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Peace in the clover-scented air,
And stars within the dome;
And underneath, in dim repose,
A plain, New England home.
Within, a widow in her weeds,
From whom all joy is flown,
Who kneels among her sleeping babes,
And weeps and prays alone!

Ex. CXCVIII.-ADDRESS AT THE CONSECRATION OF THE SOLDIER'S CEMETERY, AT GETTYSBURG, NOVEMBER, 1863.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

FOURSCORE and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion of it as the final resting-place of those who here gave their lives that the nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here; but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us,-that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to the cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom; and that the government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

LIERARY OF

DIRGE FOR A SOLDIER.

Ex. CXCIX.-DIRGE FOR A SOLDIER.

GEORGE H. BOKER.

CLOSE his eyes, his work is done!
What to him is friend or foeman,
Rise of moon, or set of sun,
Hand of man, or kiss of woman?
Lay him low, lay him low,
In the clover or the snow!
What cares he? he can not know.
Lay him low!

As man may, he fought his fight,
Proved his truth by his endeavor;
Let him sleep in solemn night,
Sleep forever and forever.

Lay him low, lay him low,
In the clover or the snow!
What cares he? he can not know!
Lay him low!

Fold him in his country's stars,
Roll the drum and fire the volley!

What to him are all our wars,
What but death bemocking folly!
Lay him low, lay him low,

In the clover or the snow,

What cares he? he can not know!
Lay him low!

Leave him to God's watching eye,

Trust him to the hand that made him;

Mortal love weeps idly by;

God alone has power to aid him.

Lay him low, lay him low,
In the clover or the snow!
What cares he? he can not know!
Lay him low!

301

Ex. CC.-AFTER THE BATTLE.

THE drums are all muffled, the bugles are still;
There's a pause in the valley, a halt on the hill;
And bearers of standards swerve back with a thrill
Where sheaves of the dead bar the way;
For a great field is reaped, Heaven's garners to fill,
And stern Death holds his harvest to-day.

There's a voice in the wind like a spirit's low cry;
"Tis the muster-roll sounding,-and who shall reply
For those whose wan faces glare white to the sky,
With eyes fixed so steadfast and dimly,

As they wait the last trump, which they may not defy!
Whose hands clutch the sword-hilt so grimly.

The brave heads late lifted are solemnly bowed,
As the riderless chargers stand quivering and cowed,-
As the burial requiem is chanted aloud,

The groans of the death-stricken drowning,
While Victory looks on like a queen pale and proud
Who awaits till the morning her crowning.

There is no mocking blazon, as clay sinks to clay;
The vain pomps of peace-time are all swept away
In the terrible face of the dread battle-day;

Nor coffins nor shroudings are here;

Only relics that lay where thickest the fray,and a headless spear.

A rent casque

Far away, tramp on tramp, sounds the march of the foe,
Like a storm-wave retreating, spent, fitful and slow;
With sound like their spirits that faint as they go
By the red-glowing river, whose waters

Shall darken with sorrow the land where they flow
To the eyes of her desolate daughters.

They are fled they are gone; but oh! not as they came ;
In the pride of those numbers they staked on the game,
Never more shall they stand in the vanguard of fame,

Never lift the stained sword which they drew; Never more shall they boast of a glorious name, Never march with the leal and the true.

A THANKSGIVING HYMN.

303

Where the wreck of our legions lay stranded and torn,
They stole on our ranks in the mist of the morn;
Like the giant of Gaza, their strength it was shorn
Ere those mists have rolled up to the sky;

From the flash of the steel a new day-break seemed born,
As we sprang up to conquer or die.

The tumult is silenced; the death-lots are cast,
And the heroes of battle are slumbering their last:
you dream of yon pale form that rode on the blast?
Would ye see it once more, oh ye brave!

Do

Yes-the broad road to honor is red where ye passed,. And of glory ye asked-but a grave!

Ex. CCI.-A THANKSGIVING HYMN.

PARK BENJAMIN.

Oн, God of Battles! by whose hand,
Uplifted to protect the right,

Are led the armies of our land

To be triumphant in the fight;
Without whose smile, the solemn night

Which now in shadow veils the sky

Would never yield to morning light,

Bend down, and hear thy people's cry.

Bend from thy heaven of heavens, and see
A nation which had grown so great
That, drawing off their heart from Thee,
They worshipped fortune, fame and fate,
And called upon thy name too late.

Thy righteous anger we deplore;

Oh, look upon their hapless state

And be our sure defence once more.

Be thou, who wast our father's God,

Our own reliance, strength and stay;

And let the sacred path they trod

Still be their children's chosen way,

Illumined by that glorious ray
Which guided through the desert drear,
A fire at night, a cloud by day,
For many a sad, despairing year.

Oh thou, whose smiling face appears

At last, behind war's awful frown;
The tribute of our grateful tears,

Like rain in Summer falling down,
Accept, and let thy mercy crown
This contest, holy in thy sight;

And thine be all the vast renown,
And ours the victory of Right.

Ex. CCII.-I HAVE A COUNTRY.

"I have a country," cried a boy, starting up. "My father is fighting for it, and my brother has died for it."

I HAVE a country! who with coward tongue

And treacherous heart has said it is not so?

I have a country, and her flag is flung,

Starry and bright on all the winds that blow.

I have a country! From the shores of Maine,
Stormy and bleak, to the Pacific sea;
The granite mountains and the fertile plains,
The mighty rivers, all belong to me.

To me alike, the sturdy northern pines

Which toss their branches in the winds forlorn,
The feathery palm trees and the clustering vines,
The fields of cotton and the groves of corn.

I have a country, for the brave have died
Upon a thousand fields to make them free;
The land is mine, their blood has sanctified-

Mine, North and South, and mine from sea to sea.

And 'neath her banner still the battles rage,

And armies wrestle in the cannon's breath;

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