I
The flowers lie faded on his mound,
The rose and lily are decayed;
The stam’ring words of praise, we said,
Did vanish almost with their sound.
The throng that stood around his bier,
Is scattered in accustomed ways;
And now and then a neighbor says:
“This was the saddest of the year.”
Alas, if this was all we gave;
Then were our eulogies a shame;
Unworthy of his noble name,
A mockery around his grave.