The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and PoliticsVarious
History
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
Various
American periodicals
Four hours the Death-Fight has roared,
(Gun-deck and berth-deck blood-wet!)
Her mainmast's gone by the board,
Down come topsail and jib!
We're smashing her, rib by rib,
And the pirate yells grow weak,--
But the Black Flag flies there yet,
The Death's Head grinning apeak!
Long has she haunted the seas,
Terror of sun and breeze;
Her deck has echoed with groans;
Her hold is a horrid den,
Piled to the orlop with bones
Of starved and of murdered men!
They swarm 'mid her shrouds in hosts,
The smoke is murky with ghosts!
But to-day her cruise shall be short!
She's bound to the Port she cleared from,
She's nearing the Light she steered from,--
Ah, the Horror sees her fate!
Heeling heavy to port,
She strikes, but all too late!
Down with her cursed crew,
Down with her damned freight,
To the bottom of the Blue,
Ten thousand fathom deep!
With God's glad sun o'erhead,--
That is the way to weep,
So will we mourn our dead!
THE PLACE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN IN HISTORY.
The funeral procession of the late President of the United States has
passed through the land from Washington to his final resting-place in
the heart of the Prairies. Along the line of more than fifteen hundred
miles his remains were borne, as it were, through continued lines of the
people; and the number of mourners and the sincerity and unanimity of
grief were such as never before attended the obsequies of a human being;
so that the terrible catastrophe of his end hardly struck more awe than
the majestic sorrow of the people. The thought of the individual was
effaced; and men's minds were drawn to the station which he filled, to
his public career, to the principles he represented, to his martyrdom.
There was at first impatience at the escape of his murderer, mixed with
contempt for the wretch who was guilty of the crime; and there was
relief in the consideration, that one whose personal insignificance was
in such a contrast with the greatness of his crime had met with a sudden
and ignoble death. No one stopped to remark on the personal qualities of
Abraham Lincoln, except to wonder that his gentleness of nature had not
saved him from the designs of assassins. It was thought then, and the
event is still so recent it is thought now, that the analysis and
graphic portraiture of his personal character and habits should be
deferred to less excited times; as yet the attempt would wear the aspect
of cruel indifference or levity, inconsistent with the sanctity of the
occasion. Men ask one another only, Why has the President been struck
down, and why do the people mourn? We think we pay the best tribute to
his memory and the most fitting respect to his name, if we ask after the
relation in which he stands to the history of his country and his
fellow-man.
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