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"OLD IRONSIDES "

[Written with reference to the proposed breaking up of the famous U. S. frigate "Constitution."]

BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down!
Long has it waved on high,
And many an eye has danced to see
That banner in the sky;
Beneath it rung the battle-shout,

And burst the cannon's roar:
The meteor of the ocean air

Shall sweep the clouds no more!

Her deck, once red with heroes' blood,
Where knelt the vanquished foe,
When winds were hurrying o'er the flood
And waves were white below,

No more shall feel the victor's tread,
Or know the conquered knee:
The harpies of the shore shall pluck
The eagle of the sea!

O better that her shattered hulk
Should sink beneath the wave!
Her thunders shook the mighty deep,
And there should be her grave:
Nail to the mast her holy flag,
Set every threadbare sail,

And give her to the god of storms,
The lightning and the gale!

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I wrote some lines once on a time

In wondrous merry mood,

And thought, as usual,

men would

They were exceeding good.

They were so queer, so very queer,
I laughed as I would die;

Albeit, in the general way,
A sober man am I.

I called my servant, and he came;
How kind it was of him,
To mind a slender man like me,
He of the mighty limb!

say

"These to the printer," I exclaimed,
And, in my humorous way,
I added (as a trifling jest),
"There'll be the devil to pay."

He took the paper, and I watched,
And saw him peep within;
At the first line he read, his face
Was all upon the grin.

He read the next; the grin grew broad,

And shot from ear to ear;

He read the third; a chuckling noise
I now began to hear.

The fourth; he broke into a roar;
The fifth; his waistband split;
The sixth; he burst five buttons off,
And tumbled in a fit.

Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye,
I watched that wretched man,
And since, I never dare to write
As funny as I can.

THE LAST LEAF

BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES

I saw him once before,

As he passed by the door;
And again

The pavement-stones resound
As he totters o'er the ground
With his cane.

They say that in his prime,
Ere the pruning-knife of time
Cut him down,

Not a better man was found
By the crier on his round
Through the town.

But now he walks the streets,
And he looks at all he meets

So forlorn;

And he shakes his feeble head,
That it seems as if he said,
They are gone."

The mossy marbles rest

On the lips that he has pressed
In their bloom;

And the names he loved to hear
Have been carved for many a year
On the tomb.

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And if I should live to be
The last leaf upon the tree
In the spring,

Let them smile, as I do now,
At the old forsaken bough
Where I cling.

THE VOICELESS

BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES

We count the broken lyres that rest
Where the sweet wailing singers slumber,
But o'er their silent sister's breast

The wild-flowers who will stoop to number?
A few can touch the magic string,

And noisy Fame is proud to win them:

Alas for those that never sing,

But die with all their music in them!

Nay, grieve not for the dead alone

Whose song has told their hearts' sad story,Weep for the voiceless, who have known The cross without the crown of glory! Not where Leucadian breezes sweep

O'er Sappho's memory-haunted billow,
But where the glistening night-dews weep
On nameless sorrow's churchyard pillow.

O hearts that break and give no sign
Save whitening lip and fading tresses,

Till Death pours out his cordial wine

Slow-dropp'd from Misery's crushing presses,

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