"An old man, wearied with the storms of State," now only asks a little earth for charity. Costly heathen pageants there will be in these streets to his memory, and politicians will, I suppose, hold their drunken and profane debauch over his grave, as over the tomb of that far-famed friend of freedom who died two years ago. But he has ceased to be mortal. The memory of his battle-fields faded from before his dying sight. Power rests no longer in his hands; victory perches on another banner. His ear is still, and his heart is cold. How hollow sounds the voice of former flattery! His riches go to other men; his slaves will be called by his name no more; the scourge that goads them to unpaid toil is now owned by another man. His fame goes back to such as gave; the accident of an accident succeeds him in the presidential chair; only the man, not the officer, goes home to God, with what of goodness and piety he had won. His manhood is all that he can carry out of the world; elected or rejected, a conqueror or conquered, it is now the same to him; and it may be the humblest female slave who only earned the bread which her master only ate, and got an enforced concubinage for pay, takes rank in heaven far before the man whom the nation honored with its highest trust, and for whom the official Senate and low-browed Church send out their hollow groans. "The glories of our birth and State Are shadows, not substantial things. There is no armor against fate: Death lays his icy hand on kings. Sceptre and crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made, With the poor crooked scythe and spade. "Some men with swords may reap the field, And plant fresh laurels where they kill; But their strong arms at last must yield, They tame but one another still. Early or late They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath, When they, pale captives, creep to death. "The garlands wither on his brow: Then boast no more his mighty deeds, Upon death's purple altar now, See where the victor victim bleeds. All heads must come To the cold tomb, Only the actions of the just Smell sweet and blossom in the dust."