Of wheels; the groan of yokes and grinding steel
And iron chain, and lo! at last the whole

Vast line, that reached as if to touch the goal,
Began to stretch and stream away and wind
Toward the West, as if with one control;

Then hope loomed fair, and home lay far behind;
Before, the boundless plain, and fiercest of their kind.

At first the way lay green and fresh as seas,
And far away as any reach of wave;

The sunny streams went by in belt of trees;
And here and there the tassel'd tawny brave

Swept by on horse, looked back, stretched forth and gave
A yell of warn, and then did wheel and rein

Awhile, and point away, dark-browed and grave,

Into the far and dim and distant plain

With signs and prophecies, and then plunged on again.

Some hills at last began to lift and break;
Some streams began to fail of wood and tide,
The somber plain began betime to take
A hue of weary brown, and wild and wide
It stretched its naked breast on every side.
A babe was heard at last to cry for bread
Amid the deserts; cattle lowed and died,
And dying men went by with broken tread,
And left a long black serpent line of wreck and dead.

Strange hungered birds, black-winged and still as death,
And crowned of red with hooked beaks, blew low
And close about, till we could touch their breath

Strange unnamed birds, that seemed to come and go
In circles now, and now direct and slow,

Continual, yet never touch the earth;
Slim foxes slid and shuttled to and fro
At times across the dusty weary dearth

Of life, looked back, then sank like crickets in a hearth.

Then dust arose, a long dim line like smoke

From out of riven earth. The wheels went groaning by,
Ten thousand feet in harness and in yoke,
They tore the ways of ashen alkali,

And desert winds blew sudden, swift and dry.
The dust! it sat upon and filled the train!

It seemed to fret and fill the very sky.

Lo! dust upon the beasts, the tent, the plain,
And dust, alas! on breasts that rose not up again.

They sat in desolation and in dust

By dried-up desert streams; the mother's hands
Hid all her bended face; the cattle thrust

Their tongues and faintly called across the lands.
The babes, that knew not what this way through sands
Could mean, did ask if it would end today.

The panting wolves slid by, red-eyed, in bands
To pools beyond. The men looked far away,
And, silent, saw that all a boundless desert lay.

They rose by night; they struggled on and on
As thin and still as ghosts; then here and there
Beside the dusty way before the dawn,
Men silent laid them down in their despair
And died. But woman! Woman,
May man have strength to give to you your due;

frail as

fair!

You faltered not, nor murmured anywhere,
You held your babes, held to your course, and you

Bore on through burning hell your double burdens through.

Men stood at last, the decimated few,

Above a land of running streams, and they?

They pushed aside the boughs, and peering through
Beheld afar the cool refreshing bay;

Then some did curse, and some bend hands to pray;
But some looked back upon the desert, wide
And desolate with death, then all the day

They mourned. But one, with nothing left beside
His dog to love, crept down among the ferns and died.

The Cincinnatus of the West,

Whom envy dared not hate,

Bequeathed the name of WASHINGTON,
To make man blush there was but one!

THE CHARACTER OF WASHINGTON 2

HENRY CABOT LODGE (1850- >

Washington stands among the greatest men of human history, and those in the same rank with him are very few. Whether measured by what he did, or what he was, or by the effect of his work upon the history of mankind, in every aspect he is entitled to the place he holds among the greatest of his race.

Few men in all time have such a record of achievement. Still fewer can show, at the end of a career so crowded with high deeds and memorable victories, a life so free

1 From Works of Lord Byron, published by John Murray, London, 1832.

2 From "Hero Tales from American History," by Henry Cabot Lodge and Theodore Roosevelt. Copyright, 1895, by The Century Company, New York. Used by permission of the publishers.

from spot, a character so unselfish and so pure, a fame so void of doubtful points demanding either defense or explanation. Eulogy of such a life is needless, but it is always important to recall and freshly to remember just what manner of man he was.

In the first place, he was physically a striking figure. He was very tall, powerfully made, with a strong, handsome face. He was remarkably muscular and powerful. As a boy, he was a leader in all outdoor sports. No one could fling the bar farther than he, and no one could ride more difficult horses. As a young man, he became a woodsman and hunter. Day after day he could tramp through the wilderness with his gun and his surveyor's chain, and then sleep at night beneath the stars. He feared no exposure or fatigue, and he outdid the hardiest backwoodsman in following a winter trail and swimming icy streams. This habit of vigorous bodily exercise he carried through life. Whenever he was at Mount Vernon he gave a large part of his time to fox hunting, riding after his hounds through the most difficult country. His physical power and endurance counted for much in his success when he commanded his army, and when the heavy anxieties of general and President weighed upon his mind and heart.

He was an educated but not a learned man. He read well and remembered what he read, but his life was from the beginning a life of action, and the world of men his school. He was not a military genius like Hannibal, or Cæsar, or Napoleon, of which the world has had only three or four examples. But he was a great soldier of the type which the English race has produced, like Marlborough and Cromwell, Wellington, Grant, and Lee. He was patient under defeat, capable of large combina