Chapter IV: Poets (1)

=_Francis Hopkinson,[75] 1737-1791._=

From "The Battle of the Kegs.[76]"

=_316._=

Gallants, attend, and hear a friend
Trill forth harmonious ditty;
Strange things I'll tell, which late befell
In Philadelphia city.

'Twas early day, as poets say,
Just when the sun was rising,
A soldier stood on a log of wood,
And saw a thing surprising.

As in amaze he stood to gaze,--
The truth can't be denied, sir,--
He spied a score of kegs, or more,
Come floating down the tide, sir.

A sailor, too, in jerkin blue,
This strange appearance viewing,
First rubbed his eyes, in great surprise,
Then said some mischief's brewing.

* * * * *

Some fire cried, which some denied,
But said the earth had quakéd;
And girls and boys, with hideous noise,
Ran through the streets half naked.

* * * * *

The royal band now ready stand,
All ranged in dread array, sir,
With stomach stout, to see it out,
And make a bloody day, sir.

The cannons roar from shore to shore;
The small arms make a rattle;
Since wars began, I'm sure no man
E'er saw so strange a battle.

A hundred men, with each a pen,
Or more,--upon my word, sir,
It is most true,--would be too few
Their valor to record, sir.

[Footnote 75: A prominent author of the revolutionary era.]

[Footnote 76: In the revolutionary war, while the British held Philadelphia, some floating torpedoes were one day sent down the river to destroy their vessels, and this novel mode of attack caused the alarm described by the poet.]

* * * * *

=_John Trumbull, 1750-1831._= (Manual, pp. 490, 512.)

From "McFingal."

=_317._=

Though this, not all his time was lost on,
He fortified the town of Boston,
Built breastworks that might lend assistance
To keep the patriots at a distance;
For, howsoe'er the rogues might scoff,
He liked them best the farthest off;
Works of important use to aid
His courage when he felt afraid.

* * * * *

For Providence, disposed to tease us,
Can use what instruments it pleases;
To pay a tax, at Peter's wish,
His chief cashier was once a fish.

* * * * *

An English bishop's cur of late
Disclosed rebellions 'gainst the State;
So frogs croaked Pharaoh to repentance,
And lice delayed the fatal sentence:
And Heaven can rain you at pleasure,
By Gage, as soon as by a Caesar.
Yet did our hero in these days
Pick up some laurel-wreaths of praise;
And as the statuary of Seville
Made his cracked saint an excellent devil.
So, though our war small triumph brings,
We gained great fame in other things.
Did not our troops show great discerning,
And skill, your various arts in learning?
Outwent they not each native noodle
By far, in playing Yankee-doodle?
Which, as 'twas your New England tune,
'Twas marvellous they took so soon.
And ere the year was fully through,
Did they not learn to foot it too,
And such a dance as ne'er was known
For twenty miles on end lead down?
Did they not lay their heads together,
And gain your art to tar and feather,
When Colonel Nesbitt, thro' the town,
In triumph bore the country-clown?
Oh! what a glorious work to sing
The veteran troops of Britain's king,
Adventuring for th'heroic laurel
With bag of feathers and tar-barrel!
To paint the cart where culprits ride,
And Nesbitt marching at its side.
Great executioner and proud,
Like hangman high, on Holborn road;
And o'er the slow-drawn rumbling car,
The waving ensigns of the war!

* * * * *

=_Philip Freneau, 1752-1832._= (Manual, pp. 486, 511.)

From "An Indian Burying-ground."

=_318._=

In spite of all the learned have said,
I still my old opinion keep;
The posture that we give the dead,
Points out the soul's eternal sleep.

Not so the ancients of these lands;--
The Indian, when from life released,
Again is seated with his friends,
And shares again the joyous feast.

His imaged birds, and painted bowl,
And venison, for a journey dressed,
Bespeak the nature of the soul,--
Activity, that wants no rest.

His bow, for action ready bent,
And arrows, with a head of bone,
Can only mean that life is spent,
And not the finer essence gone.

* * * * *

Here still a lofty rock remains,
On which the curious eye may trace,
Now wasted half by wearing rains,
The fancies of a ruder race.

* * * * *

By midnight moons, o'er moistening dews,
In vestments for the chase arrayed.
The hunter still the deer pursues,
The hunter and the deer--a shade.

* * * * *

=_David Humphreys, 1783-1818._= (Manual, p. 512.)

From "The Happiness of America."

=_319._= RECOLLECTIONS OF THE WAR.

I too, perhaps, should Heaven prolong my date,
The oft-repeated tale shall oft relate;
Shall tell the feelings in the first alarms,
Of some bold enterprise the unequalled charms;
Shall tell from whom I learnt the martial art,
With what high chiefs I played my early part--
With Parsons first--

* * * * *
Death-daring Putnam--then immortal Greene--
Then how great Washington my youth approved,
In rank preferred, and as a parent loved.
With him what hours on warlike plains I spent,
Beneath the shadow of th' imperial tent;
With him how oft I went the nightly round
Through moving hosts, or slept on tented ground;
From him how oft--(nor far below the first,
In high behests and confidential trust)--
From him how oft I bore the dread commands,
Which destined for the fight the eager bands;
With him how oft I passed the eventful day,
Bode by his side, as down the long array
His awful voice the columns taught to form,
To point the thunders and direct the storm.
But, thanks to Heaven! those days of blood are o'er;
The trumpet's clangor, the loud cannon's roar.

* * * * *

No more this hand, since happier days succeed,
Waves the bright blade, or reins the fiery steed.
No more for martial fame this bosom burns;
Now white-robed Peace to bless a world returns;
Now fostering Freedom all her bliss bestows,
Unnumbered blessings for unnumbered woes.

* * * * *

=_Samuel J. Smith,[77] 1771-1835._=

=_320._= PEACE, BE STILL.

When, on his mission from his home in heaven,
In the frail bark the Saviour deigned to sleep,
The tempest rose--with headlong fury driven,
The wave-tossed vessel whirled along the deep:
Wild shrieked the storm amid the parting shrouds,
And the vexed billows dashed the darkening clouds.

Ah! then how futile human skill and power,--
"Save us! we perish in the o'erwhelming wave!"
They cried, and found in that tremendous hour,
"An eye to pity, and an arm to save."
He spoke, and lo! obedient to His will,
The raging waters, and the winds were still.

And thou, poor trembler on life's stormy sea,
Where dark the waves of sin and sorrow roll,
To Him for refuge from the tempest flee,--
To Him, confiding, trust the sinking soul;
For O, He came to calm the tempest-tossed,
To seek the wandering, and to save the lost.

For thee, and such as thee, impelled by love,
He left the mansions of the blessed on high;
Mid sin, and pain, and grief, and fear, to move,
With lingering anguish, and with shame to die.
The debt to Justice, boundless Mercy paid,
For hopeless guilt, complete atonement made.

O, in return for such surpassing grace,
Poor, blind, and naked, what canst thou impart?
Canst thou no offering on his altar place?
Yes, lowly mourner; give him all thy heart:
That simple offering he will not disown,--
That living incense may approach his throne.

[Footnote 77: A gentleman of fortune and literary culture; a life-long resident in the country, in his native State, New Jersey.]

* * * * *

=_William Clifton, 1772-1790._= (Manual, p. 512.)

From lines "To Fancy."

=_321._= PLEASURES OF IMAGINATION.

Is my lonely pittance past?
Fleeting good too light to last?
Lifts my friend the latch no more?
Fancy, thou canst all restore;
Thou canst, with thy airy shell,
To a palace raise my cell.

* * * * *

With thee to guide my steps, I'll creep
In some old haunted nook to sleep,
Lulled by the dreary night-bird's scream,
That flits along the wizard stream,
And there, till morning 'gins appear,
The tales of troubled spirits hear.

Sweet's the dawn's ambiguous light,
Quiet pause 'tween day and night,
When afar the mellow horn
Chides the tardy gaited morn,
And asleep is yet the gale
On sea-beat mount, and rivered vale.
But the morn, though sweet and fair;
Sweeter is when thou art there;
Hymning stars successive fade,
Fairies hurtle through the shade,
Lovelorn flowers I weeping see,
If the scene is touched by thee.

* * * * *
Thus through life with thee I'll glide,
Happy still what'er betide,
And while plodding sots complain
Of ceaseless toil and slender gain,
Every passing hour shall be
Worth a golden age to me.

* * * * *

=_Robert Treat Paine, 1773-1811._= (Manual, p. 512.)

From "The Ruling Passion."

=_322._= THE MISER.

Next comes the miser; palsied, jealous, lean,
He looks the very skeleton of Spleen!
'Mid forests drear, he haunts, in spectred gloom,
Some desert abbey or some druid's tomb;
Where hearsed in earth, his occult riches lay,
Fleeced from the world, and buried from the day.
With crutch in hand, he points his mineral rod,
Limps to the spot, and turns the well-known sod.
While there, involved in night, he counts his store
By the soft tinklings of the golden ore,
He shakes with terror lest the moon should spy,
And the breeze whisper, where his treasures lie.

This wretch, who, dying, would not take one pill,
If, living, he must pay a doctor's bill,
Still clings to life, of every joy bereft;
His God is gold, and his religion theft!
And, as of yore, when modern vice was strange,
Could leathern money current pass on 'change,
His reptile soul, whose reasoning powers are pent
Within the logic bounds of cent per cent,
Would sooner coin his ears than stocks should fall,
And cheat the pillory, than not cheat at all!

* * * * *

=_John Blair Linn,[78] 1777-1804._=

From "The Powers of Genius."

=_323._= WRETCHEDNESS OF SAVAGE LIFE.

The human fabric early from its birth,
Feels some fond influence from its parent earth;
In different regions different forms we trace,
Here dwells a feeble, there an iron race;
Here genius lives, and wakeful fancies play,
Here noiseless stupor sleeps its life away.
* * * * *
Chill through his trackless pines the hunter passed,
His yell arose upon the howling blast;
Before him fled, with all the speed of fear,
His wealth--and victim, yonder helpless deer.
Saw you the savage man, how fell and wild,
With what grim pleasure, as he passed, he smiled?
Unhappy man! a wretched wigwam's shed
Is his poor shelter, some dry skins his bed;
Sometimes alone upon the woodless height
He strikes his fire, and spends his watchful night;
His dog with howling bays the moon's red beam,
And starts the wild deer in his nightly dream.
Poor savage man! for him no yellow grain
Waves its bright billows o'er the fruitful plain;
For him no harvest yields its full supply,
When winter hurls his tempest through the sky.
No joys he knows but those which spring from strife,
Unknown to him the charms of social life.
Rage, malice, envy, all his thoughts control,
And every dreadful passion burns his soul.
Should culture meliorate his darksome home,
And cheer those wilds where he is wont to roam;
* * * * *
Should fields of tillage yield their rich increase,
And through his wastes walk forth the arts of peace,
His sullen soul would feel a genial glow,
Joy would break in upon the night of woe;
Knowledge would spread her mild, reviving ray,
And on his wigwam rise the dawn of day.

[Footnote 78: A Presbyterian clergyman, who died prematurely; an associate and connection of Charles Brockden Brown. Has left several poems of merit. A native of Pennsylvania.]

* * * * *

=_Francis S. Key, 1779-1843._= (Manual, p. 523.)

=_324._= THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER.

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed, at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming;
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there:

On that shore, dimly seen through the mist of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
'Tis the Star-Spangled Banner; O, long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where are the foes who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war, and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave;
And the Star-Spangled Banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation;
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just;
And this be our motto, "In God is our trust;"
And the Star-Spangled Banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

* * * * *

=_Washington Alston, 1779-1843._= (Manual, pp. 504. 510.)

From the "Sylphs of the Seasons."

=_325._=

Methought, within a desert cave,
Cold, dark, and solemn as the grave,
I suddenly awoke.
It seemed of sable night the cell
Where, save when from the ceiling fell
An oozing drop, her silent spell
No sound had ever broke.

There motionless I stood alone,
Like some strange monument of stone
Upon a barren wild;
Or like (so solid and profound
The darkness seemed that walled me round)
A man that's buried under ground,
Where pyramids are piled.

* * * * *

Then spake the Sylph of Spring serene,
"'Tis I thy joyous heart, I ween.
With sympathy shall move:
For I with living melody
Of birds in choral symphony,
First waked thy soul to poesy,
To piety and love.

"When thou, at call of vernal breeze,
And beckoning bough of budding trees,
Hast left thy sullen fire;
And stretched thee in some mossy dell,
And heard the browsing wether's bell,
Blithe echoes rousing from their cell
To swell the tinkling choir:

"Or lured by some fresh-scented gale
That wooed the moored fisher's sail
To tempt the mighty main,
Hast watched the dim, receding shore,
Now faintly seen the ocean o'er,
Like hanging cloud, and now no more
To bound the sapphire plain.

"Then, wrapped in night, the scudding bark,
(That seemed, self-poised amid the dark,
Through upper air to leap,)
Beheld, from thy most fearful height,
The rapid dolphin's azure light
Cleave, like a living meteor bright,
The darkness of the deep."

* * * * *

=_John Pierpont, 1785-1866._= (Manual, p. 513.)

=_326._= A TEMPERANCE SONG.

In Eden's green retreats,
A water-brook--that played
Between soft, mossy seats,
Beneath a plane tree's shade,
Whose rustling leaves
Danced o'er its brink--
Was Adam's drink,
And also Eve's.

* * * * *

And, when the man of God
From Egypt led his flock,
They thirsted, and his rod
Smote the Arabian rock,
And forth a rill
Of water gushed,
And on they rushed,
And drank their fill.

Had Moses built a still,
And dealt out to that host
To every man his gill,
And pledged him in a toast,
Would cooler brains,
Or stronger hands,
Have braved the sands
Of those hot plains?

If Eden's strength and bloom,
Gold water thus hath given,
If e'en beyond the tomb,
It is the drink of heaven,
Are not good wells
And crystal springs
_The very things
for our Hotels?_

* * * * *

=_327._= THE PILGRIM FATHERS.

The Pilgrim Fathers,--where are they?
The waves that brought them o'er
Still roll in the bay, and throw their spray,
As they break along the shore:
Still roll in the bay, as they roll'd that day
When the Mayflower moor'd below,
When the sea around was black with storms,
And white the shore with snow.

The mists, that wrapp'd the Pilgrim's sleep,
Still brood upon the tide;
And his rocks yet keep their watch by the deep,
To stay its waves of pride.
But the snow-white sail, that he gave to the gale
When the heavens look'd dark, is gone;--
As an angel's wing, through an opening cloud,
Is seen, and then withdrawn.

The Pilgrim exile,--sainted name!
The hill, whose icy brow
Rejoiced when he came, in the morning's flame,
In the morning's flame burns now.
And the moon's cold light, as it lay that night
On the hill-side and the sea,
Still lies where he laid his houseless head;--
But the Pilgrim,--where is he?

The Pilgrim Fathers are at rest.
When summer's throned on high,
And the world's warm breast is in verdure dress'd
Go, stand on the hill where they lie.
The earliest ray of the golden day
On that hallow'd spot is cast;
And the evening sun, as he leaves the world,
Looks kindly on that spot last.

The Pilgrim _spirit_ has not fled;
It walks in the noon's broad light;
And it watches the bed of the glorious dead,
With their holy stars, by night.
It watches the bed of the brave who have bled,
And shall guard this ice-bound shore,
Till the waves of the bay, where the Mayflower lay,
Shall foam and freeze no more.

* * * * *

=_James G. Percival, 1786-1856._= (Manual, p. 515.)

=_328._= THE CORAL GROVE.

Deep in the wave is a coral grove,
Where the purple mullet and gold-fish rove;
Where the sea-flower spreads its leaves of blue,
That never are wet with the falling dew,
But in bright and changeful beauty shine,
Far down in the green and glassy brine.
The floor is of sand, like the mountain drift,
And the pearl-shells spangle the flinty snow;
From coral rocks, the sea-plants lift
Their boughs, where the tides and billows flow;
The water is calm and still below,
For the winds and waves are absent there,
And the sands are bright as the stars that glow
In the motionless fields of upper air.
There, with its waving blade of green,
The sea-flag streams through the silent water,
And the crimson leaf of the dulse is seen
To blush like a banner bathed in slaughter.
There, with a light and easy motion,
The fan-coral sweeps through the clear, deep sea,
And the yellow and scarlet tufts of ocean
Are bending like corn on the upland lea,
And life, in rare and beautiful forms,
Is sporting amid those bowers of stone.

* * * * *

=_Richard H. Dana, 1787-._= (Manual, pp. 501, 504, 514.)

From "The Buccaneer."

=_329._=

A sweet, low voice, in starry nights,
Chants to his ear a 'plaining song;
Its tones come winding up the heights,
Telling of woe and wrong;
And he must listen, till the stars grow dim,
The song that gentle voice doth sing to him.

O, it is sad that aught so mild
Should bind the soul with bands of fear;
That strains to soothe a little child
The man should dread to hear!
But sin hath broke the world's sweet peace, unstrung
The harmonious chords to which the angels sung.

* * * * *

But he no more shall haunt the beach,
Nor sit upon the tall cliff's crown,
Nor go the round of all that reach,
Nor feebly sit him down,
Watching the swaying weeds; another day,
And he'll have gone far hence that dreadful way.

To-night the charméd number's told.
"Twice have I come for thee," it said.
"Once more, and none shall thee behold.
Come, live one, to the dead!"
So hears his soul, and fears the coming night,
Yet sick and weary of the soft, calm light.

Again he sits within that room;
All day he leans at that still board;
None to bring comfort to his gloom,
Or speak a friendly word.
Weakened with fear, lone, haunted by remorse,
Poor, shattered wretch, there waits he that pale horse.

* * * * *

=_Richard Henry Wilde, 1789-._= (Manual, pp. 521, 501.)

=_330._= MY LIFE IS LIKE THE SUMMER ROSE.

My life is like the summer rose
That opens to the morning sky,
But, ere the shades of evening close,
Is scattered on the ground to die;
Yet on that rose's humble bed
The softest dews, of night are shed,
As if she wept such waste to see;
But none shall drop a tear for me.

My life is like the autumn leaf
That trembles in the moon's pale ray;
Its hold is frail, its state is brief,
Restless, and soon to pass away;
But when that leaf shall fall and fade,
The parent tree will mourn its shade,
The winds bewail the leafless tree;
But none shall breathe a sigh, for me.

My life is like the print which feet
Have left on Tampa's desert strand;
Soon as the rising tide shall beat,
Their track will vanish from the sand;
Yet, as if grieving to efface
All vestige of the human race,
On that lone shore loud moans the sea;
But none shall thus lament for me.

* * * * *

=_James A. Hillhouse, 1789-1844._= (Manual, p. 487.)

From "Hadad."

=_331._=

_Hadad._ Confide in me.
I can transport thee, O, to a paradise
To which this Canaan is a darksome span.
Beings shall welcome, serve thee, lovely as angels;
The elemental powers shall stoop, the sea
Disclose her wonders, and receive thy feet
Into her sapphire chambers; orbéd clouds
Shall chariot thee from zone to zone, while earth,
A dwindled, islet, floats beneath thee. Every
Season and clime shall blend for thee the garland.
The Abyss of time shall cast its secrets, ere
The flood marred primal nature, ere this orb
Stood in her station. Thou shalt know the stars,
The houses of eternity, their names,
Their courses, destiny--all marvels high.

_Tam._ Talk not so madly.

* * * * *

From "The Judgment."

=_332._=

As, when from some proud capital that crowns
Imperial Ganges, the reviving breeze
Sweeps the dank mist, or hoary river fog
Impervious mantled o'er her highest towers,
Bright on the eye rush Bramah's temples, capp'd
With spiry tops, gay-trellised minarets,
Pagods of gold, and mosques with burnish'd domes,
Gilded, and glistening in the morning sun,
So from the hill the cloudy curtains roll'd,
And, in the lingering lustre of the eve,
Again the Saviour and his seraphs shone.
Emitted sudden in his rising, flash'd
Intenser light, as toward the right hand host
Mild turning, with a look ineffable,
The invitation he proclaim'd in accents
Which on their ravish'd ears pour'd thrilling, like
The silver sound of many trumpets, heard
Afar in sweetest jubilee: then, swift
Stretching his dreadful sceptre to the left,
That shot forth horrid lightnings, in a voice
Clothed but in half its terrors, yet to them
Seem'd like the crush of heaven, pronounced the doom.
The sentence utter'd as with life instinct,
The throne uprose majestically slow;
Each angel spread his wings; in one dread swell
Of triumph mingling as they mounted, trumpets
And harps, and golden lyres, and timbrels sweet,
And many a strange and deep-toned instrument
Of heavenly minstrelsy unknown on earth,
And angels' voices, and the loud acclaim
Of all the ransom'd like a thunder shout,
Far through the skies melodious echoes roll'd
And faint hosannas distant climes return'd.

* * * * *

=_John M. Harney,[79] 1789-1855._=

From "Crystallina: a Fairy Tale."

=_333._=

On the stormy heath a ring they form;
They place therein the fearful maid,
And round her dance in the howling storm.
The winds beat hard on her lovely head:
But she clasped her hands, and nothing said.

O, 'twas, I ween, a ghastly sight
To see their uncouth revelry.
The lightning was the taper bright,
The thunder was the melody,
To which they danced with horrid glee.

The fierce-eyed owl did on them scowl,
The bat played round on leathern wing,
The coal-black wolf did at them howl,
The coal-black raven did croak and sing,
And o'er them flap his dusky wing.

An earthquake heaved beneath their feet,
Pale meteors revelled in the sky,
The clouds sailed by like a routed fleet,
The night-winds shrieked as they passed by,
The dark-red moon was eclipsed on high.

[Footnote 79: One of the earliest poets of the West, but a native of Delaware.]

* * * * *

=_Charles Sprague, 1791-._= (Manual, p. 514.)

From "Curiosity."

=_334._= THE NEWSPAPER.

Turn to the Press--its teeming sheets survey,
Big with the wonders of each passing day;
Births, deaths, and weddings, forgeries, fires, and wrecks,
Harangues and hailstorms, brawls and broken necks;
Where half-fledged bards, on feeble pinions, seek
An immortality of near a week;
Where cruel eulogists the dead restore,
In maudlin praise, to martyr them once more;
Where ruffian slanderers wreak their coward spite,
And need no venomed dagger while they write.

* * * * *

Yet, sweet or bitter, hence what fountains burst,
While still the more we drink the more we thirst.
Trade hardly deems the busy day begun
Till his keen eye along the page has run;
The blooming daughter throws her needle by,
And reads her schoolmate's marriage with a sigh;
While the grave mother puts her glasses on,
And gives a tear to some old crony gone.
The preacher, too, his Sunday theme lays down.
To know what last new folly fills the town.
Lively or sad, life's meanest, mightiest things,
The fate of fighting cocks, or fighting kings--
Nought comes amiss; we take the nauseous stuff,
Verjuice or oil, a libel or a puff.

* * * * *

=_Lydia H. Sigourney, 1791-1865._= (Manual, pp. 484, 523.)

=_335._= THE WIDOW AT HER DAUGHTER'S BRIDAL.

Deal gently, thou whose hand hath won
The young bird from its nest away,
Where, careless, 'neath a vernal sun,
She gayly carolled day by day;
The haunt is lone, the heart must grieve,
From where her timid wing doth soar
They pensive lisp at hush of eve,
Yet hear her gushing song no more.

Deal gently with her; thou art dear,
Beyond what vestal lips have told,
And, like a lamb from fountains clear,
She turns, confiding, to thy fold.
She round thy sweet, domestic bower
The wreath of changeless love shall twine,
Watch for thy step at vesper hour,
And blend her holiest prayer with thine.

Deal gently, thou, when, far away,
'Mid stranger scenes her foot shall rove,
Nor let thy tender care decay;
The soul of woman lives in love.
And shouldst thou, wondering, mark a tear,
Unconscious, from her eyelids break,
Be pitiful, and soothe the fear
That man's strong heart may ne'er partake.

A mother yields her gem to thee,
On thy true breast to sparkle rare;
She places 'neath thy household tree
The idol of her fondest care;
And, by thy trust to be forgiven
When judgment wakes in terror wild,
By all thy treasured hopes of heaven,
Deal gently with the widow's child.

* * * * *

=_William O. Sutler,[80] 1793-._=

From "The Boatman's Horn."

=_336._=

O Boatman, wind that horn again;
For never did the listening air
Upon its lambent bosom bear
So wild, so soft, so sweet a strain.
What though thy notes are sad and few,
By, every simple boatman blown?
Yet is each pulse to nature true,
And melody in every tone.
How oft, in boyhood's joyous day,
Unmindful of the lapsing hours,
I've loitered on my homeward way,
By wild Ohio's bank of flowers,
While some lone boatman from the deck
Poured his soft numbers to that tide,
As if to charm from storm and wreck
The boat where all his fortunes ride!
Delighted Nature drank the sound,
Enchanted Echo bore it round
In whispers soft and softer still,
From hill to plain, and plain to hill.

[Footnote 80: A native of Kentucky; a favorite Western poet; at one time prominent as a politician.]

* * * * *

=_337._= THE BATTLE-FIELD OF RAISIN.

The battle's o'er; the din is past;
Night's mantle on the field is cast;
The Indian yell is heard no more;
The silence broods o'er Erie's shore.
At this lone hour I go to tread
The field where valor vainly bled;
To raise the wounded warrior's crest,
Or warm with tears his icy breast;
To treasure up his last command,
And bear it to his native land.
It may one pulse of joy impart
To a fond mother's bleeding heart,
Or, for a moment, it may dry
The tear-drop in the widow's eye.
Vain hopes, away! The widow ne'er
Her warrior's dying wish shall hear.
The passing zephyr bears no sigh;
No wounded warrior meets the eye;
Death is his sleep by Erie's wave;
Of Raisin's snow we heap his grave.
How many hopes lie buried here--
The mother's joy, the father's pride,
The country's boast, the foeman's fear,
In 'wildered havoc, side by side!
Lend me, thou silent queen of night,
Lend me a while thy waning light,
That I may see each well-loved form
That sank beneath the morning storm.

* * * * *

=_William Cullen Bryant, 1794-._= (Manual, pp. 487, 524.)

From his "Poems."

=_338._= LINES TO A WATER FOWL.

Whither, midst falling dew,
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far through their rosy depths dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eye
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly seen against the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brink
Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean side?

There is a Power whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,--
The desert and illimitable air,--
Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned,
At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere,
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end,
Soon shalt thou find a summer home and rest,
And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend
Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest.

Thou'rt gone; the abyss of heaven
Hath swallowed up thy form; yet on my heart
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,
And shall not soon depart.

He who, from zone to zone,
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone,
Will lead my steps aright.

* * * * *

From "The Antiquity of Freedom."

=_339._= FREEDOM IRREPRESSIBLE.

O Freedom, thou art not, as poets dream,
A fair, young girl, with light and delicate limbs,
And wavy tresses gushing from the cap
With which the Roman master crowned his slave
When he took off the gyves. A bearded man,
Armed to the teeth, art thou; one mailéd hand
Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow,
Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred
With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs
Are strong with struggling. Power at thee has launched
His bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee.
They could not quench the life thou hast from heaven.
Merciless power has dug thy dungeon deep,
And his swart armorers, by a thousand fires,
Have forged thy chain; yet, while he deems thee bound,
The links are shivered, and the prison walls
Fall outward; terribly thou springest forth,
As springs the flame above a burning pile,
And shoutest to the nations, who return
Thy shoutings, while the pale oppressor flies.

* * * * *

From "Thanatopsis."

=_340._= COMMUNION WITH NATURE, SOOTHING.

To him who in the love of Nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language: for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile,
An eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house.
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;--
Go forth, under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around--
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air,--
Comes a still voice. Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground.
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,
And lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix for ever with the elements,
To be a brother to the insensible rock,
And to the sluggish clod which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.

* * * * *

As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men,
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron, and maid,
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man,--
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
By those, who in their turn shall follow them.
So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, that moves
To that mysterious realm where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

* * * * *

=_341._= THE LIVING LOST.

Matron! the children of whose love,
Each to his grave, in youth had passed,
and now the mould is heaped above
The dearest and the last!
Bride! who dost wear the widow's veil
Before the wedding flowers are pale!
Ye deem the human heart endures
No deeper, bitterer grief than yours.

Yet there are pangs of keener wo,
Of which the sufferers never speak,
Nor to the world's cold pity show
The tears that scald the cheek,
Wrung from their eyelids by the shame
And guilt of those they shrink to name,
Whom once they loved with cheerful will,
And love, though fallen and branded, still.

Weep, ye who sorrow for the dead;
Thus breaking hearts their pain relieve;
And reverenced are the tears ye shed.
And honored ye who grieve.
The praise of those who sleep in earth,
The pleasant memory of their worth,
The hope to meet when life is past,
Shall heal the tortured mind at last.

But ye, who for the living lost
That agony in secret bear,
Who shall with soothing words accost
The strength of your despair?
Grief for your sake is scorn for them
Whom ye lament, and all condemn;
And o'er the world of spirits lies
A gloom from which ye turn your eyes.

* * * * *

=_342._= THE SONG OF THE SOWER.

Brethren, the sower's task is done.
The seed is in its Winter bed.
Now let the dark-brown mould be spread,
To hide it from the sun,
And leave it to the kindly care
Of the still earth and brooding air.
As when the mother, from her breast,
Lays the hushed babe apart to rest,
And shades its eyes, and waits to see
How sweet its waking smile will be.
The tempest now may smite, the sleet
All night on the drowned furrow beat,
And winds that from the cloudy hold
Of winter, breathe the bitter cold,
Stiffen to stone the yellow-mould,
Yet safe shall lie the wheat;
Till, out of heaven's unmeasured blue,
Shall walk again the genial year,
To wake with warmth, and nurse with dew,
The germs we lay to slumber here.
O blessed harvest yet to be!
Abide thou with the love that keeps,
In its warm bosom tenderly,
The life which wakes, and that which sleeps.
The love that leads the willing spheres
Along the unending track of years,
And watches o'er the sparrow's nest,
Shall brood above thy winter rest,
And raise thee from the dust, to hold
Light whisperings with the winds of May;
And fill thy spikes with living gold,
From Summer's yellow ray.
Then, as thy garners give thee forth,
On what glad errands shalt thou go,
Wherever, o'er the waiting earth,
Roads wind, and rivers flow!
The ancient East shall welcome thee
To mighty marts beyond the sea;
And they who dwell where palm-groves sound
To summer winds the whole year round,
Shall watch, in gladness, from the shore,
The sails that bring thy glistening store.

* * * * *

=_343._= THE PLANTING OF THE APPLE-TREE.

Come, let us plant the apple-tree!
Cleave the tough greensward with the spade;
Wide let its hollow bed be made;
There gently lay the roots, and there
Sift the dark mould with kindly care,
And press it o'er them tenderly,
As, round the sleeping infant's feet,
We softly fold the cradle-sheet:
So plant we the apple-tree.

What plant we in the apple-tree?
Buds, which the breath of summer days
Shall lengthen into leafy sprays;
Boughs, where the thrush with crimson breast
Shall haunt and sing and hide her nest.
We plant upon the sunny lea
A shadow for the noontide hour,
A shelter from the summer shower,
When we plant the apple-tree.

What plant we in the apple-tree?
Sweets for a hundred flowery springs,
To load the May-wind's restless wings,
When, from the orchard-row, he pours
Its fragrance through our open doors;
A world of blossoms for the bee;
Flowers for the sick girl's silent room;
For the glad infant, sprigs of bloom,
We plant with the apple-tree.

What plant we in the apple-tree?
Fruits that shall swell in sunny June,
And redden in the August noon,
And drop as gentle airs come by
That fan the blue September sky;
While children, wild with noisy glee,
Shall scent their fragrance as they pass,
And search for them the tufted grass
At the foot of the apple-tree.

And when above this apple-tree
The winter stars are quivering bright,
And winds go howling through the night,
Girls, whose young eyes o'erflow with mirth,
Shall peel its fruit by cottage-hearth,
And guests in prouder homes shall see,
Heaped with the orange and the grape,
As fair as they in tint and shape,
The fruit of the apple-tree.

The fruitage of this apple-tree,
Winds, and our flag of stripe and star,
Shall bear to coasts that lie afar,
Where men shall wonder at the view,
And ask in what fair groves they grew;
And they who roam beyond the sea,
Shall look, and think of childhood's day,
And long hours passed in summer play
In the shade of the apple-tree.

Each year shall give this apple-tree
A broader flush of roseate bloom,
A deeper maze of verdurous gloom,
And loosen, when the frost-clouds lower,
The crisp brown leaves in thicker shower;
The years shall come and pass, but we
Shall hear no longer, where we lie,
The summer's songs, the autumn's sigh,
In the boughs of the apple-tree.

And time shall waste this apple tree.
Oh, when its aged branches throw
Thin shadows on the sward below,
Shall fraud and force and iron-will
Oppress the weak and helpless still?
What shall the tasks of mercy be,
Amid the toils, the strifes, the tears
Of those who live when length of years
Is wasting this apple-tree?

"Who planted this old apple-tree?"
The children of that distant day
Thus to some aged man shall say;
And gazing on its mossy stem,
The gray-haired man shall answer them:
"A poet of the land was he.
Born in the rude, but good, old times;
'Tis said he made some quaint old rhymes
On planting the apple-tree."

* * * * *

=_Maria Brooks, 1795-1845._= (Manual, p. 523.)

=_344._= MARRIAGE.

The bard has sung, God never formed a soul
Without its own peculiar mate, to meet
Its wandering half, when ripe to crown the whole
Bright plan of bliss, most heavenly, most complete!

But thousand evil things there are that hate
To look on happiness: these hurt, impede,
And, leagued with time, space, circumstance, and fate,
Keep kindred heart from heart, to pine, and pant, and bleed.

And as the dove to far Palmyra flying,
From where her native founts of Antioch beam,
Weary, exhausted, longing, panting, sighing,
Lights sadly at the desert's bitter stream;

So, many a soul, o'er life's drear desert faring,
Love's pure, congenial spring unfound, unquaffed,
Suffers, recoils, then thirsty and despairing
Of what it would, descends, and sips the nearest draught.

* * * * *

=_Joseph Rodman Drake, 1795-1820._= (Manual, p. 517.)

From "The Culprit Fay."

=_345._= THE FAY'S DEPARTURE.

* * * * *

The moon looks down on old Crow-nest,
She mellows the shades, on his shaggy breast,
And seems his huge grey form to throw
In a silver cone on the wave below;
His sides are broken by spots of shade,
By the walnut bough and the cedar made,
And through their clustering branches dark
Glimmers and dies the fire-fly's spark--
Like starry twinkles that momently break,
Through the rifts of the gathering tempest's rack.

The stars are on the moving stream,
And fling, as its ripples gently flow,
A burnished length of wavy beam
In an eel-like, spiral line below;
The winds are whist, and the owl is still,
The bat in the shelvy rock is hid.
And naught is heard on the lonely hill
But the cricket's chirp, and the answer shrill
Of the gauze-winged katy-did;
And the plaint of the wailing whip-poor-will,
Who mourns unseen, and ceaseless sings,
Ever a note of wail and woe,
Till morning spreads her rosy wings,
And earth and sky in her glances grow.

The moth-fly, as he shot in air,
Crept under the leaf, and hid her there;
The katy-did forgot its lay,
The prowling gnat fled fast away,
The fell mosquito checked his drone
And folded his wings till the Fay was gone,
And the wily beetle dropped his head,
And fell on the ground as if he were dead;
They crouched them close in the darksome shade,
They quaked all o'er with awe and fear,
For they had felt the blue-bent blade,
And writhed at the prick of the elfin spear;
Many a time on a summer's night.
When the sky was clear, and the moon was bright,
They had been roused from the haunted ground,
By the yelp and bay of the fairy hound;
They had heard the tiny bugle-horn,
They had heard the twang of the maize-silk string,
When the vine-twig bows were tightly drawn,
And the nettle shaft through air was borne,
Feathered with down of the hum-bird's wing.
And now they deemed the courier-ouphe,
Some hunter sprite of the elfin ground;
And they watched till they saw him mount the roof
That canopies the world around;
Then glad they left their covert lair,
And freaked about in the midnight air.

* * * * *

=_Fitz-Greene Halleck, 1795-1869._= (Manual, p. 515.)

=_346._= MARCO BOZZARIS.

At midnight, in his guarded tent,
The Turk was dreaming of the hour
When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent,
Should tremble at his power;
In dreams, through camp and court he bore
The trophies of a conqueror;
In dreams his song of triumph heard;
Then wore his monarch's signet ring:
Then pressed that monarch's throne--a king;
As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing,
As Eden's garden bird.

At midnight, in the forest shades,
Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band,
True as the steel of their tried blades,
Heroes in heart and hand.
There had the Persian thousands stood,
There had the glad earth drunk their blood
On old Platoea's day;
And now there breathed that haunted air
The sons of sires that conquer'd there,
With arm to strike and soul to dare,
As quick, as far as they.

An hour pass'd on--the Turk awoke;
That bright dream was his last;
He woke to hear his sentries shriek,
"To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!"
He woke--to die, midst flame, and smoke,
And shout, and groan, and sabre-stroke,
And death-shots, falling thick and fast
As lightnings from the mountain-cloud;
And heard, with voice as trumpet loud,
Bozzaris cheer his band:
"Strike--till the last arm'd foe expires;
Strike--for your altars and your fires;
Strike--for the green graves of your sires:
God, and your native land!"

They fought--like brave men, long and well;
They piled that ground with Moslem slain;
They conquer'd--but Bozzaris fell,
Bleeding at every vein.
His few surviving comrades saw--
His smile when rang their proud hurrah,
And the red field was won:
Then saw in death his eyelids close
Calmly, as to a night's repose
Like flowers at set of sun.

Come to the bridal chamber, Death!
Come to the mother's, when she feels,
For the first time, her first-born's breath;
Come when the blessed seals
That close the pestilence, are broke,
And crowded cities wail its stroke;
Come in consumption's ghastly form,
The earthquake shock, the ocean storm;
Come when the heart beats high and warm,
With banquet-song, and dance, and wine;
And thou art terrible: the tear,
The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier,
And all we know, or dream, or fear,
Of agony, are thine.

But to the hero, when his sword
Has won the battle for the free,
Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word;
And in its hollow tones are heard
The thanks of millions yet to be.
Come, when his task of fame is wrought--
Come, with her laurel-leaf blood-bought--
Come, in her crowning hour--and then
Thy sunken eye's unearthly light
To him is welcome as the sight
Of sky and stars to prison'd men:
Thy grasp is welcome as the hand
Of brother in a foreign land;
Thy summons welcome as the cry
That told the Indian isles were nigh,
To the world-seeking Genoese;
When the land-wind from woods of palm,
And orange-groves, and fields of balm,
Blew o'er the Haytian seas.

Bozzaris! with the storied brave
Greece nurtured in her glory's time,
Rest thee--there is no prouder grave,
E'en in her own proud clime.
Site wore no funeral weeds for thee,
Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume,
Like torn branch, from death's leafless tree,
In sorrow's pomp and pageantry,
The heartless luxury of the tomb:
But she remembers thee as one
Long loved and for a season gone,
For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed,
Her marble wrought, her music breathed:
For thee she rings the birth-day bells;
Of thee her babes' first lisping tells,
For thine, her evening prayer is said
At palace couch, and cottage bed;
Her soldier, closing with the foe,
Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow;
His plighted maiden, when she fears
For him, the joy of her young years,
Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears.
And she, the mother of thy boys,
Though in her eye and faded cheek
Is read the grief she will not speak,
The memory of her buried joys,
And even she who gave thee birth,
Will by their pilgrim-circled hearth,
Talk of thy doom without a sigh:
For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's,
One of the few, the immortal names,
That were not born to die.

* * * * *

From "Fanny."

=_347._= THE BROKEN MERCHANT.

Fanny! 'twas with her name my song began;
'Tis proper and polite her name should end it;
If in my story of her woes, or plan
Or moral can be traced, 'twas not intended;
And if I've wronged her, I can only tell her
I'm sorry for it--so is my bookseller.

* * * * *

Her father sent to Albany a prayer
For office, told how fortune had abused him,
And modestly requested to be mayor--
The council very civilly refused him;
Because, however much they might desire it,
The "public good," it seems, did not require it.

Some evenings since, he took a lonely stroll
Along Broadway, scene of past joys and evils;
He felt that withering bitterness of soul,
Quaintly denominated the "blue devils;"
And thought of Bonaparte and Belisarius,
Pompey, and Colonel Burr, and Caius Marius.

And envying the loud playfulness and mirth.
Of those who passed him, gay in youth and hope,
He took at Jupiter a shilling's worth
Of gazing, through the showman's telescope;
Sounds as of far-off bells came on his ears,
He fancied 'twas the music of the spheres.

He was mistaken, it was no such thing,
'Twas Yankee Doodle, played by Scudder's band;
He muttered, as he lingered listening,
Something of freedom and our happy land;
Then sketched, as to his home he hurried fast,
This sentimental song--his saddest and his last.

* * * * *

=_John G.C. Brainard, 1796-1828._= (Manual, p. 523.)

From Lines "To the Connecticut River."

=_348._= THE PAST AND THE PRESENT.

From that lone lake, the sweetest of the chain,
That links the mountain to the mighty main,
Fresh from the rock and swelling by the tree,
Rushing to meet, and dare, and breast the sea--
Fair, noble, glorious river! in thy wave
The sunniest slopes and sweetest pastures lave;
The mountain torrent, with its wintry roar,
Springs from its home and leaps upon thy shore:
The promontories love thee--and for this
Turn their rough cheeks, and stay thee for thy kiss.

* * * * *

Dark as the forest leaves that strew the ground,
The Indian hunter here his shelter found;
Here cut his bow and shaped his arrows true,
Here built his wigwam and his bark canoe,
Speared the quick salmon leaping up the fall,
And slew the deer without the rifle-ball.

* * * * *

What Art can execute, or Taste devise,
Decks thy fair course and gladdens in thine eyes--
As broader sweep the bendings of thy stream,
To meet the southern sun's more constant beam.
Here cities rise, and sea-washed commerce hails
Thy shores and winds with all her flapping sails,
From Tropic isles, or from the torrid main--
Where grows the grape, or sprouts the sugar-cane--
Or from the haunts where the striped haddock play,
By each cold northern bank and frozen bay.
Here, safe returned from every stormy sea,
Waves the striped flag, the mantle of the free--
That star-lit flag, by all the breezes curled
Of yon vast deep whose waters grasp the world.

* * * * *

=_Robert C. Sands, 1799-1832._= (Manual, p. 504.)

From "Weehawken."

=_349._= HISTORICAL REMINISCENCES.

Eve o'er our path is stealing fast:
Yon quivering splendors are the last
The sun will fling, to tremble o'er
The waves that kiss the opposing shore;
His latest glories fringe the height
Behind us, with their golden light.

* * * * *

Yet should the stranger ask what lore
Of by-gone days, this winding shore,
Yon cliffs, and fir-clad steeps, could tell
If vocal made by Fancy's spell,
The varying legend might rehearse
Fit themes for high romantic verse.

O'er yon rough heights and moss-clad sod
Oft hath the stalwart warrior trod;
Or peered with hunter's gaze, to mark
The progress of the glancing bark.
Spoils, strangely won on distant waves.
Have lurked in yon obstructed caves.

When the great strife for Freedom rose,
Here scouted oft her friends and foes,
Alternate, through the changeful war,
And beacon-fires flashed bright and far;
And here, when Freedom's strife was won,
Fell, in sad feud, her favored son;--

Her son,--the second of the band,
The Romans of the rescued land.
Where round yon capes the banks descend,
Long shall the pilgrim's footsteps bend;
There, mirthful hearts shall pause to sigh
There, tears shall dim the patriot's eye.

There last he stood. Before his sight
Flowed the fair river, free and bright;
The rising Mart, and isles and bay,
Before him in their glory lay,--
Scenes of his love and of his fame,--
The instant ere the death-shot came.

* * * * *

=_George W. Doane, 1799-1859._= (Manual, p. 523.)

From "Evening."

=_350._=

Softly now the light of day
Fades upon my sight away;
Free from care, from labor free,
Lord, I would commune with thee.

Thou, whose all-pervading eye
Nought escapes, without, within,
Pardon each infirmity,
Open fault, and secret sin.

Soon for me the light of day
Shall forever pass away;
Then, from sin and sorrow free,
Take me, Lord, to dwell with thee!

Thou who sinless, yet hast known
All of man's infirmity;
Then, from thy eternal throne,
Jesus, look with pitying eye.

* * * * *

=_George P. Morris, 1801-1864._= (Manual, p. 523.)

=_351._= HIGHLANDS OF THE HUDSON.