!
And the laurel-crowned Present comes humbly at last,
And bends by our side at the shrine of the Past.
With the hands that such burdens unshrinking have borne,
From the brow weary cares have so furrowed and worn,
She takes off the chaplet, and lays it with tears,
That she cares not to hide, at the feet of the Years.
Hark! a breath of faint music, a murmur of song!
A form of strange beauty is floating along
On the soft summer air, and the Future draws near,
With a light on her young face, unshadowed and clear.
Two garlands she bears in the arms that not yet
Have toiled ’neath the burden and heat of the day;
Lo! both are of amaranth, fragrant and wet
With the dew of remembrance, and fadeless alway.
Oh! well may we hush our vain babblings—and wait!
He who merits the crown, wears it sooner or late!
On the brow of the Present, the grave of the Past,
The wreaths they have earned shall rest surely at last!

VERMONT

(WRITTEN FOR THE VERMONT CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION, AT BENNINGTON, AUGUST 15, 1877.)

I.

O woman-form, majestic, strong and fair,
Sitting enthroned where in upper air
Thy mountain-peaks in solemn grandeur rise,
Piercing the splendor of the summer skies—
Vermont! Our mighty mother, crowned to-day
In all the glory of thy hundred years,
If thou dost bid me sing, how can I but obey?
What though the lips may tremble, and the verse
That fain would grandly thy grand deeds rehearse
May trip and falter, and the stammering tongue
Leave all unrhymed the rhymes that should be sung?
I can but do thy bidding, as is meet,
Bowing in humble homage at thy feet—
Thy royal feet—and if my words are weak,
O crownèd One, ’twas thou didst bid me speak!

II.

Yet what is there to say,
Even on this proud day,
This day of days, that hath not oft been said?
What song is there to sing
That hath not oft been sung?
What laurel can we bring
That ages have not hung
A thousand times above their glorious dead?
What crown to crown the living
Is left us for our giving,
That is not shaped to other brows
That wore it long ago?
Our very vows but echo vows
Breathed centuries ago!
Earth has no choral strain,
No sweet or sad refrain,
No lofty pæan swelling loud and clear,
That Virgil did not know,
Or Danté, wandering slow
In mystic trances, did not pause to hear!
When gods from high Olympus came
To touch old Homer’s lips with flame,
The morning stars together sung
To teach their raptures to his tongue.
For him the lonely ocean moaned;
For him the mighty winds intoned
Their deep-voiced chantings, and for him
Sweet flower-bells pealed in forests dim.
From earth and sea and sky he caught
The spell of their divinest thought,
While yet it blossomed fresh and new
As Eden’s rosebuds wet with dew!
Oh! to have lived when earth was young,
With all its melodies unsung!
The dome of heaven bent nearer then
When gods and angels talked with men—
When Song itself was newly born,
The Incarnation of the Morn!
But now, alas! all thought is old,
All life is but a story told,
And poet-tongues are manifold;
And he is bold who tries to wake,
Even for God or Country’s sake,
In voice, or pen, or lute, or lyre,
Sparks of the old Promethean fire!

III.

And yet—O Earth, thank God!—the soul of song
Is as immortal as the eternal stars!
O trembling heart! take courage and be strong.
Hark! to a voice from yonder crystal bars:

_“Did the roses blow last June?
Do the stars still rise and set?
And over the crests of the mountains
Are the light clouds floating yet?
Do the rivers run to the sea
With a deep, resistless flow?
Do the little birds sing north and south
As the seasons come and go?_

_Are the hills as fair as of old?
Are the skies as blue and far?
Have you lost the pomp of the sunset,
Or the light of the evening star?
Has the glory gone from the morning?
Do the wild winds wail no more?
Is there now no thunder of billows
Beating the storm-lashed shore?_

_Is Love a forgotten story?
Is Passion a jester’s theme?
Has Valor thrown down its armor?
Is Honor an idle dream?
Is there no pure trust in woman?
No conquering faith in God?
Are there no feet strong to follow
In the paths the martyrs trod?_

_Did you find no hero graves
When your violets bloomed last May—
Prouder than those of Marathon,
Or ‘old Platea’s day’?
When your red and white and blue
On the free winds fluttered out,
Were there no strong hearts and voices
To receive it with a shout?
Oh! let the Earth grow old!
And the burning stars grow cold!
And, if you will, declare man’s story told!
Yet, pure as faith is pure,
And sure as death is sure,
As long as love shall live, shall song endure!_”

IV.

When, one by one, the stately, silent Years
Glide like pale ghosts beyond our yearning sight,
Vainly we stretch our arms to stay their flight,
So soon, so swift they pass to endless night!
We hardly learn to name them,
To praise them or to blame them,
To know their shadowy faces,
Ere we see their empty places!
Only once the glad Spring greets them;
Only once fair Summer meets them;
Only once the Autumn glory
Tells for them its mystic story;
Only once the Winter hoary
Weaves for them its robes of light!
Years leave their work half-done; like men, alas!
With sheaves ungathered to their graves they pass,
And are forgotten. What they strive to do
Lives for a while in memory of a few;
Then over all Oblivion’s waters flow—
The Years are buried in the long ago!
But when a Century dies, what room is there for tears?
Rather in solemn exaltation let us come,
With roll of drum
(Not muffled as in woe),
With blare of bugles, and the liquid flow
Of silver clarions, and the long appeal
Of the clear trumpets ringing peal on peal;
With clash of bells, and hosts in proud array,
To pay meet homage to its burial day!
For its proud work is done. Its name is writ
Where all the ages that come after it
Shall read the eternal letters, blazoned high
On the blue dome of the impartial sky.
What ruthless fate can darken its renown,
Or dim the lustre of its starry crown?
On mountain-peaks of Time each Century stands alone;
And each, for glory or for shame, hath reaped what it hath sown!

V.

But this—the one that gave thee birth
A hundred years ago, O beauteous mother!
This mighty Century had a mightier brother,
Who from the watching earth
Passed but last year! Twin-born indeed were they—
For what are twelve months to the womb of time
Pregnant with ages?—Hand in hand they climbed
With clear, young eyes uplifted to the stars;
With great, strong souls that never stopped for bars,
Through storm and darkness up to glorious day!
Each knew the other’s need; each in his breast
The subtle tie of closest kin confessed;
Counted the other’s honor as his own;
Nor feared to sit upon a separate throne;
Nor loved each other less when—wondrous fate!—
One gave a Nation life, and one a State!

VI.

Oh! rude the cradle in which each was rocked,
The infant Nation, and the infant State!
Rough nurses were the Centuries, that mocked
At mother-kisses, and for mother-arms
Gave their young nurslings sudden harsh alarms,
Quick blows and stern rebuffs. They bade them wait,
Often in cold and hunger, while the feast
Was spread for others, and, though last not least,
Gave them sharp swords for playthings, and the din
Of actual battle for the mimic strife
That childhood glories in!
Yet not the less they loved them. Spartans they,
Who could not rear a weak, effeminate brood.
Better the forest’s awful solitude,
Better the desert spaces, where the day
Wanders from dawn to dusk and finds no life!

VII.

But over all the tireless years swept on,
Till side by side the Centuries grew old,
And the young Nation, great and strong and bold,
Forgot its early struggles, in triumphs later won!
It stretched its arms from East to West;
It gathered to its mighty breast
From every clime, from every soil,
The hunted sons of want and toil;
It gave to each a dwelling-place;
It blent them in one common race;
And over all, from sea to sea,
Wide flew the banner of the free!
It did not fear the wrath of kings,
Nor the dread grip of deadlier things—
Gaunt Famine with its ghastly horde,
Dishonor sheathing its foul sword,
Nor faithless friend, nor treacherous blow
Struck in the dark by stealthy foe;
For over all its wide domain,
From shore to shore, from main to main,
From vale to mountain-top, it saw
The reign of plenty, peace, and law!

VIII.

Thus fared the Nation, prosperous, great, and free,
Prophet and herald of the good to be;
And on its humbler way, in calm content,
The lesser State, the while, serenely went.
Safe in her mountain fastnesses she dwelt,
Her life’s first cares forgot, its woes unfelt,
And thought her bitterest tears had all been shed,
For peace was in her borders, and God reigned overhead.

IX.

But suddenly over the hills there came
A cry that rent her with grief and shame—
A cry from the Nation in sore distress,
Stricken down in the pride of its mightiness!
With passionate ardor up she sprang,
And her voice like the peal of a trumpet rang—
“What ho! what ho! brave sons of mine,
Strong with the strength of the mountain pine!
To the front of the battle, away! away!
The Nation is bleeding in deadly fray,
The Nation, it may be, is dying to-day!
On, then, to the rescue! away! away!”

X.

Ah! how they answered let the ages tell,
For they shall guard the sacred story well!
Green grows the grass to-day on many a battle-field;
War’s dread alarms are o’er; its scars are healed;
Its bitter agony has found surcease;
A re-united land clasps hands in peace.
But, oh! ye blessed dead, whose graves are strown
From where our forests make perpetual moan,
To those far shores where smiling Southern seas
Give back soft murmurs to the fragrant breeze—
Oh! ye who drained for us the bitter cup,
Think ye we can forget what ye have offered up?
The years will come and go, and other centuries die,
And generation after generation lie
Down in the dust; but, long as stars shall shine,
Long as Vermont’s green hills shall bear the pine,
As long as Killington shall proudly lift
Its lofty peak above the storm-cloud’s rift,
Or Mansfield hail the blue, o’erarching skies,
Or fair Mount Anthony in grandeur rise,
So long shall live the deeds that ye have done,
So deathless be the glory ye have won!

XI.

Not with exultant joy
And pride without alloy,
Did the twin Centuries rejoice when all was o’er.
What though the Nation rose
Triumphant o’er its foes?
What though the State had gained
The meed of faith unstained?
Their mighty hearts remembered the dead that came no more!
Remembered all the losses,
The weary, weary crosses,
Remembered earth was poorer for the blood that had been shed,
And knew that it was sadder for the story it had read!
So, clasping hands with somewhat saddened mien,
And eyes uplifted to the Great Unseen
That rules alike o’er Centuries and men,
Onward they walked serenely toward—the End!

XII.

One reached it last year. Ye remember well—
The wondrous tale there is no need to tell—
How the whole world bowed down beside its bier;
How all the Nations came, from far or near,
Heaping their treasures on its mighty pall—
Never had kingliest king such funeral!
Old Asia rose, and, girding her in haste,
Swept in her jewelled robes across the waste,
And called to Egypt lying prone and hid
Where waits the Sphinx beside the pyramid;
Fair Europe came with overflowing hands,
Bearing the riches of her many lands;
Dark Afric, laden with her virgin gold,
Yet laden deeper with her woes untold;
Japan and China in grotesque array,
And all the enchanted islands of Cathay!

XIII.

To-day the other dies.
It walked in humbler guise,
Nor stood where all men’s eyes
Were fixed upon it.
Earth may not pause to lay
A wreath upon its bier,
Nor the world heed to-day
Our dead that lieth here!

Yet well they loved each other—
It and its greater brother.
To loftiest stature grown,
Each earned its own renown;
Each sought of Time a crown,
And each has won it;

XIV.

But what to us are Centuries dead,
And rolling Years forever fled,
Compared with thee, O grand and fair
Vermont—our Goddess-mother?
Strong with the strength of thy verdant hills,
Fresh with the freshness of mountain-rills,
Pure as the breath of the fragrant pine,
Glad with the gladness of youth divine,
Serenely thou sittest throned to-day
Where the free winds that round thee play
Rejoice in thy waves of sun-bright hair,
O thou, our glorious mother!
Rejoice in thy beautiful strength and say
Earth holds not such another!
Thou art not old with thy hundred years,
Nor worn with toil, or care, or tears:
But all the glow of the summer-time
Is thine to-day in thy glorious prime!
Thy brow is fair as the winter-snows,
With a stately calm in its still repose;
While the breath of the rose the wild bee sips,
Half-mad with joy, cannot eclipse
The marvellous sweetness of thy lips;
And the deepest blue of the laughing skies
Hides in the depths of thy fearless eyes,
Gazing afar over land and sea
Wherever thy wandering children be!
Fold on fold,
Over thy form of grandest mould
Floweth thy robe of forest green,
Now light, now dark, in its emerald sheen.
Its broidered hem is of wild flowers rare,
With feathery fern-fronds light as air
Fringing its borders. In thy hair
Sprays of the pink arbutus twine,
And the curling rings of the wild grape vine.
Thy girdle is woven of silver streams;
Its clasp with the opaline lustre gleams
Of a lake asleep in the sunset beams;
And, half concealing
And half revealing,
Floats over all a veil of mist
Pale-tinted with rose and amethyst!

XV.

Arise, O noble mother of great sons,
Worthy to rank among earth’s mightiest ones,
And daughters fair and beautiful and good,
Yet wise and strong in loftiest womanhood—
Rise from thy throne, and, standing far and high
Outlined against the blue, adoring sky,
Lift up thy voice, and stretch thy loving hands
In benediction o’er the waiting lands!
Take thou our fealty! at thy feet we bow,
Glad to renew each oft-repeated vow!
No costly gifts we bring to thee to-day;
No votive wreaths upon thy shrine we lay;
Take thou our hearts, then!—hearts that fain would be
From this day forth, O goddess, worthier thee!

GETTYSBURG
1863-1889

I.

Brothers, is this the spot?
Let the drums cease to beat;
Let the tread of marching feet,
With the clash and clang of steel
And the trumpet’s long appeal
(Cry of joy and sob of pain
In its passionate refrain)
Cease awhile,
Nor beguile
Thoughts that would rehearse the story
Of the past’s remembered glory;
Thoughts that would revive to-day
Stern War’s rude, imperious sway;
Waken battle’s fiery glow
With its ardor and its woe,
With its wild, exulting thrills,
With the rush of mighty wills,
And the strength to do and dare—
Born of passion and of prayer!

II.

Let the present fade away,
And the splendors of to-day;
For our hearts within us burn
As our glances backward turn.
What rare memories awaken
As the tree of life is shaken,
And its storied branches blow
In the winds of long ago!
Do ye not remember, brothers,
Ere the war-days how ’twas said
Grand, heroic days were over
And proud chivalry was dead?
Still we saw the glittering lances
Gleaming through the old romances,
Still beheld the watch-fires burning
On the cloudy heights of Time;
And from fields that they had won,
When the stormy fight was done,
Saw victorious knights returning
Flushed with triumph’s joy sublime!
For the light of song and story
Kindled with supernal glory
Plains where ancient heroes fought;
And illumined, with a splendor
Rare and magical and tender,
All the mighty deeds they wrought.
But we thought the sword of battle,
Long unused, had lost its glow,
And the sullen war-gods slumbered
Where their altar-fires burned low!

III.

_Was_ the nation dull and sodden,
Buried in material things?
’Twas the chrysalis, awaiting
The sure stirring of its wings!
For when rang the thrilling war-cry
Over all the startled land,
And the fiery cross of battle,
Flaming, sped from hand to hand,
Then how fared it, O my brothers?
Were men false or craven then?
Did they falter?
Did they palter?
Did they question why or when?
Oh, the story shall be told
Until earth itself is old,
How, from mountain and from glen,
More than thrice ten thousand men
Heard the challenge of the foe,
Heard the nation’s cry of woe,
Heard the summoning to arms,
And the battle’s loud alarms!
In tumultuous surprise,
Lo, their answer rent the skies;
And its quick and strong heart-thrills
Rocked the everlasting hills!
Forth from blossoming fields they sped
To the fields with carnage red!
Left the plowshare standing still;
Left the bench, the forge, the mill;
Left the quiet walks of trade
And the quarry’s marble shade;
Left the pulpit and the court,
Careless ease and idle sport;
Left the student’s cloistered halls
In the old, gray college walls;
Left young love-dreams, dear and sweet,
War’s stern front, unblenched, to meet!
Oh, the strange and sad amaze
Of those unforgotten days,
When the boys whom we had guided,
Nursed and loved, caressed and chided,
Suddenly, as in a night,
Sprang to manhood’s proudest height;
And with calmly smiling lips,
As who life’s rarest goblet sips,
Dauntless, with unhurried breath,
Marched to danger and to death!

IV.

Soldiers, is this the spot?
Fair the scene is, calm and fair,
In this still October air;
Far blue hills look gently down
On the happy, tranquil town,
And the ridges nearer by
Steeped in autumn sunshine lie.
Laden orchards, smiling fields,
Rich in all that nature yields;
Bright streams winding in and out
Fertile meadows round about,
Lowing herds and hum of bee,
Birds that flit from tree to tree,
Children’s voices ringing clear,
All we touch or see or hear—
Fruit of gold in silver set—
Tell of joy and peace. And yet—
Soldiers, is this the spot
That can never be forgot?
Was it here that shot and shell
Poured as from the mouth of hell,
Drenched the shrinking, trembling plain
With a flood of fiery rain?
Was it here the awful wonder
Of the cannon’s crashing thunder
Shook the affrighted hills, and made
Even the stolid rocks afraid?
Was it here an armèd host,
Like two clouds where lightnings play,
Or two oceans, tempest tost,
Clashed and mingled in the fray?
Here that, ’mid the din and smoke,
Roar of guns and sabre stroke,
Tramp of furious steeds, where moan
Horse and rider, both o’erthrown,
Lurid fires and battle yell,
Forty thousand brave men fell?

V.

O brothers, words are weak!
What tongue shall dare to speak?
Even song itself grows dumb
In this high presence.—Come
Forth, ye whose ashes lie
Under this arching sky!
Speak ye in accents clear
Words that we fain would hear!
Tell us when your dim eyes,
Holy with sacrifice,
Looked through the battle smoke
Up to the skies;
Tell us, ye valiant dead,
When your souls starward fled,
How from the portals far
Where the immortals are,
Chieftains and vikings old,
Heroes and warriors bold,
Men whom old Homer sung,
Men of each age and tongue,
Knights from a thousand fields
Bearing their blazoned shields
Thronged forth to meet ye!
Tell us how, floating down,
Each with a martyr’s crown,
They who had kept the faith,
Grandly defying death;
They who for conscience’ sake
Felt their firm heartstrings break;
They who for truth and right
Unshrinking fought the fight;
They who through fire and flame
Passed on to deathless fame,
Hastened to greet ye!
Tell how they welcomed ye,
Hailed and applauded ye,
Claimed ye as comrades true,
Brave as the world e’er knew;
Led your triumphant feet
Up to the highest seat,
Crowned ye with amaranth,
Laurel and palm.

VI.

Alas, alas! They speak not!
The silence deep they break not!
Heaven keeps its martyred ones
Beyond or moon or suns;
And Valhalla keeps its braves,
Leaving to us their graves!
Then let these graves speak for them
As long as the wind sweeps o’er them!
As long as the sentinel ridges
Keep guard on either hand;
As long as the hills they fought for
Like silent watch-towers stand!

VII.

Yet not of them alone
Round each memorial stone
Shall the proud breezes whisper as they pass,
Rustling the faded leaves
On chilly autumn eves,
And swaying tenderly the sheltering grass!
O ye who on this field
Knew not the joy to yield
Your young, glad lives in glorious conflict up;
Ye who as bravely fought,
Ye who as grandly wrought,
Draining with them war’s darkly bitter cup,
As long as stars endure
And God and Truth are sure;
While Love still claims its own,
While Honor holds its throne
And Valor hath a name,
Still shall these stony pages
Repeat to all the ages
The story of your fame!

VIII.

O beautiful one, my Country,
Thou fairest daughter of Time,
To-day are thine eyes unclouded
In the light of a faith sublime!
No thunder of battle appals thee;
From thy woe thou hast found release;
From the graves of thy sons steals only
This one soft whisper,—“PEACE!”

“NO MORE THE THUNDER OF CANNON”

No more the thunder of cannon,
No more the clashing of swords,
No more the rage of the contest,
Nor the rush of contending hordes;
But, instead, the glad reunion,
The clasping of friendly hands,
The song, for the shout of battle,
Heard over the waiting lands.

O brothers, to-night we greet you
With smiles, half sad, half gay—
For our thoughts are flying backward
To the years so far away—
When with you who were part of the conflict,
With us who remember it all,
Youth marched with his waving banner,
And his voice like a bugle call!

We would not turn back the dial,
Nor live over the past again;
We would not the path re-travel,
Nor barter the “now” for the “then.”
Yet, oh, for the bounding pulses,
And the strength to do and dare,
When life was one grand endeavor,
And work clasped hands with prayer!

But blessed are ye, O brothers,
Who feel in your souls alway
The thrill of the stirring summons
You heard but to obey;
Who, whether the years go swift,
Or whether the years go slow,
Will wear in your hearts forever
The glory of long ago!

GRANT
AUGUST 8, 1885

God sends his angels where he will,
From world to world, from star to star;
They do his bidding as they fly,
Whether or near or far!

Whither it went, or what its quest,
I know not; but one August day
A great white angel through the far
Dim spaces took its way;

Until below it our fair earth,
Like a rich jewel fitly hung—
An emerald set with silver gleams—
In the blue ether swung.

The angel looked; the angel paused;
Then down the starry pathway swept,
Till mount and valley, hill and plain,
Beneath its vision slept.

Poised on a far blue mountain peak,
It saw the land, from sea to sea,
Lifting in veilèd splendor up
The banner of the free!

From tower and turret, spire and dome,
From stately halls, and cabins rude,
Where crag and cliff and forest meet
In awful solitude,

It saw strange, sombre pennants float,
Black shadows on the summer breeze
That bore, from shore to shore, the wail
Of solemn symphonies.

It saw long files of armèd men,
Clad in a garb of faded blue,
Pass up and down the sorrowing land
As if in grand review.

It saw through crowded city streets,
Funereal trains move to and fro,
With tolling bells, and muffled drums,
And trumpets wailing low.

Descending then the angel sought
A stern, sad man of many cares—
Ah, oft before have mortals talked
With angels, unawares!

The angel spake, as man to man—
“What does it mean, O friend?” it cried,
“These sad-browed hosts, these weeds of woe,
This mourning far and wide?”

The stranger answered in amaze—
“Know you not what the whole world knows?
To his long home, thus grandly borne,
Earth’s greatest warrior goes.

The foremost soldier of his age,
The victor on full many a field—
Who saw the bravest of the brave
To his stern prowess yield.”

The angel sighed. “That means,” it said,
“Tumult and anguish, pain and death,
And countless sons of men borne down
By the fierce cannon’s breath!”

Then passed from sight the heavenly guest,
And from the mountain-top again
Took its far flight from North to South,
Above the homes of men.

But still, where’er it went, it saw
The starry banners half mast high,
And tower and turret hung with black
Against the reddening sky!

Still saw long ranks of armèd men
Who for the blue had worn the gray—
Still saw the sad processions pass,
Darkening the summer day!

“Was this _their_ conqueror whom you mourn?”
The angel said to one who kept
Lone watch where, deep in grass-grown graves,
Young Southern soldiers slept.

“Victor, yet friend,” the answer came,
“Even theirs who here their life-blood poured!
He, when the bitter field was won,
Was first to sheathe the sword,

And cry: ‘O brothers, take my hand—
Brave foemen, let us be at peace!
O’er all the undivided land
Let clash of conflict cease!’”

The wondering angel went its way
From world to world, from star to star,
Where planet unto planet turned,
And suns blazed out afar.

“Learn, learn, O universe,” it cried,
“How great is he whose foemen lay
Their love and homage at his feet,
On this—his burial day!”

FRIAR ANSELMO AND OTHER POEMS

FRIAR ANSELMO

FRIAR ANSELMO for a secret sin
Sat bowed with grief the convent cell within;
Nor dared, such was his shame, to lift his eyes
To the low wall whereon, in dreadful guise,
The dead CHRIST hung upon the cursèd tree,
Frowning, he thought, upon his misery.
What was his sin it matters not to tell.
But he was young and strong, the records say:
Perhaps he wearied of his narrow cell;
Perhaps he longed to work, as well as pray;
Perhaps his heart too warmly beat that day!
Perhaps—for life is long—the weary road
That he must travel, bearing as a load
The slow, monotonous hours that, one by one,
Dragged in a lengthening chain from sun to sun,
Appalled his eager spirit, and his vow
Pressed like an iron hand upon his brow.
Perhaps some dream of love, of home, of wife,
Had stirred this tumult in his lonely life,
Tempting his soul to barter heavenly bliss,
And sell its birthright for a woman’s kiss!
At all events, the struggle had been hard;
And as a bird from the glad ether barred,
So had he beat his wings till, bruised and torn,
He wished that night he never had been born!
And still the dead CHRIST on the cursèd tree
Seemed but to mock his hopeless misery;
Still Mary mother turned her eyes away,
Nor saint nor angel bent to hear him pray!

The calm, cold moonlight through the casement shone;
Weird shadows darkened on the floor of stone;
Without, what solemn splendors! and within
What fearful wrestlings with despair and sin!
Sudden and loud the cloister bell outrang;
Afar a door swung to with sullen clang;
And overhead he heard the rhythmic beat,
The measured monotone of many feet
Seeking the chapel for the midnight prayer.
Black wings seemed hovering round him in the air,
Beating him back when with a stifled moan
He would have sought the holy altar stone.
Then with a swift, sharp cry, prostrate he fell
Before the crucifix. “The gates of hell
Shall not prevail against me!” loud he cried,
Stretching his arms to CHRIST, the crucified.
“By Thy dread cross, Thy dying agony,
Thine awful passion, LORD, deliver me!”

Was it a dream? The taunting demons fled;
Through the dim cell a wondrous glory spread;
And all the air was filled with rare perfumes
Wafted from censers rich with heavenly blooms.
Transfigured stood the CHRIST before his eyes,
Clothed in white samite, woven in Paradise,
And from the empty cross upon the wall
Streamed a wide splendor that encompassed all!
Was it a dream? Anselmo’s sight grew dim;
The cloistered chamber seemed to reel and swim;
Yet well his spirit knew the glorious guest,
And all his manhood rose to meet the test.
“What wilt Thou have me, LORD, to do?” he cried
With pallid lips, and kissed the sacred feet.
And then in accents strangely calm, yet sweet,
These words he heard from CHRIST, the crucified,
The pitying CHRIST his inmost soul who read,
With all its wild unrest, its doubt and dread:
“MAKE THOU A COPY OF MY HOLY WORD!”
Then mystic presences about him stirred;
The vision faded. At the dawn of day
Prostrate and pallid in the dusk he lay.
Was it a dream? GOD knows! The narrow cell
Wore the old aspect he had learned so well,
And from the crucifix upon the wall
No glory streamed illuminating all!
Yet still a subtile fragrance filled the room;
And looking round him in the soft, gray gloom,
Anselmo saw upon the fretted floor
An eagle’s quill that this grave legend bore:
“He works most nobly for his fellow-men
Who gives My word to them, by tongue or pen!”

Henceforth Anselmo prayed, but worked as well,
Nor felt the bondage of his cloister cell;
For all his soul was filled with high intent,
He had no dream since its accomplishment—
To make a copy of the Holy Word,
Fairer than eye had seen, or ear had heard,
Or heart conceived of! Day by day he wrought,
His fingers guided by a single thought;
Forming each letter with the tenderest care,
With points of richest color here and there;
With birds on swaying boughs, and butterflies
Poised on gay wings o’er sprays of eglantine;
With tangled tracery of flower and vine
Through which gleamed cherub faces, half divine;
With fading leaves that drift when summer dies,
And angels floating down the evening skies—
Each word an orison, each line a prayer!
Slowly the work went on from day to day;
The seasons came and went; May followed May;
Year after year passed by with stately tread
To join the countless legions of the dead,
Till Fra Anselmo, wan and bowed with age,
Bent, a gray monk, above the parchment page.
Death waited till he wrote the last fair line,
Then touched his hand and closed the Book Divine!

* * * * *

The world has grown apace since then.
He who would give GOD’S word to men,
In cloistered cell, o’er parchment page,
No longer bends from youth to age.
Countless as leaves by autumn strewn
The leaves of His great Book are blown
Over the earth as wide and far
As seeds by wandering breezes are!
Yet none the less He speaks to-day
As to Anselmo in his cell;
Bidding men speed upon their way
His later messages as well.
For not alone in Holy Book,
In revelations dim and old,
In sweetest stories simply told,
In grand, prophetic strains that reach
The loftiest heights of human speech,
In martial hymn, or saintly psalm,
In fiery threat, or logic calm,
GOD’S messages are writ to-day—
And He whose voice Mount Sinai shook
Still bids men hearken and obey!
He writes His name upon the hills;
He whispers in the mountain rills;
He speaks through every flower that blows,
In breath of lily, tint of rose;
In sultry calms; in furious beat
Of the wild storm’s tempestuous feet;
In starlit night, and dewy morn,
And splendor of the day new-born!
He uttereth His thunders where
The shock of battle rends the air;
He guides the fiery steeds of War;
He rules unseen the maddening jar,
The hate and din of party strife,
And bids it serve the nation’s life;
He leads fair Science, where she walks
With stately tread among the stars,
Or where, with reverent voice, she talks
With Nature through the eternal bars!
His Word is uttered wheresoe’er
A human soul has ears to hear.
The royal message never errs;
GOD send it true interpreters!

THE KING’S ROSEBUD

Only a blushing rosebud, folding up
Such wealth of sweetness in its dewy cup
That the whole air was like rare incense flung
From golden censers round high altars swung!
One day the king passed by with stately tread,
And, reaching forth his hand, he lightly said,
“All sweets are mine; therefore this rose I take,
And wear it in my bosom for Love’s sake.”
Then, while the king passed on with smiling face,
The sweet rose gloried in its pride of place.

But ah! the deeds that in Love’s name are done!
The woeful wrack wrought underneath the sun!
Still with that smile upon his lip, the king
Laid his rash hand upon the beauteous thing;
In hot haste tore the crimson leaves apart,
And drained the sweetness from its glowing heart;
Seared the soft petals with its fiery breath,
Then tossed it from him to ignoble death!
When next with idle steps I passed that way,
Prone in the mire the king’s fair rosebud lay.

SOMEWHERE

How can I cease to pray for thee? Somewhere
In God’s great universe thou art to-day:
Can He not reach thee with His tender care?
Can He not hear me when for thee I pray?

What matters it to Him, who holds within
The hollow of His hand all worlds, all space,
That thou art done with earthly pain and sin?
Somewhere within His ken thou hast a place.

Somewhere thou livest and hast need of Him:
Somewhere thy soul sees higher heights to climb;
And somewhere still there may be valleys dim
That thou must pass to reach the hills sublime.

Then all the more, because thou canst not hear
Poor human words of blessing, will I pray,
O true, brave heart! God bless thee, whereso’er
In His great universe thou art to-day!

PERADVENTURE

I am thinking to-night of the little child
That lay on my breast three summer days,
Then swiftly, silently, dropped from sight,
While my soul cried out in sore amaze.

It is fifteen years ago to-night;
Somewhere, I know, he has lived them through,
Perhaps with never a thought or dream
Of the mother-heart he never knew!

Is he yet but a babe? or has he grown
To be like his brothers, fair and tall,
With a clear, bright eye, and a springing step,
And a voice that rings like a bugle call?

I loved him. The rose in his waxen hand
Was wet with the dew of my falling tears;
I have kept the thought of my baby’s grave
Through all the length of these changeful years.

Yet the love I gave him was not like that
I give to-day to my other boys,
Who have grown beside me, and turned to me
In all their griefs and in all their joys.

Do you think he knows it? I wonder much
If the dead are passionless, cold, and dumb;
If into the calm of the deathless years
No thrill of a human love may come!

Perhaps sometimes from the upper air
He has seen me walk with his brothers three;
Or felt in the tender twilight hour
The breath of the kisses they gave to me!

Over his birthright, lost so soon,
Perhaps he has sighed as the swift years flew;
O child of my heart! you shall find somewhere
The love that on earth you never knew!

RENA
(A LEGEND OF BRUSSELS)

I.

St. Gudula’s bells were chiming for the midnight, sad and slow,
In the ancient town of Brussels, many and many a year ago,

And St. Michael, poised so grandly on his lofty, airy height,
Seemed transfigured in the glory of the full moon’s tender light,

When, a fair and saintly maiden crowned with locks of palest gold,
Rena stood beside her lover, son of Hildebrand the Bold.

She with grief and tears was pallid; but his face was hard and
stern:
All the passion of his being in his dark eyes seemed to burn.

“Never dream that I will give thee back thy plighted faith,” he
cried,
“By St. Michael’s sword I swear it, thou, my love, shalt be my
bride!”

“Nay, but hear me,” she responded; “hear the words that I must
speak;
I must speak, and thou must hearken, though my heart is like to
break.

Yestermorn, as I sat spinning blithely at my cottage door,
Straightway fell a stately shadow in the sunshine on the floor;

And a figure stood before me, so majestic and so grand,
That I knew it in a moment for the mighty Hildebrand—

Stood and gazed on me till downward at my feet the distaff dropped,
And in all my veins the pulsing of the swift life-current stopped.

‘Thou art Rena,’ then he uttered, and he swore a dreadful oath,
And the tempest of his anger beat on me and on us both.

‘She who thinks to wed with Volmar must have lands and gold,’ said
he,
‘Or must come of noble lineage, fit to mate with mine and me!

Thou art but a peasant maiden, empty-handed, lowly born;
All the ladies of my castle would look down on thee with scorn.

Even he will weary of thee when his passion once is spent,
Vainly cursing her who doomed him to an endless discontent!’

Then I, trembling, rose up slowly, and I looked him in the face,
Though the dreadful frown it wore seemed to darken all the place.

‘Sir, I thank you for this warning,’ said I, speaking low and clear,
‘But the laughter of your ladies I must teach my heart to bear.

For the rest—your son is noble—and my simple womanhood
He will hold in loving honor, as a saint the holy rood!’

Oh! then his stern face whitened, and a bitter laugh laughed he:
‘Truly this my son is noble, and he shall not wed with thee.

Hear my words now, and remember! for by this good sword I swear,
And by Michael standing yonder, watching us from upper air,

If he dares to place a wedding-ring upon your dowerless hand,
On his head shall fall a father’s curse—the curse of Hildebrand!’

O, my Volmar! Then the earth rocked, and I fell down in a swoon;
When I woke the room was silent; it was past the hour of noon;

And I waited for thy coming, as the captive waits for death,
With a mingled dread and longing, and a half-abated breath!”

Straight the young man bowed before her, as before a holy shrine:
“Never hand of high-born lady was more richly dowered than thine!

What care I for gold or honors, or—my—father’s—curse?” he said;
But the words died out in shudders, and his face grew like the dead.

Then she twined her white arms round him, and she murmured, sweet
and low,
As the night wind breathing softly over banks where violets blow:

“‘He who is accursed of father, he shall be accursed of God,’
Long ago said one who followed where the holy prophets trod.

Kiss me once, then, O my Volmar! just once more, my Volmar dear,
Even as you would kiss my white lips if I lay upon my bier!

For a gulf as dark as death has opened wide ’twixt thee and me;
Neither thou nor I can cross it, and thy wife I may not be!”

II.

Once again the bells of midnight chimed from St. Gudula’s towers,
While St. Michael watched the city slumbering through the ghostly
hours.

But no slumber came to Rena where she moaned in bitter pain,
For the anguish of that parting wrought its work on heart and brain.

Suddenly the air grew heavy as with magical perfume,
And a weird and wondrous splendor filled the dim and silent room.

In the middle of the chamber stood a lady fair and sweet,
With bright tresses falling softly to her small and sandalled feet.

Flushed her cheeks were as a wild rose, and the glory of her eyes
Was the laughing light and glory of the kindling morning skies.

Airy robes of lightest tissue from her white arms floated free;
They seemed woven of the mist that curls above the azure sea,

Wrought in curious devices, star and wheel and leaf and flower,
That, like frost upon a window-pane, might vanish in an hour.

In her hands she bore a cushion, quaintly fashioned, strangely set
With small silver pins that spanned it like a branching coronet;

And from threads of finest texture swung light bobbins to and fro,
As the lady stood illumined in the weird and wondrous glow.

Not a single word she uttered; but, as silent as a shade,
Down the room she swiftly glided and beside the startled maid

Knelt, a radiant vision, smiling into Rena’s wondering eyes,
Giving arch yet gracious answer to her tremulous surprise.

Then she laid the satin cushion on the wondering maiden’s knee,
And to all her mute bewilderment, no syllable spake she.

But, as in and out and round about, the silver pins among,
Flashed the white hand of the lady, and the shining bobbins swung,

Lo! a web of fairy lightness like the misty robe she wore,
Swiftly grew beneath her fingers, drifting downward to the floor!

And as Rena looked and wondered, inch by inch the marvel grew,
Till the eastern windows brightened as the gray dawn struggled
through.

Then the lady’s hand touched Rena’s, and she pointed far away,
Where the palace towers were gleaming in the first red light of day.

But when once again the maiden turned her glance within the room,
With the lady fair had vanished all the splendor and perfume.

Still the satin cushion lay there, quaintly fashioned, strangely set
With the silver pins that spanned it like a branching coronet;

Still the light web she had woven lay in drifts upon the floor,
Like the mist wreaths resting softly on some lone, enchanted shore!

III.

Slowly Rena raised the cushion, with her sweet eyes shining clear,
Lightly tossed the fairy bobbins, half in gladness, half in fear.

Ah! not vain had been her watching as the lovely lady wrought;
All the magic of her fingers her own cunning hand had caught!

Many a day above the cushion Rena’s peerless head was bent,
And through many a solemn night she labored on with sweet intent.

For, mayhap, the mystic marvels that she wove might bring her gold—
A fair dowry fit to match the pride of Hildebrand the Bold!

Then she braided up her long hair, and put on her russet gown,
And with wicker basket laden passed she swiftly through the town,

To the palace where Queen Ildegar, with dames of high degree,
In a lofty oriel window sat, the beauteous morn to see.

In the door-way she stood meekly, till the queen said, “Maiden fair,
What have you in yonder basket that you carry with such care?”

Eagerly she raised her blue eyes, hovering smiles and tears between,
Then across the room she glided, and knelt down before the queen.

Lifting up the wicker cover, “Saints in heaven!” cried Ildegar,
“Here are tissues fit for angels, wrought with wreath and point and
star,

In most curious devices! Never saw I aught so rare—
Where found you these frail webs woven of the lightest summer air?”

“Well they may be fit for angels,” said she, underneath her breath;
“O my lady, hear a story that is strange and true as death.”

But ere yet the tale was ended, up rose good Queen Ildegar,
And she sent her knights and pages to the castle riding far.

“Bring me Hildebrand and Volmar, ere the sun goes down!” she cried,
“Ho! my ladies, for a wedding, and your queen shall bless the bride!

I will buy these airy wonders, and this maiden in her hand
Shall a dowry hold as royal as the noblest in the land.”

So they combed her shining tresses, and they brought her robes of
silk,
Broidered thick with gold and silver, on a ground as white as milk.

But she whispered, “Sweetest ladies, let me wear my russet gown,
That I wore this happy morning walking blithely through the town.

I am but a peasant maiden, all unused to grand estate,
And for robes of silken splendor, dearest ladies, let me wait!”

Then the good queen, smiling brightly, from the wicker basket took
Lightest web of quaintest pattern, and its filmy folds out-shook.

With her own white hand she laid it over Rena’s golden hair,
And she cried, “Oh, look, my ladies! Ne’er before was bride so fair!”

A SECRET

It is your secret and mine, love!
Ah, me! how the dreary rain
With a slow persistence, all day long
Dropped on the window-pane!
The chamber was weird with shadows
And dark with the deepening gloom
Where you in your royal womanhood,
Lay waiting for the tomb.

They had robed you all in white, love;
In your hair was a single rose—
A marble rose it might well have been
In its cold and still repose!
O, paler than yonder carven saint,
And calm as the angels are,
You seemed so near me, my beloved,
Yet were, alas, so far!

I do not know if I wept, love;
But my soul rose up and said—
“My heart shall speak unto her heart,
Though here she is lying—dead!
I will give her a last love-token
That shall be to her a sign
In the dark grave—or beyond it—
Of this deathless love of mine.”

So I sought me a little scroll, love;
And thereon, in eager haste,
Lest another’s eye should read them
Some mystic words I traced.
Then close in your claspèd fingers,
Close in your waxen hand,
I placed the scroll for an amulet,
Sure you would understand!