Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE CITY IN RUINS. fV yore a city by Time's river stood. Holding commerce with silent, distant worlds, Rich argosies came stealing from the gloom As if from the Unknown, and bore such fruits As mortals tasting once, love more than well With sober hunger's yearning. There they dwelt— A people favored by a righteousness; By qualities of mind not of a race, But of mankind more large, commensurate With those of fabled deities; by types Of beauty, all unconscious of their charm, With virtue's spirit e'er sustaining them ; By manly tone deep in affinity With wisdom's valor, happy in the skill Of choosing hopes that met ambition's aim With sweet reality. But to a close An era came, like Day that sees the sun Go down, and is in gloom. A heavy cloud Above the city hung, and pensive was The brow where joy had been, as oracles A grievous time foretold. Life's modes had changed. Succeeding on the heels of vanity, Freedom's discord licensed oppression's ills. Some warning voices rose and spoke of things As once they were, and to the present turned With scornful fingers. But, alack ! men's ears Were deaf, or whene'er otherwise not prone So to adapt their acts unto the means That would reform their plight. Anon there came One who did mutter words from depths of that Strange fervency which works within the breast Of him who has just found fresh inner might Accruing to the virtue of himself. A sharpness of mild sense was his to cope With life's sure obstacles, o'ercoming much With kindly effort when his will arose And bade him courage use. Often he stood Above a crowd, as separate from it As Nestor from a soldier-throng, resolved And still resolving on accomplishment Of duteous service. Speaking, men he tried To move with new impulses, n...