The Cambria freeman. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1867-1938, 1882-06-23

The buried ruins 'of dead empires seek,
of Indian, Syrian, Persian, Roman, Greek
From shattered capital and frieZe upraise
The stately structure of their golden days:
| Their laws occult, their priests and prophets
ask,
Their altaTs search, their oracles unmask,
Their parable from birth to burial see,
The acorn germ, the growth, the dense
leafed tree,
A world of RANT life f: the sudden day
When like new strange glory shOne decay,
A golden glow amid the green the change
From branch to branch at Iife's receding
range,
Till nothing stands of towering strength and
Save naked trunk and arms whose veins are
dried,
And these, too, crumble till no sign remain
To mark its place upon thewind-swept plain.
Why died the empires? Like the forest trees
Did nature doom them ? or did slow disease
Assail their roots and poison all their springs
The old-time story answers mobiles, kings,
Have made and been the State, their names
Its history holds its wealth, its wars, their
own.
Their wanton will could raise, enrich. con-
demn;
The toiling millions lived and died for them.
Their fortunes rose in conquest fell in guilt !;
The people never owned them, never built.
Those olden times how many words are
scent
In weak regret and shallow argument
To prove them wiser, happier than our own
The Oldest moment that the world has
Is passing now. Those vaunted times were
young;
Their wisdom from unlettered peasants
SOrung;
Their laws from mobiles arrogant and rude:
Their Justice force, their whole achievement
crude.
With men the old are wise why change the
rule
school?
Respect the past for all the good It knew:
Give noble lives and struggling truths their
But ask. what freedom knew the common
Who served and bled and won the victories
then
The leaders are immortal, but the hordes
They led to death were simply human
swords,
Unknowing what they fought for. why they
fell.
What change has come? ? Imperial Europe
tell
Deaths warders cry from twenty centuries
peaks
Plataea's field the word of Pleyra speaks:
The martial draft still wastes the peasant
farms,
a dozen kings, five million men in arms;
The earth mapped out estate like, hedged
with steel;
In neighboring schools the children bred to
Unnatural hate, distoined in speech and
creed;
The forges roaring for the armies need;
The cities buIided by the people lined
With Sowing forts and rOadways under
mined;
At every Fashioned frontier, evey state,
Suspicion, swOrded, standing by the gate
But turn our eyes from those oppressive
lands
Behold, one country all defenceIess stands,
One nation continent, from East to West
With riches heaped upon her bOunteOus
breast;
Her mines, her marts, her skill of hand and
brain,
Where sleep the conquerors9 Here is chance
for spoil
Such unmatched fields, such endless, Thought
Vain dream of olden time The robber
strength
That swept its will is overmatched at length.
Here, not with swords but smiles the people
greet
The foreign spy in harboT granary, street;
Here towns unguarded lie, for here alone
Nor caste, nor king, nor privilege is known.
For home tue farmer ploughS, the miner
delves,
A land of toilers, toiling for themselves:
y land Of cities, which no fortress shields,
Whose open streets, reach out to fertile
fielGs;
Whose roads are shaken by no armies tread:
Whose only camps are cities of the dead
Go stand at Arlington, the graves among:
No ramparts, cannons there, no banners
hung,
No threat above the Capital no blare
To warn the senators the guns are there.
But never yet was city fortified
Like that sad height above POtOmac's tide;
There never yet was elOquence in speech
Like those ten thousand stones, a name on
each
No guards e'er pressed such claim on court
or king
As these Prsetorians to our Senate bring;
The Army OF Potomac never lay
SO full of strength as in its camp to-day
On fatal Cheronea's field the Greeks
a lion raised, "a sOmbeT tomb that speaks
No word, no name an emblem of the pride
Of those who ruled the insect host that died.
But by her soldiers graves Columbia proves
How fast toward morn the night of manhood
moves.
Those low white lines at Gettysburg remain,
The sacred record of her numblest slain,
Where children's children in their time will
come
To view with pride their heroe-father's tomb.
While down the ages runs the patriot line
Till rich tradition makes each tomb a shrine
Our standing army these, with spectre
glaiyeS,
Our fortressed towns their battle-ordered
graves.
Here Sleep our valiant, sown ike dragons
teeth
Here newborn sons renew the pious wreath
Here proud Columbia bends, with tear-stirred
mouth,
To kiss their biood-seal, binding North and
South,
Two clasping hands upoa the knot they tied
When Union lived and human Slavery died.
Who doubt our strength OF measure it with
those
Whose armed millions wait for coming foes,
They judge by royal standards, that depend
On hIteing hands to threaten OF defend,
That keep their war-dOgs chained IN time Of
peace,
And dread foe scarce less than their re-
lease.
Who hunt wild beasts with cheetahs, fercely
tame,
Must watch their hounds as we'll as fear their
game.
Around our veterans hung no dread or doubt
When thrice million men we're mustered
As scattered seed in new-ploughed land, or
flakes
Of Spring time snow that fan in smiling
lakes,
Our war.born soldiers sank into the sea
OF peaceful life and fruitful energy.
No sign remained of that vast army, save
In field and street new workmen, brOnzed
and grave
Some whiting teamsters still in army vest
some quiet citizens with medalled breast.
So died the hatred of our brother -feud;
Inc conflict DER, the triumph was subdued
WAT victor King e'er spared tie vanquished
How Tnuch of rnarc,, 4t5 ..., r,. -