And the feet of those he fought for,
Echo round his bones for evermore.
“Lead out the pageant: sad and slow,
As fits an universal woe,
Let the long procession go,
And let the sorrowing crowd about it grow,
And let the mournful martial music blow;
The last great Englishman is low.”
We hope that Wellington was not “the last great Englishman.” If so, English greatness must indeed be “low.” But the thought is irresistible: Is not the undertaker’s hand again visible in all this? How different is it from the sad, simple, manly beauty of the lament of a poet, whose name scarcely stands in the list of English authors, for one of those soldiers who gloriously failed! Here is how Wolfe sings of the burial of Sir John Moore:
“Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,