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A REPLY TO MISS DICKINSON.

To the Editor of the Tribune.

SIR: It is always agreeable to answer a lady's question, and I take pleasure in answering those of Miss Dickinson. 

Question First asks me to state "when, where, and under what conditions" I became familiar with Miss Dickinson's play of "Aurelian."  Answer: One night in January last, at the Tremont House, Boston, I took the play to bed with me, and read it through, comfortably and carefully, in about three hours. This was in room 58, between the hours of 9 and 12. Wind, dead east. Night, exceedingly cold. The "conditions" were all favorable-- especially to repose.

Question Second,—which consists of three inquiries, all tending to one and the same point,—asks me definitely to state what the good purpose is which I think would be served, in case the production of Miss Dickinson's play of "Aurelian" should direct renewed public attention to William Ware's novels of "Aurelian" and "Zenobia."  Answer: The dissemination of first-class literature, and thus the diffusion of refined and elevated pleasure. Those novels do not in the least resemble Miss Dickinson's play. They are excellent books-intellectual in grasp of subject and character, imaginative in spirit, and classical in style. Whatever should tend to revive them in public knowledge would serve a good purpose.

Question Third asks me to state in what way the statement circulated, that John McCullough had accepted Miss Dickinson's "Aurelian," and would act in it, proves to have been incorrect.  Answer: In the usual way of news. I asked Mr. McCullough, personally, whether he intended to act in Miss Dickinson's "Aurelian," and he replied that he did not. My inference, naturally, was that he had not accepted the play. He spoke of Miss Dickinson, however, in terms of the highest esteem, and added that he should be glad to act with her in any good play from her pen. Having read "Aurelian," I know that his decision not to act in it was entirely judicious and right, as it would not have suited him. Nothing was either asked by me or said by him about either its acceptance or rejection, and I have not even dreamed of impugning Miss Dickinson's veracity or disturbing her peace of mind. Yours, WILLIAM WINTER.
New York, March 16, 1879.

PLEDGE TO THE DEAD.
BY WILLIAM WINTER.
[Read at the banquet of the Society of the Army of the Potomac, at Albany, June 18, 1879.]

I.

From the lily of love that uncloses
In the glow of a festival kiss.
On the wind that is heavy with roses
And shrill with the bugles of bliss.
Let it float o'er the mystical ocean
That breaks on the kingdom of night--
Our oath of eternal devotion
To the heroes who died for the right!

II.

They loved, as we love, yet they parted
From all that man's spirit can pride;
Left the tumult of youth, the sweet guerdon
Hope promised to conquer from Fate, --
Gave all, for the agonized burden
Of death for the Flag and the State!

III.

Where they roam on the slopes of the mountain
That only by angels is trod,
Where they muse by the crystalline fountain
That springs in the garden of God.
Are they lost in unspeakable splendor?
Do they never look back and regret?--
Ah, the valiant are constant and tender, 
And Honor can never forget!

IV.

Divine in their pitying sadness
They grieve for their comrades of earth;
They will hear us, and start into gladness,
And echo the notes of our mirth:
They will lift their white hands in a blessing
We shall know by the tear that it brings--
The rapture of friendship confessing
With harps and the waving of wings!

V.

In that grim and relentless upheaval
Which blesses the world through a curse,
Still bringing the good out of evil—
The garland of peace on the hearse!—
They were shattered, consumed and forsaken,
Like the shadows that fly from the dawn;
We may never know why they were taken,
But we always shall feel, they are gone.

VI.

If the wind that sighs over our prairies
No longer is solemn with knells,--
But lovely with flowers and fairies,
And sweet with the calm Sabbath bells;
If Virtue, in cottage and palace,
Leads Love to the bridal of Pride,
'Tis because out of war's bitter chalice
Out heroes drank deeply--and died!

VII.

Ah, grander in doom-stricken glory
Than the greatest that linger behind,
They shall live in perpetual story,
Who saved the last hope of mankind!
For their cause was the cause of the races
That languished in slavery's night;
And the death that was pale on their faces
Has filled the whole world with its light!

VIII.

To the clouds and the mountains we breathe it, 
To the freedom of planet and star;
Let the tempests of ocean enwreathe it,
Let the winds of the night bear it far—
Our oath, that, till manhood shall perish,
And honor and virtue are sped,
We are true to the cause that they cherish,
And eternally true to the dead!