Page:The Hundred Best Poems (lyrical) in the English language - second series.djvu/145

 Let the bell be toll'd: And a reverent people behold The towering car, the sable steeds: Bright let it be with its blazon'd deeds, Dark in its funeral fold. Let the bell be toll'd: And a deeper knell in the heart be knoll'd; And the sound of the sorrowing anthem roll'd Thro' the dome of the golden cross; And the volleying cannon thunder his loss; He knew their voices of old. For many a time in many a clime His captain's-ear has heard them boom Bellowing victory, bellowing doom: When he with those deep voices wrought, Guarding realms and kings from shame; With those deep voices our dead captain taught The tyrant, and asserts his claim In that dread sound to the great name, Which he has worn so pure of blame, In praise and in dispraise the same, A man of well-attemper'd frame. O civic muse, to such a name, To such a name for ages long, To such a name, Preserve a broad approach of fame, And ever-echoing avenues of song.

Who is he that cometh, like an honour'd guest, With banner and with music, with soldier and with priest, With a nation weeping, and breaking on my rest? Rh