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Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889

The Exile at Rest

By John Pierpont (1785–1866)

HIS falchion flashed along the Nile;

His hosts he led through Alpine snows;

O’er Moscow’s towers, that shook the while,

His eagle flag unrolled,—and froze.

Here sleeps he now, alone;—not one

Of all the kings whose crowns he gave,

Nor sire, nor brother, wife, nor son,

Hath ever seen or sought his grave.

Here sleeps he now, alone;—the star,

That led him on from crown to crown,

Hath sunk;—the nations from afar

Gazed, as it faded and went down.

He sleeps alone;—the mountain cloud

That night hangs round him, and the breath

Of morning scatters, is the shroud

That wraps his martial form in death.

High is his couch;—the ocean flood

Far, far below by storms is curled,

As round him heaved, while high he stood,

A stormy and inconstant world.

Hark! Comes there from the Pyramids,

And from Siberia’s waste of snow,

And Europe’s fields, a voice that bids

The world be awed to mourn him?—No;—

The only, the perpetual dirge,

That’s heard here, is the sea-bird’s cry,

The mournful murmur of the surge,

The cloud’s deep voice, the wind’s low sigh.