Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 18.djvu/251



Hall Jackson Kelley 223

has recently dedicated the McLoughlin Home at Oregon City and reinterred the body of Jason Lee at Salem. The body of Kelley lies in his boyhood home in Gilmanton, and there it should remain. Above it might well be placed these words of Stevenson, which read as if they were written with Kelley in mind:

"Here lies one who meant well, tried a little, failed nmch: — surely that may be his epitaph, of which he need not be ashamed. Nor will he complain at the summons which calls a defeated soldier from the field ; defeated, ay, if he were Paul or Marcus Aurelius : — but if there is still one inch of fight in his old spirit, undishonoured. The faith which sustained him in his life-long blindness and life-long disappointment will scarce even be required in this last formality of laying down his arms. Give him a march with his old bones ; there, out of the glorious sun-colored earth, out of the day and the dust and the ecstasy — ^there goes another Faithful Failure !"

(To be concluded)