| |
| WHERE Wall Street’s head from full Broadway | |
| Takes portions of the surge and spray, | |
| By silent night, and roaring day, | |
| Its graves it guardeth. | |
| |
| The jetsam of the swollen stream, | 5 |
| Profounder far their peace doth seem, | |
| For tossing drift that from their dream, | |
| The still close wardeth. | |
| |
| In days when Bleecker Street was rus, | |
| And Murray Hill as is to us | 10 |
| Champlain, Au Sable; when this fuss | |
| And fret were quiet; | |
| |
| When ladies yet might think it queer | |
| To date in 18—; when all here, | |
| In brief, was up-town—in the year, | 15 |
| Say ’08,—I spy it. | |
| |
| Perchance, in there among the pews, | |
| Turned down his Sunday buckled shoes, | |
| Knight Lawrence—ere that latest cruise— | |
| The stainless sinner! | 20 |
| |
| Trite wonder, where his tomb doth stand. | |
| Had he a thought? The rector’s hand | |
| He pressed, most like. Just back to land, | |
| And drove to dinner. | |
| |
| Yet, haply, here from me a span, | 25 |
| Some stopped to chat of the new man | |
| In Portugal, and his great plan | |
| For Boney brewing. | |
| |
| How Burr’d turned up again, some said, | |
| Young Irving made abroad great head, | 30 |
| And how of Gallic power the spread | |
| We’d all be ruing. | |
| |
| Splash, splash! the midnight’s fresh laid dust | |
| The swift aids churn the mud—needs must, | |
| The troops, from off Long Island thrust, | 35 |
| Are marching nor’ward. | |
| |
| Lord Sterling’s taken, and his men | |
| All slain—the field was but a pen | |
| Of slaughter: we’re the King’s again | |
| From this time forward. | 40 |
| |
| It buffets back the lines-men’s drum, | |
| Steel-fringed the scarlet ribbons come, | |
| Strong silence through the sullen hum | |
| St. George back bringing. | |
| |
| Even the gliding of their files, | 45 |
| In step that tells upon the miles, | |
| They wheel—cling, clang, upon the aisles | |
| Their muskets ringing. | |
| |
| Strain pipe and bellows! Belfry sway! | |
| Roar street and slip! We greet to-day | 50 |
| Primmest of patres patriæ, | |
| Great George!—it endeth. | |
| |
| Scant gleaner I amid the dead; | |
| The reaper closely harvested; | |
| A gesture here, a word there said, | 55 |
| Are all he lendeth. | |
| |
| What point or purpose had their fate? | |
| They lived, and unlived; like a slate | |
| Their old place is—our names the late | |
| Their places borrow. | 60 |
| |
| Rubbed out, writ in; it seemeth strange | |
| To me, and plain to you—we’ll change; | |
| The old thought and the new will range | |
| This time to-morrow. | |
| |
| And, silent ones, if what one saith, | 65 |
| You hear, and comforts life in death | |
| As death in life, you’ll wish for breath | |
| To make me know it. | |
| |
| For, somehow, when first seen the place, | |
| It seemed to nourish more the grace | 70 |
| Of kinship than did all the space | |
| Above, below it. | |
| |
| Come on, friend—here we may not lie; | |
| Our place is taken, yet may I, | |
| And you, find some day time to die— | 75 |
| A rest remaineth. | |
| |
| Some spot is ours—a quiet nook, | |
| Where shade and shine make pipe and book | |
| To idlers pleasant: thither look, | |
| Where peace sole reigneth. | 80 |
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