Page:The poems of Emma Lazarus volume 1.djvu/206

Tears, love, and honor he shall have,
Through ages keeping green his grave.
Too late approved, too early lost,
His story is the people s boast.
Tough-sinewed offspring of the soil,
Of peasant lineage, reared to toil,
In Europe he had been a thing
To the glebe tethered—here a king!
Crowned not for some transcendent gift,
Genius of power that may lift
A Cassar or a Bonaparte
Up to the starred goal of his heart;
But that he was the epitome
Of all the people aim to be.
Were they his dying trust ? He was
No less their model and their glass.
In him the daily traits were viewed
Of the undistinguished multitude.
Brave as the silent myriads are,
Crushed by the juggernaut world-car ;
Strong with the people s strength, yet mild,
Simple and tender as a child ;
Wise with the wisdom of the heart,
Able in council, field, and mart ;
Nor lacking in the lambent gleam,
The great soul s final stamp the beam
Of genial fun, the humor sane
Wherewith the hero sports with pain.
His virtues hold within the span
Of his obscurest fellow-man.