Chapter 34

O joyous youth, whose glory is to dare,-- Thy foot firm planted on the lowest stair, Thine eye uplifted to the loftiest height Where Fame stands beckoning in the rosy light, Thanks for thy flattering tales, thy fond deceits, Thy loving lies, thy cheerful smiling cheats Nature's rash promise every day is broke,-- A thousand acorns breed a single oak, The myriad blooms that make the orchard gay In barren beauty throw their lives away; Yet shall we quarrel with the sap that yields The painted blossoms which adorn the fields, When the fair orchard wears its May-day suit Of pink-white petals, for its scanty fruit? Thrice happy hours, in hope's illusion dressed, In fancy's cradle nurtured and caressed, Though rich the spoils that ripening years may bring, To thee the dewdrops of the Orient cling,-- Not all the dye-stuffs from the vats of truth Can match the rainbow on the robes of youth!

Dear unborn children, to our Mother's trust We leave you, fearless, when we lie in dust: While o'er these walls the Christian banner waves From hallowed lips shall flow the truth that saves; While o'er those portals Veritas you read No church shall bind you with its human creed. Take from the past the best its toil has won, But learn betimes its slavish ruts to shun. Pass the old tree whose withered leaves are shed, Quit the old paths that error loved to tread, And a new wreath of living blossoms seek, A narrower pathway up a loftier peak; Lose not your reverence, but unmanly fear Leave far behind you, all who enter here!

As once of old from Ida's lofty height The flaming signal flashed across the night, So Harvard's beacon sheds its unspent rays Till every watch-tower shows its kindling blaze. Caught from a spark and fanned by every gale, A brighter radiance gilds the roofs of Yale; Amherst and Williams bid their flambeaus shine, And Bowdoin answers through her groves of pine; O'er Princeton's sands the far reflections steal, Where mighty Edwards stamped his iron heel; Nay, on the hill where old beliefs were bound Fast as if Styx had girt them nine times round, Bursts such a light that trembling souls inquire If the whole church of Calvin is on fire! Well may they ask, for what so brightly burns As a dry creed that nothing ever learns? Thus link by link is knit the flaming chain Lit by the torch of Harvard's hallowed plain.

Thy son, thy servant, dearest Mother mine, Lays this poor offering on thy holy shrine, An autumn leaflet to the wild winds tost, Touched by the finger of November's frost, With sweet, sad memories of that earlier day, And all that listened to my first-born lay. With grateful heart this glorious morn I see,-- Would that my tribute worthier were of thee!

POST-PRANDIAL

PHI BETA KAPPA

WENDELL PHILLIPS, ORATOR; CHARLES GODFREY LELAND, POET

1881

"THE Dutch have taken Holland,"--so the schoolboys used to say; The Dutch have taken Harvard,--no doubt of that to-day! For the Wendells were low Dutchmen, and all their vrows were Vans; And the Breitmanns are high Dutchmen, and here is honest Hans.

Mynheers, you both are welcome! Fair cousin Wendell P., Our ancestors were dwellers beside the Zuyder Zee; Both Grotius and Erasmus were countrymen of we, And Vondel was our namesake, though he spelt it with a V.

It is well old Evert Jansen sought a dwelling over sea On the margin of the Hudson, where he sampled you and me Through our grandsires and great-grandsires, for you would n't quite agree With the steady-going burghers along the Zuyder Zee.

Like our Motley's John of Barnveld, you have always been inclined To speak,--well,--somewhat frankly,--to let us know your mind, And the Mynheers would have told you to be cautious what you said, Or else that silver tongue of yours might cost your precious head.

But we're very glad you've kept it; it was always Freedom's own, And whenever Reason chose it she found a royal throne; You have whacked us with your sceptre; our backs were little harmed, And while we rubbed our bruises we owned we had been charmed.

And you, our quasi Dutchman, what welcome should be yours For all the wise prescriptions that work your laughter-cures? "Shake before taking"?--not a bit,--the bottle-cure's a sham; Take before shaking, and you 'll find it shakes your diaphragm.

"Hans Breitmann gif a barty,--vhere is dot barty now?" On every shelf where wit is stored to smooth the careworn brow A health to stout Hans Breitmann! How long before we see Another Hans as handsome,--as bright a man as he!

THE FLANEUR

BOSTON COMMON, DECEMBER 6, 1882

DURING THE TRANSIT OF VENUS

I LOVE all sights of earth and skies, From flowers that glow to stars that shine; The comet and the penny show, All curious things, above, below, Hold each in turn my wandering eyes: I claim the Christian Pagan's line, _Humani nihil_,--even so,-- And is not human life divine? When soft the western breezes blow, And strolling youths meet sauntering maids, I love to watch the stirring trades Beneath the Vallombrosa shades Our much-enduring elms bestow; The vender and his rhetoric's flow, That lambent stream of liquid lies; The bait he dangles from his line, The gudgeon and his gold-washed prize. I halt before the blazoned sign That bids me linger to admire The drama time can never tire, The little hero of the hunch, With iron arm and soul of fire, And will that works his fierce desire,-- Untamed, unscared, unconquered Punch My ear a pleasing torture finds In tones the withered sibyl grinds,-- The dame sans merci's broken strain, Whom I erewhile, perchance, have known, When Orleans filled the Bourbon throne, A siren singing by the Seine.

But most I love the tube that spies The orbs celestial in their march; That shows the comet as it whisks Its tail across the planets' disks, As if to blind their blood-shot eyes; Or wheels so close against the sun We tremble at the thought of risks Our little spinning ball may run, To pop like corn that children parch, From summer something overdone, And roll, a cinder, through the skies.

Grudge not to-day the scanty fee To him who farms the firmament, To whom the Milky Way is free; Who holds the wondrous crystal key, The silent Open Sesame That Science to her sons has lent; Who takes his toll, and lifts the bar That shuts the road to sun and star. If Venus only comes to time, (And prophets say she must and shall,) To-day will hear the tinkling chime Of many a ringing silver dime, For him whose optic glass supplies The crowd with astronomic eyes,-- The Galileo of the Mall.

Dimly the transit morning broke; The sun seemed doubting what to do, As one who questions how to dress, And takes his doublets from the press, And halts between the old and new. Please Heaven he wear his suit of blue, Or don, at least, his ragged cloak, With rents that show the azure through!

I go the patient crowd to join That round the tube my eyes discern, The last new-comer of the file, And wait, and wait, a weary while,

And gape, and stretch, and shrug, and smile, (For each his place must fairly earn, Hindmost and foremost, in his turn,) Till hitching onward, pace by pace, I gain at last the envied place, And pay the white exiguous coin: The sun and I are face to face; He glares at me, I stare at him; And lo! my straining eye has found A little spot that, black and round, Lies near the crimsoned fire-orb's rim. O blessed, beauteous evening star, Well named for her whom earth adores,-- The Lady of the dove-drawn car,-- I know thee in thy white simar; But veiled in black, a rayless spot, Blank as a careless scribbler's blot, Stripped of thy robe of silvery flame,-- The stolen robe that Night restores When Day has shut his golden doors,-- I see thee, yet I know thee not; And canst thou call thyself the same?

A black, round spot,--and that is all; And such a speck our earth would be If he who looks upon the stars Through the red atmosphere of Mars Could see our little creeping ball Across the disk of crimson crawl As I our sister planet see.

And art thou, then, a world like ours, Flung from the orb that whirled our own A molten pebble from its zone? How must thy burning sands absorb The fire-waves of the blazing orb, Thy chain so short, thy path so near, Thy flame-defying creatures hear The maelstroms of the photosphere! And is thy bosom decked with flowers That steal their bloom from scalding showers? And bast thou cities, domes, and towers, And life, and love that makes it dear, And death that fills thy tribes with fear?

Lost in my dream, my spirit soars Through paths the wandering angels know; My all-pervading thought explores The azure ocean's lucent shores; I leave my mortal self below, As up the star-lit stairs I climb, And still the widening view reveals In endless rounds the circling wheels That build the horologe of time. New spheres, new suns, new systems gleam; The voice no earth-born echo hears Steals softly on my ravished ears I hear them "singing as they shine"-- A mortal's voice dissolves my dream: My patient neighbor, next in line, Hints gently there are those who wait. O guardian of the starry gate, What coin shall pay this debt of mine? Too slight thy claim, too small the fee That bids thee turn the potent key.

The Tuscan's hand has placed in thine. Forgive my own the small affront, The insult of the proffered dime; Take it, O friend, since this thy wont, But still shall faithful memory be A bankrupt debtor unto thee, And pay thee with a grateful rhyme.

AVE

PRELUDE TO "ILLUSTRATED POEMS"

FULL well I know the frozen hand has come That smites the songs of grove and garden dumb, And chills sad autumn's last chrysanthemum;

Yet would I find one blossom, if I might, Ere the dark loom that weaves the robe of white Hides all the wrecks of summer out of sight.

Sometimes in dim November's narrowing day, When all the season's pride has passed away, As mid the blackened stems and leaves we stray,

We spy in sheltered nook or rocky cleft A starry disk the hurrying winds have left, Of all its blooming sisterhood bereft.

Some pansy, with its wondering baby eyes Poor wayside nursling!--fixed in blank surprise At the rough welcome of unfriendly skies;

Or golden daisy,--will it dare disclaim The lion's tooth, to wear this gentler name? Or blood-red salvia, with its lips aflame.

The storms have stripped the lily and the rose, Still on its cheek the flush of summer glows, And all its heart-leaves kindle as it blows.

So had I looked some bud of song to find The careless winds of autumn left behind, With these of earlier seasons' growth to bind.

Ah me! my skies are dark with sudden grief, A flower lies faded on my garnered sheaf; Yet let the sunshine gild this virgin leaf,

The joyous, blessed sunshine of the past, Still with me, though the heavens are overcast,-- The light that shines while life and memory last.

Go, pictured rhymes, for loving readers meant; Bring back the smiles your jocund morning lent, And warm their hearts with sunbeams yet unspent!

BEVERLY FARMS, July 24, 1884.

KING'S CHAPEL

READ AT THE TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY

Is it a weanling's weakness for the past That in the stormy, rebel-breeding town, Swept clean of relics by the levelling blast,

Still keeps our gray old chapel's name of "King's," Still to its outworn symbols fondly clings,-- Its unchurched mitres and its empty crown?

Poor harmless emblems! All has shrunk away That made them gorgons in the patriot's eyes; The priestly plaything harms us not to-day; The gilded crown is but a pleasing show, An old-world heirloom, left from long ago, Wreck of the past that memory bids us prize,

Lightly we glance the fresh-cut marbles o'er; Those two of earlier date our eyes enthrall: The proud old Briton's by the western door, And hers, the Lady of Colonial days, Whose virtues live in long-drawn classic phrase,-- The fair Francesca of the southern wall.

Ay! those were goodly men that Reynolds drew, And stately dames our Copley's canvas holds, To their old Church, their Royal Master, true, Proud of the claim their valiant sires had earned, That "gentle blood," not lightly to be spurned, Save by the churl ungenerous Nature moulds.

All vanished! It were idle to complain That ere the fruits shall come the flowers must fall; Yet somewhat we have lost amidst our gain, Some rare ideals time may not restore,-- The charm of courtly breeding, seen no more, And reverence, dearest ornament of all.

Thus musing, to the western wall I came, Departing: lo! a tablet fresh and fair, Where glistened many a youth's remembered name In golden letters on the snow-white stone,-- Young lives these aisles and arches once have known, Their country's bleeding altar might not spare.

These died that we might claim a soil unstained, Save by the blood of heroes; their bequests A realm unsevered and a race unchained. Has purer blood through Norman veins come down From the rough knights that clutched the Saxon's crown Than warmed the pulses in these faithful breasts?

These, too, shall live in history's deathless page, High on the slow-wrought pedestals of fame, Ranged with the heroes of remoter age; They could not die who left their nation free, Firm as the rock, unfettered as the sea, Its heaven unshadowed by the cloud of shame.

While on the storied past our memory dwells, Our grateful tribute shall not be denied,-- The wreath, the cross of rustling immortelles; And willing hands shall clear each darkening bust, As year by year sifts down the clinging dust On Shirley's beauty and on Vassall's pride.

But for our own, our loved and lost, we bring With throbbing hearts and tears that still must flow, In full-heaped hands, the opening flowers of spring, Lilies half-blown, and budding roses, red As their young cheeks, before the blood was shed That lent their morning bloom its generous glow.

Ah, who shall count a rescued nation's debt, Or sum in words our martyrs' silent claims? Who shall our heroes' dread exchange forget,-- All life, youth, hope, could promise to allure For all that soul could brave or flesh endure? They shaped our future; we but carve their names.

HYMN

FOR THE SAME OCCASION

SUNG BY THE CONGREGATION TO THE TUNE OF TALLIS'S EVENING HYMN

O'ERSHADOWED by the walls that climb, Piled up in air by living hands, A rock amid the waves of time, Our gray old house of worship stands.

High o'er the pillared aisles we love The symbols of the past look down; Unharmed, unharming, throned above, Behold the mitre and the crown!

Let not our younger faith forget The loyal souls that held them dear; The prayers we read their tears have wet, The hymns we sing they loved to hear.

The memory of their earthly throne Still to our holy temple clings, But here the kneeling suppliants own One only Lord, the King of kings.

Hark! while our hymn of grateful praise The solemn echoing vaults prolong, The far-off voice of earlier days Blends with our own in hallowed song:

To Him who ever lives and reigns, Whom all the hosts of heaven adore, Who lent the life His breath sustains, Be glory now and evermore!

HYMN.--THE WORD OF PROMISE

(by supposition)

An Hymn set forth to be sung by the Great Assembly at Newtown, [Mass.] Mo. 12. 1. 1636.

[Written by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, eldest son of Rev. ABIEL HOLMES, eighth Pastor of the First Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts.]

LORD, Thou hast led us as of old Thine Arm led forth the chosen Race Through Foes that raged, through Floods that roll'd, To Canaan's far-off Dwelling-Place.

Here is Thy bounteous Table spread, Thy Manna falls on every Field, Thy Grace our hungering Souls hath fed, Thy Might hath been our Spear and Shield.

Lift high Thy Buckler, Lord of Hosts! Guard Thou Thy Servants, Sons and Sires, While on the Godless heathen Coasts They light Thine Israel's Altar-fires!

The salvage Wilderness remote Shall hear Thy Works and Wonders sung; So from the Rock that Moses smote The Fountain of the Desart sprung.

Soon shall the slumbering Morn awake, From wandering Stars of Errour freed, When Christ the Bread of Heaven shall break For Saints that own a common Creed.

The Walls that fence His Flocks apart Shall crack and crumble in Decay, And every Tongue and every Heart Shall welcome in the new-born Day.

Then shall His glorious Church rejoice His Word of Promise to recall,-- ONE SHELTERING FOLD, ONE SHEPHERD'S VOICE, ONE GOD AND FATHER OVER ALL!

HYMN

READ AT THE DEDICATION OF THE OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES HOSPITAL AT HUDSON, WISCONSIN

JUNE 7, 1877

ANGEL of love, for every grief Its soothing balm thy mercy brings, For every pang its healing leaf, For homeless want, thine outspread, wings.

Enough for thee the pleading eye, The knitted brow of silent pain; The portals open to a sigh Without the clank of bolt or chain.

Who is our brother? He that lies Left at the wayside, bruised and sore His need our open hand supplies, His welcome waits him at our door.

Not ours to ask in freezing tones His race, his calling, or his creed; Each heart the tie of kinship owns, When those are human veins that bleed.

Here stand the champions to defend From every wound that flesh can feel; Here science, patience, skill, shall blend To save, to calm, to help, to heal.

Father of Mercies! Weak and frail, Thy guiding hand Thy children ask; Let not the Great Physician fail To aid us in our holy task.

Source of all truth, and love, and light, That warm and cheer our earthly days, Be ours to serve Thy will aright, Be Thine the glory and the praise!

ON THE DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD

I.

FALLEN with autumn's falling leaf Ere yet his summer's noon was past, Our friend, our guide, our trusted chief,-- What words can match a woe so vast!

And whose the chartered claim to speak The sacred grief where all have part, Where sorrow saddens every cheek And broods in every aching heart?

Yet Nature prompts the burning phrase That thrills the hushed and shrouded hall, The loud lament, the sorrowing praise, The silent tear that love lets fall.

In loftiest verse, in lowliest rhyme, Shall strive unblamed the minstrel choir,--- The singers of the new-born time, And trembling age with outworn lyre.

No room for pride, no place for blame,-- We fling our blossoms on the grave, Pale,--scentless,--faded,--all we claim, This only,--what we had we gave.

Ah, could the grief of all who mourn Blend in one voice its bitter cry, The wail to heaven's high arches borne Would echo through the caverned sky.

II.

O happiest land, whose peaceful choice Fills with a breath its empty throne! God, speaking through thy people's voice, Has made that voice for once His own.

No angry passion shakes the state Whose weary servant seeks for rest; And who could fear that scowling hate Would strike at that unguarded breast?

He stands, unconscious of his doom, In manly strength, erect, serene; Around him Summer spreads her bloom; He falls,--what horror clothes the scene!

How swift the sudden flash of woe Where all was bright as childhood's dream! As if from heaven's ethereal bow Had leaped the lightning's arrowy gleam.

Blot the foul deed from history's page; Let not the all-betraying sun Blush for the day that stains an age When murder's blackest wreath was won.

III.

Pale on his couch the sufferer lies, The weary battle-ground of pain Love tends his pillow; Science tries Her every art, alas! in vain.

The strife endures how long! how long! Life, death, seem balanced in the scale, While round his bed a viewless throng Await each morrow's changing tale.

In realms the desert ocean parts What myriads watch with tear-filled eyes, His pulse-beats echoing in their hearts, His breathings counted with their sighs!

Slowly the stores of life are spent, Yet hope still battles with despair; Will Heaven not yield when knees are bent? Answer, O thou that hearest prayer.

But silent is the brazen sky; On sweeps the meteor's threatening train, Unswerving Nature's mute reply, Bound in her adamantine chain.

Not ours the verdict to decide Whom death shall claim or skill shall save; The hero's life though Heaven denied, It gave our land a martyr's grave.

Nor count the teaching vainly sent How human hearts their griefs may share,-- The lesson woman's love has lent, What hope may do, what faith can bear!

Farewell! the leaf-strown earth enfolds Our stay, our pride, our hopes, our fears, And autumn's golden sun beholds A nation bowed, a world in tears.

THE GOLDEN FLOWER

WHEN Advent dawns with lessening days, While earth awaits the angels' hymn; When bare as branching coral sways In whistling winds each leafless limb; When spring is but a spendthrift's dream, And summer's wealth a wasted dower, Nor dews nor sunshine may redeem,-- Then autumn coins his Golden Flower.

Soft was the violet's vernal hue, Fresh was the rose's morning red, Full-orbed the stately dahlia grew,-- All gone! their short-lived splendors shed. The shadows, lengthening, stretch at noon; The fields are stripped, the groves are dumb; The frost-flowers greet the icy moon,-- Then blooms the bright chrysanthemum.

The stiffening turf is white with snow, Yet still its radiant disks are seen Where soon the hallowed morn will show The wreath and cross of Christmas green; As if in autumn's dying days It heard the heavenly song afar, And opened all its glowing rays, The herald lamp of Bethlehem's star.

Orphan of summer, kindly sent To cheer the fading year's decline, In all that pitying Heaven has lent No fairer pledge of hope than thine. Yes! June lies hid beneath the snow, And winter's unborn heir shall claim For every seed that sleeps below A spark that kindles into flame.

Thy smile the scowl of winter braves Last of the bright-robed, flowery train, Soft sighing o'er the garden graves, "Farewell! farewell! we meet again!" So may life's chill November bring Hope's golden flower, the last of all, Before we hear the angels sing Where blossoms never fade and fall!

HAIL, COLUMBIA!

1798

THE FIRST VERSE OF THE SONG

BY JOSEPH HOPKINSON

"HAIL, Columbia! Happy land! Hail, ye heroes, heaven-born band, Who fought and bled in Freedom's cause, Who fought and bled in Freedom's cause, And when the storm of war was gone Enjoy'd the peace your valor won. Let independence be our boast, Ever mindful what it cost; Ever grateful for the prize, Let its altar reach the skies.

"Firm--united--let us be, Rallying round our Liberty; As a band of brothers join'd, Peace and safety we shall find."

ADDITIONAL VERSES

WRITTEN AT THE REQUEST OF THE COMMITTEE FOR THE CONSTITUTIONAL CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION AT PHILADELPHIA,

1887

LOOK our ransomed shores around, Peace and safety we have found! Welcome, friends who once were foes! Welcome, friends who once were foes, To all the conquering years have gained,-- A nation's rights, a race unchained!

Children of the day new-born, Mindful of its glorious morn, Let the pledge our fathers signed Heart to heart forever bind!

While the stars of heaven shall burn, While the ocean tides return, Ever may the circling sun Find the Many still are One!

Graven deep with edge of steel, Crowned with Victory's crimson seal, All the world their names shall read! All the world their names shall read, Enrolled with his, the Chief that led The hosts whose blood for us was shed. Pay our sires their children's debt, Love and honor, nor forget Only Union's golden key Guards the Ark of Liberty!

While the stars of heaven shall burn, While the ocean tides return, Ever may the circling sun Find the Many still are One!

Hail, Columbia! strong and free, Throned in hearts from sea to sea Thy march triumphant still pursue! Thy march triumphant still pursue With peaceful stride from zone to zone, Till Freedom finds the world her own.

Blest in Union's holy ties, Let our grateful song arise, Every voice its tribute lend, All in loving chorus blend!

While the stars in heaven shall burn, While the ocean tides return, Ever shall the circling sun Find the Many still are One!

POEM