It has girdled the depths of our heart’s red blood, It has welded our chain in a white-heat fire, And the Gray has come with the old-time flood, And the Blue stands firm in the old-time fire. And starving eyes, whence Hope had fled Look up where the light of the message ran: Let the Past be past, let the dead be dead— Now and forever, American. O, valorous Gray, in the grave of your fate! Oh, valorous Blue, in the long deady ears! Ye were sown in sorrow and harrowed in Hate, But your harvest to-day is a nation’s tears, For the message you left through the land has sped From the lips of God to the heart of man: Let the Past be past, let the dead be dead— Now and forever, American. JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE.