THE DEAD PRESIDENT

Edward Rowland Sill

WERE there no crowns on earth,
No evergreen to wreathe a hero wreath,
That he must pass beyond the gates of death,
Our hero, our slain hero, to be crowned?
Could there on our unworthy earth be found
Naught to befit his worth?

The noblest soul of all!

When was there ever since our Washington,
A man so pure, so wise, so patient-one
Who walked with this high good alone in sight,
To speak, to do, to sanction only Right,
Though very heaven should fall.

Ah, not for him we weep;

What honor more could be in store for him?
Who would have had him linger in our dim

And troublesome world, when his great work was

done

Who would not leave that worn and weary one
Gladly to sleep?

For us the stroke was just;

We were not worthy of that patient heart;
We might have helped him more, not stood apart,
And coldly criticised his works and ways—
Too late now, all too late-our little praise
Sounds hollow o'er his dust.

Be merciful, O our God!

Forgive the meanness of our human hearts,
That never, till a noble soul departs,
See half the worth, or hear the angel's wings
Till they go rustling heavenward as he springs
Up from the mounded sod.

Yet what a deathless crown

Of Northern pine and Southern orange-flower,
For victory, and the land's new bridal-hour,
Would we have wreathed for that beloved brow!
Sadly upon his sleeping forehead now
We lay our cypress down.

O martyred one, farewell!

Thou hast not left thy people quite alone,
Out of thy beautiful life there comes a tone
Of power, of love, of trust, a prophecy,
Whose fair fulfilment all the earth shall be,
And all the Future tell.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

William Henry Venable

(1864)

No adulation vain the poet brings,
Investing thee with godlike excellence;
In eloquence of truth he fitly sings

Thy eulogy by praising Common Sense,
Firm Honesty and Courage undismayed,
Deep Faith and Magnanimity sublime!
What though the violent thy name upbraid?
Thy Wisdom's vindication leave to Time.
O man of Fate, abide the sure event;

Writ in the stars, behold the just decree!
The God of Love chose thee His instrument,
To save the Union, set the Bondman free!
Smile on amid thy care, for even now

The war-cloud scatters and its thunders cease;
A grateful Nation waits to crown thy brow
With healing leaves of victory and peace.

THE LINCOLN-CHILD

James Oppenheim

CLEARING in the forest,

In the wild Kentucky forest,

And the stars, wintry stars strewn above!

O Night that is the starriest

Since Earth began to roll—

For a Soul

Is born out of Love!

Mother love, father love, love of Eternal God-
Stars have pushed aside to let him through-

Through heaven's sun-sown deeps

One sparkling ray of God

Strikes the clod

(And while an angel-host through wood and clearing

sweeps!)

Born in the Wild

The Child

Naked, ruddy new,

Wakes with the piteous human cry and at the motherheart sleeps.

To the mother wild berries and honey,

To the father awe without end,

To the child a swaddling of flannel-
And a dawn rolls sharp and sunny
And the skies of winter bend
To see the first sweet word penned
In the godliest human annal.

Frail Mother of the Wilderness-
How strange the world shines in
And the cabin becomes chapel
And the baby reveals God-

Sweet Mother of the Wilderness,
New worlds for you begin,
You have tasted of the apple
That giveth wisdom starred.

Do you dream, as all Mothers dream,

That the child at your heart
Is a marvel apart,

A frail star-beam

Unearthly splendid?

Ah, you are the one mother
Whose dream shall come true,
Though another, not you,
Shall see it ended.

Soon in the wide wilderness,

On a branch blown over a creek,
Up a trail of the wild 'coon,
In a lair of the wild bee,

The wildling boy, by Danger's stress,
Learnt the speech the wild things speak,

Learnt the Earth's eternal tune

Of God and starred Eternity

Went to school where God Himself was master,
Went to church where Earth was minister-

And in Danger and Disaster

Felt his future manhood stir!

All about him lay the land,
Eastern cities, Western prairie,

Wild, immeasurable, grand,

But he was lost where blossomy boughs make airy Bowers in the forest, and the sand

Makes brook-water a clear mirror that gives back

Green branches and trunks black

And clouds across the heavens lightly fanned.

Yet all the Future dreams, eager to waken,
Within that woodland soul-

And the bough of boy has only to be shaken
That the fruit drop whereby this Earth shall roll
A little nearer God than ever before.

Little recks he of war,

Of national millions waiting on his word—
Dreams still the Event unstirred

In the heart of the boy, the little babe of the wild-
But the years hurry and the tide of the sea

Of Time flows fast and ebbs, and he, even he,
Must leave the wilderness, the wood-haunts wild-
Soon shall the cyclone of Humanity

Tearing through Earth suck up this little child
And whirl him to the top, where he shall be
Riding the storm-column in the lightning-stroke,
Calm at the peak, while down below worlds rage,
And Earth goes out in blood and battle-smoke,
And leaves him with the sun-an epoch and an age!

Hushed be our hearts, and veneration

Steep us in joy,

Hushed be our mills, while a saved nation

Reveres this boy!

Hushed be our homes, while a holy elation

Makes the heart mild

Each home has a child

And we worship a race of Lincolns in each that we

love!

No, they may not stand above

The storm and steer the States,

These little children that are born from us

No, they may not Lincolns prove

In the grandeur of their fates

But Lincolns let them be in the heart and in the soulEven thus