Attempt > Volume 3

THE ATTEMPT. Go
As the soft wind, sweet with the breath of the flowers.
Stole lazily up from the garden bowers,
It bore on its light wings the voices gay
Of his merry young brothers, laughing at play;
And oh ! how sweet was their childish glee,
Their innocent mirth unchecked and free,
To the ear that had only heard so long
The din of a mighty battle throng,
The bugle blast, and the charger's tramp,
And the thousand sounds of a warrior camp.
Ended for ever the toil and the strife.
The terrible conflict of life for life,
The rush, the clamour, the clash, the roar,
Never to break on his quiet more,
That blessed calm, which at last had come.
With the peace, and the rest, and the love of home.
Alas ! alas ! that the noble head.
Must lie so soon with the household's dead !
That the pleasant voice must be stilled and hushed.
And the life from out of the brave heart crushed.
And his home's bi-ight simlight be dimmed so soon.
By his grave's broad shadow athwart it thrown.
Yet so it must be;—the death waiTant has sped
That shall number his name with the glorious dead;
That shall snatch from his brow the laurels just won.
In the dust of death to trample them down;
That shall sheathe for ever the sword that had flashed
Like a torrent down from a mountain dashed.
Whose glorious strength to the noonday light.
Leaps madly forth, and then falls in night.
There is no fame in the silent tomb,
No gleam of arms 'mid its solemn gloom ;
All the haughty splendour of war is past.