Classic Poem

Reared in the atmosphere of chivalry
And stirred by legends of the knightly past,
He felt himself in spirit armor-clad,
And entering the jousts on prancing steed,
Sworn unto Beauty and ideals of Right.
Combat and valor, schools and courts of arms,
Appealed to every soldier quality
In him who, from the loins of warriors got,
Sensed martial lineage in flesh and soul.
He heard the trumpets sounding through his dreams.
He saw great banners waving in the sky.
The clouds were slopes where phantom armies marched,
The thunders Nature's high artillery.
So felt he, thought he, turned he up the ways
Of boyhood's courses and of youth's ascents.

In after years, commanding real battalions,
His venturous spirit and his valiant deeds
Were blazonry to every academe
Of home, West Point, and the stern sphere of war.

But in the Nation's School, as in his home,
The " States Rights " doctrine stamped his opening mind,
And 'neath the aegis of his Government
He learned, alas, that his beloved State,
If so her people willed, might rise supreme,
And break the ties that bound her to the Union. —
Let blame be just as virtue judgment gives. —
And in the Nation's School, as in his home,
He found the pregnant meaning of those words
Upon the shield of West Point's Hall of Fame,
Of " Duty, Honor, Country. " Thus he passed
Full-laden with conceptions and ideals
Prefiguring the struggle soon to come,
And full-equipped for action. Thus he passed
From martial dreaming unto martial service.

Service it was of science and of skill,
Of engineering, ne'er to be forgot.
Has Hampton Roads a voice from bulwarks strong,
The Mississippi from far-fended shores,
Or has Fort Hamilton an answering cheer
Across Manhattan's spacious harbor wards?
These cite achievements wrought for Country's sake
By him who struck the hardest at her heart.