I PS 2249 .L85A8 'I9l4 FIE FIRESIDE JOHN D. LONG ( w *'^^ -^ >s\J^' (:i;iss^3 124 2 l)()()k > L & 5 A ^ PRKSILNTDO TJYl AT THE FIRESIDE AT THE FIRESIDE John D. Long BOSTON ALBERT HARRISON HALL 1914 Published November, 1914 am Author samuel usher Boston, Massachusetts TO HELEN SOME of .these verses have for several years been floating about in the news- papers, and now with others — all written a good while ago — they are printed together in this book for the sake of old times, and I dedicate them to you who were so filially in sympathy with me in the receding memories and associations they recall. CONTENTS At the Fireside 9 Margaret . 10 Helen 12 Curlylocks 13 Thanksgiving 14 Per Astra ad Coelum i6 Asleep 17 On the Train i8 Crow Point 19 The Music Box 22 Nezinscot 23 The Old Songs 24 The Mountains of Maine . 26 Wood Notes 28 The Dead Leaves 31 Apple Buds 34 School Days 36 The Beach 37 Sunset . . . . 39 Limitation 40 Jesus . . . . 41 Evening Hymn 42 Our Minister 43 Our Sexton 44 Ordination Hymn 46 The Pilgrim 47 Centennial Hymn, 1876 . 48 The Flag . 49 The Soldiers' Home 51 The Capitol at Washington 52 A Kindly Critic . 55 AT THE FIRESIDE AT nightfall by the firelight's cheer My little Margaret sits me near, And begs me tell of things that were When I was little, just like her. Ah, little lips! you touch the spring Of sweetest sad remembering, And heart and hearth flash all aglow With ruddy tints of long ago. I at my father's fireside sit. Youngest of all who circle it, And beg him tell me what did he When he was little, just like me. [9] MARGARET I AM a little three-year old: My eyes are heaven, my hair is gold. What heaven and gold are, I don't know, But what I mean is, Ma says so. Waked by the birdies and the sun. Till night I chatter and I run; And am so happy all day through I make all others happy, too. They say my face is sweet and fair Beneath the big brown hat I wear; Sometimes I stick it with a trim Of dandelions round the brim. At night when tire my little feet, Tm glad my bread and milk to eat; In mama's lap my head I lay, This is the prayer I always say : — [lOj " Now I lay me down to sleep, Father in heaven, take care of me: May my sleep, be sound and sweet And my waking happy be." In bed tucked safe from harm and cold, Shadows and slumber round me fold: Sometimes I dream that, one by one. The brown mice o'er my pillow run. [II] H' HELEN "ELEN is aged two; Look at the tender blue Her eyes have tempted from the heaven- liest patches in the skies! Look at her rose-tint face, The ineffable fine grace That in its smiles and dimples everywhere upon it lies! Had lady's hand e'er such An inborn grace of touch? Could nestling head more gently woo, for- giving or forgiven? Did ever mouth put up. Or bud, so fresh a cup? Or little feet make doorway seem so like the gate of heaven? Father enfold, I pray, This little lamb alway: My arm and love will such poor shelter be in storm or stress, That oh ! may thy great arm Keep her dear feet from harm. And thy great love enwrap her in its perfect happiness! [12] CURLYLOCKS THE door bursts open and in he runs, Dearest to us of God's little ones. Mid the clover half-hid, he has gathered up The dandelion and buttercup. Their tribute of yellow gold-dust glows, Like down upon fruit, on his chin and nose. The embodied sunshine always lies On his curly fair hair and bright brown eyes. His face so swiftly mirrors his heart, It sparkles with speech ere his lips are apart. He gleams through the house from morn till night, A laughing, tiptoeing soul of light. All beautiful colors, all bright spirits meet In this Raphael's cherub on volatile feet. [13] THANKSGIVING LAST night, dear Hilda, was Thanks- giving Eve, Deluged and wild. The wind surged in great waves That beat upon the house and wrapped it round And made it tremble, yet awoke no fear; For in their mighty hands there seemed a sense Of safety, as, enfolded in the heart Of a strong man, a woman nestles safe, Sure that no harm can happen though the arm That clasps might crush her in its play- fulness — A lion's strength, yet gentle to her love. Over the beach and wharves the tide rushed up. And swimming o'er the meadows made them lakes. We on the shore felt all the toss and storm And lingered by the lamplight and the fire. The rain pelted the windows, cheating us To come and look into the face of night. So dark that not a feature answered back. And yet the very tempest made me glad To think that thou, far inland from the sea, [14] Hadst reached the shelter of thine own dear hearth, Safe-havened from all risk of care and toil, Letting thy heart go free, once more at rest And happy like a child again at home. I knew God's love and peace were with thee there And breathed, unheard, my Benedicite. Was it unheard? It may be One did hear, And give his angels charge concerning thee, So thou shalt dash thy foot against no stone. Thanksgiving day. Still wild the storm. The rain Is snow, sweeping cross land and sea in wraiths Of mist, yet warmer, merrier makes in- doors New England's festival of hearth and home. I sit beside my fire, but not alone ; For from the past come clustering in old friends. Kinsfolk and sainted ones who years ago Sat at my father's board Thanksgiving day, In the sweet village-time among the hills. My heart is full of memories, and of thanks For life's rich fruits, for friendships and for faith In human hearts, and sure for you, my friend. Dear spirit that hath healing in thy wings. [15] PER ASTRA AD COELUM TIME was I loved the stars and skies For their own sake — nor now less fond — Yet now far past their range my eyes Go searching for the heaven beyond. Time was I loved your soulful eyes For their own sake — nor now repent, So soft the lovelight in them lies, Of every mood so eloquent. Yet now like stars they long have been Not more the light by which I trod Than gateways where I enter in To breathe the love and peace of God. [1 6] ASLEEP THIS little baby child hath cried Himself asleep at some light, childish pain ; And on his face its traces still abide Like shapes of clouds o'er meadow flying, — Upon his cheek a teardrop lying, As on a leaf a single drop of rain. See! as I bend above his face, The shade of grief flies like the hurrying cloud, And like a flood of sunshine in its place. The shadow yielding to the splendor, A smile so sunny breaks and tender, His soul seems speaking through it half aloud. Say, what is passing in his sleep? What are the dreams across his vision driven? Hath one, too young to sow, begun to reap? Doth he, at one light grief repining. The worthlessness of earth divining. Already dream of better things in heaven? [17] ON THE TRAIN IN the late fall, from out the window of the car, I see the restful wings of night slow fall and fold, — And naught distinct, as swift we shoot, ex- cept afar The soft horizon-line of melting hill and wold. Then faint at first, brighter at every throb, glow forth The stars that pioneer the lighting of God's dome. Ay! there ye are, ye dipper jewels of the north. Who ever go before and stand above my home. My babes have said their prayers, and nestle to their sleep; My wife, soul-full for them and me, looks out on you : Guard them, ye starry sentinels, while on I sweep ; Flash them the message of my tender lr\Tr<=k onrl ■f-riiP' love and true. [1 8] CROW POINT HOW sweet the day! E'en as a miser wakes At times under the touch of pity's hand And gives profusely from his hoarded store, His face as tender as a mother's smile Ere yet his greed encase it o'er again, So now the bleak November opes its heart And pours o'er all the earth and sky the soft And melting haze of August, and we walk Through fields again, and sit upon the rocks. Here to the dreams, in which this Sabbath day The whole world seems to sleep, we also yield. Into our raptured hearts we draw the deep And blessed influence of the scene. Afar The blue hills fade and veil their ragged tops Beneath the light that softens them: the bare Brown fields flush almost into beauty, as The face of age does sometimes catch again The beauty of its youth : the fir-trees fringe The landscape with immortal hues of green. Across the outspread meadow-lands appear The furrows of the earth just ploughed, and fresh [19] With all the fragrance of the new-turned sod; The sheep, that herded closer when we came, Stand picturesquely grouped upon the ledge And scan us with grave eyes : the cattle love The sun, and saunter feeding here and there, Unconscious that they grace the hillsides now As when the Hebrew poet in his song Sang of the cattle on a thousand hills. Out of the hazy light, e'en as we gaze, Grow on our eyes the Quincy spires far off: The Weymouth village roofs break through the air, And masts of ships at anchor, and, anon, The outlines dim of nestling cottages. Sweet church bells, softened by the dis- tance, strike. And children's voices come, we know not whence. And from the turnpike bridge the thud of hoofs. Eastward, incessant roars the rolling surf; And, just below us, flocks of ducks alight Upon the water, gabbling as they swim; The islands in the harbor lie asleep, Unwaked, so still the surface of the sea, So slumberous the drowsy atmosphere. A rift of inky cloud, its edge defined [20] As with a pencil, rests high up the sky And finds its shadow in the wave below; Elsewhere so faint the light's gradations that The sky and sea upon the horizon meet, And mingle into one. Low in the west E'en as we look, the misty veil is rent, And in a single opening silver-lined The sun half lifts its heavy eyelid and, All else still shrouded in the haze, Its rays fall only on the fortress walls And on the sails of schooners gliding past, Illumining them with light so soft and rare, So delicately fading on the deep That artist's pencil ne'er can copy it, Nor other than the canvas of the soul Reflect its memory. Let us walk on : For now the setting sun's last cloud-tinge faints. The village with its belfry and its elms, Its wharfs and slopes and houses on the hill. Seen from the rustic railing of the bridge On which we linger as we pass, doth seem Like some New England painter's work, who paints, Pent up in town, his dear old village home. Farewell! the night sinks down, the rain- drops fall. And chill November shuts her heart again. [21] THE MUSIC BOX IDLY a music box I wound, And in the gloaming sat alone; The shadows blended with the sound; Memories came mellowing with the tone. It played two tunes — one like the glad Song-greeting of the birds at dawn : One a pathetic minor, sad As loving eyes of love forlorn. Now loud, now low, it laughed and wept. Then faltered down, slower yet and slower, Until the lingering last bars left Were the most plaintive of the score. Slow, intermittent, faint the notes Like single pearls of sweetness roll, Till, with the last and sweetest, floats Into the far-away my soul. So in those shadowed years died she Who was the melody of love. Life ebbing slow and plaintively. Like heart-drops from a bleeding dove; Yet struck an ever sweeter note. Almost too faint to hear at last, Though backward now its echoes float The clearest, sweetest of the past. [22] NEZINSCOT RETURIvTED from years of rack and toil, Escaped from fetter-locks of care, Again I walk my native soil, Again I breathe my native air. The snow is on the circling hills; The crisp smoke curls its morning tress; My heart with old-time freedom fills, I feel again its restfulness. Beside bright hearths with clustering friends, We live our memories back once more ; Too soon the winter evening ends ; — It can recall, but not restore. [23] THE OLD SONGS THE songs we sang were few a.nd plain : We sang them o'er and o'er again. 'Twas long ago, yet now and then We meet and sing them o'er again. And when the last sweet chord has died, We sit in silence side by side. Our hearts are full to running o'er With raindrops from the skies of yore; And none dares speak, but, silent all, We almost hear the shadows fall. Then, while the twilight deepens fast, As dim and somber as the past. Like souls revisiting the spheres Come back to us the buried years. And in their light, but not as then, We live their seasons o'er again. Till closing round our downcast eyes We feel the blinding tear-mists rise. [24] The olden songs, the simple lays, Full of the breath of other days, With dear associations rife. Have come to be a part of life, And though they touch the heart with pain We sing them o'er and o'er again. [25] THE MOUNTAINS OF MAINE I NE'ER shall forget when returning one day To my home 'mid the mountains of Maine, When the summer was nigh and the fair hand of May Was bedecking the country again, What a thrill of delight, inexpressibly sweet, I felt while extending my gaze O'er the scenes, unforgotten, where often my feet Had rambled in earlier days. What a welcoming look I imagined I found In the old streaked mountains in view, In the quick-flowing streams, and meadows elm-crowned. And the fields clothed in summer's bright hue. How the full honest breeze I had tasted so oft, With health and with vigor o'erladen, Swept over my cheek with a touch that was soft As the smooth, velvet hand of a maiden. [26] My soul swelled with joy, springing up to the skies With the view that was spread out before it; ' Then, deeper emotions beginning to rise, A feeling of sadness came o'er it: For I knew from these scenes of my boy- hood around me, The lakes, and the woods and the plain, I must part and dissever the ties that had bound me So long to the mountains of Maine. [27] WOOD NOTES O'ER broken ways, through rock and wood, By brook, by steep, by solitude, By farm-house lone the cliff below, Into the forest depths we go. The moss yields softly to our feet; The birches o'er our pathway meet; Their leaves the azure dot, and make A floating, happy bridge of sighs. Hid woodmates call and bird-notes break In loud and sudden ringing cries, Till half-way up the mountain side. Gleams through the trees the sheeny tide. As if some god with wand had smit The mighty rock and drawn from it The cool, sweet waters forth to make The bridal of the wood and lake. Around its rim, the forest shade In darkened lines of light is laid. Above and imaged in its breast, O'erhangs the bald lone mountain crest. Set like a gem, its face is seen. Raising like lips its little steeps To kiss the breath that o'er them sweeps; Then not a wrinkle on its sheen. Save when upleaps the springing trout, Whence bubbling circles widen out, Until exhausted in their reach. They faint in silence on the beach. [28] 'Twas here we came in sporting days; Our roaring camp-fires, red with blaze, Inflamed the night and Hght the tide With fans of firelight flaring wide. Here on the fallen trunks that sleep Bent in the wave and half on shore, — Here on the tonsured rocks that keep The waters back that spray them o'er, We lay at morn and lay at night And threw with merciless delight The gold-flecked swimmers to the skies; Yet all to pity turned, instead. So still they lay with filming eyes And fading spots of blue and red. Till gasping hard and fast for breath, Tossing the nestling leaves, in vain They struggled, in the throes of death. The living waters to regain. At night, weary of mountain ways. We saw, above the hills afar The gloom succeed the sunset's blaze. Whence burst anon the evening star To gem with gold the August night And touch the wave with broken light. The air from nooks and arches grim The open tree- trunks wandered through; We saw the mountain top grow dim. Fading and dark, mid falling dew ; We saw the rich dark flashing light [29] The ripples threw beneath the night; And still we heard, in pulses low, Their ceaseless beatings ebb and flow; We saw the clouds drive swiftly through The starlit depths of faintest blue, And heard the voices in the air That rise at night in forest deep And weird and pensive music bear To lull the senses into sleep. At morn we saw the sun uprise And fire the forest green anew With every tint of verdant dyes, Striking the mountain-side with light, While all below still grayer grew And woods and waves wore twilight hue, Thus crowning day upon the night. And all this sweet transition hour A thousand warblers waked and sung And drenched the branches with a shower Of tuneful trills that interrung. The morn was brimmed with melody. That overflowed in countless rills Through ether purling to the sea And rippling down aerial hills. They struck the dewy leaves and woke As many echoes slumbering there, Till the whole world in carol broke. And myriad song-notes thrilled the air. [30] THE DEAD LEAVES SUCH a glory of red And orange and gold On hill-top and wold, On the slope and the side, From the foot to the head, Of the mountains anigh, As far and as wide As the outlooking eye Hath range to behold! As if in the night A billow of gold Had flamingly rolled The wilderness o'er. And left in its trace The magnificent light Of the colors it bore, To enrich the whole face Of the earth with a store Of measureless gold. They are fallen and dead ; And the fulness and strength Of their beauty have fled ; And, wasted at length And withered and thin. Their delicate frames Already begin [31] To be painfully plain, Like a man when the flames Of fever and pain Have hollowed his face, And tightened the skin, And discovered the trace Of the bones of his face. They lived and are dying. I fancy them sighing Over the past. They sigh that at last, After all the sweet phase Of the long summer days, The end is but death ; And that life at the best Is a trial and test And only a breath. And almost I see Them looking at me With sorrowful faces, As day after day I bear them away And carefully lay Them in burial places. [32] The bare, stricken boughs Like mourners are left Alone and bereft Like statues of grief Till the spring-time awake, And the new life arouse Each slumbering leaf. So may it awake And, like spring weather, make The better soul rise, Like a blossom awake And bloom out of the eyes! [33] APPLE BUDS BURST, ye apple-buds, red and white; Breathe your fragrance into the dawn ; You will fade and fall ere Saturday night, And the apple-boughs wonder where you are gone. Sing, ye little birds, robin and wren; Build your nests where the buds unfold; Where will you be, and your nestful, when The apple-boughs shrivel in winter cold? Burst, fond heart, with the love you bestow; Sing, happy heart, with the love you bring: The apple-blooms fall, and the birds they go, But love in the soul is eternal spring. Lift your tender eyes, violets blue ; Cling, daisy, close to the meadow's soft breast ; For your petals will weep, tear-dropped with dew. When your false lover, sunbeam, kisses the west. [34] Toss, ye idle winds, out on the leaves; Woo the gold in her sunny hair: Death and October await their sheaves; Then wooing is weeping, and hope de- spair. Burst, fond heart, with the love you be- stow; Sing, happy heart, with the love you bring; The leaves they fall, and her tresses lie low. But love over death forever is king. [35] SCHOOL DAYS THE years go by, but never lose The garnered wealth they bore, The morning, kissing up the dews, Is richer than before. All rains that fell, all suns that shone, In this June's roses stay: The past is all the more our own When clustered with to-day. So beams our school-time here and now Eden of book and scroll — The scholar's sunrise on the brow, His stirring in the soul. Again we part, but with us take The bygone's draught divine, For in our hearts afresh awake The days of auld lang syne. [36] THE BEACH DEAR friends In sweet remembered days Spent long ago beside the sea, — Once more, re-singing olden lays, I ask you live them o'er with me. So long, so short ago they seem. Half fact, half fancy, of our youth. At once kaleidoscoped in dream, Yet clearly outlined in the truth. Apart, they bind us still. We meet — A word or nod — we pass — and, lo. We stroll the sands, and at our feet The great blue waters ebb and flow. Fair skies are over sea and land; The woods are cool, the fields are green; The church, the light on either hand, The fulness of repose between. We swim at dawn, we raise the mast. We lie on rocks, watch brig and barque With great white sails glide slowly past, Till the long day glooms into dark. [37] We gather at the evening meal; The candle flickers on the wall ; Outside the warm night shadows steal ; The sea's deep murmurs rise and fall. We sit about the open door, We tell old tales, we sing old staves, Till the cool stars deep slumber pour. And dreams are in the lulling waves. [38] SUNSET ON the West Behold the gorgeous mountain crest! Dusk hills and slopes, where cattle feast, Enclose the East. In the West The crimson sun lies down to rest; Yet from its bars one ray released Streams to the East. In the East A cottage window-pane, increased And to a flaming meteor dressed, Out-glows the West. Such are they Who, dwelling far from light away, Yet, catching there a ray divine, Supremely shine. [39] LIMITATION YOU walk amid a wilderness Of hurrying forms and eager feet, And now and then a hand you press Or smile to nods from those you meet. And yet you are not here, but far; Your mind is not with forms and flesh ; Your soul is where the breezes are, As free from weight, as free from mesh. Your soul is where the breezes are ; Nay, faster rides than rolls the sea. Outruns the wind, and strike th star, And whirleth through immensity. It is not with you on the earth ; It sees not those who pass you by; But, proudly mindful of its birth, It springeth, firelike, to the sky. [40] JESUS I WOULD, dear Jesus, I could break The hedge that creeds and hearsay make. And, Hke thy first disciples, be In person led and taught by thee. I read thy words — so strong, so sweet; I seek the footprints of thy feet; But men so mystify the trace, I long to see thee face to face. Wouldst thou not let me, at thy side, In thee, in thee so sure, confide? Like John, upon thy breast recline And feel thy heart make mine divine? [41] EVENING HYMN THE evening winds begin to blow, The shadows now grow long; But still we linger, ere we go, To sing our latest song. Sing praise to God for sun and shade. For summer's smiles and tears, For all the blessings he has laid Upon our teeming years. Sing to each other truer love, Affection's kindly glow, The tenderness of God above In human hearts below. E'en as the dews now gently fall. So, smiling on the day, May God at eve upon us all His benediction lay. [42] OUR MINISTER THREESCORE and ten the years that round Your full life to its perfect sphere, With the white wreath of honor crowned, The full corn ripened in the ear. To God, to man thy brother, true. Give not yet o'er the Christian strife ; Let us who love you, still pursue The leading of your noble life. God's peace is in your heart, well earned; Sure treasure yours, laid up above: The bread you cast hath all returned In harvests of unmeasured love. [43I OUR SEXTON GRAY in service and true as steel, An honest man is our sexton old, One of the sort in whom we feel The antique stamp of the genuine gold. Sure as the clock that stands in the tower For forty long years he has rung the bell, Struck the glad chimes of the wedding hour. And tolled the sad notes of the funeral knell. The homely church, old-fashioned and grim. He loves it now as he loved his wife ; The organ and pulpit commune with him. And the aisles and pews are his very life. He loves its glooms, and its shadows win His spirit back to the silent yore: He has ushered so many out and in! He remembers so many who come no more! He would sooner part hand than fail his trust : Forty long years and no day lost ! Winter and summer, come what must, Duty has found him true to his post. [44] But God has now smitten him hard, and torn The wife of his youth from his side apart; And he enters the church, this Sabbath morn. With aching lids and a broken heart. Yet he rings the bell with a swing so bold None knows he winces at every throb. Nor do I till in mine his hand I hold, And hear him, through lips that quiver, sob — " For many a week in pain she lay. But grew easy at last at morning's peep: I sat by her bedside night and day, And closed her eyes when she fell asleep." He catches the rope in dumb despair ; The bell rings out wide over the town. And utters abroad on the morning air The cry of anguish his heart keeps down. [45] ORDINATION HYMN OH Father, let thy spirit wake, Thy flame inspire his soul we pray Who here the bread of life shall break, And point to us thy truth and v/ay. Our shepherd who shall lead, be he. To pastures green by waters still; Thy staff to comfort us so we. Through shadows walking, fear no ill. A prophet sitting by the well. Let him thy living water draw. Interpreter to wisely tell In spirit and in truth thy law. Be with him that he lift thy rod, With us that we stay up his hand, So we with him and all with God Move onward to the promised land. [46] THE PILGRIM ALMIGHTY God, to thee we raise Our hymns of thankfulness and praise, Within the hollow of whose hand The Pilgrim sought his promised land : — Not the rich pastures of the vine Flowing with honey, milk and wine, But bleak shores swept by storm and sea, His rude sole welcome — thou art free! With corn he wooed the sullen soil, But more with learning, home and toil, Till now no vineyard of the sun Blooms like the wilderness he won. Inspired by faith, in purpose great. He steadfast set his church and state ; Made them to stand 'gainst flood and shock. For both he built upon the rock. One taught — to God and conscience true — More light to seek, the right to do : The other broadened to the span Of man's equality with man. Children of fathers such as he, Be ours his true nobility! Lord of the realm, he served its growth; To serve — be still the freeman's oath! [47] CENTENNIAL HYMN, 1876 PRAISE be to God, whose cloud by day And fire by night have led the way Till sure and staunch the nation clears Its cycle of a hundred years. A hundred years of growth and grace; And lo, a sparse dependent race, Within the Atlantic border pent, Hath broadened o'er a continent. From grander heights attained, we bless The grand beginnings, none the less: Unhushed by time, their utterance rings And stirs us still to grander things. Today before us rise sublime The giants of that early time As fearing God, not kings, they dare A freeman's commonwealth declare. [48] THE FLAG LIKE the grass swayed to and fro Over which the breezes go, Like long tresses tumbhng down RippHng up from foot to crown, Like billows rolling on the ocean, Our glorious flag floats full and free. Its matchless hues now interfuse, And now swell wide against the tide That bloats its straining canopy; Like smoke it wreathes in rills, and breathes Its fainting blaze into the haze, And slowly palpitates until It lures the eye as if it still Went rippling further through the sky — The very poetry of motion! Emblem thou of liberty, Banner of the brave and free, Stars and stripes! Red, white and blue! Old Thirteen, new Thirty- two! Afloat aloft on land or ocean. There's not an eye with tears untraced That sees thy glory in the sky; [49] There's no true heart that would not die To keep thy scroll, no stripe erased, No star obscured, still floating high; No wanderer, far from home, beholds Without a thrill thy sheltering folds ; There's no man, worthy to be free. Who doth not look and cling to thee With all a patriot's devotion. [50] THE SOLDIER'S HOME ' 1861-1881 A MOTHER'S kiss — a sweetheart's sigh, — A cottage door, red-arched with rose; A fair young soldier cries Good-bye, And to the front of battle goes. Wounded at Malvern Hill he fell; In Libby wasted, heart and limb; Kinder hath death been than the shell At Gettysburg that shattered him. Yet dared he all, and all he bore. What need feared he, come late or soon? Had not his country o'er and o'er Pledged him her laurel and her boon? Nation and state keep well their trust; Yet lest one roofless veteran roam, Mother, sweetheart and roses — dust, Add we our gift — a soldier's home. [51] THE CAPITOL AT WASHINGTON THIS is the terrace of the Capitol. The July sun sets slowly in the west And with its glow suffuses there the sky 'Gainst which the monument springs high and white. The city roofs are clustered in the green Luxuriant foliage of the summer leaves; While near at hand against these marble walls Sweep up soft lawns like emerald set with pearl. The hum of the long summer day is past, And silence, yet more eloquent, has come — The silence of the hushing of the earth, As if in his great arm God gave it rest. Sweetness and light are laid upon its face, — The sweetness of the light of dying day, So exquisite that though it seems unwaned It quenches not the young moon's crescent horn Which shines serene and clear half up the sky. [52] Sweetness and light it is, but, more than these. It is the embodied deity of peace, — The peace of nature's love enfolding down, The peace that puts to rest the heart of man. The peace of land and people blessed by God. Southward, between the arches of the trees, The gleam of the Potomac answers back. As it lies lingering at the bathing feet Of the Virginia hills whose tops are crowned With verdure and with rich dark cooling woods. Across from shore to shore the long bridge runs And with its slender stretch yet firmly links Forever to each other North and South. What memories throng it now, dense as the hosts That made it echo once the tread of war! Lo, there the field where freedom's mighty heart Throbbed in the breasts of chivalry and youth. And sped to battle which it bled to win For those it fought for and for those it fought. [53] There lie the ashes of the patriot dead Who people now the spaces of the sky And thence look down upon a land re- deemed, On shackled bondmen disenthralled and free, A broken union whole — united states, Aye, and united hearts, — one people all. [54] A KINDLY CRITIC OH, my baby with soft white cheeks! Oh, my baby with wise blue eyes! Nestle your head down under my chin, Hear papa sing of the sea and the skies. Nobody else thinks he can sing: You are so little you tolerate him, And when you laugh and look up in his face, His heart is happiness full to the brim. Homely red flannel night-gown on, You have gone to sleep while he holds you fast; Dreamless you slumber, but wide wakes he And walks with the shadowy dreams of the past. [55] APR 14 1915 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS lllililllllililliliilil 015 762 550