Page:New Yorker Obituary.pdf/12



Nature, thy fairy godmother, Has lavished, for thy part, A prodigality of gifts To make thee what thou art: The lovely face, the gifted mind, The kind and generous heart.

I see thee, with thy night-black hair Flung wild and loose in thy despair; Upraised are thy imploring hands To heaven, which yet thy prayer withstands; And in thy deep and flashing eye Is passion's utter agony.

A Grecian statue dost thou seem, Wrought up in some tumultuous dream; While in the music of thy tone Is every thrill to sorrow known. Queen art thou—and still must be queen, While one heart keeps thy haunting scene.

The conqueror of a thousand fields! Not as in olden time, When carnage urged its crimson path, And conquest was a crime— But in a universal war For every right sublime.

The laurel that he wears should have In English hearts its birth; His victories kept inviolate Our island's sacred earth; They were the glorious ransom given For every English hearth.