Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1889-02-19
A TOUCHING TRIBUTE IN VERSE.
To the Editor of the EAGLE

1
| To the Editor Of the EAGLE.
Not long since received letter from
an old friend in Greedy, Colo, man of
rare scholarship, Intellectual vigor and
moral integrity, and man before whose
calm, yet rugged grandeur bow at be-
fore superior being. Theologically he
is what would be called an agnostic, yet
his faith in man and his readiness and
efficiency to serve him, would teach
many believer humility.
| He tells me In verses, tremulous with
emotion, of the death of promising
| daughter. I remember well the day she
graduated from the High school, bearing
serenely the honors of her class. Since
that time among other things she took a
course of languages at the State Agricul-
tural college and was already well into
another course of study at the State Uni
versity, when the fever came which
closed her eyes in death. A remarkably
healthy child she was, having never re-
quired the doctors care from birth to
last illness. On the New Year proceed
ing her death the father presented her
with an album in which to put the
pictures of her classmates. On the first
leaf he wrote:
As time sweeps on, and robs you of the
faces
That erst enriched your life with smiles
and graces,
May these sweet pictures, which the SIM
beam traces,
Keep warm their memories, for the souls
embraces.
Little did he dream that her sweet
face of all that bright array would be
first to pass from earth away.
Under these lines he has since writ
ten
The lines above betray Elusive hopes
The May morn promise of a sunny day,
Remote 10 me appeared the western
slopes,
On.which its brilliant light would fade
away.
The first of all these you thful faces, thine,
To lose its bloom to wither, shrink and
waste.
To loose affections tracings clear and fine,
To have its bright intelligence erased.
The first of all that brilliant sisterhood,
Whose highest honor5 c. owned thy proud
young head,
To sink beneath the all-engulfing flood,
Life's feast just tasted full before thee
spread.
One hour supreme of glorious gladness
thine,
When borne on thoughts and feelings
current strong,
You Quaffed the spirits pure ETHEREAL wine,
The Joy of face-transfigured listening
throng.
This hour was worth an age of listless
life,
A long, dull, dragging life you did not
crave,
You fancied that your reckoning years
were rife,
With stimuli that lead to early grave
But this grand hour seemed morn to
The promise of the noontides fuller
light.
For taste of moments more intense in
store
When weakened powers achieve the
SUBMITS height.
The 'busiless fabric of dream appears,
The splendid purpose" beaming in |
those eyes,
The future hardening OF those wistful |
ears
A phantasy that lures an hour and dies |
We sat and watched the lips grow thin |
and pale,
The speech came painful to the numbed |
tongue,
But could not think that strength and |
tone would fail,
To come again to one so brave and |
young.
The ear grew dull and caught the sound |
with pain,
The eyes grew dim and felt falling
light,
They told of worn and weary wasted
brain
Of consciousness fast sinking into night.
At last the slow and slower, hard drawn
breath.
The languid pulse, the cold sweat on the
brow,
The sense OF touch extinct showed hover
ing death
Was slowly settling on it's victim now.
Soon all is DER, the last long breath ex-
hailed,
The pulse is still, the heart has ceased to
beat,
The CLASSY eyes the ether waves assaulted
In vain. There was no spirit there to
greet.
To ruins now the house it built with care
Had built, but could not keep in fit re-
pair.
Without house, say, does it better fare?
air?
Dur science says the only thought know,
Is product of a working, wasting brain.
by rich red blood in ceaseless
flow,
Refreshed by sleep and free from press
ure's strain.
With weary, sleepless brain and sad, sore
heart,
I bow before deaths stern reality,
The inner life pines for its severed part,
But walls in vain to deaf mortality.
The all is heartless bleak inanity,
1t hears no prayers, is blind to falling
tears;
70 praise or blame it were insanity,
For what to it our few or many yeas.
Here is threnody which in its ten
lerness and strength of feeling, its brave
,utfettings with despair and doubt, its
allegiance to the souls light in spite OF
he souls deepest love has touched me
more than any other have read.
In the supreme moments Of life
ioubt not that the heart speaks truer I
han the head. AS one has written:
All, yet, when all is thought and said,
The heart still overruleS the head,
still what we hope we must believe,
And what is given US receive.
dust-still believe for still we hope /.
That in world Of larger scope,
What here is faithfully begun,
Viii be completed not undone."