Page:Pieces People Ask For.djvu/84

74 Its pioneers are the dreamers who heed neither tongue nor pen Of the human spiders whose silk is wove from the lives of toiling men.

Come, brothers, here to the burial! But weep not, rather rejoice For his fearless life and his fearless death; for his true, unequalled voice, Like a silver trumpet sounding the note of human right; For his brave heart always ready to enter the weak ones' fight, For his soul unmoved by the mob's wild shout or the social sneer's disgrace, For his freeborn spirit, that drew no line between class or creed or race.

Come, workers! here was a teacher, and the lesson he taught was good: There are no classes or races, but one human brotherhood; There are no creeds to be outlawed, no colors of skin debarred; Mankind is one in its rights and wrongs,—one right, one hope, one guard. By his life he taught, by his death we learn the great reformer's creed: The right to be free, and the hope to be just, and the guard against selfish greed. And richest of all are the unseen wreaths on his coffin-lid laid down By the toil-stained hands of workmen,—their sobs, their kiss, and their crown. John Boyle O'Reilly.

baby lay in its mother's arms, All sweet with its tiny dimpled charms; But little mouth and tongue wercsore, And of its food 'twould take no more. The doctor hemmed, and shook his head. And looking wise, he gravely said,