Obit July 27, 1887, Kansas City, Missouri

Gifted, and loved, and praised By every friend; Never a murmur raised Against him, to the end! With tireless interest He wrought as he thought best,-- And--lo, we bend Where now he takes his rest!

His heart was loyal, to Its latest thrill, To the home-loves he knew-- And now forever will,-- Mother and brother--they The first to pass away,-- And, lingering still, The sister bowed to-day.

Pure as a rose might be, And sweet, and white, His father's memory Was with him day and night:-- He spoke of him, as one May now speak of the son,-- Sadly and tenderly,-- Yet as a trump had done.

Say, then, of him: He knew Full depths of care And stress of pain, and you Do him scant justice there,-- Yet in the lifted face Grief left not any trace, Nor mark unfair, To mar its manly grace.

It was as if each day Some new hope dawned-- Each blessing in delay, To him, was just beyond; Between whiles, waiting, he Drew pictures, cunningly-- Fantastic--fond-- Things that we laughed to see.

Sometimes, as we looked on His crayon's work, Some angel-face would dawn Out radiant, from the mirk Of features old and thin, Or jowled with double-chin, And eyes asmirk, And gaping mouths agrin.

That humor in his art, Of genius born, Welled warmly from a heart That could not but adorn All things it touched with love-- The eagle, as the dove-- The burst of morn-- The night--the stars above.

Sometimes, amid the wild Of faces queer, A mother, with her child Pressed warm and close to her; This, I have thought, somehow, The wife, with head abow, Unreconciled, In the great shadow now.

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O you of sobbing breath, Put by all sighs Of anguish at his death-- Turn--as he turned his eyes, In that last hour, unknown In strange lands, all alone-- Turn thine eyes toward the skies, And, smiling, cease thy moan.