The Life and Public Services of James A. Garfield / Twentieth President of the United States, Including Full and Accurate Details of His Eventful Administration, Assassination, Last Hours, Death, Etc., Together with Notable Extracts from His Speeches and Letters

by E. E. Brown

AN ODE ON THE ASSASSINATION.

[A prize offered by a London weekly for the best poem on the attempted assassination of President Garfield was awarded to the author of the following.]

Veil now, O Liberty! thy blushing face,
At the fell deed that thrills a startled world;
While fair Columbia weeps in dire disgrace,
And bows in sorrow o'er the banner furled.

No graceless tyrant falls by vengeance here,
'Neath the wild justice of a secret knife;
No red Ambition ends its grim career,
And expiates its horrors with its life.

Not here does rash Revenge misguided burn,
To free a nation with the assassin's dart;
Or roused Despair in angry madness turn,
And tear its freedom from a despot's heart.

But where blest Liberty so widely reigns,
And Peace and Plenty mark a smiling land,
Here the mad wretch its fair white record stains,
And blurs its beauties with a "bloody hand."

Here the elect of millions, and the pride
Of those who own his mild and peaceful rule,—
Here virtue sinks and yields the crimson tide,
Beneath the vile unreason of a fool!