| |
| HUSHED are the sounds of party-strife | |
| In reverence round the quiet bed, | |
| As all the busy streams of Life | |
| Seem stayed beside one spirit fled: | |
| And England sends the message on, | 5 |
| To West and East,—a great man gone. | |
| |
| He, but a few short days ago | |
| Held in a nation’s half-mistrust, | |
| Here feared, there followed, lying low, | |
| Where all may trample on his dust, | 10 |
| Lies safe with laurels round his brow,— | |
| His party’s then, his England’s now. | |
| |
| Strong loves he conquered on his way, | |
| Strong as the enmities he woke, | |
| And the loosed passions of the day | 15 |
| In praise and anger round him broke: | |
| Anger and Enmity’s o’erthrown, | |
| Death has for sister, Love alone. | |
| |
| Men called him alien, deemed him set | |
| On dreams of empire not of ours, | 20 |
| And prone true empire to forget | |
| In the long clash of jarring powers: | |
| But England’s ’scutcheon blazons still | |
| The motto of his life,—I will. | |
| |
| In steady purpose, steady toil, | 25 |
| He followed, and he won, the prize, | |
| Which through the Senate’s fierce turmoil | |
| Lighted, but dazzled not, his eyes: | |
| Nor rank, nor fortune, smoothed the course; | |
| He dared, and conquered, and by force. | 30 |
| |
| As patient as the great should be, | |
| As watchful as the purposed are, | |
| He marked power’s ebbing, flowing sea, | |
| Now sparkling near, now murmuring far, | |
| Till with strong hand he grasped the helm, | 35 |
| Through storm and shine to steer a realm. | |
| |
| And when, Life’s threescore years and ten | |
| In the long passage overpast, | |
| He yielded up the helm again, | |
| He stood as steady to the last: | 40 |
| Not Cæsar’s robe, when Cæsar died, | |
| Was folded with a calmer pride. | |
| |
| Calmly he gave the reins of State, | |
| As first he held them, self-possessed; | |
| And undismayed, as unelate, | 45 |
| Turned to the love once loved the best, | |
| And wooed, from strife of tongues apart, | |
| The Muse of Story to his heart. | |
| |
| So, England’s Minister, good-night! | |
| Nor praise, nor blame, can move thee now; | 50 |
| Safe from the fierce and public light | |
| Which beat upon thy vessel’s prow: | |
| Thy place is with the great alone, | |
| Not one’s nor other’s—England’s own. | |
| |
