Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

By Thomas BaileyAldrich

687 Heredity

A SOLDIER of the Cromwell stamp,

With sword and psalm-book by his side,

At home alike in church and camp:

Austere he lived, and smileless died.

But she, a creature soft and fine—

From Spain, some say, some say from France;

Within her veins leapt blood like wine—

She led her Roundhead lord a dance!

In Grantham church they lie asleep;

Just where, the verger may not know.

Strange that two hundred years should keep

The old ancestral fires aglow!

In me these two have met again;

To each my nature owes a part:

To one, the cool and reasoning brain;

To one, the quick, unreasoning heart.