Tributes on Seventieth Birthday 



To David Starr Jordan on His Seventieth Birthday 



This is the glad day when 



One of the world's great men 

 Has rounded out his threescore years and ten; 



And we awhile would pause 



Upon so fair a cause 

 To add our tribute to a world's applause. 



Words are so poor and cold 



We leave our love untold 

 Except when privileged moments make us bold; 



Now we at last can say 



The word that silent lay 

 Deep down within our hearts for many a day. 



We pay the honor due 



The man of world-wide view, 

 The scholar, leader, poet, prophet, who 



Had but to speak the word 



And every heart was stirred. 

 And every eye looked up, and all the nations heard. 



But we his friends who know 



The genial human glow. 

 The kindly humor those clear eyes can show, 



We value more the name 



Of friend than all his fame! 

 To him who never stopped for praise or blame, 



But did the thing he knew 



Was right and just and true, 

 If not in men's, yet pleasing in God's view; 



To him our best we bring 



When we no praises sing. 

 But make our love our simple offering. 



Yet in his fame we dare 



To claim our humbler share; 

 All he has done to make the world more fair 



A borrowed glory lends 



To us, his loyal friends; 

 And to us, too, his call to serve extends. 



C 831 : 



