But spared, with us, till now,
Each laureled Caesar's brow.

No Caesar he, whom we lament,
A man without a precedent,
Sent it would seem, to do
His work--and perish too!

Not by the weary cares of state,
The endless tasks, which will not wait,
Which, often done in vain,
Must yet be done again;

Not in the dark, wild tide of war,
Which rose so high, and rolled so far,
Sweeping from sea to sea
In awful anarchy;--

Four fateful years of mortal strife,
Which slowly drained the Nation's life,
(Yet, for each drop that ran
There sprang an armed man!)

Not then;--but when by measures meet--
By victory, and by defeat,
By courage, patience, skill,
The people's fixed "We will!"

Had pierced, had crushed rebellion dead--
Without a hand, without a head:--
At last, when all was well,
He fell--O, how he fell!

Tyrants have fallen by such as thou,
And good hath followed,--may it now!
(God lets bad instruments
Produce the best events.)

But he, the man we mourn today,
No tyrant was; so mild a sway
In one such weight who bore
Was never known before!

_From "Poems of Richard Henry Stoddard"_
Copyright, 1880, by Charles Scribner's Sons.

[Illustration: "THE GOOD GRAY POET" (Walt Whitman)]

Walt Whitman, born in West Hills, Long Island, New York, May 31, 1819.
He was educated in the public schools of Brooklyn and New York City.
Learned the printing trade at which he worked during the summer and
taught school in winter. He made long pedestrian tours through the
United States and even extended his tramps through Canada. His chief
work, _Leaves of Grass_, is a series of poems through which he earned
the praise of some and the abuse of others. He visited the army when a
brother was wounded and remained afterward as a volunteer nurse. Died
1892.

O CAPTAIN!