“AND ONE FELL BY THE WAYSIDE ...”
SCHOLAR, and man of letters, and daintily nurtured,
You were one with your peers,
Leaving the half-told story,
Throwing away the dear things of this life-time—
All you found was the steady, silent effort,
Only the toilsome moulding, the shaping the weapon,
None of the keen sword-glory.
Not for you the crown and the consummation,
Not the battle-death, sharp, swift, and kindly;
Only the early plodding on, half blindly,
Only seeing the end by the faith of the spirit,
Only the hardest of all, the preparation,
All the heart-breaking spadework,
Formulas, initiation;
Only the snows of December ...
Under the snow the quiet brown land lies sleeping,
Waiting the breath of Spring—
God will remember.
J. E. A. CARVER
(MAGDALEN)