Part 80

THE VICTORY AT YORKTOWN.

(From Arms and the Man.)

A Metrical Address recited on the one hundredth anniversary of the surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown, on invitation of the United States Congress, October 19, 1881.

PROLOGUE.

Full-burnished through the long-revolving years The ploughshare of a Century to-day Runs peaceful furrows where a crop of Spears Once stood in War's array.

And we, like those who on the Trojan plain See hoary secrets wrenched from upturned sods;-- Who, in their fancy, hear resound again The battle-cry of Gods;--

We now,--this splendid scene before us spread Where Freedom's full hexameter began-- Restore our Epic, which the Nations read As far its thunders ran.

Here visions throng on People and on Bard, Ranks all a-glitter in battalions massed And closed around as like a plumèd guard, They lead us down the Past.

I see great Shapes in vague confusion march Like giant shadows, moving vast and slow, Beneath some torch-lit temple's mighty arch Where long processions go.

I see these Shapes before me all unfold, But ne'er can fix them on the lofty wall, Nor tell them, save as she of Endor told What she beheld to Saul.

WASHINGTON AND LEE.

(From Memorial Ode.)

Our history is a shining sea Locked in by lofty land, And its great Pillars of Hercules, Above the shifting sand I here behold in majesty Uprising on each hand.

These Pillars of our history, In fame forever young, Are known in every latitude And named in every tongue, And down through all the Ages Their story shall be sung.

The Father of his Country Stands above that shut-in sea, A glorious symbol to the world Of all that's great and free; And to-day Virginia matches him-- And matches him with Lee.

FOOTNOTE:

By permission of Mrs. Jane Barren Hope Marr.

JAMES WOOD DAVIDSON.

~1829=----.~

JAMES WOOD DAVIDSON was born in Newberry County, South Carolina, and educated at South Carolina College, Columbia. He taught at Winnsboro and at Columbia until the opening of the war, when he enlisted as a volunteer in the Army of Northern Virginia, and served throughout the great struggle. After the war he taught again in Columbia till 1871. Then he removed to Washington and in 1873 to New York, where he engaged in literary and journalistic work. He has also lived in Florida and represented Dade County in the State Legislature. He is now living in Washington City.

WORKS.

Living Writers of the South, (1869). The Correspondent. Poetry of the Future. Dictionary of Southern Authors, [unfinished]. School History of South Carolina. Bell of Doom, [a poem]. Florida of To-day. Helen of Troy, [a romance of ancient Greece; unfinished.]

Dr. Davidson's "Living Writers of the South" has made his name well known as a critic and student of literature, and his labors in behalf of Southern letters entitle him to high regard.

THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE POETICAL.

(From Poetry of the Future.)

The relation between the Beautiful and Beauty on the one hand, and the Poetical and Poetry on the other, has generally been seen, when seen at all, vaguely; that is to say, seen as the Beautiful and the Poetical themselves have been seen--"in a mirror darkly." This indistinctness seems to have grown out of the faulty views of nature taken by the speculators. . . . . . . . . . In brief, then, Nature is an effect--a product--of a Power lying behind or above it; and it stands, accordingly, to that Power in the relation of an effect to a cause. That cause we shall describe as Spiritual; the effect, as Natural. The Natural, or Nature, is the material Universe embracing the three kingdoms, known as mineral, vegetable, and animal. . . . .

Such being the case, everything in nature is a correspondent of some thing--is expressive of and consequently representative and exponential of something--above it or behind it; and that something is an idea--a thing not material. It follows, then, that every object in nature has real character in itself as a representative of an idea; just as, say, an anchor is representative of hope, a heart, of love, an olive branch, of peace, and a ring, of marriage. . .

We next come to consider the percipient mind. Men's minds have limited and imperfect faculties and capabilities. That which is good, or true, or beautiful, to one mind can hardly be the same in the same way and degree to any other mind. It is true--as some writers have stated, but none seems willing to push the propositions to their legitimate conclusions--that the Good and the Beautiful are true, the Beautiful and the True are good, and the True and the Good are beautiful. We wish to accept the propositions in their most comprehensive scope and with all their legitimate consequences.