Finest of linen you wear;
Comrades in luxury you cherish,
Sumptuous daily you fare.
What of your neighbors who perish?
When you would heighten your cheer
By a contrast that's very dramatic,
Fancy what scenes may appear
In a certain dim hospital attic.
Swarming and sweltering, and scant
Of air,—foul to soul as to senses,—
Where he that is guilty of Want
Meets a doom fit for graver offences.
Worn-out, the pauper nurse sleeps;
The sufferer, forsaken, is crying
With no one to moisten his lips,—
No one to mark that he's dying.
Who should hear the catch in his breath
'Mid the coughs, curses, ravings, resounding
Through the ward o'er the bed of his death,
From the close-crowded pallets surrounding?
And picture the scenes, to come
Perhaps, of another sorrow
Nearer your stately home,—
That you will not have to borrow;
When hushed is all merry din,
And your smiling guests have vanished;
When your flowers come blooming in,
To be glanced at once and banished;
When vain are all the crafts
That Mammon serve, and never
Tour costliest, coolest draughts
Can quench the fire of your fever;
When your street is red with tan,
And your oft-pulled door-bell muffled,
That the peace of a dying man
By no faintest sound be ruffled;
When love, to give you rest,
Doth toil with soothings fruitless;
And skill has done its best,
And the town's best skill is bootless;