The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-05-17
POET AND ORATOR.

The Evening Meeting Poem by G. A.
Townsend, and Grafton by Major Ma
ginnis.
WASHINGTON, May 16.-The exercises this
evening at the National Theater drew to-
gether an audience distinguished, enthusi-
astc and sympathetic. The stage, auditori
UNI and galleries were filled, the one with
officers of the army met to celebrate its tri-
umph, the other with surviving members of
that army their friends, and the welcoming
people of the city of Washington. The in
terror decorations of the theater were bril-
liant.
General Humphries, the retiring presi-
dent, opened the exercises by introducing
Judge Edmonds. While Judge Edmonds
was speaking, General Sherman came on the
stage from one of the wings, AS he moved
across to his seat in front, the veterans ca ught
sight of him and interrupted the speech o
give him welcome with three rousing
cheers and tiger" Many veterans in
their enthusiasm, stood upon their seats and
waved their hats.
At the conclusion of Judge Edmonds's ad-
dress, the Marine band rendered the "Star
Spangled Banner" and then the President
introduced the poet, George Alfred Town
send, who with much feeling, delivered
poem, the reading OF which was frequently
interrupted by applause The poem is as
follows:
Civil soldiers, re-assembled by the river of your
fame!
Ye who saved the virgin city bathed in Wash
ington's clear namel
Which of all your past commanders doth this day
your memory haunt
Scott, Mcdowell, Burnside, Hooker, Meade, Nc
Clellan, Halleck, Grant,
There is one too little mentioned when your
proud reunions come,
And tine thoughtful love of country dies upon the
sounding drum;
Let me call him your muster! Let me
wake him in your griefi
Captain by the Constitution, Abr'am Lincoln
was your chief
Ever nearest to his person, ye were his defense
and shield;
He alone of your commanders died upon the
battle field;
All your Generals were his children, leaning on
him childish-wiled.
And they all were filial mourners round the
mighty tomb he filled.
Tender as the harp of David his soft answers
now become,
When amid the cares of kingdoms rose and fell
some Absalom;
Aud his hum0r glds his memory like light
within a tent,
Or the sunken sun that fingers on the lofty mon.
ument.
Like the slave that saw the sunrise with his
face toward the West,
AS IL flashed, while yet twas hidden, on q slen-
der steeple's crest,
SO, while Victory turned her from him, ere the
dawn In welcome came,
On his pen Emancipation glittered like an altar
hameF
Feeling for the doomed deserter, feeling for the
drafted sire,
For the empty Northern hearthstone and the
Southern home atire,
Mercy kept him grim as Moloch, all the future
And eternal peace to garner for the millions yet
to be.
Not soldier of the classics he could see through
learned pretense,
Master of the greatest science, military common
sense;
AS he watched your marches, comrades, hither
thither, wayward years,
On his map the roads you followed, you can trace
them by his tears.
In the reaIthe people clamored, In the front the
Generals missed;
In his inner councils harbored critic and an-
tagOnist,
But he ruled them by an instinct like the Queens
With health Of soul that honeyea publicans
and pharisees.
Faith OF faith, we looked behind us for chief Of
higher tone,
While the voice that drowned the trumpets was
the echo of our own;
Ever thus. my own companions! Genius has us
by the hand,
Walking on the tempest with us, every crisis to
command.
Like the bugle blown at evening by some home
sick of art,
Lineoln's words, unearthly, quiver in the uni
versa heart,
Not an echo left of malice,' scarce Of triumph in
the strain,
As when summer thunder murmurs in pathetic
showers of rain.