Page:The Earl of Mayo.djvu/209

Rh 'Yesterday,' said one of the Dublin papers, 'we saw a State Solemnity vitalised by the subtle spell of national feeling. Seldom are the two things united in an Irish public funeral. When imperial pomp is displayed, the national heart is cold. When the people pay spontaneous homage to the dead, the trappings of the State are absent, its voice mute. Yesterday, for once, this ill-omened rule was broken. Government and the people united in doing honour to an illustrious Irishman.' The Indian Press had given vent to the wild sorrow of many races in many languages; the English newspapers were full of nobly expressed tributes; Parliamentary chiefs had their well-chosen utterances for the nation's loss. But Lord Mayo, as he sat on the top of the sea-girt hill and gazed towards the west, where his dear home lay beyond the sunset, would have prized that united mourning of his countrymen above any panegyric. They laid him at last in the secluded graveyard which he had chosen on his own land.