The day that sees thy care laid down
Thy people mourn thy gentle sway,
Their tears the glory of thy Crown.
Within our isles, far o'er the sea,
From Polar Star to Southern Cross,
The voice of mourning's loud for thee
Of mourning for a nation's loss.
We leave thee to thy slumber deep,
Enshrouded in a people's love !
" He giveth His beloved sleep ; "
'Tis thine, this last gift from above !
ROBERT CLARK.
CLEMENT SCOTT 75
XXVII.
in
REST thou in Peace ! Beloved Queen !
The Journey's ended ! Duty done !
Oh Paradise ! unknown, unseen !
O love ! with the Eternal One !
There, where all Souls shall feel, shall see,
The Wonder of Eternity !
Where tears fall not, and sorrows cease,
Rest thou in Peace, oh Rest in Peace !
No more shall Spring's sweet violet
Or summer rose, enchant thine eyes ;
But myriad blooms in sunshine set,
Adorn God's world that never dies.
Oh ! picture Love ! without its sting !
Conceive a life, unstained by pain,
Enter the Court where Angels sing,
Beloved Queen ! Greet Love again !
7 6
The world, what was it ? sun and snow,
A spark of joy, a fire of tears.
Dear heart, that braved it, blow on blow,
Put on thy Crown of endless years !
Oh ! Everlasting Mystery,
Revealed alone to those who die !
God has decreed thy Soul's release,
Queen ! Perfect Queen ! Oh ! Rest in
Peace !
CLEMENT SCOTT.
ALFRED COCHRANE 77
XXVIII.
THIS is the thing that God hath willed,
And as the winter day departs,
The sad foreboding stands fulfilled,
And casts its shadow on our hearts ;
Proclaiming lands and seas across
The tidings of the nation's loss.
So great a Queen, that Sorrow's breath
Touches the earth from end to end ;
So well-beloved that at her death
The lowliest seems to lose a friend ;
So glorious that no voice can phrase
Words too exalted for her praise.
Victoria mighty memories rise
Which that immortal name can wake,
Proud feats of valour and emprise
Wrought and attempted for her sake,
Bold companies, where this has been
The watchword, " Gentlemen, the Queen ! "
78 MIGHTY MEMORIES
Warriors whose fame Time shall not dim
Have held her smile as their reward,
From Gough and Havelock to him,
Her latest champion of the sword ;
For her the gallant records ring
From Inkerman to Mafeking.
Historic statesmen, these and those,
Session by session at her side
Counselled her maidenhood, or chose
Her ripe experience as their guide ;
Illustrious names the lists reveal
Melbourne and Beaconsfield and Peel
Since first our England, something tired
Of idols of a dowdier sort,
That fresh young maiden Queen admired
And her rejuvenated Court.
Oh ! to those days, to those gay throngs
How blithe an air of youth belongs !
The shade slipped forward on the stone,
To customs that were new and strange,
And still one sentiment alone
The years could neither end nor change ;
By wife, by widow, as by maid
By her the old devotion stayed.
ALFRED COCHRANE 79
And so she stands, erect, sublime,
The central figure on the stage,
Moving through that amazing time
Which men call the Victorian Age,
While science and invention planned
Unnumbered marvels in her land.
Proved worthy of the crown she wore,
The burden of imperial cares
Strong in her people's love she bore,
Her happiness, her sorrows theirs ;
Herself, alike in best or worst,
Always the greatest and the first.
Call no man happy, says the sage,
Till he has drawn his parting breath ;
But surely she, from youth to age,
Was happy both in life and death.
No single jarring thought is there
That matchless beauty to impair.
She never knew the weary years
Of failing mind and waning powers,
But, conscious of her people's tears
A few brief melancholy hours,
She lingered life and death between,
Then died as she had lived, a Queen.
ALFRED COCHRANE.
8o OUR BEREAVEMENT
XXIX.
ut:
WE all are orphans, all are motherless !
Death's shadow lurks in every English home :
To us comes death-in-life, and heart's distress,
To Her the everlasting crown has come.
O tender face ! shall we behold no more
The noble countenance, the hair grown grey
In caring for the People ? Passed away
All that made England England ! She who
wore
The British Crown was Britain's self, and we,
Whose barque is tossed on sorrow's shoreless sea
Are homeless, outcasts, orphans, motherless :
God pity us in our supreme distress !
O Glorious, O Beloved ! Mother, Queen
Our sea-salt tears are not for thee to-night,
Who dwellest in the everlasting light,
But for our orphaned selves. Our eyes have
seen
R. C. FILLINGHAM 81
A darker day than days of war's defeat :
Death in his cruellest fashion us doth meet,
Taking our Mother from us. Death has done
To-day its direst deed, smiting not one
But every home in England ! England weeps
While on her bier, England's Great Mother
sleeps.
It is no time for speaking. Voice, be
dumb !
The darkest day of England's years has come.
From peer's and peasant's eyes the tear-drops
start,
Each heart in England is a broken heart !
R. C. FILLINGHAM.
82 ACROSS THE BAR
XXX.
Across tye
QUEEN of the Western Isles, and of the East
Crown'd Empress ! The long shadows fall
one way
In the still evening of thy glorious day.
Thy loneliness is ended : thou art one
With visions of the sunset, and of Him
In whose clear shining mortal eyes grow dim.
Lately we watch'd thee move within that light.
The radiance fell and fill'd thee more and
more:
How tenderly it touch'd the hem of war !
Let Erin answer from her greener fields
Erin, the Mother, mourning for her dead,
The Daughter, reverencing thy bow'd head.
And let them from their shallow graves reply
Thy many-nurtured sons who, side by side,
Fought for thy sovereignty and, winning, died.
LAURIE MAGNUS 83
For thou wast awful, even as thou wast mild ;
A present comfort, and a power unseen,
Disposer and Consoler, Mother and Queen.
O Ruler's mind ! O stricken woman's heart !
Thy children call across the bar to thee :
" How shall we miss thee in the time to be,
" Whose wisdom was the milk of human woe,
And duty was thy light by night and day,
And faith and love the flowers upon thy way.
" For thee the heroes of the era wrought
The Prince of Arts, captain of a long line,
The Sage of Statecraft, and the Seer Divine. 1
"Thine was the smile that bound the Empire
round,
Thrill'd alien Kings, and summon'd from its
grave
Old chivalry, new-born, and lowly brave.
" And thine the word, more skill'd than all the
arts
To heal, and thine the mirror-tear that held
All solace of all grief since first tears well'd."
* * *
1 Albert, Disraeli, Tennyson. L. M.
84 TO HER PEOPLE
Thank God, no lone regret disturbs thy fame :
No pious limner, with ideal design,
Need add, or alter, or omit a line.
Thank God, no lone regret disturbs us now :
We knew thee, lov'd thee, and, where know-
ledge fail'd,
Love overflow'd his measure and prevail'd.
LAURIE MAGNUS.
XXXI.
BE still, be still, O People! The King hath
laid His Hand
Upon the Heart encompassing the hearts of
all your race,
And called the Blameless Queen who loved the
lowliest in Her land
From all the glory earth could give to look
upon His Face.
J. J. BELL 85
Bow down, bow down, O People ! But never
to the dust
Of arid grief let any soul in dull despair be
bowed.
Amid Her fair, green memories that ages shall
not rust
Bend low, but be not broken; be humble,
yet be proud !
Give thanks, give thanks, O People ! Yea, even
while ye weep,
Give thanks for Her who was so good, so
pure, so great, so wise
That half the world was stricken sad the hour
She fell asleep
Oh, ne'er before did Death find tears within
so many eyes !
Be brave, be brave, O People ! Remember
how She bore
Herself with simple grandeur in the gloom as
in the glare,
And how She oft rejoiced with you although
Her heart was sore,
And how Her courage wavered not beneath
increasing care.
86 TO HER PEOPLE
Be strong, be strong, O People ! The Queen
had need of rest.
But ye must still press forward to the Good
that was Her goal
Banded together North and South knit close
with East and West
Living as in the radiance of a mother's
sainted soul.
Praise God, praise God, O People ! The reign
of Her so royal,
So faithful thro' Her changing life, ends not
in one dark day.
And over all who mourn Her now with loving
hearts and loyal
Victoria the Good shall hold an endless holy
sway !
J. J. BELL.
REGINALD HUGHES 87
XXXII.
THE Queen is dead ! Our Queen, the Queen
of Queens ;
And England sits as in a dream, and sobs,
And rich and poor, and high and low, are made
Peers by griefs patent of nobility.
Never, since on the shingly Ebbsfleet shore
The first keel grated bearing Englishmen
To win us England, has a cry gone up
So universal, tender, dolorous,
As this that thrills the land ; which hears amazed
The falling tears of distant kith and kin,
From coral-lipped Australia's shadeless wilds
To where, in thunder-speech of avalanche,
Great Kinchinjanga calls to Everest.
Ah ! but, in sooth, though miracles be cheap,
Since Christ was, has no wonder been like this.
A Queen the glory of whose womanhood
Outshone a perfect queenliness, till at length
The queen was but the halo round the friend,
The sovereign round the mother. For no blow
That struck an English home but hurt her too.
No loss too common for her sympathy,
No grief too lowly for her heart to share.
88 KATHLEEN BARROW
Chary of weeping is this realm of hers ;
Yet now weep on, her England, nor with words
Profane the silence of a world in tears.
REGINALD HUGHES.
XXXIII.
n iljf iJromtsf tr Hanfr,
SLEEP, Sleep.
The long, long day, radiant with deeds well
done,
Has reached at last the setting of the sun,
The weary feet that faltered to their rest
Have touched the golden kingdom of the Blest,
And the winged myriads hush their triumph song
To draw the pilgrim into the shining throng.
Sleep, Sleep.
Rest, Rest.
The book of life is closed and folded now.
See how serenely Death has smoothed her brow.
Love of her life, we lay her at thy side,
No more a widow, but a white-souled bride.
Over those lonely years to clasp thy hand
'Neath God's own sunshine in the Promised
Land.
Rest, Rest.
KATHLEEN BARROW.
S. TREVOR FRANCIS 89
XXXIV.
& Star*
OUR QUEEN is DEAD.
Like some bright beauteous star,
She blazed upon the firmament of time,
With light increasing with her numbering years ;
Until her rich-orbed glory glowed and gleamed,
As does the sun in midst of summer days.
DEATH THEN SMOTE HER.
Pale grew the star and fled.
All men were struck with deep and dazed
distress,
And wept, their eyes could never, never more
Its glory see.
But as I wept, and wept, I saw that star
Out of the darkness, deep and dire, arise
With light more beauteous, yea, a thousand-fold
More beautiful than aught of earthly skies,
Or earthly thrones.
I saw it borne away,
Until it sat upon the brow of One
Whose head erstwhile was crowned with cruel
thorns.
90 S. REYNOLDS HOLE
I saw it shine as never o'er this earth
It beamed before, as on that holy brow
It played and quivered in the light of heaven.
There was its rest, fixed on the crown of Him
Who is both Lord of lords, and King of kings.
S. TREVOR FRANCIS.
XXXV.
otr Hest out* ^ween
BORNE by Thy angels, through the awful way,
To Paradise, where dawns the eternal day,
God rest our Queen !
Faith dares not doubt ; her prayer and ours is
heard ;
She claims the precious promise of Thy Word,
God rest our Queen !
With those, her dearest, whom she mourned so
long,
She lives, and loves, and learns the triumph-
song.
God rest our Queen !
Glory to Jesus there remaineth still
This rest for all who seek to do His will
With her our Queen.
S. REYNOLDS HOLE.
F. E. WEATHERLY 91
XXXVI.
tye tywen !
<&otr Satf ti)c B ing !
" GOD save the Queen ! " her people cried,
As trembling at the gate she stood,
Where stretched the Kingdom fair and wide
That she has made so great, so good !
" God save the Qeeen ! " it echoed far,
From land to land, from sea to sea,
Where morning star to evening star
Proclaimed her march of victory.
" God comfort her ! " we knelt and prayed
With aching hearts and loving tears,
As sorrow after sorrow laid
Its finger on her widowed years.
" God be with her ! " it came at last,
We wept and watched with bated breath,
As bravely, peacefully she passed
Adown the shadowy vale of death.
God of our fathers, still the same,
We kneel and ask Thy guiding hand,
For her dear sake, in her dear name,
God, save the King and keep our land !
F. E. WEATHERLY.
92 AT REST
XXXVII.
at &e*t.
A TRIBUTE FROM THE SOCIETY OF AMERICAN
WOMEN IN LONDON.
STATELY she lies; and half her years have
vanished !
Her hands are folded on her quiet breast.
Stately she lies ; and all her cares are banished !
She, who has laboured long, now sleeps at
rest.
Mother, and wife, and Queen a threefold glory
Lightens her face, where wakes the smile of
death ;
While wondering, whispering crowds repeat her
story,
" Mother and Queen " they sob with quiver-
ing breath.
Round the wide world the solemn bells are
tolling
The passing of the Queen the well-beloved,
Whose smile gave comfort, and whose words
consoling
A potent balm of wondrous healing proved.
ELLA M. DIETZ GLYNES 93
The passing of the Queen, the patient mother,
Who toiled unceasing with a mother's strength
For her dear people's weal ; nor looked for other
Duty or Right, through all her long life's
length.
" The passing of the Queen." They wonder,
weeping,
How the great heart of love from love can
cease,
Can she, who watched o'er all, at last be
sleeping ?
Sleeping, at last, as one who dreams of
peace.
Beneath a veil she lies, where lilies glisten ;
Strong men bow low, gazing thro' mists of
tears,
While beating hearts throb fast, and yearning
listen
For the dear voice, which swayed thro' long
dim years.
So long our Queen, our Queen and Mother
tender,
With sunlight in her heart a Queen she
smiled
94 AT REST
And Woman, always human 'neath her splen-
dour,
Frank, true, and brave, and trusting as a
child.
She gave her people love, and all devotion
They gave love life for country and for
Queen.
Through the wide earth hearts beat with one
emotion,
Because she lieth still ; a veil between.
Farewell, thou mighty Queen ! Thou best
beloved !
Nations shall mourn thee, earth shall be thy
shrine !
The brightness of thy face may be removed,
But hearts unnumbered are for ever thine !
A righteous Ruler ! Thou thy throne hast
planted
Beneath the cross where love was crucified,
Thy prayer for grace, in deep abundance
granted,
Hath spread thine Empire far as flows the
tide.
ELLA M. DIETZ GLYNES 95
Unto earth's utmost bounds the heathen bless
thee,
The many peoples whom thy rule hath
blessed,
And peoples, now unborn, shall yet confess thee
The Queen whom wisdom ruled and love
possessed.
Thy race shall call thee blessed, when hereafter
Their children's children listen at the knee,
The Saxon race, whose great deep-hearted
laughter
Springs from their freedom, boundless as the
sea.
The freedom thou hast nurtured, wisely cher
ished,
That like the sea shall spread throughout the
earth,
To save the peoples that erstwhile had perished,
Had not such freedom given new life, new
birth.
Farewell, blest Queen ! Farewell ! Keep watch
above us,
Hide from our knowledge grief's too perilous
deep,
96 AT REST
Watch over us on high, cease not to love us
With love surviving death, and death-born
sleep.
From shadowy mists beyond, oh ! thou great-
hearted !
A voice hath called thee, and thy soul obeyed.
One claimed his own, and now, no longer parted,
Thine earthly form by his shall soon be laid
Behold thy life is finished to completeness !
Unnumbered blessings follow in thy train ;
The lilies lie and wrap thee in their sweetness,
While silent tears fall like the blessed rain.
ELLA M. DIETZ GLYNES.
ARTHUR A. SYKES 97
XXXVIII.
Ffctoria'0
IN kraal and ghaut and coral-reef,
Unnumbered swarthy millions cry,
" The Great Queen dead ? She cannot die !
Nor may we know so great a grief ! "
As in past days a Caesar's soul
Heav'nward was held to wing its way,
Thence to send down on earth its ray,
A new light in the starry pole,
So for strange myriad hearts that mourn
Stunned, disallowing Death's decree,
Northward to-day from o'er the sea
A humble Kaffir's voice is borne :
1 An old head-man in Pondoland, when told of the
Queen's death, thought for a moment, and then said :
" I shall look in the sky to-night for a new star."
G
98 VICTORIA'S STAR
" This night there shall be seen a sign
To mark the Empire-Mother's love
Continuing in the Land above,
A new star in the heav'ns will shine ! "
Let, then, a fancied gleam increase
The glorious Southern Cross that soars
O'er African and Austral shores
Her blessing, Unity and Peace !
Add to the Flag that near or far,
O'er Commonwealth, Dominion, State,
Waves in a realm inviolate
One splendour more Victoria's Star !
ARTHUR A. SYKES.
Cfte
1-4, 1901
H. D. RAWNSLEY 101
XXXIX.
ftf JTlootr*
SHE comes ! Before her every ensign dips
Such majesty has Death she still is Queen ;
Pale shines the Solent, as it sobs between
Her islands dumb beneath the dark eclipse
Of Britain's noblest Sovereignty Her ships
Lie sorrowing on the waters ; silent lean
Her seamen on the yards, and what they
mean
The guns forth-tell from melancholy lips.
Across the flood how drear the water-way !
The very Heavens do seem to feel grief's
mood ;
And the winds sigh, as if by pain possessed :
So to the island of perpetual rest
She comes ! Ah, well ! for she has crossed the
flood,
And we this side in lamentation stay.
H. D. RAWNSLEY.
102 HER LAST REVIEW
XL.
" Most greatly lived
This Star of England." King Henry V.
MAKE room upon the shining, placid sea !
Sob your salutes, ye thousand minute guns !
For lo ! here comes the richest argosy
That earth hath seen in all her circling suns !
Hang your proud battle-banners half-mast high ;
There's sorrow on the earth, and sea, and
sky !
Lay out in league-long lines your guardian
ships,
And let their guns salute with saddened
lips;
Let each craft pipe on high its loyal crew
The great Sea-Queen holds now her last
review !
ALEXANDER LAMONT 103
The sun looks down from out heaven's cloud-
less dome,
And o'er the Solent's gleaming, peaceful
breast ;
Victoria sails for her loved, Royal home,
Ere dips life's ship down in Death's golden
West.
With pennons drooped and crews in sorrow
dumb
Through one great, human touch, soul knit
to soul,
The ships of foes we fought of yore have
come
To pay her homage at Death's muster-roll.
And phantom fleets, led by the brave of
yore
Drake, Howard, Grenville of Armada fame
Unsignalled by drooped flag or cannon's roar,
Bear down, saluting her immortal name.
Between those lines of sorrow-freighted ships,
As sails her galleon o'er the silent sea,
Each chief salutes, as low his flag he dips,
The " silent Mother of our Kings to be."
HER LAST REVIEW
And as the honoured ship its proud path weaves
Through the long avenue of gleaming guns,
The great Sea-Queen in stately death receives
The homage of her thrice ten thousand sons.
The haven's reached ; and, as the setting sun
Burns on the grandest pageant Time has
seen,
Great Nelson's " Victory " fires the last proud
gun
Of salutation to Earth's noblest Queen.
Meet gun to boom last in that high salute
The gun that blazed through all Trafalgar's
Day
Well may it now remain for ever mute :
The glory of the Earth hath passed away !
ALEXANDER LAMONT.
WARHAM ST LEGER 105
XLI.
Ftctorta
SHE is asleep ! a rest how calm and deep,
For so He giveth His beloved sleep !
A rest no cares can mar, no summons break,
Save the last call, among the Just to wake !
From the fair Isle of Summer, where the seas
Flash with their summer-brilliant memories,
With solemn pomp the long-drawn fleets be-
tween,
In Death's last dignity comes home the Queen !
Fear not to wake her ! Hearken ! one by
one
The fiery anguish of the minute gun
Smites with its hard despair the nation's heart
Our first great loss in which she bears no part.
There strikes the cold of new unsolaced grief,
Her gracious words at last bring no relief;
Could she but hear us now, our cry would be,
" We miss thee sorest in our tears for thee ! "
io6 VICTORIA REDUX
And now along the stately water-way,
So oft of yore with white-winged pleasure gay,
Leaving for aye her summer isle forlorn,
Past the great battleships their Queen is borne.
Not now their microcosmic power they vaunt,
Angels of wrath or mercy militant ;
Fettered with woe her might's Symplegades
Salute in death the Mistress of the Seas !
Meetly the floating Isles of Freedom fly
Their sorrow's lofty symbol half-mast high,
For her, who true to trust in peace and war
Gave and obeyed the sign of Trafalgar !
Righteous and great, all littleness above,
Homely, for Home is still the heart of love,
True Soul of England, thy ennobled years
Call a World's homage to an Empire's tears !
Oh, reverend head, mysterious with State,
Oh, hands of comfort 'neath an Empire's
weight,
Long hast thou shown the road, and led the
way;
Therefore we bless our God for thee to-day !
WARHAM ST LEGER.
ELLA WHEELER WILCOX 107
XLII.
THE Queen is taking a drive to-day,
They have hung with purple the carriage-way,
They have dressed with purple the royal track
Where the Queen goes forth and ne'er comes
back.
Let no man labour as she goes by
On her last appearance to mortal eye.
With heads uncovered let all men wait
For the Queen to pass, in her regal state.
Army and Navy shall lead the way
For that wonderful coach of the Queen's to-day.
Kings and Princes and Lords of the land
Shall ride behind her, a humble band,
And over the city and over the world
Shall the Flags of all Nations be half-mast-
furled
io8 THE QUEEN'S LAST RIDE
For the silent lady of royal birth
Who is riding away from the Courts of earth ;
Riding away from the world's unrest
To a mystical goal, on a secret quest.
Tho' in royal splendour she drives through the
town,
Her robes are simple, she wears no crown,
And yet she wears one, for widowed no more,
She is crowned with the love that has gone
before,
And crowned with the love she has left behind
In the hidden depths of each mourner's mind.
Bow low your heads lift your hearts on high
The Queen in silence is driving by !
ELLA WHEELER WILCOX.
F. FRANKFORT MOORE 109
XLIII.
I.
WE hear the muffled tolling
Of the bells :
We hear the muffled rolling
Of the drums :
We hear the sullen thunders
Of the guns :
And every sound that sunders
The silence of the gloom
Every sudden, sullen boom
That comes from gun and steeple
To the sombre city tells
To the death-dumb street it stuns
That this we hear is but the great heart of a
sorrow-smitten people,
Sobbing, throbbing with the tremor of the
drums.
She comes :
She comes :
She comes.
FINIS CORONAT OPUS
II.
She comes among the people that she made :
She comes among the multitude once more :
In statelier pageant than before,
In lordlier robes array'd.
She comes who came as child, as girl, as wife,
In every heart throughout her land to live.
" Be faithful unto death and I will give
To thee a Croivn of Life"
She heard the Voice Divine that promiseth
That crown whose lustre death defies;
And now the world becomes one voice which
cries :
" She has been faithful unto death."
Lift up your hearts, ye people ; for she comes
A Queen unto Jier Crowning on this day.
The Dead March is a Coronation Lay,
There is triumph in the rolling of the drums.
III.
The heaviest burthen ever woman bore
Was laid upon her by the King of Kings :
The burden of a realm that evermore
Rolls onward like a tide from shore to shore
A sea whose boundaries no horizon rings.
F. FRANKFORT MOORE
That gift of God, most dread and most divine,
A sceptre, was her maiden heritage.
But in her hand the sceptre was a sign
From sacred maidenhood to sacred age
A symbol still of Freedom's Sovereignty
A symbol still of Mercy's Monarchy,
Till round the world a girdle she enwove,
The sacred cincture of her peoples' love.
IV.
Alas ! a girdle of her peoples' grief