Punch/Volume 147/Issue 3829/Earl Roberts (In Memory)

by Owen Seaman

To the Memory
of
Field-Marshal Earl Roberts
of Kandahar and Pretoria.

Born, 1832.Died, on service at the front, Nov. 14th, 1914.

He died, as soldiers die, amid the strife,
 Mindful of England in his latest prayer:
God, of His love, would have so fair a life
   Crowned with a death as fair.

He might not lead the battle as of old,
 But, as of old, among his own he went,
Breathing a faith that never once grew cold,
   A courage still unspent.

So was his end; and, in that hour, across
 The face of War a wind of silence blew,
And bitterest foes paid tribute to the loss
   Of a great heart and true.

But we who loved him, what have we to lay
 For sign of worship on his warrior-bier?
What homage, could his lips but speak to-day,
   Would he have held most dear?

Not grief, as for a life untimely reft;
 Not vain regret for counsel given in vain;
Not pride of that high record he has left,
   Peerless and pure of stain;

But service of our lives to keep her free,
 The land he served; a pledge above his grave
To give her even such a gift as he,
   The soul of loyalty, gave.

That oath we plight, as now the trumpets swell
 His requiem, and the men-at-arms stand mute,
And through the mist the guns he loved so well
   Thunder a last salute!
O. S.