ARMS AND THE MAN.
A Metrical Address recited on the one hundredth anniversary of the surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown on invitation of a joint committee of the Senate and House of the United States Congress.
PROLOGUE.
Full-burnished through the long-revolving years
The ploughshare of a Century to-day
Runs peaceful furrows where a crop of Spears
Once stood in War's array.
And we, like those who on the Trojan plain
See hoary secrets wrenched from upturned sods;—
Who, in their fancy, hear resound again
The battle-cry of gods;—
We now,—this splendid scene before us spread
Where Freedom's full hexameter began—
Restore our Epic, which the Nations read
As far its thunders ran.
Here visions throng on People and on Bard,
Ranks all a-glitter in battalions massed
And closed around as like a plumèd guard,
They lead us down the Past.
I see great Shapes in vague confusion march
Like giant shadows, moving vast and slow,
Beneath some torch-lit temple's mighty arch
Where long processions go.
I see these Shapes before me, all unfold,
But ne'er can fix them on the lofty wall,
Nor tell them, save as she of Endor told
What she beheld to Saul.
THE DEAD STATESMAN.
I see his Shape who should have led these ranks—
GARFIELD I see whose presence had evoked
The stormy rapture of a Nation's thanks—
His chariot stands unyoked!
Unyoked and empty, and the Charioteer
To Fame's expanded arms has headlong rushed
Ending the glories of a grand career,
While all the world stood hushed.
The thunder of his wheels is done, but he
Sustained by patience, fortitude, and grace—
A Christian Hero—from the struggle free—
Has won the Christian's race!
His wheel-tracks stop not in the Valley cold
But upward lead, and on, and up, and higher,
Till Hope can realize and Faith behold
His chariot mount in fire!
Therefore, my Countrymen, lift up your hearts!
Therefore, my Countrymen, be not cast down!
He lives with those who well have done their parts,
And God bestowed his crown!
And yet another form to-day I miss;—
Grigsby the scholar, good, and pure, and wise,
Who now, perchance, from scenes of perfect bliss
Looks down with tender eyes.
Where his great friend, through life great Winthrop stands,
Winthrop, whose gift, in life's departing hours,
Went to the dying Old Virginian's hands
Who died amid those flowers.[11]
Prayers change to blooms, the ancient Rabbins taught;
So his, then, seemed to blossom forth and glow,
As if his supplicating soul had brought
Sandalphon down below.
But, happily, that Winthrop stood to-day,
The patriot, scholar, orator, and sage,
To tell the meaning of this grand array
And vindicate an Age.
That Era's life and meaning his to teach,
To him the parchments, but the shell to me,
His voice the voice of billows on the beach
Wherein we heard the sea.
My voice the voice of some sequestered stream
Which only boasts, as on its waters glide,
That, here and there, it shows a broken gleam
Of pictures on its tide.