Chapter 3

Raise then the hymn to Death. Deliverer! God hath anointed thee to free the oppressed And crush the oppressor. When the armed chief, The conqueror of nations, walks the world, And it is changed beneath his feet, and all Its kingdoms melt into one mighty realm-- Thou, while his head is loftiest and his heart Blasphemes, imagining his own right hand Almighty, thou dost set thy sudden grasp Upon him, and the links of that strong chain That bound mankind are crumbled; thou dost break Sceptre and crown, and beat his throne to dust. Then the earth shouts with gladness, and her tribes Gather within their ancient bounds again. Else had the mighty of the olden time, Nimrod, Sesostris, or the youth who feigned His birth from Libyan Ammon, smitten yet The nations with a rod of iron, and driven Their chariot o'er our necks. Thou dost avenge, In thy good time, the wrongs of those who know No other friend. Nor dost thou interpose Only to lay the sufferer asleep, Where he who made him wretched troubles not His rest--thou dost strike down his tyrant too. Oh, there is joy when hands that held the scourge Drop lifeless, and the pitiless heart is cold. Thou too dost purge from earth its horrible And old idolatries;--from the proud fanes Each to his grave their priests go out, till none Is left to teach their worship; then the fires Of sacrifice are chilled, and the green moss O'ercreeps their altars; the fallen images Cumber the weedy courts, and for loud hymns, Chanted by kneeling multitudes, the wind Shrieks in the solitary aisles. When he Who gives his life to guilt, and laughs at all The laws that God or man has made, and round Hedges his seat with power, and shines in wealth,-- Lifts up his atheist front to scoff at Heaven, And celebrates his shame in open day, Thou, in the pride of all his crimes, cutt'st off The horrible example. Touched by thine, The extortioner's hard hand foregoes the gold Wrung from the o'er-worn poor. The perjurer, Whose tongue was lithe, e'en now, and voluble Against his neighbour's life, and he who laughed And leaped for joy to see a spotless fame Blasted before his own foul calumnies, Are smit with deadly silence. He, who sold His conscience to preserve a worthless life, Even while he hugs himself on his escape, Trembles, as, doubly terrible, at length, Thy steps o'ertake him, and there is no time For parley--nor will bribes unclench thy grasp. Oft, too, dost thou reform thy victim, long Ere his last hour. And when the reveller, Mad in the chase of pleasure, stretches on, And strains each nerve, and clears the path of life Like wind, thou point'st him to the dreadful goal, And shak'st thy hour-glass in his reeling eye, And check'st him in mid course. Thy skeleton hand Shows to the faint of spirit the right path, And he is warned, and fears to step aside. Thou sett'st between the ruffian and his crime Thy ghastly countenance, and his slack hand Drops the drawn knife. But, oh, most fearfully Dost thou show forth Heaven's justice, when thy shafts Drink up the ebbing spirit--then the hard Of heart and violent of hand restores The treasure to the friendless wretch he wronged. Then from the writhing bosom thou dost pluck The guilty secret; lips, for ages sealed, Are faithless to the dreadful trust at length, And give it up; the felon's latest breath Absolves the innocent man who bears his crime; The slanderer, horror-smitten, and in tears, Recalls the deadly obloquy he forged To work his brother's ruin. Thou dost make Thy penitent victim utter to the air The dark conspiracy that strikes at life, And aims to whelm the laws; ere yet the hour Is come, and the dread sign of murder given.

Thus, from the first of time, hast thou been found On virtue's side; the wicked, but for thee, Had been too strong for the good; the great of earth Had crushed the weak for ever. Schooled in guile For ages, while each passing year had brought Its baneful lesson, they had filled the world With their abominations; while its tribes, Trodden to earth, imbruted, and despoiled, Had knelt to them in worship; sacrifice Had smoked on many an altar, temple roofs Had echoed with the blasphemous prayer and hymn: But thou, the great reformer of the world, Tak'st off the sons of violence and fraud In their green pupilage, their lore half learned-- Ere guilt had quite o'errun the simple heart God gave them at their birth, and blotted out His image. Thou dost mark them flushed with hope, As on the threshold of their vast designs Doubtful and loose they stand, and strik'st them down.

* * * * *

Alas! I little thought that the stern power Whose fearful praise I sung, would try me thus Before the strain was ended. It must cease-- For he is in his grave who taught my youth The art of verse, and in the bud of life Offered me to the muses. Oh, cut off Untimely! when thy reason in its strength, Ripened by years of toil and studious search, And watch of Nature's silent lessons, taught Thy hand to practise best the lenient art To which thou gavest thy laborious days, And, last, thy life. And, therefore, when the earth Received thee, tears were in unyielding eyes And on hard cheeks, and they who deemed thy skill Delayed their death-hour, shuddered and turned pale When thou wert gone. This faltering verse, which thou Shalt not, as wont, o'erlook, is all I have To offer at thy grave--this--and the hope To copy thy example, and to leave A name of which the wretched shall not think As of an enemy's, whom they forgive As all forgive the dead. Rest, therefore, thou Whose early guidance trained my infant steps-- Rest, in the bosom of God, till the brief sleep Of death is over, and a happier life Shall dawn to waken thine insensible dust.

Now thou art not--and yet the men whose guilt Has wearied Heaven for vengeance--he who bears False witness--he who takes the orphan's bread, And robs the widow--he who spreads abroad Polluted hands of mockery of prayer, Are left to cumber earth. Shuddering I look On what is written, yet I blot not out The desultory numbers--let them stand, The record of an idle revery.

THE MASSACRE AT SCIO.°

Weep not for Scio's children slain; Their blood, by Turkish falchions shed, Sends not its cry to Heaven in vain For vengeance on the murderer's head.

Though high the warm red torrent ran Between the flames that lit the sky, Yet, for each drop, an armed man Shall rise, to free the land, or die.

And for each corpse, that in the sea Was thrown, to feast the scaly herds, A hundred of the foe shall be A banquet for the mountain birds.

Stern rites and sad, shall Greece ordain To keep that day, along her shore, Till the last link of slavery's chain Is shivered, to be worn no more.

THE INDIAN GIRL'S LAMENT.°

An Indian girl was sitting where Her lover, slain in battle, slept; Her maiden veil, her own black hair, Came down o'er eyes that wept; And wildly, in her woodland tongue, This sad and simple lay she sung:

"I've pulled away the shrubs that grew Too close above thy sleeping head, And broke the forest boughs that threw Their shadows o'er thy bed, That, shining from the sweet south-west, The sunbeams might rejoice thy rest.

"It was a weary, weary road That led thee to the pleasant coast, Where thou, in his serene abode, Hast met thy father's ghost: Where everlasting autumn lies On yellow woods and sunny skies.

"Twas I the broidered mocsen made, That shod thee for that distant land; 'Twas I thy bow and arrows laid Beside thy still cold hand; Thy bow in many a battle bent, Thy arrows never vainly sent.

"With wampum belts I crossed thy breast, And wrapped thee in the bison's hide, And laid the food that pleased thee best, In plenty, by thy side, And decked thee bravely, as became A warrior of illustrious name.

"Thou'rt happy now, for thou hast passed The long dark journey of the grave, And in the land of light, at last, Hast joined the good and brave; Amid the flushed and balmy air, The bravest and the loveliest there.

"Yet, oft to thine own Indian maid Even there thy thoughts will earthward stray,-- To her who sits where thou wert laid, And weeps the hours away, Yet almost can her grief forget, To think that thou dost love her yet.

"And thou, by one of those still lakes That in a shining cluster lie, On which the south wind scarcely breaks The image of the sky, A bower for thee and me hast made Beneath the many-coloured shade.

"And thou dost wait and watch to meet My spirit sent to join the blessed, And, wondering what detains my feet From the bright land of rest, Dost seem, in every sound, to hear The rustling of my footsteps near."

ODE FOR AN AGRICULTURAL CELEBRATION.

Far back in the ages, The plough with wreaths was crowned; The hands of kings and sages Entwined the chaplet round; Till men of spoil disdained the toil By which the world was nourished, And dews of blood enriched the soil Where green their laurels flourished: --Now the world her fault repairs-- The guilt that stains her story; And weeps her crimes amid the cares That formed her earliest glory.

The proud throne shall crumble, The diadem shall wane, The tribes of earth shall humble The pride of those who reign; And War shall lay his pomp away;-- The fame that heroes cherish, The glory earned in deadly fray Shall fade, decay, and perish. Honour waits, o'er all the Earth, Through endless generations, The art that calls her harvests forth, And feeds the expectant nations.

RIZPAH.

And he delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them in the hill before the Lord; and they fell all seven together, and were put to death in the days of the harvest, in the first days, in the beginning of barley-harvest.

And Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah, took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until the water dropped upon them out of heaven, and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest upon them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night.

2 SAMUEL, xxi. 10.

Hear what the desolate Rizpah said, As on Gibeah's rocks she watched the dead. The sons of Michal before her lay, And her own fair children, dearer than they: By a death of shame they all had died, And were stretched on the bare rock, side by side. And Rizpah, once the loveliest of all That bloomed and smiled in the court of Saul, All wasted with watching and famine now, And scorched by the sun her haggard brow, Sat mournfully guarding their corpses there, And murmured a strange and solemn air; The low, heart-broken, and wailing strain Of a mother that mourns her children slain:

"I have made the crags my home, and spread On their desert backs my sackcloth bed; I have eaten the bitter herb of the rocks, And drunk the midnight dew in my locks; I have wept till I could not weep, and the pain Of my burning eyeballs went to my brain. Seven blackened corpses before me lie, In the blaze of the sun and the winds of the sky. I have watched them through the burning day, And driven the vulture and raven away; And the cormorant wheeled in circles round, Yet feared to alight on the guarded ground. And when the shadows of twilight came, I have seen the hyena's eyes of flame, And heard at my side his stealthy tread, But aye at my shout the savage fled: And I threw the lighted brand to fright The jackal and wolf that yelled in the night.

"Ye were foully murdered, my hapless sons, By the hands of wicked and cruel ones; Ye fell, in your fresh and blooming prime, All innocent, for your father's crime. He sinned--but he paid the price of his guilt When his blood by a nameless hand was spilt; When he strove with the heathen host in vain, And fell with the flower of his people slain, And the sceptre his children's hands should sway From his injured lineage passed away.

"But I hoped that the cottage roof would be A safe retreat for my sons and me; And that while they ripened to manhood fast, They should wean my thoughts from the woes of the past. And my bosom swelled with a mother's pride, As they stood in their beauty and strength by my side, Tall like their sire, with the princely grace Of his stately form, and the bloom of his face.

"Oh, what an hour for a mother's heart, When the pitiless ruffians tore us apart! When I clasped their knees and wept and prayed, And struggled and shrieked to Heaven for aid, And clung to my sons with desperate strength, Till the murderers loosed my hold at length, And bore me breathless and faint aside, In their iron arms, while my children died. They died--and the mother that gave them birth Is forbid to cover their bones with earth.

"The barley-harvest was nodding white, When my children died on the rocky height, And the reapers were singing on hill and plain, When I came to my task of sorrow and pain. But now the season of rain is nigh, The sun is dim in the thickening sky, And the clouds in sullen darkness rest Where he hides his light at the doors of the west. I hear the howl of the wind that brings The long drear storm on its heavy wings; But the howling wind and the driving rain Will beat on my houseless head in vain: I shall stay, from my murdered sons to scare The beasts of the desert, and fowls of air."

THE OLD MAN'S FUNERAL.

I saw an aged man upon his bier, His hair was thin and white, and on his brow A record of the cares of many a year;-- Cares that were ended and forgotten now. And there was sadness round, and faces bowed, And woman's tears fell fast, and children wailed aloud.

Then rose another hoary man and said, In faltering accents, to that weeping train, "Why mourn ye that our aged friend is dead? Ye are not sad to see the gathered grain, Nor when their mellow fruit the orchards cast, Nor when the yellow woods shake down the ripened mast.

"Ye sigh not when the sun, his course fulfilled, His glorious course, rejoicing earth and sky, In the soft evening, when the winds are stilled, Sinks where his islands of refreshment lie, And leaves the smile of his departure, spread O'er the warm-coloured heaven and ruddy mountain head.

"Why weep ye then for him, who, having won The bound of man's appointed years, at last, Life's blessings all enjoyed, life's labours done, Serenely to his final rest has passed; While the soft memory of his virtues, yet, Lingers like twilight hues, when the bright sun is set?

"His youth was innocent; his riper age Marked with some act of goodness every day; And watched by eyes that loved him, calm, and sage, Faded his late declining years away. Cheerful he gave his being up, and went To share the holy rest that waits a life well spent.

"That life was happy; every day he gave Thanks for the fair existence that was his; For a sick fancy made him not her slave, To mock him with her phantom miseries. No chronic tortures racked his aged limb, For luxury and sloth had nourished none for him.

"And I am glad that he has lived thus long, And glad that he has gone to his reward; Nor can I deem that nature did him wrong, Softly to disengage the vital cord. For when his hand grew palsied, and his eye Dark with the mists of age, it was his time to die."

THE RIVULET.

This little rill, that from the springs Of yonder grove its current brings, Plays on the slope a while, and then Goes prattling into groves again, Oft to its warbling waters drew My little feet, when life was new, When woods in early green were dressed, And from the chambers of the west The warmer breezes, travelling out, Breathed the new scent of flowers about, My truant steps from home would stray, Upon its grassy side to play, List the brown thrasher's vernal hymn, And crop the violet on its brim, With blooming cheek and open brow, As young and gay, sweet rill, as thou.

And when the days of boyhood came, And I had grown in love with fame, Duly I sought thy banks, and tried My first rude numbers by thy side. Words cannot tell how bright and gay The scenes of life before me lay. Then glorious hopes, that now to speak Would bring the blood into my cheek, Passed o'er me; and I wrote, on high, A name I deemed should never die.

Years change thee not. Upon yon hill The tall old maples, verdant still, Yet tell, in grandeur of decay, How swift the years have passed away, Since first, a child, and half afraid, I wandered in the forest shade. Thou ever joyous rivulet, Dost dimple, leap, and prattle yet; And sporting with the sands that pave The windings of thy silver wave, And dancing to thy own wild chime, Thou laughest at the lapse of time. The same sweet sounds are in my ear My early childhood loved to hear; As pure thy limpid waters run, As bright they sparkle to the sun; As fresh and thick the bending ranks Of herbs that line thy oozy banks; The violet there, in soft May dew, Comes up, as modest and as blue, As green amid thy current's stress, Floats the scarce-rooted watercress: And the brown ground-bird, in thy glen, Still chirps as merrily as then.

Thou changest not--but I am changed, Since first thy pleasant banks I ranged; And the grave stranger, come to see The play-place of his infancy, Has scarce a single trace of him Who sported once upon thy brim. The visions of my youth are past-- Too bright, too beautiful to last. I've tried the world--it wears no more The colouring of romance it wore. Yet well has Nature kept the truth She promised to my earliest youth. The radiant beauty shed abroad On all the glorious works of God, Shows freshly, to my sobered eye, Each charm it wore in days gone by.

A few brief years shall pass away, And I, all trembling, weak, and gray, Bowed to the earth, which waits to fold My ashes in the embracing mould, (If haply the dark will of fate Indulge my life so long a date) May come for the last time to look Upon my childhood's favourite brook. Then dimly on my eye shall gleam The sparkle of thy dancing stream; And faintly on my ear shall fall Thy prattling current's merry call; Yet shalt thou flow as glad and bright As when thou met'st my infant sight.

And I shall sleep--and on thy side, As ages after ages glide, Children their early sports shall try, And pass to hoary age and die. But thou, unchanged from year to year, Gayly shalt play and glitter here; Amid young flowers and tender grass Thy endless infancy shalt pass; And, singing down thy narrow glen, Shalt mock the fading race of men.

MARCH.

The stormy March is come at last, With wind, and cloud, and changing skies, I hear the rushing of the blast, That through the snowy valley flies.

Ah, passing few are they who speak, Wild stormy month! in praise of thee; Yet, though thy winds are loud and bleak, Thou art a welcome month to me.

For thou, to northern lands, again The glad and glorious sun dost bring, And thou hast joined the gentle train And wear'st the gentle name of Spring.

And, in thy reign of blast and storm, Smiles many a long, bright, sunny day, When the changed winds are soft and warm, And heaven puts on the blue of May.

Then sing aloud the gushing rills And the full springs, from frost set free, That, brightly leaping down the hills, Are just set out to meet the sea.

The year's departing beauty hides Of wintry storms the sullen threat; But in thy sternest frown abides A look of kindly promise yet.

Thou bring'st the hope of those calm skies, And that soft time of sunny showers, When the wide bloom, on earth that lies, Seems of a brighter world than ours.

SONNET TO ----.

Ay, thou art for the grave; thy glances shine Too brightly to shine long; another Spring Shall deck her for men's eyes,--but not for thine-- Sealed in a sleep which knows no wakening. The fields for thee have no medicinal leaf, And the vexed ore no mineral of power; And they who love thee wait in anxious grief Till the slow plague shall bring the fatal hour. Glide softly to thy rest then; Death should come Gently, to one of gentle mould like thee, As light winds wandering through groves of bloom Detach the delicate blossom from the tree. Close thy sweet eyes, calmly, and without pain; And we will trust in God to see thee yet again.

AN INDIAN STORY.

"I know where the timid fawn abides In the depths of the shaded dell, Where the leaves are broad and the thicket hides, With its many stems and its tangled sides, From the eye of the hunter well.

"I know where the young May violet grows, In its lone and lowly nook, On the mossy bank, where the larch-tree throws Its broad dark boughs, in solemn repose, Far over the silent brook.

"And that timid fawn starts not with fear When I steal to her secret bower; And that young May violet to me is dear, And I visit the silent streamlet near, To look on the lovely flower."

Thus Maquon sings as he lightly walks To the hunting-ground on the hills; 'Tis a song of his maid of the woods and rocks, With her bright black eyes and long black locks, And voice like the music of rills.

He goes to the chase--but evil eyes Are at watch in the thicker shades; For she was lovely that smiled on his sighs, And he bore, from a hundred lovers, his prize, The flower of the forest maids.

The boughs in the morning wind are stirred, And the woods their song renew, With the early carol of many a bird, And the quickened tune of the streamlet heard Where the hazels trickle with dew.

And Maquon has promised his dark-haired maid, Ere eve shall redden the sky, A good red deer from the forest shade, That bounds with the herd through grove and glade, At her cabin-door shall lie.

The hollow woods, in the setting sun, Ring shrill with the fire-bird's lay; And Maquon's sylvan labours are done, And his shafts are spent, but the spoil they won He bears on his homeward way.

He stops near his bower--his eye perceives Strange traces along the ground-- At once to the earth his burden he heaves, He breaks through the veil of boughs and leaves, And gains its door with a bound.

But the vines are torn on its walls that leant, And all from the young shrubs there By struggling hands have the leaves been rent, And there hangs on the sassafras, broken and bent, One tress of the well-known hair.

But where is she who, at this calm hour, Ever watched his coming to see? She is not at the door, nor yet in the bower; He calls--but he only hears on the flower The hum of the laden bee.

It is not a time for idle grief, Nor a time for tears to flow; The horror that freezes his limbs is brief-- He grasps his war-axe and bow, and a sheaf Of darts made sharp for the foe.

And he looks for the print of the ruffian's feet, Where he bore the maiden away; And he darts on the fatal path more fleet Than the blast that hurries the vapour and sleet O'er the wild November day.

'Twas early summer when Maquon's bride Was stolen away from his door; But at length the maples in crimson are dyed, And the grape is black on the cabin side,-- And she smiles at his hearth once more.

But far in the pine-grove, dark and cold, Where the yellow leaf falls not, Nor the autumn shines in scarlet and gold, There lies a hillock of fresh dark mould, In the deepest gloom of the spot.

And the Indian girls, that pass that way, Point out the ravisher's grave; "And how soon to the bower she loved," they say, "Returned the maid that was borne away From Maquon, the fond and the brave."

SUMMER WIND.