In Memoriam.
The nation's heart is sad!
Her best beloved son,
The great and good!
Has winged his flight from earth,
And white robed angels
Shift the gorgeous scenery of the sky
To let his soul pass onward
To his God!
Who sent his messenger to bid him "Come."
Sumner is dead!
Oh! many moons must come
And many go
Ere we be comforted again,
Or hush the sighs
That follow him up the golden stair,
Echoing through all the shining corridors
Of heaven,
Where our beloved one has gone to rest!
Sumner is dead!
Oh, sad refrain!
In which the teeming earth
Doth find a voice,
And nature's gentle hands
Are laid within the clasping of our own;
Stilling the joyous songs of long silent
Birds,
That no awakening sound disturb our grief!
She casts her snow white mantle
O'er the whispering grass!
And hushes the hasty footfall
Of coming spring!
Calling to the swift March wind
To carry along the golden clouds
To waiting angels
The mournful tidings of our woe!
Sumner is dead!
O sad repeating words!
That beat upon our hearts
Like showers of frozen hail!
Melting in tears!
That swell the tidal wave of sorrow,
Sweeping adown the great Pacific slopes,
Rushing along
To the sorrowful shores of the broad Atlantic.
Sumner is dead!
And bitter tears
From our sad eyes
Doth make us little recompense
For his most noble life! Though
The nations of the earth rise up to comfort us;
The glorious Orient and the kindly Occident
Stretch forth their hands
To us
Across the spaces of the earth!
Sumner is dead!
And the tears of heaven
Are mingling with the tears of earth,
Above his new made grave.
Showers of stormy rain
Descend upon the grave of our beloved dead,
Whose most honored dust
Is heirloom
To all the sorrowing nations of the earth!
Sumner is dead!
O mournful hearts,
At whose red-lintel doors
The angel of sorrow knocks,
And knocks again!
O tear filled eyes! upon whose drooping fringes
The heavy foot of sorrow presses hard
Be comforted!
For God shall wipe the tears from your sad eyes.