| |
From “Ode on the Death of the Duke”
November 18, 1852
I. BURY the Great Duke | |
| With an empire’s lamentation, | |
| Let us bury the Great Duke | |
| To the noise of the mourning of a mighty nation, | |
| Mourning when their leaders fall, | 5 |
| Warriors carry the warrior’s pall, | |
| And sorrow darkens hamlet and hall. | |
| |
II. Where shall we lay the man whom we deplore? | |
| Here, in streaming London’s central roar. | |
| Let the sound of those he wrought for, | 10 |
| And the feet of those he fought for, | |
| Echo round his bones for evermore. | |
| |
III. Lead out the pageant: sad and slow, | |
| As fits an universal woe. | |
| Let the long, long procession go, | 15 |
| And let the sorrowing crowd about it grow. | |
| And let the mournful martial music blow; | |
| The last great Englishman is low. | |
| |
IV. Mourn, for to us he seems the last, | |
| Remembering all his greatness in the Past. | 20 |
| No more in soldier fashion will he greet | |
| With lifted hand the gazer in the street. | |
| O friends, our chief state-oracle is mute; | |
| Mourn for the man of long enduring blood, | |
| The statesman-warrior, moderate, resolute, | 25 |
| Whole in himself, a common good. | |
| Mourn for the man of amplest influence, | |
| Yet clearest of ambitious crime, | |
| Our greatest yet with least pretence, | |
| Great in council and great in war, | 30 |
| Foremost captain of his time, | |
| Rich in saving common-sense, | |
| And, as the greatest only are, | |
| In his simplicity sublime. | |
| O good gray head which all men knew, | 35 |
| O voice from which their omens all men drew, | |
| O iron nerve to true occasion true, | |
| O fallen at length that tower of strength | |
| Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew! | |
| Such was he whom we deplore. | 40 |
| The long self-sacrifice of life is o’er. | |
| The great World-victor’s victor will be seen no more. | |
| |
V. All is over and done: | |
| Render thanks to the Giver, | |
| England, for thy son. | 45 |
| Let the bell be toll’d. | |
| Render thanks to the Giver, | |
| And render him to the mould. | |
| Under the cross of gold | |
| That shines over city and river, | 50 |
| There he shall rest for ever | |
| Among the wise and the bold. | |
| Let the bell be toll’d: | |
| And a reverent people behold | |
| The towering car, the sable steeds: | 55 |
| Bright let it be with its blazon’d deeds, | |
| Dark in its funeral fold. | |
| Let the bell be toll’d: | |
| And a deeper knell in the heart be knoll’d; | |
| And the sound of the sorrowing anthem roll’d | 60 |
| Thro’ the dome of the golden cross; | |
| And the volleying cannon thunder his loss; | |
| He knew their voices of old. | |
| For many a time in many a clime | |
| His captain’s-ear has heard them boom | 65 |
| Bellowing victory, bellowing doom; | |
| When he with those deep voices wrought, | |
| Guarding realms and kings from shame; | |
| With those deep voices our dead captain taught | |
| The tyrant, and asserts his claim | 70 |
| In that dread sound to the great name, | |
| Which he has worn so pure of blame, | |
| In praise and in dispraise the same, | |
| A man of well-attemper’d fame. | |
| O civic muse, to such a name, | 75 |
| To such a name for ages long, | |
| To such a name, | |
| Preserve a broad approach of fame, | |
| And ever-echoing avenues of song. | |
| |
