The black festoons that stretch for miles,
And turn the streets to funeral aisles?

(No house too poor to show
The nation's badge of woe.)

The cannon's sudden, sullen boom,
The bells that toll of death and doom,
The rolling of the drums,

The dreadful car that comes?

Peace! Let the long procession come; For hark, the mournful muffled drum, The trumpet's wail afar,

And see, the awful car!

Peace! Let the sad procession go, While cannon boom and bells toll slow. And go, thou sacred car,

Bearing our woe afar!

Go, darkly borne, from State to State,
Whose loyal, sorrowing cities wait
To honor all they can

The dust of that good man.

Go, grandly borne, with such a train
As greatest kings might die to gain.
The just, the wise, the brave,
Attend thee to the grave.

And you, the soldiers of our wars,
Bronzed veterans, grim with noble scars,
Salute him once again,

Your late commander-slain !

Yes, let your tears indignant fall,
But leave your muskets on the wall;
Your country needs you now
Beside the forge-the plough.

(When Justice shall unsheathe her brand,
If Mercy may not stay her hand,
Nor would we have it so,

She must direct the blow.)

And you, amid the master-race,
Who seem so strangely out of place,
Know ye who cometh? He
Who hath declared ye free.

Bow while the body passes-nay,
Fall on your knees, and weep, and pray!
Weep, weep-I would ye might—
Your poor black faces white!

And, children, you must come in bands,
With garlands in your little hands,
Of blue and white and red,

To strew before the dead.

So sweetly, sadly, sternly goes
The Fallen to his last repose.
Beneath no mighty dome,
But in his modest home;

The churchyard where his children rest,
The quiet spot that suits him best,
There shall his grave be made,
And there his bones be laid.

And there his countrymen shall come,
With memory proud, with pity dumb,
And strangers far and near,
For many and many a year.

For many a year and many an age,
While History on her ample page
The virtues shall enroll

Of that Paternal Soul.

RICHARD HENRY STODDARD.

WHEN LILACS LAST IN THE DOORYARD BLOOM'D.

["I think this poem and 'Lowell's Commemoration Ode,' each in its own way, the most notable elegies resulting from the war and its episodes."-E. C. Stedman.]

WHEN lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd,

And the great star early droop'd in the western sky in the night,

I mourn'd, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring, Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,

And thought of him I love.

O powerful western fallen star!

O shades of night-O moody, tearful night!

O great star disappear'd-O the black murk that hides the star!

O cruel hands that hold me powerless-O helpless soul of me!

O harsh surrounding cloud that will not free my soul.

In the door-yard fronting an old farm-house near the white-wash'd palings,

Stands the lilac-bush tall-growing with heart-shap'd leaves of rich green,

With many a pointed blossom rising delicate, with the perfume strong I love,

With every leaf a miracle-and from this bush in the door-yard,

With delicate-color'd blossoms and heart-shaped leaves of rich green,

A sprig with its flower I break.

In the swamp in seclud'd recesses

A shy and hidden bird is warbling a song.

Solitary the thrush,

The hermit withdrawn to himself, avoiding the settlements,

Sings by himself a song.

Song of the bleeding throat,

Death's outlet song of life, (for well, dear brother, I know

If thou wast not granted to sing thou would'st surely die.)

Over the breast of the spring, the land, amid cities, Amid lanes, and through old woods, where lately the violets peep'd from the ground, spotting the gray debris,

Amid the grass in the fields each side of the lanes, passing the endless grass,

Passing the yellow-spear'd wheat, every grain from its shroud in the dark-brown fields uprisen, Passing the apple-tree blows of white and pink in the orchards,

Carrying a corpse to where it shall rest in the grave, Night and day journeys a coffin.

Coffin that passes through lanes and streets,

Through day and night with the great cloud darkening the land,

With the pomp of the inloop'd flags, with the cities draped in black,

With the show of the States themselves as of crapeveil'd women standing,

With processions long and winding and the flambeaus of the night,

With the countless torches lit, with the silent sea of faces and the unbared heads,

With the waiting depot, the arriving coffin and the

sombre faces,

With dirges through the night, with the thousand voices rising strong and solemn,

With all the mournful voices of the dirges pour'd around the coffin,

The dim-lit churches and the shuddering organs— where amid these you journey,

With the tolling, tolling bells' perpetual clang,
Here, coffin that slowly passes,

I give you my sprig of lilac.

*

*

*

*

*

O how shall I warble myself for the dead one there

I loved?

And how shall I deck my song for the large sweet soul that has gone?

And what shall my perfume be for the grave of him I love ?

Sea-winds blown from east and west,

Blown from the Eastern sea and blown from the Western sea, till there on the prairies meeting, These and with these and the breath of my chant I'll perfume the grave of him I love.

To the tally of my soul,

*

Loud and strong kept up the gray-brown bird, With pure deliberate notes spreading filling the night.

Loud in the pines and cedars dim,

Clear in the freshness moist and the swamp per

fume,

And I with my comrades there in the night.

While my sight that was bound in my eyes unclos'd, As to long panoramas of visions.

And I saw askant the armies,

I saw as in noiseless dreams hundreds of battleflags,

Borne through the smoke of the battles and pierc'd with missiles I saw them,