National Republican., 1876-01-04
THE DYING YEAR.
BY WILLIAM ". ROBERTSON.

Over the smOuldering embers dim.
That struggled to live on his cherries hearth,
The Old Year bowed him, silent and grim,
Coming his life from its radiant birth.
Out were the lights in his halls of state;
No wardcr stood by the hingeless door;
From his fallen fortunes, diseonsolate,
The glory had fed forevermOre.
But high were the reyeries held below
Under his feeble and palsied head;
Scanty respect for him they show
What to the living are dying or dead?
But watch they keep by the castle gate,
A bright lookout on the midnight drear;
They welcome monarch to high estate,
They wait his coming, the glad New Year!
Neither heeds nor hears the graybeard hoar
The din his former lieges keep;
Cold is the blast through the open door
The Old Year mods, as If asleep.
Well may he sleep! his course is run;
He has sewed his ickle cOurtiers day
A monarch dethroned, his work is done
In cold neglect let him pass away!
But he rouses at last, as the tolling bell
Proclaims that the night is waning fast,
And the eehoing sounds ring his dying knell-
He and his belong to the shadowy Past,
And crOuched in the shade OF his lonely bier,
Over the smOuldering embers dim,
He family murmers, with none to hear
But himself and the poet and darkness grim.
merry times I've seen in these darkened halls.
Youth and Beauty with gladness gay
Since first waited beneath the walls,
Bright with the glory of New Years day.
Yet many the dimmed and saddened hours
Many the moments of wild regret!
Faded and dead are the amaranth flowers,
Too scentless to cherish, too dear to forget.
Brave hopes have been strangled by ruthless
might,
Love has grown cold in many breast;
Dear ones are sleeping in endless night;
Hearts are aching in cold unrest.
What matters IL now? wait alone.
UnlOved, unwept, for the final end.
Who waits to hear my dying moan?
Who 1T this time is the Old Years friend:''
Bright CLEANED the lights on the winter snow,
Music arose in an anthem clear;
Wild the tumult they raised below,
And knew they welcomed the glad New Year.
The bells rang out on the frosty air,
Clear and sweet in matin hymn.
The clock struck twelve, and the dead Old Year
Breathed out his life with the embers dim.
1 covered his face with the darksome pail,
l stretched his limbs on the lonely bier
For he. gave me hopes would fain recall
And to me at least was the Old Year dear.
But hurried with speed to the revels below
Who'll blame if we bury in haste the past:
1t gave us much-and we love it so!-
Eut the kaiser by rights, after all, is the last.
And the New Year, clothed in the amaranth here
Ofour hopes and trusts, right royal love
We have buried the old, and the radiant new
Shall bloom in the truth fOrevermOre!
Dig deep the grave, and sin and shame.
falsehoOd and sorrow, deceit and moil,
Suffering and want and evil fame,
Trouble and carnage, unrequited toll
Cover them all with the dead Old Year,
Deep meath the clOds that We lay over him.
So shall they rest on his crumbling bier,
Forever entombed in the darkness grim.
Virtue and peace in our hearts evermore
Shall live. uncursCd with the passion and care
Yc have buried forage with the days before
When We welcomed the reign of the bright New
Year.