The shades of night were falling fast,
As through an Alpine
village passed
A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice,
A banner with the
strange device
Excelsior!
His brow was sad; his eye beneath,
Flashed like a faulchion
from its sheath,
And like a silver clarion rung
The accents of that
unknown tongue,
Excelsior!
In happy homes he saw the light
Of household fires gleam warm
and bright;
Above, the spectral glaciers shone,
And from his lips escaped
a groan,
Excelsior!
"Try not the Pass!" the old man said;
"Dark lowers the
tempest overhead,
The roaring torrent is deep and wide!"
And loud that
clarion voice replied,
Excelsior!
"O stay," the maiden said, "and rest
Thy weary head upon this
breast!"
A tear stood in his bright blue eye,
But still he answered, with
a sigh,
Excelsior!
"Beware the pine-tree's withered branch!
Beware the awful
avalanche!"
This was the peasant's last Good-night,
A voice replied, far
up the height,
Excelsior!
At break of day, as heavenward
The pious monks of Saint
Bernard
Uttered the oft-repeated prayer,
A voice cried through the
startled air
Excelsior!
A traveller, by the faithful hound,
Half-buried in the snow
was found,
Still grasping in his hand of ice
That banner with the strange
device
Excelsior!
There in the twilight cold and gray,
Lifeless, but beautiful,
he lay,
And from the sky, serene and far,
A voice fell, like a falling
star,
Excelsior!
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow