I had never before been so powerfully impressed by any picture. It seemed fairly to speak to me. I took an envelope from my pocket and set down the verses given here. These verses were afterwards published in one or two metropolitan papers. Mr. James Bryce, then English Ambassador at Washington, saw them and wrote me a beautiful letter about them, in which he said, "Your little poem 'The Last Journey' attracts me very much." You see he was beginning to grow old, and I knew that was the reason these lines of mine had made an appeal to him. Not very long after this I also had a letter about the verses from Dr. Osler, then Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford. In it he said, "I have read your little poem 'The Last Journey' with unusual interest." And again I knew why. You see, it does not matter very much what our rank or our station here, no matter whether a human being is a king or what his station in life may be, he still is a human being. We are all reaching out after the same great thing. The fine thing about the sentiment of these little verses is that although you wish to and may not believe it, it is coming true anyway. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- THE LAST JOURNEY One night when in a youthful dream, I saw a moonlit sea, And sailing o'er its dark expanse, A ship of mystery. The lonely traveler seemed to be On some great mission bound, As o'er the darkened waters It sailed without a sound. Long years have passed; old age has come: The fire of life is low. Again I think of that strange dream Of youth so long ago. And in the ship that swiftly sailed That silent moonlit sea, I seem to see a storm-tossed soul Bound for eternity. Now to my mind this sweet dream comes, A peaceful memory, For soon I'll be A YOUTH again, With Immortality!