Still shines the light of holy lives
Like star-beams over doubt;
Each sainted memory, Christlike, drives
Some dark possession out.

O friend! O brother! not in vain
Thy life so calm and true,
The silver dropping of the rain,
The fall of summer dew!

How many burdened hearts have prayed
Their lives like thine might be !
But more shall pray henceforth for aid
To lay them down like thee.

With weary hand, yet steadfast will,
In old age as in youth,

Thy Master found thee sowing still
The good seed of his truth.

As on thy task-field closed the day
In golden-skied decline,

His angel met thee on the way,
And lent his arm to thine.

Thy latest care for man--thy last
Of earthly thought a prayer—
O, who thy mantle, backward cast,
Is worthy now to wear?

Methinks the mound which marks thy bed

Might bless our land and save,

As rose, of old, to life the dead

Who touched the prophet's grave!

RANTOUL.

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RANTOUL.22

ONE day, along the electric wire
His manly word for Freedom sped
We came next morn: that tongue of fire
Said only, "He who spake is dead!"

Dead! while his voice was living yet,
In echoes round the pillared dome!
Dead! while his blotted page lay wet

With themes of state and loves of home!

Dead! in that crowning grace of time,

That triumph of life's zenith hour! Dead! while we watched his manhood's prime Break from the slow bud into flower!

Dead! he so great, and strong, and wise, While the mean thousands yet drew breath; How deepened, through that dread surprise, The mystery and the awe of death!

From the high place whereon our votes
Had borne him, clear, calm, earnest, fell
His first words, like the prelude notes
Of some great anthem yet to swell.

We seemed to see our flag unfurled,
Our champion waiting in his place
For the last battle of the world-
The Armageddon of the race.

Through him we hoped to speak the word
Which wins the freedom of a land;

And lift, for human right, the sword

Which dropped from Hampden's dying hand.

For he had sat at Sidney's feet,

And walked with Pym and Vane apart; And, through the centuries, felt the beat Of Freedom's march in Cromwell's heart.

He knew the paths the worthies held,
Where England's best and wisest trod :
And, lingering, drank the springs that welled
Beneath the touch of Milton's rod.

No wild enthusiast of the right,
Self-poised and clear, he showed alway
The coolness of his northern night,
The ripe repose of autumn's day.

His steps were slow, yet forward still

He pressed where others paused or failed; The calm star clomb with constant will— The restless meteor flashed and paled!

Skilled in its subtlest wile, he knew
And owned the higher ends of Law;
Still rose majestic on his view

The awful Shape the schoolman saw.

Her home the heart of God; her voice
The choral harmonies whereby

The stars, through all their spheres, rejoice,
The rhythmic rule of earth and sky!

We saw his great powers misapplied
To poor ambitions; yet, through all,

We saw him take the weaker side,

And right the wronged, and free the thrall

Now, looking o'er the frozen North

For one like him in word and act, To call her old, free spirit forth,

And give her faith the life of fact

RANTOUL.

To wreak her party bonds of shame,
And labor with the zeal of him
To make the Democratic name
Of Liberty the synonym—

We

e sweep the land from hill to strand,
We seek the strong, the wise, the brave,
And, sad of heart, return to stand
In silence by a new-made grave!

There, where his breezy hills of home
Look out upon his sail-white seas,
The sounds of winds and waters come,
And shape themselves to words like these:

215

"Why, murmuring, mourn that he, whose power Was lent to Party over long,

Heard the still whisper at the hour

He set his foot on Party wrong?

"The human life that closed so well
No lapse of folly now can stain;
The lips whence Freedom's protest fell
No meaner thought can now profane.

ic Mightier than living voice his grave That lofty protest utters o'er; Through roaring wind and smiting wave

It speaks his hate of wrong once more.

"Men of the North! your weak regret Is wasted here; arise and pay

To freedom and to him your debt,

By following where he led the way!"

THE DREAM OF PIO NONO.

Ir chanced, that while the pious troops of France Fought in the crusade Pio Nono preached, What time the holy Bourbons stayed his hands (The Hur and Aaron meet for such a Moses), Stretched forth from Naples towards rebellious

Rome

To bless the ministry of Oudinot,

And sanctify his iron homilies

And sharp persuasions of the bayonet,
That the great pontiff fell asleep, and dreamed.

He stood by Lake Tiberias, in the sun Of the bright Orient; and beheld the lame, The sick, and blind, kneel at the Master's feet, And rise up whole. And, sweetly over all, Dropping the ladder of their hymn of praise From heaven to earth, in silver rounds of song, He heard the blessed angels sing of peace, Good-will to man, and glory to the Lord.

Then one, with feet unshod, and leathern face Hardened and darkened by fierce summer suns And hot winds of the desert, closer drew His fisher's haick, and girded up his loins, And spake, as one who had authority: "Come thou with me."

Lake-side and eastern sky

And the sweet song of angels passed away,
And, with a dream's alacrity of change,
The priest, and the swart fisher by his side,
Beheld the Eternal City lift its domes
And solemn fanes and monumental pomp
Above the waste Campagna. On the hills
The blaze of burning villas rose and fell,