St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1877-08-24
Better the desert spaces, where the day
Wanders from dawn to dusk and finds no life

w anuels from dawn TO dusk and finds no life!
VII
But over all the tireless years swept on,
Till side by side the Centuries grew old,
And the young Nation, great and strong and
bold,
Forgot its early struggles, in triumphs later wonl
1t stretched its arms from East to West;
1t gathered to its mighty breast
From every cline, from every soil
The hunted sons of want and toll;
1t gave to each dwelling place;
1t blent them in one common race
And over all, from sea to sea,
Wide flew the banner of the freel
1t did not fear the wrath of kings,
Nor the dread grip of deadlier things
Gaunt Famine with its CHASTITY horde
Dishonor sheathing it's foul sword.
Nor faithless friend treacherous blow
Struck in the dark by stealthy foe
For over all its wide domain
From shore to shore, from main to main,
From vale to mountain top, it saw
The reign of plenty, peace and lawl
VIII
Thus Jared the Nation, prosperous, great and
free,
Prophet and herald of the good to be;
And on its humber way, in calm content,
Safe in her mountain Businesses she dwelt,
Her lifes first cares forgot its woes unfelt,
And thought her btterest tears had all been shed,
For peace was in her borders, and God reigned
overhead.
But suddenly over the hills there came
A cry that rent her with grief and shame
A cry from the Nation in sore distress
Stricken down in the pride of its mightinessl
With passionate ardOr up she sprang.
And her voice like the peal of trumpet rang
What no! brave sons of mine,
Strong with the strength of the mountain pine
To the front of the battle, away away!
The Nation is bleeding in deadly fray,
The Nation, it may be, is dying to-day!
On, then, to the rescue away awayr'
All! how they answered let the ages tell
For they shall guard the sacred story well
Green grows the grass, today on many a bat
tle-fed;
Wars dread alarms are DER; its scars are
healed;
Its bitter agony has found surcease;
A reunited land clasps hands in peace
But, oh ye blessed dead, whose graves are
strewn
From where our forests make perpetual mOan
To those far shores where smiling Southern
Give back soft murmurs to the fragrant breeze
Oye who drained for the bitter cup,
Think ye we can forget what ye have offered up?
The years will come and CO. and other centuries die
And generation after generation lie
Down in the dust; but long stars shall shine,
Long Vermonts green hills shall bear the
pine,
AS long as Killington shall proudly lift
Its lofty peak above the stormcloud's rift,
Or Mansfield hail the blue O'er-arching skies,
Or fair Mount Anthony in grandeur rise,
So long shall live the deeds that ye have done,
So deathless be the glory ye have wOnl
With exutant joy
And pride without alloy,
Did the twin Centuries rejoice when all was DER.
What though the Nation rose
Triumphant DER its foes
What though the State had gained
The need of faith unstaned!
Their mighty hearts remembered the dead that
came no mOrel
Remembered all the losses
The weary, weary crosses,
Remembered earth poorer for the blood that
had been shed,
And knew that it was sadder for the story it had
read
So clasping hands with somewhat saddened mien,
And eyes uplifted to the Great Unseen,
That rules alike DER centuries and men,
Onward they walked serenely toward-the End
One reached it last year. Ye remember well
The wOndrous tale there is no need to tell
How the whole world bowed down beside its bier
How all the Nations came, from far or near,
Heaping their treasures on its mighty pail
Never had kingliest king such funerall
Old Asia rose, and girding her in haste,
Swept in her iewelled robes across the waste,
And called to Egypt lying prone and hid
Where waits the Sphinx beside the pyramid
Fair Europe came with overlooking hands,
Bearing the riches of her many lands;
Dark Afric laden with her virgin gold,
Yet laden deeper with her woes untold;
Japan and China in grotesque array,
And all the enchanted islands of Cathsy!
XIII.
To-day the other dies,
| 1t walked in humber guise
Nor stood where all mems eyes
| Were fixed upon it.
| Earth may not pause to lay
| A wreath upon its bier.
| Nor the world heed to-day
Our dead that lieth here!
Yet well they loved each other
1t and its greater brother,
The loftiest stature grown,
Each earned its own renown;
Each sought of Time crown,
And each has won it
| XIV.
| But what to US are Centuries dead.
And rolling years forever fled,
| Compared with the, grand and fair
Vermont-our goddess mother?
Strong with the strength of thy verdant hills,
| Fresh with the freshness of mountain rills,
Pure as the breath of the fragrant pine
Glad with the gladness of youth divine,
| Serenely thou sittest throned to-day
| Where the free winds that round thee play
|. Rejoice in thy waves of n-brght hair,
| thou, our glorious mother!
Rejoice in thy beautiful strength and say
Earth holds not such another!
Thou art not old with thy hundred years
| Nor worn with care, or toll or tears,
| But all the glow of the summer time
Is thine today in thy glorious prime!
Thy brow is fair as the winter SHOWS,
With a stately calm in its still repose;
While the breath of the rose the wild bee sips
Half mad with joy, cannot eclipse
The marvellous sweetness ofthy lips:
And the deepest blue of the laughing skies
Hides in the depths of thy fearless eyes,
| faro lam md