Hymns and Odes for Temperance Occasions XIV: The Drunkard's Funeral

There was, some eighteen years or more ago,
A young man, a parishioner of mine,
Whose name was Willard. There are Willards many,
As there are many Lords and many Smiths.
This Willard was a butcher;--and my meats
I often bought of him, in Boylston Market.


He was a man of about five feet ten;
Upright, of ample chest and well-knit frame.
His eyes were black; and, on his healthy cheeks,
The rose and lily met and kissed each other.
Had he, instead of Boston, dwelt in Rome,
The sculptors there, Thorwaldsen and Canova,
Might have pulled caps to see whose studio
Willard should grace by standing as a model,
When those magicians were about to call
A young Apollo from Carrara's marble.


His young wife, in her comfortable home,
I visited, in my parochial walks;--
And, for a year or two, his pew, I saw,
Was never empty on the Sabbath day.
But, after that, both from his pew and stall
He was an absentee; and then I learned
That he'd become a drover; and, as such,
Went up and down the earth, and to and fro,
And dealt in bullocks, as he'd dealt in beef.


Still later,--and, meanwhile, his face no more
Was seen with those who, in the holy place,
"Came to present themselves before the Lord;"
And, therefore, knew I him or his no more;--
I sometimes saw him, in the business streets,
Acting, it seemed to me, as owner, first,
And, last, as only driver, of a dray.
And then, for years, he was to me as lost.
His comely figure sometimes swam along
Before the closing eye of Memory;
And I would ask myself what had become
Of Willard; he had seemed like one on whom
The eye of Fortune had not turned with smiles;--
Like one who, on the ladder of affairs,
Had been, for some time, stepping,--like a man
Descending from a roof with empty hod,--
Backwards and downwards. But years rolled away;
The places he had filled were filled by others;--
Another, in the market, had his stall;
And, to his pew, another family
"Came, to present themselves before the Lord."
Such is the mutability of life!


Years passed;--and, late one Saturday, there came
A neighbour, to request that I would go,
And offer prayer with a poor family
Whose head was taken away. The tenement,
The cold brick tenement, where the poor wife
Sat with her children, shrouded in coarse weeds,
Appeared almost as chill and desolate
As did the cold, white tenement of clay,
That lay o'erthrown before me. There appeared,
Around the mourners, not a single thing
That spoke of comfort past, or good to come;--
Nothing,--save what the bowels of the law
Deny its harpy fingers. I saw then,--
What I'd surmised,--that these poor, desolate ones
Must be,--they were!--a drunkard's family.


To pray with those from whom the hand of death
Hath taken away the reverend and the wise,
Or, "in its infant innocence," removed
The babe, the budding child,--meet type of heaven!--
Is a delightful office. Then the eye
Of Christian faith follows the soul, set free
From sensual chains and lures, and sees it wing
Its upward way;--and sees the gates of bliss
Swing open wide, to let the white dove in.


How full of comfort is the Holy Book,
For such as mourn the righteous and the pure!
How full of consolation then may be
The voice of him, whose office 't is to give
"Ashes to ashes, dust to dust!" But, oh!
If thou'st a heart that pity e'er hath touched,
Pity him, who the sacrifice of prayer
Must offer at a drunkard's funeral!


The brothers of the man, o'er whose remains
Prayer must be made, had from the country come
To take the body back,--now that the town
Had wrought its work upon it,--and to lay
What was once beautiful and full of life,
Into the kind arms of its mother, Earth.


The coffin's lid was closed. Before I prayed,
I stepped up by its side, to read the name
Cut on the metal plate;--for though the shades
Of evening were descending, there was light
Enough thrown off from its reflecting face
For me to see that "Willard" was the name!


Ere I withdrew, I took the widow's hand,
Dropped what poor words of comfort I could find,
And said, "On Monday I will visit you."


I did so. On the corner of her hearth,
On which were burning a few coals and brands,
I found her sitting. She was bending o'er
Her youngest child,--an infant, in her lap,--
On which she seemed to gaze in speechless woe.
Deep o'er her eyes, concealing all her face,
Fell the wide ruffle of her cap of crape.
A little barefoot girl, some ten years old,
Was taxing all her strength, o'er the poor fire
To hang an iron kettle;--not for tea,
Nor yet to cleanse the dishes, to be used
At an approaching dinner; but, to wash,
As it appeared, the few and tattered shreds
That death and infancy had lately worn.


I sat down by the desolate one, and strove
By words of soothing to dissolve the spell
That sorrow seemed to have thrown over her.
But, she was dumb,--she opened not her mouth.
My heart for her apologized, and said
"A hopeless, tearless, voiceless grief is this,"--
(For, all this while, no tear dropped on her babe!)
"And well it may be such! for, what a scene
Is this around her! What sad memories come
Up, from the past, to greet her! And, before,
O, what a dark and dreary prospect opens!
What can she say to me,--or I to her?"
Thus pleaded my heart for her. Then I spake,--
For something must be spoken,--of a trust
With which a Christian woman should resign
Her loved and lost ones,--even though they'd fallen,
As her poor husband fell,--to His high call,
Who knoweth well how feeble is our frame,
And "who remembereth that we are dust."
Then spake I of her children, who had now
No earthly father their young feet to guide,
And who on her sole arm must therefore lean
For care and culture. To a mother's hand,
And now to hers alone, they'd look for bread.
"Shouldst thou not, then, for these, thy children's sake,
With all the strength thy God hath given thee,
Bear up the burden that His mighty hand
Hath laid upon thy spirit? Shouldst thou not
Lift up thine eyes and heart to Him, and say,
'Lord, here am I, and those whom thou hast given me!
Help me, who feel thy rod, ne'er to complain
Of Him who hath appointed it! O, lead
Me, and these little ones of mine, to Thee;
And may we all, in Thee, a Father find,
Since he who was their earthly father's gone!'
Yea, widowed mourner, though bereft of him
On whose kind arm thou leanedst in thy youth,
Be not disconsolate, or overcome
By a too deep affliction. Lift thy heart,--
Lift up thine eyes!" And she did lift them up!
Then, for the first time, lifted she her eyes,--
They were the maudlin eyes of drunkenness!
She was, indeed, "o'ercome,"--but not with grief!
Rum was the "rod" that she was bowing under!
Yes! that poor widowed one, who, two days since,--
Nay, not two days!--had seen her husband borne
To the low house appointed for all living,--
A victim and a trophy of "the trade,"--
Her little children hungering for the bread
That only she could give them,--one of them,
Even then, receiving its whole stream of life
From her own bosom!--at the very hour
When he, who had commended her to God,
Yea, and would yet commend her, was to come,
To weep with them who wept, and kneel beside
The robbed and wounded,--come to stanch the blood,
And pour in oil and wine,--that woman, then,
Was so profoundly steeped in what men make,
And what the law of e'en this Christian land
Allows expressly to be sold, and borne
From house to house, and drunk in families,--
And all this, as it says, "for public good,"--
That, while I sat beside her, from her breast,
Her lap, her drunken arms, she let her babe
Upon the hearth-stone fall!


Now, in all this, there is no poetry;--
The tale is simple fact, and simply told.
The hand of God,--that painteth evening's clouds,
The gloom of midnight, and the morning's glory,
Who poureth round the death-bed of the just
A light that prompteth him with dying voice
To cry, "O grave, where is thy victory?"--
Hath painted, with the pencil of events,
This gloomy picture, and hath hung it up
Within the chamber of my memory.
I cannot copy it stronger than it is,
Nay, nor yet as it is! Yet there are those,
To whom this tale of real life,--and death,--
Thus simply told, without a single word
Of denunciation, censure, or rebuke
Towards those who made, or sold, or drank the death
To soul and body that hath here been seen,
Will give offence. Then spread it out, O God,
My Judge, and his and hers, of whom 't is told,
Yea, and the Judge of all who saw the man
Go down into his grave, and led him down,
By reaching forth their hand, with that in it
Which he knew, and which they knew, would be death,--
Spread out the tale, O God, as here it is,
Upon that record from which all, at last,--
I, and all those for whom I live and labor,
My family, my flock, my age, my race,--
Shall "in that day" be judged,--spread it all out,
As I have written it,--as it hath lain
For years, beneath thine own all-seeing eye,
And let thy judgment, then, between me pass
And those to whom I may have given offence,
Whether I write in hatred or in love,
Whether they read in charity or not!
But, so do unto me, and to my house,
And more,--if more than this of earthly woe
Thou hast in store for one who fears thee not,--
If I be let, by this world's fears or hopes,
From speaking, while thou keep'st me in thy service,
The word which thou commandest me to speak!


But give me, God of wisdom and of grace,
Give me the wisdom, all thy words of truth
And grace, with grace to speak. What is severe
In manner, tone, or spirit,--help me soften,
Till all my words become like his who spake
For Thee as never man before had spoken,--
In some good measure worthy of thy truth,--
Thy truth that sanctifies and saves the soul!
But, to that truth,--while I've a tongue to speak,
A pen to write it, or a heart to feel
Its beauty and its power,--O, let me ne'er
Prove faithless! To thy guiding hand, my God,
I give this simple tale. While writing it,
I've been drawn nearer to thee. In thy courts,
This day, I could not serve thee;--for thy hand
Hath gently touched me with infirmity;--
Upon thine altar, in my house, I lay
This little offering. Accept it, Lord,
With those that have been made thee in thine own!


Sunday, February 24th, 1839.