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e While sad-eyed martyrs had to stand and wait. Here flits mercurial _Farrar_; standing there, See mild, benignant, cautious, learned _Ware_, And sturdy, patient, faithful, honest _Hedge_, Whose grinding logic gave our wits their edge; _Ticknor_, with honeyed voice and courtly grace; And _Willard_, larynxed like a double bass; And _Channing_, with his bland, superior look, Cool as a moonbeam on a frozen brook, While the pale student, shivering in his shoes, Sees from his theme the turgid rhetoric ooze; And the born soldier, fate decreed to wreak His martial manhood on a class in Greek, _Popkin_! How that explosive name recalls The grand old Busby of our ancient halls Such faces looked from Skippon's grim platoons, Such figures rode with Ireton's stout dragoons: He gave his strength to learning's gentle charms, But every accent sounded "Shoulder arms!" Names,--empty names! Save only here and there Some white-haired listener, dozing in his chair, Starts at the sound he often used to hear, And upward slants his Sunday-sermon ear. And we--our blooming manhood we regain; Smiling we join the long Commencement train, One point first battled in discussion hot,-- Shall we wear gowns? and settled: We will not. How strange the scene,--that noisy boy-debate Where embryo-speakers learn to rule the State! This broad-browed youth, sedate and sober-eyed, Shall wear the ermined robe at Taney's side; And he, the stripling, smooth of face and slight, Whose slender form scarce intercepts the light, Shall rule the Bench where Parsons gave the law, And sphinx-like sat uncouth, majestic Shaw Ah, many a star has shed its fatal ray On names we loved--our brothers--where are they? Nor these alone; our hearts in silence claim Names not less dear, unsyllabled by fame. How brief the space! and yet it sweeps us back Far, far along our new-born history's track Five strides like this;--the sachem rules the land; The Indian wigwams cluster where we stand. The second. Lo! a scene of deadly strife-- A nation struggling into infant life; Not yet the fatal game at Yorktown won Where failing Empire fired its sunset gun. LANGDON sits restless in the ancient chair,-- Harvard's grave Head,--these echoes heard his prayer When from yon mansion, dear to memory still, The banded yeomen marched for Bunker's Hill. Count on the grave triennial's thick-starred roll What names were numbered on the lengthening scroll,-- Not unfamiliar in our e
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