ALLENBY
(JERUSALEM, 1917)
HUSH! over the City of David
A silence seems to fall,
And down the long sealed ages
There comes a far, clear call:
"ALLENBY, conqueror, hero!"
He comes in Christian state;
Uncovered and reverend, he enters
Through the Holy City's gate.
A silence seems to fall,
And down the long sealed ages
There comes a far, clear call:
"ALLENBY, conqueror, hero!"
He comes in Christian state;
Uncovered and reverend, he enters
Through the Holy City's gate.
Never a cannon has thundered
'Gainst the haunts that men revere—
The Sepulchre, hallowed and holy,
Golgotha, Gethsemane drear;
He has won them, this new crusader,
With never a battle scar,
And he sets in the place of the crescent
The Christian's risen Star.
'Gainst the haunts that men revere—
The Sepulchre, hallowed and holy,
Golgotha, Gethsemane drear;
He has won them, this new crusader,
With never a battle scar,
And he sets in the place of the crescent
The Christian's risen Star.
And high on the heights of the eons
There watches a serried host—
Those who conquered the city
Far back in the ages lost.
There Shishak of Egypt frowns darkly
To see where his warriors trod,
And Nebuchadnezzar remembers
How he pillaged the City of God.
There watches a serried host—
Those who conquered the city
Far back in the ages lost.
There Shishak of Egypt frowns darkly
To see where his warriors trod,
And Nebuchadnezzar remembers
How he pillaged the City of God.
There are Persian and Greek and Roman
Who held Jerusalem fief
Till out of the mists of the morning
Came the spears of the Moslem chief
And Omar was lord and ruler.
Then the red Crusaders came,
And Godfrey de Bouillon lifted
The city's Mohammedan shame.
Who held Jerusalem fief
Till out of the mists of the morning
Came the spears of the Moslem chief
And Omar was lord and ruler.
Then the red Crusaders came,
And Godfrey de Bouillon lifted
The city's Mohammedan shame.
But there in the shadow behind him
Stands Sal-adin, robed in state,
And he scowls at the modern Moslem
Who yielded the city's gate.
And so on the heights of the eons
Are gathered the clustered spears
Of the long procession of captors
Gone down with the vanished years.
Stands Sal-adin, robed in state,
And he scowls at the modern Moslem
Who yielded the city's gate.
And so on the heights of the eons
Are gathered the clustered spears
Of the long procession of captors
Gone down with the vanished years.
And over the City of Jesus
That silence seems to fall,
For never a pagan captor
Cheers with a ghastly call;
But surely that faint, weird music
Stirring the city's vast throng
Is Allenby's greeting of glory
From David's harp of song!
That silence seems to fall,
For never a pagan captor
Cheers with a ghastly call;
But surely that faint, weird music
Stirring the city's vast throng
Is Allenby's greeting of glory
From David's harp of song!