However, of thousands of admiring and delighted spectators none shared an exactly like opinion except in this, that the statue bore no individual resemblance; but that also was contradicted by a young lady whom I heard exclaim:  “Girls, surely that looks like Buckie O’Neill, but in love and war men are not themselves!” “How do I know?  Oh, mamma said so!”

During the ceremony of unveiling the monument a dark, ragged storm cloud hung over the Aztec mountain, fast overcasting the sky.  Thousands of people strained their eyes and held their breath in the glad anticipation of seeing the features of their lamented friend, Prescott’s honored mayor, immortalized in bronze.  When after moments of anxious suspense the veil which draped the statue parted and fell to earth, the sun’s rays pierced the clouds, while deafening cheers rent the air.  I thought I heard a weird, faint cry, an echo from the past—­but cannons boomed, drums crashed as a military band rendered its patriotic airs.

And we saw—­not the familiar, fine features of our soldier hero, so strikingly portrayed by a famed artist and molded into exact, lifelike resemblance, but instead we beheld an unknown visage—­a type, merely the semblance of a “Rough Rider,” its rigid gaze riveted on the Idol-mountain, forever enthralled by the Sphinx.

In nineteen hundred seven, on the third day of July
With shining mien and naming sword earthward St. Michael came
To save—­ever auspicious be the blessed day-
From blighting heathen guile a Christian hero’s fame
The while, breathless with awe, solemn the people gazed
And rhetoric’s inspired flame on Aztlan’s altar blazed. 
Adore the Saints, behold a miracle Divine! 
Hallowed, our Saviour, be Thy Name
And Heaven’s glory thine!

Of idol-worship now has vanished every trace
In deepest crevice and highest place
On mesa, butte and mountain-face;
From the Grand Canyon’s somber shade
The sun-scorched desert, the dripping glade
And sunken crater of Stoneman’s Lake. 
The “Casa Grande,” a home of ancient race—­
A ruin now—­is haunted by Montezuma’s wraith. 
In Montezuma’s castle, crumbling from roof to base
The winds and rain of heaven ghosts of the past now chase.

Where erstwhile the Great Spirit’s children dwelt
Forever hushed is the papoose’s wail, and stilled the squaw’s
low-crooning lilt. 
No longer shimmers starlight from eyes of savage maids
Worshippers of the fire and sun, poor dwellers of the caves-
The sisters of the deer and lo, shy startled fawns of Aztec race
Or coy ancestral dams of moon-eyed Toltec doe. 
Now Verde witches bathe in Montezuma’s well
And over its crystal waters the tourists cast their spell.