* * * * *
Earth's hodden grey will change to livelier hues
Enriched with pearl drops of the limpid dews;
Plenty will stand with her large tranquil eyes
To see her treasures o'er the landscape rise.
Thus may the lover of his country hope
To see again the Nation's spring-tide ope,
And freedom's harvest turn to ripened gold,
So that our world may give unto the old
Of its great opulence, as Joseph gave
Bread to his brothers when they came to crave.
But from his name I've paused too long you think?
Yet he who stands beside Niagra's brink
Breaketh not forth at once of its grand strife;
'Tis thus I stand subdued by his great life—
* * * * *
And with his name a host of others rise,
Climbing like planets, Fame's eternal skies:
Great names, my Brothers! with such deeds allied
That all Virginians glow with filial pride—
That here the multitude shall daily pace
Around this statue's hero-circled base,
Thinking on those who, though long sunk in sleep,
Still round our camp the guard of sentries keep—
Who when a foe encroaches on our line,
Prompt the stern challenge for the countersign—
Who with proud memories feed our bright watch-fire
Which ne'er has faded, never will expire;
Grand benedictions, they in bronze will stand
To guard and consecrate our native land!
Great names are theirs! But his, like battle song,
In quicker current sends our blood along;
For at its music hearts throb quick and large,
Like those of horsemen thundering in the charge.
God's own Knight-Errant! There his figure stands!
Our souls are full—our bonnets in our hands!
When the fierce torrent—lava-like—of bronze
To mould this statue burst it furnace bonds,
When it out-thundered in its liquid flow,
With splendid flame and scintillating glow,
'Twas in its wild tumultuous throb and storm
Type of the age which moulded into form
The god-like character of him sublime,
Whose name is reared a statue for all time
In the great minster of the whole world's heart.
* * * * *
I've called his name a statue. Stern and vast
It rests enthroned upon the mighty past:
Fit plinth for him whose image in the mind
Looms up as that of one by God designed!
Fit plinth in sooth! the mighty past for him
Whose simple name is Glory's synonyme!
E'en Fancy's self, in her enchanted sleep,
Can dream no future which may cease to keep
His name in guard, like sentinel and cry
From Time's great bastions: "It shall never die."
* * * * *
His simple name a statue? Yes, and grand
'Tis reared in this and every other land.
Around its base a group more noble stands
Than e'er was carved by human sculptor's hands,
E'en though each form, like that of old should flush
With vivid beauty's animating blush—
Though dusky bronze, or pallid stone should thrill
With sudden life at some Pygmalion's will—
For these great figures, with his own enshrined,
Are seen, my Countrymen, by men, though blind.