Knoxville daily chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1882, 1882-01-08
GARFIELD.
BY MRS. ELLEN KEY BLUNT.


BY MRS. ELLEN KEY BLUNT.
How beautiful it was to die as he has died
Making a calm around him by the force
Of his great soul, commanding peace from
strife,
And changing all the discord into rest
! A heavenly music heard as life departs.
How wonderful it was that the accursed
hate
Which smote him brought forth only loyal
love;
Like to some holy bell being struck
| Resounds with wondrous sweetness. sound
ing on
| Through all the spaces to eternity.
How noble was his dauntless fortitude
| Which, as he lay expiring, day by day
Made him almost control his destiny
And look upon his torture with a smile
AS his life wasted, in great patience, won
deringly
His watchers watched him. They were not
| alone
| Of his own people, but his watchers were
the world,
From far off shores and seas with pitful
! Sad warnings toward him as his star went
down.
Nine times ten million souls in his own
tongue
Prayed to the Almighty for his single life;
| But he had risen too near heaven in his
great flight
! To stoOp again to earth, and SO God took
him,
Like star folded in more perfect light.
| To his dead presence, and, with solemn
| care,
! Moving in silence to the measured strain
/ He loved, in mournful sweet monotony
| Repeated as they bore him step by step
! Through harvest-felds of ripening trodden
grain
They laid him reverentIy, gently down
Where all the sheaves of earth are garnered
at the last.
/ Upon his pulseless form are richly piled
| Wreaths, garlauds, of the late yet lavish
bloom
| Of the perfected summer, with the exquis-
tie thrill
| Of life SO fresh upon their shining leaves
Banners are furled around him, and the flag
We love droops mourning DER the mourning
land.
And from afar beyond our land and lakes,
From the great world that watched him Won
deringly
Come kind farewells and tender sympathies.
Pity has told her tale in every tongue go
And kings have claimed him comrade, hand
in hand.
| Fame has recorded him,
Love has rewarded him,
Mother, wife, children and people wept over
him.
England accounted him
Kindred by blood.
| All that are great and good
! Have as his mouTners stood
While he lay, day by Gay, passing away.
A Queen send comforting words of cheer,
/ And flowers to fade on his bloody bier.
| God save the Queen when her last hour is
| near.
! The North was his by birth,
/ The South is his by DEATH
He conquered by suffering grandly borne
| Our ng-cherished strifes; they are gone
and now,
Standing together, we look on his pale, dead
face,
! To whom we had given, the elected, power
| more great
Than any kings Together we revere
The majesty with which he laid it down
AT Gods command Together we shall love
His memory, and each other for his sake,
And for the heart SO high that it could hate
no man."
God rest him. He has rested himl
Nothing can ''hurt" him more
Nothing can touch him further"
More than king he lies
With the strong blaze of the worlds homag
Full on his closed eyes.
American, borne in the forest,
The great lake for him signs,
And England, crowned and sceptered,
Loves him as he dies.
He fought in the deathly valley
From morn till the set of sun,
Till eighty days had run.
Tfen he folded his arms
And his day was done.
Oh, the bloom is off of the prairie,
The butterhy's change is begun.
The pine cone flowers eternal,
The eagle has scared to the sun!