nd the purple of the heather, and the gold of
the gorse, and the azure of the bugloss, and the crimson of the poppy;
and among them, in gorgeous robes, the angels and the saints of heaven,
and the memories of heroic virtues and heroic sufferings, that they might
lift up the eyes and hearts of men for ever out of the dark sad world of
the cold north, with all its coarsenesses and its crimes, towards a realm
of perpetual holiness, amid a perpetual summer of beauty and of light: as
one who, from between the black jaws of a narrow glen, or from beneath
the black shade of gigantic trees, catches a glimpse of far lands gay
with gardens and cottages; and purple mountain ranges; and the far-off
sea; and the hazy horizon melting into the hazy sky; and finds his soul
led forth into an infinite, at once of freedom and repose.

Awful, and yet not sad; at least to one who is reminded by it, even in
its darkest winter's gloom, of the primaeval tropic forest at its two
most exquisite moments--its too brief twilight, and its too swift dawn.

Awful, and yet not sad; at least to an Englishman, while right and left
are ranged the statues, the busts, the names, the deeds, of men who have
helped, each in his place, to make my country, and your country too, that
which they are.

For am I not in goodly company? Am I not in very deed upon my best
behaviour? among my betters? and at court? Among men before whom I
should have been ashamed to say or do a base or foolish thing? Among men
who have taught me, have ennobled me, though they lived centuries since?
Men whom I should have loved had I met them on earth? Men whom I may
meet yet, and tell them how I love them, in some other world? Men, too,
whom I might have hated, and who might have hated me, had we met on this
poor piecemeal earth; but whom I may learn to regard with justice and
with charity in the world where all shall know, even as they are known?
Men, too--alas! how fast their number grows--whom I have known, have
loved, and lost too soon; and all gleaming out of the gloom, as every
image of the dead should do, in pure white marble, as if purged from
earthly taint? To them, too--

Nothing is left of them
Now but pure manly.

Yes, while their monuments remind me that they are not dead, but
living--for all live to God--then awed I am, and humbled; better so: but
sad I cannot be in such grand company.

I said, the men who helped to make my country, and yours too. It w