No wail was in his voice,--none heard, When treason's storm-cloud blackest grew, The weakness of a doubtful word; His duty, and the end, he knew. The first to smite, the first to spare; When once the hostile ensigns fell, He stretched out hands of generous care To lift the foe he fought so well. For there was nothing base or small Or craven in his soul's broad plan; Forgiving all things personal, He hated only wrong to man. The old traditions of his State, The memories of her great and good, Took from his life a fresher date, And in himself embodied stood. How felt the greed of gold and place, The venal crew that schemed and planned, The fine scorn of that haughty face, The spurning of that bribeless hand! If than Rome's tribunes statelier He wore his senatorial robe, His lofty port was all for her, The one dear spot on all the globe. If to the master's plea he gave The vast contempt his manhood felt, He saw a brother in the slave,-- With man as equal man he dealt. Proud was he? If his presence kept Its grandeur wheresoe'er he trod, As if from Plutarch's gallery stepped The hero and the demigod, None failed, at least, to reach his ear, Nor want nor woe appealed in vain; The homesick soldier knew his cheer, And blessed him from his ward of pain. Safely his dearest friends may own The slight defects he never hid, The surface-blemish in the stone Of the tall, stately pyramid. Suffice it that he never brought His conscience to the public mart; But lived himself the truth he taught, White-souled, clean-handed, pure of heart. What if he felt the natural pride Of power in noble use, too true With thin humilities to hide The work he did, the lore he knew? Was he not just? Was any wronged By that assured self-estimate? He took but what to him belonged, Unenvious of another's state. Well might he heed the words he spake, And scan with care the written page Through which he still shall warm and wake The hearts of men from age to age. Ah! who shall blame him now because He solaced thus his hours of pain! Should not the o'erworn thresher pause, And hold to light his golden grain? No sense of humor dropped its oil On the hard ways his purpose went; Small play of fancy lightened toil; He spake alone the thing he meant. He loved his books, the Art that hints A beauty veiled behind its own, The graver's line, the pencil's tints, The chisel's shape evoked from stone. He cherished, void of selfish ends, The social courtesies that bless And sweeten life, and loved his friends With most unworldly tenderness. But still his tired eyes rarely learned The glad relief by Nature brought; Her mountain ranges never turned His current of persistent thought. The sea rolled chorus to his speech Three-banked like Latium's' tall trireme, With laboring oars; the grove and beach Were Forum and the Academe. The sensuous joy from all things fair His strenuous bent of soul repressed, And left from youth to silvered hair Few hours for pleasure, none for rest.