Chapter 2

THE COMING ERA

THEY tell us that the Muse is soon to fly hence, Leaving the bowers of song that once were dear, Her robes bequeathing to her sister, Science, The groves of Pindus for the axe to clear.

Optics will claim the wandering eye of fancy, Physics will grasp imagination's wings, Plain fact exorcise fiction's necromancy, The workshop hammer where the minstrel sings,

No more with laugher at Thalia's frolics Our eyes shall twinkle till the tears run down, But in her place the lecturer on hydraulics Spout forth his watery science to the town.

No more our foolish passions and affections The tragic Muse with mimic grief shall try, But, nobler far, a course of vivisections Teach what it costs a tortured brute to die.

The unearthed monad, long in buried rocks hid, Shall tell the secret whence our being came; The chemist show us death is life's black oxide, Left when the breath no longer fans its flame.

Instead of crack-brained poets in their attics Filling thin volumes with their flowery talk, There shall be books of wholesome mathematics; The tutor with his blackboard and his chalk.

No longer bards with madrigal and sonnet Shall woo to moonlight walks the ribboned sex, But side by side the beaver and the bonnet Stroll, calmly pondering on some problem's x.

The sober bliss of serious calculation Shall mock the trivial joys that fancy drew, And, oh, the rapture of a solved equation,-- One self-same answer on the lips of two!

So speak in solemn tones our youthful sages, Patient, severe, laborious, slow, exact, As o'er creation's protoplasmic pages They browse and munch the thistle crops of fact.

And yet we 've sometimes found it rather pleasant To dream again the scenes that Shakespeare drew,-- To walk the hill-side with the Scottish peasant Among the daisies wet with morning's dew;

To leave awhile the daylight of the real, Led by the guidance of the master's hand, For the strange radiance of the far ideal,-- "The light that never was on sea or land."

Well, Time alone can lift the future's curtain,-- Science may teach our children all she knows, But Love will kindle fresh young hearts, 't is certain, And June will not forget her blushing rose.

And so, in spite of all that Time is bringing,-- Treasures of truth and miracles of art, Beauty and Love will keep the poet singing, And song still live, the science of the heart.

IN RESPONSE

Breakfast at the Century Club, New York, May, 1879.

SUCH kindness! the scowl of a cynic would soften, His pulse beat its way to some eloquent words, Alas! my poor accents have echoed too often, Like that Pinafore music you've some of you heard.

Do you know me, dear strangers--the hundredth time comer At banquets and feasts since the days of my Spring? Ah! would I could borrow one rose of my Summer, But this is a leaf of my Autumn I bring.

I look at your faces,--I'm sure there are some from The three-breasted mother I count as my own; You think you remember the place you have come from, But how it has changed in the years that have flown!

Unaltered, 't is true, is the hall we call "Funnel," Still fights the "Old South" in the battle for life, But we've opened our door to the West through the tunnel, And we've cut off Fort Hill with our Amazon knife.

You should see the new Westminster Boston has builded,-- Its mansions, its spires, its museums of arts,-- You should see the great dome we have gorgeously gilded,-- 'T is the light of our eyes, 't is the joy of our hearts.

When first in his path a young asteroid found it, As he sailed through the skies with the stars in his wake, He thought 't was the sun, and kept circling around it Till Edison signalled, "You've made a mistake."

We are proud of our city,--her fast-growing figure, The warp and the woof of her brain and her hands,-- But we're proudest of all that her heart has grown bigger, And warms with fresh blood as her girdle expands.

One lesson the rubric of conflict has taught her Though parted awhile by war's earth-rending shock, The lines that divide us are written in water, The love that unites us cut deep in the rock.

As well might the Judas of treason endeavor To write his black name on the disk of the sun As try the bright star-wreath that binds us to sever And blot the fair legend of "Many in One."

We love You, tall sister, the stately, the splendid,-- The banner of empire floats high on your towers, Yet ever in welcome your arms are extended,-- We share in your splendors, your glory is ours.

Yes, Queen of the Continent! All of us own thee,-- The gold-freighted argosies flock at thy call, The naiads, the sea-nymphs have met to enthrone thee, But the Broadway of one is the Highway of all!

I thank you. Three words that can hardly be mended, Though phrases on phrases their eloquence pile, If you hear the heart's throb with their eloquence blended, And read all they mean in a sunshiny smile.

FOR THE MOORE CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION

MAY 28, 1879.

ENCHANTER of Erin, whose magic has bound us, Thy wand for one moment we fondly would claim, Entranced while it summons the phantoms around us That blush into life at the sound of thy name.

The tell-tales of memory wake from their slumbers,-- I hear the old song with its tender refrain,-- What passion lies hid in those honey-voiced numbers What perfume of youth in each exquisite strain!

The home of my childhood comes back as a vision,-- Hark! Hark! A soft chord from its song-haunted room,-- 'T is a morning of May, when the air is Elysian,-- The syringa in bud and the lilac in bloom,--

We are clustered around the "Clementi" piano,-- There were six of us then,--there are two of us now,-- She is singing--the girl with the silver soprano-- How "The Lord of the Valley" was false to his vow;

"Let Erin remember" the echoes are calling; Through "The Vale of Avoca" the waters are rolled; "The Exile" laments while the night-dews falling; "The Morning of Life" dawns again as of old.

But ah! those warm love-songs of fresh adolescence! Around us such raptures celestial they flung That it seemed as if Paradise breathed its quintessence Through the seraph-toned lips of the maiden that sung!

Long hushed are the chords that my boyhood enchanted As when the smooth wave by the angel was stirred, Yet still with their music is memory haunted, And oft in my dreams are their melodies heard.

I feel like the priest to his altar returning,-- The crowd that was kneeling no longer is there, The flame has died down, but the brands are still burning, And sandal and cinnamon sweeten the air.

II. The veil for her bridal young Summer is weaving In her azure-domed hall with its tapestried floor, And Spring the last tear-drop of May-dew is leaving On the daisy of Burns and the shamrock of Moore.

How like, how unlike, as we view them together, The song of the minstrels whose record we scan,-- One fresh as the breeze blowing over the heather, One sweet as the breath from an odalisque's fan!

Ah, passion can glow mid a palace's splendor; The cage does not alter the song of the bird; And the curtain of silk has known whispers as tender As ever the blossoming hawthorn has heard.

No fear lest the step of the soft-slippered Graces Should fright the young Loves from their warm little nest, For the heart of a queen, under jewels and laces, Beats time with the pulse in the peasant girl's breast!

Thrice welcome each gift of kind Nature's bestowing! Her fountain heeds little the goblet we hold; Alike, when its musical waters are flowing, The shell from the seaside, the chalice of gold.

The twins of the lyre to her voices had listened; Both laid their best gifts upon Liberty's shrine; For Coila's loved minstrel the holly-wreath glistened; For Erin's the rose and the myrtle entwine.

And while the fresh blossoms of summer are braided For the sea-girdled, stream-silvered, lake-jewelled isle, While her mantle of verdure is woven unfaded, While Shannon and Liffey shall dimple and smile,

The land where the staff of Saint Patrick was planted, Where the shamrock grows green from the cliffs to the shore, The land of fair maidens and heroes undaunted, Shall wreathe her bright harp with the garlands of Moore!

TO JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE

APRIL 4, 1880

I BRING the simplest pledge of love, Friend of my earlier days; Mine is the hand without the glove, The heart-beat, not the phrase.

How few still breathe this mortal air We called by school-boy names! You still, whatever robe you wear, To me are always James.

That name the kind apostle bore Who shames the sullen creeds, Not trusting less, but loving more, And showing faith by deeds.

What blending thoughts our memories share! What visions yours and mine Of May-days in whose morning air The dews were golden wine,

Of vistas bright with opening day, Whose all-awakening sun Showed in life's landscape, far away, The summits to be won!

The heights are gained. Ah, say not so For him who smiles at time, Leaves his tired comrades down below, And only lives to climb!

His labors,--will they ever cease,-- With hand and tongue and pen? Shall wearied Nature ask release At threescore years and ten?

Our strength the clustered seasons tax,-- For him new life they mean; Like rods around the lictor's axe They keep him bright and keen.

The wise, the brave, the strong, we know,-- We mark them here or there, But he,--we roll our eyes, and lo! We find him everywhere!

With truth's bold cohorts, or alone, He strides through error's field; His lance is ever manhood's own, His breast is woman's shield.

Count not his years while earth has need Of souls that Heaven inflames With sacred zeal to save, to lead,-- Long live our dear Saint James!

WELCOME TO THE CHICAGO COMMERCIAL CLUB

January 14, 1880

CHICAGO sounds rough to the maker of verse; One comfort we have--Cincinnati sounds worse; If we only were licensed to say Chicago! But Worcester and Webster won't let us, you know.

No matter, we songsters must sing as we can; We can make some nice couplets with Lake Michigan, And what more resembles a nightingale's voice, Than the oily trisyllable, sweet Illinois?

Your waters are fresh, while our harbor is salt, But we know you can't help it--it is n't your fault; Our city is old and your city is new, But the railroad men tell us we're greener than you.

You have seen our gilt dome, and no doubt you've been told That the orbs of the universe round it are rolled; But I'll own it to you, and I ought to know best, That this is n't quite true of all stars of the West.

You'll go to Mount Auburn,--we'll show you the track,-- And can stay there,--unless you prefer to come back; And Bunker's tall shaft you can climb if you will, But you'll puff like a paragraph praising a pill.

You must see--but you have seen--our old Faneuil Hall, Our churches, our school-rooms, our sample-rooms, all; And, perhaps, though the idiots must have their jokes, You have found our good people much like other folks.

There are cities by rivers, by lakes, and by seas, Each as full of itself as a cheese-mite of cheese; And a city will brag as a game-cock will crow Don't your cockerels at home--just a little, you know?

But we'll crow for you now--here's a health to the boys, Men, maidens, and matrons of fair Illinois, And the rainbow of friendship that arches its span From the green of the sea to the blue Michigan!

AMERICAN ACADEMY CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION

MAY 26, 1880

SIRE, son, and grandson; so the century glides; Three lives, three strides, three foot-prints in the sand; Silent as midnight's falling meteor slides Into the stillness of the far-off land; How dim the space its little arc has spanned!

See on this opening page the names renowned Tombed in these records on our dusty shelves, Scarce on the scroll of living memory found, Save where the wan-eyed antiquarian delves; Shadows they seem; ab, what are we ourselves?

Pale ghosts of Bowdoin, Winthrop, Willard, West, Sages of busy brain and wrinkled brow, Searchers of Nature's secrets unconfessed, Asking of all things Whence and Why and How-- What problems meet your larger vision now?

Has Gannett tracked the wild Aurora's path? Has Bowdoin found his all-surrounding sphere? What question puzzles ciphering Philomath? Could Williams make the hidden causes clear Of the Dark Day that filled the land with fear?

Dear ancient school-boys! Nature taught to them The simple lessons of the star and flower, Showed them strange sights; how on a single stem,-- Admire the marvels of Creative Power!-- Twin apples grew, one sweet, the other sour;

How from the hill-top where our eyes beheld In even ranks the plumed and bannered maize Range its long columns, in the days of old The live volcano shot its angry blaze,-- Dead since the showers of Noah's watery days;

How, when the lightning split the mighty rock, The spreading fury of the shaft was spent! How the young scion joined the alien stock, And when and where the homeless swallows went To pass the winter of their discontent.

Scant were the gleanings in those years of dearth; No Cuvier yet had clothed the fossil bones That slumbered, waiting for their second birth; No Lyell read the legend of the stones; Science still pointed to her empty thrones.

Dreaming of orbs to eyes of earth unknown, Herschel looked heavenwards in the starlight pale; Lost in those awful depths he trod alone, Laplace stood mute before the lifted veil; While home-bred Humboldt trimmed his toy ship's sail.

No mortal feet these loftier heights had gained Whence the wide realms of Nature we descry; In vain their eyes our longing fathers strained To scan with wondering gaze the summits high That far beneath their children's footpaths lie.

Smile at their first small ventures as we may, The school-boy's copy shapes the scholar's hand, Their grateful memory fills our hearts to-day; Brave, hopeful, wise, this bower of peace they planned, While war's dread ploughshare scarred the suffering land.

Child of our children's children yet unborn, When on this yellow page you turn your eyes, Where the brief record of this May-day morn In phrase antique and faded letters lies, How vague, how pale our flitting ghosts will rise!

Yet in our veins the blood ran warm and red, For us the fields were green, the skies were blue, Though from our dust the spirit long has fled, We lived, we loved, we toiled, we dreamed like you, Smiled at our sires and thought how much we knew.

Oh might our spirits for one hour return, When the next century rounds its hundredth ring, All the strange secrets it shall teach to learn, To hear the larger truths its years shall bring, Its wiser sages talk, its sweeter minstrels sing!

THE SCHOOL-BOY

Read at the Centennial Celebration of the foundation of Phillips Academy, Andover.

1778-1878

THESE hallowed precincts, long to memory dear, Smile with fresh welcome as our feet draw near; With softer gales the opening leaves are fanned, With fairer hues the kindling flowers expand, The rose-bush reddens with the blush of June, The groves are vocal with their minstrels' tune, The mighty elm, beneath whose arching shade The wandering children of the forest strayed, Greets the bright morning in its bridal dress, And spreads its arms the gladsome dawn to bless. Is it an idle dream that nature shares Our joys, our griefs, our pastimes, and our cares? Is there no summons when, at morning's call, The sable vestments of the darkness fall? Does not meek evening's low-voiced Ave blend With the soft vesper as its notes ascend? Is there no whisper in the perfumed air When the sweet bosom of the rose is bare? Does not the sunshine call us to rejoice? Is there no meaning in the storm-cloud's voice? No silent message when from midnight skies Heaven looks upon us with its myriad eyes?

Or shift the mirror; say our dreams diffuse O'er life's pale landscape their celestial hues, Lend heaven the rainbow it has never known, And robe the earth in glories not its own, Sing their own music in the summer breeze, With fresher foliage clothe the stately trees, Stain the June blossoms with a livelier dye And spread a bluer azure on the sky,-- Blest be the power that works its lawless will And finds the weediest patch an Eden still; No walls so fair as those our fancies build,-- No views so bright as those our visions gild!

So ran my lines, as pen and paper met, The truant goose-quill travelling like Planchette; Too ready servant, whose deceitful ways Full many a slipshod line, alas! betrays; Hence of the rhyming thousand not a few Have builded worse--a great deal--than they knew.

What need of idle fancy to adorn Our mother's birthplace on her birthday morn? Hers are the blossoms of eternal spring, From these green boughs her new-fledged birds take wing, These echoes hear their earliest carols sung, In this old nest the brood is ever young. If some tired wanderer, resting from his flight, Amid the gay young choristers alight, These gather round him, mark his faded plumes That faintly still the far-off grove perfumes, And listen, wondering if some feeble note Yet lingers, quavering in his weary throat:-- I, whose fresh voice yon red-faced temple knew, What tune is left me, fit to sing to you? Ask not the grandeurs of a labored song, But let my easy couplets slide along; Much could I tell you that you know too well; Much I remember, but I will not tell; Age brings experience; graybeards oft are wise, But oh! how sharp a youngster's ears and eyes!

My cheek was bare of adolescent down When first I sought the academic town; Slow rolls the coach along the dusty road, Big with its filial and parental load; The frequent hills, the lonely woods are past, The school-boy's chosen home is reached at last. I see it now, the same unchanging spot, The swinging gate, the little garden plot, The narrow yard, the rock that made its floor, The flat, pale house, the knocker-garnished door, The small, trim parlor, neat, decorous, chill, The strange, new faces, kind, but grave and still; Two, creased with age,--or what I then called age,-- Life's volume open at its fiftieth page; One, a shy maiden's, pallid, placid, sweet As the first snow-drop, which the sunbeams greet; One, the last nursling's; slight she was, and fair, Her smooth white forehead warmed with auburn hair; Last came the virgin Hymen long had spared, Whose daily cares the grateful household shared, Strong, patient, humble; her substantial frame Stretched the chaste draperies I forbear to name. Brave, but with effort, had the school-boy come To the cold comfort of a stranger's home; How like a dagger to my sinking heart Came the dry summons, "It is time to part; Good-by!" "Goo-ood-by!" one fond maternal kiss. . . . Homesick as death! Was ever pang like this? Too young as yet with willing feet to stray From the tame fireside, glad to get away,-- Too old to let my watery grief appear,-- And what so bitter as a swallowed tear! One figure still my vagrant thoughts pursue; First boy to greet me, Ariel, where are you? Imp of all mischief, heaven alone knows how You learned it all,--are you an angel now, Or tottering gently down the slope of years, Your face grown sober in the vale of tears? Forgive my freedom if you are breathing still;

If in a happier world, I know you will. You were a school-boy--what beneath the sun So like a monkey? I was also one. Strange, sure enough, to see what curious shoots The nursery raises from the study's roots! In those old days the very, very good Took up more room--a little--than they should; Something too much one's eyes encountered then Of serious youth and funeral-visaged men; The solemn elders saw life's mournful half,-- Heaven sent this boy, whose mission was to laugh, Drollest of buffos, Nature's odd protest, A catbird squealing in a blackbird's nest. Kind, faithful Nature! While the sour-eyed Scot-- Her cheerful smiles forbidden or forgot-- Talks only of his preacher and his kirk,-- Hears five-hour sermons for his Sunday work,-- Praying and fasting till his meagre face Gains its due length, the genuine sign of grace,-- An Ayrshire mother in the land of Knox Her embryo poet in his cradle rocks;-- Nature, long shivering in her dim eclipse, Steals in a sunbeam to those baby lips; So to its home her banished smile returns, And Scotland sweetens with the song of Burns!

The morning came; I reached the classic hall; A clock-face eyed me, staring from the wall; Beneath its hands a printed line I read YOUTH IS LIFE'S SEED-TIME: so the clock-face said: Some took its counsel, as the sequel showed,-- Sowed,--their wild oats,--and reaped as they had sowed. How all comes back! the upward slanting floor,-- The masters' thrones that flank the central door,-- The long, outstretching alleys that divide The rows of desks that stand on either side,-- The staring boys, a face to every desk, Bright, dull, pale, blooming, common, picturesque. Grave is the Master's look; his forehead wears Thick rows of wrinkles, prints of worrying cares; Uneasy lie the heads of all that rule, His most of all whose kingdom is a school. Supreme he sits; before the awful frown That bends his brows the boldest eye goes down; Not more submissive Israel heard and saw At Sinai's foot the Giver of the Law. Less stern he seems, who sits in equal Mate On the twin throne and shares the empire's weight; Around his lips the subtle life that plays Steals quaintly forth in many a jesting phrase; A lightsome nature, not so hard to chafe, Pleasant when pleased; rough-handled, not so safe; Some tingling memories vaguely I recall, But to forgive him. God forgive us all!