BURIED AT SEA.
[Suggested by the burial, in Galveston Bay, of a woman who died on shipboard of a contagious fever.]
Far back in the ages, dim with dust, We read of the idol gold;And under the sacred roof-tile yet The story is often toldOf the idol wrought—of the precious ore— And set in the temple fair;When men bowed down to the golden calf, Forgetting that God was there.
But that was ages ago, they say, Before the Redeemer came,When all this beautiful Christian love Was naught but a smothered flame.When even the wisest, best of men— The truest of all the true—The godlike words of the golden rule Not one of them even knew.
193