In Cornwall and Across the Sea With Poems Written in Devonshire. By Douglas B. W. Sladen |
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| II. |
IN MEMORIAM.—SIR CHARLES SLADEN, K.C.M.G. |
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| IV. |
 | In Cornwall and Across the Sea |  |
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IN MEMORIAM.—SIR CHARLES SLADEN, K.C.M.G.
[_]
[Born at Ripple Court, Dover, 1816. Premier of the Colony of Victoria in the Crisis of 1868. Buried in the Cemetery overlooking the Sea, at Geelong, where he had resided for forty years, 1884.]
'Tis meet that he who dies away from home
Should sleep beside the sea which links and parts
His grave and ancient churchyards, where the hearts
Of those, who gave him birth, are laid in tomb.
'Tis meet, that when a strong man yields to doom
His rest should be 'mid those for whom he fought,
Amid the monuments of what he wrought,
And in some place to which all folk may come.
And therefore thou wert laid upon the hill
O'erlooking the blue stillness of the bay
Outside the city, where it was thy will
In thy long sojourn forty years to stay,
Far from the snowy cliffs which saw thy birth
On the most famous island of the Earth.
Should sleep beside the sea which links and parts
His grave and ancient churchyards, where the hearts
Of those, who gave him birth, are laid in tomb.
'Tis meet, that when a strong man yields to doom
His rest should be 'mid those for whom he fought,
Amid the monuments of what he wrought,
And in some place to which all folk may come.
And therefore thou wert laid upon the hill
O'erlooking the blue stillness of the bay
Outside the city, where it was thy will
In thy long sojourn forty years to stay,
Far from the snowy cliffs which saw thy birth
On the most famous island of the Earth.
115
II.
Thy birth was in the zone of pines, thy deathFar from the cherry crofts and fields of corn
And hop-clad hillsides 'mid which thou wast born;
Far from the Severn stream that wandereth
(Past stately hall and bleak Salopian heath,
With here and there a salmon in a pool)
Where thou wert bred, at Philip Sidney's school,
Far from that other stream, that rivalleth
The classic Isis in world-wide renown,
Where thou didst make the study of the law
And the bright page of history thine own,
And from the great metropolis, which saw
Thy happy wooing hours and studious days
While thou wast conning Justice's dark ways.
| In Cornwall and Across the Sea | |