OUR LINCOLN. By Benoni-Benjamin. ' I "HE voice of prophecy was his: A crisis is at hand; A house divided 'gainst itself canfiot divided stand; One tendency must bind the parts to make the C'nion strong; The conflict's irrepressible between the right and wrong. Through mists that dimmed so many eyes how clearly he discerned That every man has right to eat the bread his hand has earned. When days were darkest, his the faith, so simple yet sublime, That somehow God would lift the weight from all men in due time. He led us onward step by step, slow too when we were slow. But when we turned toward freedom's goal, struck freedom's grandest blow. Back through the years fourscore and more he saw the fathers' plan — A Nation whose chief corner-stone should be the Rights of Man. And then he saw thick clouds and darkness cover all the land. And heard the awful silence that presaged the storm at hand. And when the war-god sped the lightning 'cross the southern sky, He raised the fathers' flag above the fathers' house full high, And to the Northlands blew a bugle-note so loud and clear, That all the Northlands heard it and responded with one cheer. They came by thousands at his call, the Nation's life to save. By thousands, too, the last full measure of devotion gave. And at his bidding, by the graves of our heroic slain, We made the high resolve : These dead shall not have died in vain; This Nation, under God, shall have of freedom a new birth; Self government — the peoples — shall not perish from the earth. For years, how fondly did we hope, how frevently all pray, That speedily the mighty scourge of war might pass away. In vain our hope and prayer : A great offence we must atone; God wills that nations too must reap the harvest they have sown; All sunk must be the wealth piled up by unrequited toil; For all the blood drawn with the lash our blood must drench t/ie soil;
