low,
The conscience of him testing every stroke,
To make his deed the measure of a man.

So came the Captain with the mighty heart;
And when the step of earthquake shook the house,
Wresting the rafters from their ancient hold,
He held the ridge-pole up and spiked again
The rafters of the Home. He held his place--
Held the long purpose like a growing tree--
Held on through blame and faltered not at praise,
And when he fell, in whirlwind, he went down
As when a kingly cedar, green with boughs,
Goes down with a great shout upon the hills,
And leaves a lonesome place against the sky.

[Illustration: THE WHITE HOUSE]

The corner-stone was laid by George Washington on the 13th of October,
1792. The mansion was first occupied by President John Adams in the
year 1800, also by every succeeding President. British troops burned
it in 1814, in President Madison's term. It was the first public
building erected in Washington. It is constructed of Virginia
freestone, and is 170 feet in length, 80 feet in depth, and consists
of a rustic basement, two stories and an attic.

John Vance Cheney, born Groveland, New York, December 29, 1848.
Graduated Temple Hill Academy, Genesee, New York, at seventeen.
Assistant principal there two years later. Practiced law, New York,
1875-6; librarian Free Public Library, San Francisco, 1887-94;
Newberry Library, Chicago, 1894-1909; author, _The Old Doctor_, 1881;
and a number of poems, 1887-1911.

LINCOLN

The hour was on us; where the man?
The fateful sands unfaltering ran,
And up the way of tears
He came into the years.

Our pastoral captain. Forth he came,
As one that answers to his name;
Nor dreamed how high his charge,
His work how fair and large,

To set the stones back in the wall
Lest the divided house should fall,
And peace from men depart,
Hope and the childlike heart.

We looked on him; "'Tis he," we said,
"Come crownless and unheralded,
The shepherd who will keep
The flocks, will fold the sheep."