The Topeka state journal., 1911-09-26
THE HOsTs ARE VANISHING.
(MEMORIAL ODE.l


The hosts are vanishing today
and all along the lines,
Their ranks are thinning as they did
Among the storm-swept pines,
Where Grant and Lee met, face to face
Amid the Wilderness,
And Sherman won the hero's crown,
through battles storm and stress
Turn back the leaves of history
A half hundred years,
And see them rally round the flag
With ringing shouts and cheers.
See how they proudly march away
To some ensanguined field
And there amid the clash Of arms
Compel the foe to yield.
Call back the vanished years. and see
The fleets sweep to and fro
Around the wild Atlantic coast
And Gulf of Mexicoi
Behold the steel-clad Monitor
On devastation's track
Hurled like a flaming thunderbolt
Against the Merrimackl
See Porter's fleet, with flags afloat
Amid those thrilling scenes,
Go crashing through the barricades
In front of New Orleans!
See Farragut, lashed to the mast,
In sunny Mobile Bay,
Turn loose the iron hurricane
That sweeps the foe away!
See how, at Missionary Ridge,
Wars missionaries wild
Charge up the cannon-croWded slopes
With dead and dying piledi
See that wild scene, above the clouds,
Where Hooker, fronting Bragg,
Sweeps ike a whirlwind up the sleeps
To 1ookout's lofty cragi
Then turn your gaze on Gettysburg,
With titans struggling there,
While slaughter RACES in a storm
That glooms the midday glarei
See Spottsylvania's grim redoubts,
Gfrt round by cleaning steel,
Where thunder-crashing battlements
Make old Virginia reell
See those brave souls the bravest brave,
Whose deeds no records tell,
Who bore their pangs and starved and
died
In many a prison cell;
Then match their courage If you can
In any hour of time,
In any record of the past,
Or any deeds sublime.
The hosts are vanishing today,
But not amid the notes
OF fife and drum and bugle blast,
And flaming iron thrOats,
AS in the days when clashing steel
And guns reverberant
Flung notes adown beleagured heights
Wild, dread and dissonant-
The notes the minnie-singers pealed
From trench and guarded lines;
The notes the crashing cannons rolled
Among the palms and pines;
The notes the storming regiments
Poured forth from joyful lips,
While on the quaking shore was heard
The thunder of the ships.
The notes that echoed round the home
That had no vacant chair;
The notes that told of broken hearts
And mourners in despair,
All Joined to make a song sublime,
No civic host could sing,
When Freedom called her n1instrels out
And bade her anthems ringi
The hosts are vanishing today,
And, one by one, they go
Down to their last encounter, with
Life's unrelenting foe;
All silently they go, who changed
The brazen notes Of strife,
And press along with silent tread
Across the plains Of life
Gray hairs along the shattered lines
And boards in moonlight dipped,
Are waving signal messages,
To comrades pallid Tipped,
While faltering steps in broken time
And hands that clasp no more
Proclaim them passing up the heights
To comrades gone before.
And, here today, we dedicate
This great memorial hall,
To those who gave, in love and trust,
Their lives for one and all;
And may the flag they died to save
Still symbolic that trust,
Till God calls all the sons of men
To slumber in the dustl
HENRY NJ. ROBY. NJ. D.
Topeka, Kan