Which he has worn so pure of blame,
In praise and in dispraise the same,
A man of well-attemper’d frame.
O civic Muse, to such a name,
To such a name for ages long,
To such a name,
Preserve a broad approach of fame,
And ever-echoing avenues of song.
—Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington. Tennyson.
Venerable men! you have come down to us from a former generation. Heaven has bounteously lengthened out your lives, that you might behold this joyous day. You are now where you stood fifty years ago, this very hour, with your brothers and your neighbors, shoulder to shoulder, in the strife for your country. Behold, how altered! The same heavens are indeed above your heads; the same ocean rolls at your feet; but all else how changed!