How sad and desolate is the home from which some loved one has been
borne suddenly away, with the firm assurance that "the places that
once knew them shall know them no more forever."
The vacant seat at table, the return of their usual hour of arrival,
all places and all things remind us of the departed one, and bring
up harrowing remembrances of the past, that add deeper pangs to our
sorrow, and fill our hearts with more unendurable anguish, and suffuse
our cheeks with more scalding tears, as the stern reality presses upon
us, that it always must be thus.
Companion of my youth, can it be possible thy manly form is hid
beneath this grassy mound at my feet? that I never again shall hear
the sound of that voice, whose endearing tone won me to thy side,
to unite my destiny with thine, and float with thee over life's
tempestous ocean?
Rough, indeed, has been the passage, and many the adverse storms we
have encountered, during our thirty-two years companionship, and now,
way-worn and weary, the grave--the greedy grave claims thee for its
occupant. How sweet is the assurance "that the graves shall give up
their dead, and this mortal shall put on immortality." Yes, this dear
dust shall rise again, and be clothed in undying youth.
O, how stealthily the stern messenger came, laying low the form of the
strong man, ere we were aware of his danger. One week--one short week,
and yet to him a week of agonizing suffering, and all was over.
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