LXXIII.

And yet I wept thee not, thou true and brave! I could not weep--there gather’d round thy name Too deep a passion. _Thou_ denied a grave! _Thou_, with the blight flung on thy soldier’s fame! Had I not known thy heart from childhood’s time? Thy heart of hearts?--and couldst thou die for crime? No! had all earth decreed that death of shame, I would have set, against all earth’s decree, Th’ inalienable trust of my firm soul in thee!