To Walter Bowne, Esq.

“Stand not upon the order of your going,But go at once.”

“I cannot but remember such things were,And were most precious to me.”

e do not blame you, Walter Bowne,For a variety of reasons;You’re now the talk of half the town,A man of talent and renown,And will be for perhaps two seasons.That face of yours has magic in it;Its smile transports us in a minuteTo wealth and pleasure’s sunny bowers;And there is terror in its frown,Which, like a mower’s scythe, cuts downOur city’s loveliest flowers.

We therefore do not blame you, sir,Whate’er our cause of grief may be;And cause enough we have to “stirThe very stones to mutiny.”

You’ve driven from the cash and caresOf office, heedless of our prayers,Men who have been for many a yearTo us and to our purses dear,And will be to our heirs forever.Our tears, thanks to the snow and rain,Have swelled the brook in Maiden LaneInto a mountain river;And when you visit us again,Leaning at Tammany on your cane,Like warrior on his battle-blade,You’ll mourn the havoc you have made.

There is a silence and a sadnessWithin the marble mansion now;Some have wild eyes that threaten madness,Some think of “kicking up a row.”Judge Miller will not yet believeThat you have ventured to bereaveThe city and its hall of him:He has in his own fine way stated,“The fact must be substantiated,”Before he’ll move a single limb.He deems it cursed hard to yieldThe laurel won in every fieldThrough sixteen years of party war,And to be seen at noon no more,Enjoying at his office doorThe luxury of a tenth segar.

Judge Warner says that, when he’s gone,You’ll miss the true Dogberry breed;And Christian swears that you have doneA most UN-Christian deed.

How could you have the heart to strikeFrom place the peerless Pierre Van Wyck?And the twin colonels, Haines and Pell,Squire Fessenden, and Sheriff Bell;Morrell, a justice and a wise one,And Ned McLaughlin the exciseman;The two health-officers, believersIn Clinton and contagious fevers;The keeper of the city’s treasures,The sealer of her weights and measures,The harbor-master, her best bowerCable in party’s stormy hour;Ten auctioneers, three bank directors,And Mott and Duffy, the inspectorsOf whiskey and of flour!

It was but yesterday they stoodAll (ex-officio) great and good.But by the tomahawk struck downOf party and of Walter Bowne,Where are they now? With shapes of air,The caravan of things that were,Journeying to their nameless home,Like Mecca’s pilgrims from her tomb;

With the lost Pleiad; with the warsOf Agamemnon’s ancestors;With their own years of joy and grief,Spring’s bud, and autumn’s faded leaf;With birds that round their cradles flew;With winds that in their boyhood blew;With last night’s dream and last night’s dew.

Yes, they are gone; alas! each one of them;Departed—every mother’s son of them.Yet often, at the close of day,When thoughts are winged and wandering, theyCome with the memory of the past,Like sunset clouds along the mind,Reflecting, as they’re flitting fastIn their wild hues of shade and light,All that was beautiful and brightIn golden moments left behind.