Not lured by any cheat of birth,

But by his clear-grained human worth,

And brave old wisdom of sincerity! They knew that outward grace is dust; They trust

could not choose but

In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill,

And supple-tempered will That bent like perfect steel to spring again and thrust.

His was no lonely mountain-peak of mind,

Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars,

A seamark now, now lost in vapors blind;

Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined,

Fruitful and friendly for all human kind,

Yet also nigh to Heaven and loved of loftiest stars.

Nothing of Europe here, Or, then, of Europe fronting mornward still,

Ere any names of Serf and
Peer

Could Nature's equal scheme
deface;

Here was a type of the true elder race,

And one of Plutarch's men talked with us face to face.

I praise him not; it were too late; And some innative weakness there

must be

In him who condescends to victory Such as the Present gives, and cannot wait,

Safe in himself as in a fate.

So always firmly he:
He knew to bide his time,
And can his fame abide,

Still patient in his simple faith sublime,

Till the wise years decide. Great captains, with their guns and drums,

Disturb our judgment for the hour,

But at last silence comes: These all are gone, and, standing like a tower,

We sit here in the Promised Land

That flows with Freedom's honey and milk;

But 'twas they won it, sword in hand,

Making the nettle danger soft for us as silk.

We welcome back our bravest and our best;

Ah, me! not all! some come not with the rest,

Who went forth brave and bright as any here!

I strive to mix some gladness with my strain,

But the sad strings complain,
And will not please the ear;

I sweep them for a pæan, but they

Feeling his soul spring up divinely tall,

Touched but in passing by her mantle-hem.

Come back, then, noble pride, for 'tis her dower!

How could poet ever tower,
If his passions, hopes, and fears,
If his triumphs and his tears,
Kept not measure with his peo-
ple?

Boom, cannon, boom to all the winds and waves!

Clash out, glad bells, from every rocking steeple!

Banners, adance with triumph, bend your staves!

And from every mountain-peak Let beacon-fire to answering beacon speak,

Katahdin tell Monadnock, Whiteface he,

And so leap on in light from sea to sea,