As the lion when age dims his eyeball, the rose at her height, So with man--so his power and his beauty forever take 175 flight. No! Again a long draft of my soul-wine! Look forth o'er the years! Thou hast done now with eyes for the actual; begin with the seer's! Is Saul dead? In the depth of the vale make his tomb--bid arise A gray mountain of marble heaped four-square, till, built to the skies, Let it mark where the great First King slumbers; whose fame 180 would ye know? Up above see the rock's naked face, where the record shall go In great characters cut by the scribe--Such was Saul, so he did; With the sages directing the work, by the populace chid-- For not half, they'll affirm, is comprised there! Which fault to amend, In the grove with his kind grows the cedar, whereon they 185 shall spend (See, in tablets 'tis level before them) their praise, and record With the gold of the graver, Saul's story--the statesman's great word Side by side with the poet's sweet comment. The river's a-wave With smooth paper-reeds grazing each other when prophet-winds rave: So the pen gives unborn generations their due and their part 190 In thy being! Then, first of the mighty, thank God that thou art!" XIV And behold while I sang ... but O Thou who didst grant me that day, And before it not seldom hast granted thy help to essay, Carry on and complete an adventure--my shield and my sword In that act where my soul was thy servant, thy word was my 195 word-- Still be with me, who then at the summit of human endeavor And scaling the highest, man's thought could, gazed hopeless as ever On the new stretch of heaven above me--till, mighty to save, Just one lift of thy hand cleared that distance--God's throne from man's grave! Let me tell out my tale to its evening--my voice to my heart 200 Which can scarce dare believe in what marvels last night I took part, As this morning I gather the fragments, alone with my sheep, And still fear lest the terrible glory evanish like sleep! For I wake in the gray dewy covert, while Hebron upheaves The dawn struggling with night on his shoulder, and Kidron 205 retrieves Slow the damage of yesterday's sunshine. XV