Henry W. Grady
TRUE-HEARTED friend of all true friendliness!
Brother of all true brotherhoods!—Thy hand
And its late pressure now we understand
Most fully, as it falls thus gestureless,
And Silence lulls thee into sweet excess
Of sleep. Sleep thou content!—Thy loved Southland.
Is swept with tears, as rain in sunshine; and
Through all the frozen North our eyes confess
Like sorrow—seeing still the princely sign
Set on thy lifted brow, and the rapt light
Of the dark, tender, melancholy eyes—
Thrilled with the music of those lips of thine,
And yet the fire thereof that lights the night,
With the white splendor of thy prophecies.
James Whitcombe Riley.
In New York Tribune, December 23, 1889.