Part 26

Thou wilt not cower in the dust, Maryland! Thy beaming sword shall never rust, Maryland! Remember Carroll's sacred trust, Remember Howard's warlike thrust, And all thy slumberers with the just, Maryland, my Maryland!

Come! 'tis the red dawn of the day, Maryland! Come with thy panoplied array, Maryland! With Ringgold's spirit for the fray, With Watson's blood at Monterey, With fearless Lowe and dashing May, Maryland, my Maryland!

Dear Mother! burst the tyrant's chain, Maryland! Virginia should not call in vain, Maryland! She meets her sisters on the plain,-- "_Sic semper!_" 'tis the proud refrain, That baffles minions back amain, Maryland! Arise in majesty again, Maryland, my Maryland!

Come! for thy shield is bright and strong, Maryland! Come! for thy dalliance does thee wrong, Maryland! Come to thine own heroic throng Walking with Liberty along, And chant thy dauntless slogan-song, Maryland, my Maryland!

I see the blush upon thy cheek, Maryland! For thou wast ever bravely meek, Maryland! But lo! there surges forth a shriek, From hill to hill, from creek to creek, Potomac calls to Chesapeake, Maryland, my Maryland!

Thou wilt not yield the Vandal toll, Maryland! Thou wilt not crook to his control, Maryland! Better the fire upon thee roll, Better the shot, the blade, the bowl, Than crucifixion of the soul, Maryland, my Maryland!

I hear the distant thunder hum, Maryland! The Old Line's bugle, fife, and drum, Maryland! She is not dead, nor deaf, nor dumb; Huzza! she spurns the Northern scum,-- She breathes! She burns! She'll come! She'll Come! Maryland, my Maryland!

Written 1861.

ABRAM JOSEPH RYAN.

~1839=1886.~

FATHER RYAN, "the poet-priest," was born in Norfolk, Virginia, but passed most of his life farther south. He lived in New Orleans, Knoxville, Augusta, and Mobile. His death occurred in Louisville, Kentucky. His patriotic poems are among the best known and most admired that the South has produced; his religious poems evince a sad view of human life together with an exalted adoration of the Divine Will.

WORKS.

Poems. Life of Christ, [unfinished]. Some Aspects of Modern Civilization, [a lecture].

To our great regret, we have not been permitted by the publishers to copy any of Father Ryan's poems. Every one is familiar with his "Conquered Banner," and "Sword of Lee"; the "Song of the Mystic" is one of his most beautiful productions.

WILLIAM GORDON McCABE.

~1841=----.~

WILLIAM GORDON MCCABE was born near Richmond, and educated at the University of Virginia. He was a captain in the Confederate service; and since the war he has had at Petersburg one of the best schools preparatory to the University. He is a poet, and has also edited several Latin authors for school use.

WORKS.

Ballads of Battle and Bravery. Defence of Petersburg.

DREAMING IN THE TRENCHES.[38]

I picture her there in the quaint old room, Where the fading fire-light starts and falls, Alone in the twilight's tender gloom With the shadows that dance on the dim-lit walls.

Alone, while those faces look silently down From their antique frames in a grim repose-- Slight scholarly Ralph in his Oxford gown, And stanch Sir Alan, who died for Montrose.

There are gallants gay in crimson and gold, There are smiling beauties with powdered hair, But she sits there, fairer a thousand-fold, Leaning dreamily back in her low arm-chair.

And the roseate shadows of fading light Softly clear steal over the sweet young face, Where a woman's tenderness blends to-night With the guileless pride of a haughty race.

Her hands lie clasped in a listless way On the old _Romance_--which she holds on her knee-- _Of Tristram_, the bravest of knights in the fray, _And Iseult_, who waits by the sounding sea.

And her proud, dark eyes wear a softened look As she watches the dying embers fall-- Perhaps she dreams of the knight in the book, Perhaps of the pictures that smile on the wall.

What fancies I wonder are thronging her brain, For her cheeks flush warm with a crimson glow! Perhaps--ah! me, how foolish and vain! But I'd give my life to believe it so!

Well, whether I ever march home again To offer my love and a stainless name, Or whether I die at the head of my men,-- I'll be true to the end all the same.

_Petersburg Trenches, 1864._

FOOTNOTE:

[38] By permission of the author.

SIDNEY LANIER.

~1842=1881.~

SIDNEY LANIER was born in Macon, Georgia, descended from a line of artist ancestors, through whom he inherited great musical ability. He was educated at Oglethorpe College, being graduated in 1860. He and his brother Clifford entered the Confederate Army together in 1861 and served through the war; but the exposure and hardships and imprisonment developed consumption which finally caused his death.

After the war he lived for two years in Alabama as a clerk and a teacher; but his health failed and he was forced to return home where he practised law with his father till 1873. Then deciding to devote himself to music and poetry, he went to Baltimore where he was engaged as first flute in the Peabody Symphony Concerts and in 1879 as lecturer on English Literature in Johns Hopkins University. His dread disease never relaxed and he was often obliged to quit work and go to Florida, North Carolina, Georgia, and Pennsylvania in search of strength. His death occurred at Lynn, Polk County, North Carolina, on his last quest for strength and life with which to continue the work he so much loved.

His "Science of English Verse" is said to be a new and valuable addition to the study of poetry. His poems belong to the new order of thought and life. His "Tiger-Lilies" is a prose-poem, written in three weeks just after the war and laid in the mountains of Tennessee and on the eastern shore of Virginia where he was stationed. "Beauty is holiness, and holiness is beauty," was his favorite remark on the subject of Art. His work and influence are growing in importance in the regard of students.

In 1876 he was invited to write the poem for the Centennial Exposition; and the "Meditation of Columbia," composed with the musical expression always in mind,--and so too it should be read,--was the grand Ode that graced the opening day at Philadelphia. See under _Waitman Barbe_.

WORKS.

POEMS:

Edited by his wife, Mary Day Lanier, with a Memorial by William Hayes Ward.

Tiger Lilies, [novel]. Florida: its Scenery, Climate, and History. English Novel and Principles of Its Development. Science of English Verse. Boy's Froissart. Boy's King Arthur. Boy's Mabinogion. Boy's Percy.

SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE.

(_From Poems._[39])

Out of the hills of Habersham, Down the valleys of Hall, I hurry amain to reach the plain, Run the rapid and leap the fall, Split at the rock and together again, Accept my bed, or narrow or wide, And flee from folly on every side With a lover's pain to attain the plain Far from the hills of Habersham, Far from the valleys of Hall.

All down the hills of Habersham, All though the valleys of Hall, The rushes cried, _Abide, abide_, The willful waterweeds held me thrall, The laving laurel turned my tide, The ferns and the fondling grass said _Stay_, The dewberry dipped for to work delay, And the little reeds sighed _Abide, abide, Here in the hills of Habersham, Here in the valleys of Hall_.

High o'er the hills of Habersham, Veiling the valleys of Hall, The hickory told me manifold Fair tales of shade, the poplar tall Wrought me her shadowy self to hold, The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine, Overleaning, with flickering meaning and sign, Said, _Pass not, so cold, these manifold Deep shades of the hills of Habersham, These glades in the valleys of Hall_.

And oft in the hills of Habersham, And oft in the valleys of Hall, The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook-stone Did bar me of passage with friendly brawl, And many a luminous jewel lone, --Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist, Ruby, garnet, and amethyst-- Made lures with the lights of streaming stone In the clefts of the hills of Habersham, In the beds of the valleys of Hall.

But oh, not the hills of Habersham, And oh, not the valleys of Hall Avail: I am fain for to water the plain, Downward the voices of Duty call-- Downward, to toil and be mixed with the main, The dry fields burn, and the mills are to turn, And a myriad flowers mortally yearn, And the lordly main from beyond the plain Calls o'er the hills of Habersham, Calls through the valleys of Hall.

1877.

WHAT IS MUSIC?

Music is Love in search of a word.

THE TIDE RISING IN THE MARSHES.

(_From The Marshes of Glynn._[40])

Ye marshes, how candid and simple and nothing-withholding and free Ye publish yourselves to the sky and offer yourselves to the sea! Tolerant plains, that suffer the sea and the rains and the sun, Ye spread and span like the catholic man who hath mightily won God out of knowledge and good out of infinite pain And sight out of blindness and purity out of a stain.

As the marsh-hen secretly builds on the watery sod, Behold I will build me a nest on the greatness of God; I will fly in the greatness of God as the marsh-hen flies In the freedom that fills all the space 'twixt the marsh and the skies: By so many roots as the marsh-grass sends in the sod I will heartily lay me a-hold on the greatness of God: Oh, like to the greatness of God is the greatness within The range of the marshes, the liberal marshes of Glynn.

And the sea lends large, as the marsh: and lo, out of his plenty, the sea Pours fast: full soon the time of the flood-tide must be: Look how the grace of the sea doth go About and about through the intricate channels that flow Here and there, Everywhere, Till his waters have flooded the uttermost creeks and the low-lying lanes, And the marsh is meshed with a million veins, That like as with rosy and silvery essences flow In the rose-and-silver evening glow. Farewell, my lord Sun! The creeks overflow: a thousand rivulets run 'Twixt the roots of the sod; the blades of the marsh-grass stir; Passeth a hurrying sound of wings that westward whirr; Passeth, and all is still; and the currents cease to run; And the sea and the marsh are one.

How still the plains of the waters be! The tide is in his ecstasy. The tide is at his highest height: And it is night.

And now from the Vast of the Lord will the waters of sleep Roll in on the souls of men, But who will reveal to our waking ken The forms that swim and the shapes that creep Under the waters of sleep? And I would I could know what swimmeth below when the tide comes in On the length and the breadth of the marvellous marshes of Glynn.

1878.

FOOTNOTES:

[39] By permission of Mrs. Lanier, and Charles Scribner's Sons, N. Y.

[40] By permission of Mrs. Lanier, and Charles Scribner's Sons, N. Y.

JAMES LANE ALLEN.

JAMES LANE ALLEN is one of the best and most successful of the living writers of the South. He is a Kentuckian, and his sketches and stories have so far all dealt with life in his native State.

WORKS.

Life in the Blue Grass. White Cowl. Flute and Violin, and other stories. John Gray. Sister Dolorosa. A Kentucky Cardinal (1895).

SPORTS OF A KENTUCKY SCHOOL IN 1795.

(_From John Gray, a Kentucky Tale of the Olden Time._[41])

A strange mixture of human life there was in Gray's school. There were the native little Kentuckians, born in the wilderness--the first wild, hardy generation of new people; and there were the little folk from Virginia, from Tennessee, from North Carolina, and from Pennsylvania and other sources, huddled together, some rude, some gentle, and starting out now to be formed into the men and women of the Kentucky that was to be.

They had their strange, sad, heroic games and pastimes, those primitive children under his guidance. Two little girls would be driving the cows home about dusk; three little boys would play Indian and capture them and carry them off; the husbands of the little girls would form a party to the rescue; the prisoners would drop pieces of their dresses along the way; and then at a certain point of the woods--it being the dead of night now, and the little girls being bound to a tree, and the Indians having fallen asleep beside their smouldering camp-fires--the rescuers would rush in, and there would be whoops and shrieks, and the taking of scalps, and a happy return.

Or, some settlement would be shut up in a fort besieged. Days would pass. The only water was a spring outside the walls, and around this the enemy skulked in the corn and grass. But the warriors must not perish of thirst. So, with a prayer, a tear, a final embrace, the little women marched out through the gates to the spring, in the very teeth of death, and brought back water in their wooden dinner-buckets.

Or, when the boys would become men with contests of running, and pitching quoits, and wrestling, the girls would play wives and have a quilting in a house of green alder-bushes, or be capped and wrinkled grandmothers sitting beside imaginary spinning-wheels and smoking imaginary pipes.

Sometimes it was not Indian warfare, but civil strife. For one morning as many as three Daniel Boones appeared on the playground at the same moment; and at once there was a fierce battle to ascertain which was the genuine Daniel. This being decided, the spurious Daniels submitted to be the one Simon Kenton, the other General George Rogers Clarke.

This was to be a great day for what he called his class in history. Thirteen years before, and forty miles away, had occurred the most dreadful of all the battles--the disaster of the Blue Licks; and in town were many mothers who yet wept for sons, widows who yet dreamed of young husbands, fallen that beautiful August day beneath the oaks and cedars, or floating down the red-dyed river.

It was this that he had promised to tell them at noon; and a little after twelve o'clock he was standing with them on the bank of the Town Fork, in order to give vividness to his description. This stream flows unseen beneath the streets of the city [Lexington] now, and with scarce current enough to wash out its grimy channels; but then it flashed broad and clear through the long valley which formed the town common--a valley of scattered houses with orchards and corn-fields and patches of cane.

A fine poetic picture he formed as he stood there amid their eager upturned faces, bare-headed under the cool brilliant sky of May, and reciting to them, as a prose-minstrel of the wilderness, the deeds of their fathers.

This Town Fork of the Elkhorn, he said, must represent the Licking River. On that side were the Indians; on this, the pioneers, a crowd of foot and horse. There stretched the ridge of rocks, made bare by the stamping of the buffalo; here was the clay they licked for salt. In that direction headed the two ravines in which Boone had feared an ambuscade. And thus variously having made ready for battle, and looking down for a moment into the eyes of a freckly impetuous little soul who was the Hotspur of the playground, he repeated the cry of McGary, which had been the signal for attack:

"Let all who are not cowards follow me!"

[Hereupon the soldiers plunged through the river, not seeing the Indians nor even knowing where they were; and in a few minutes they were attacked and completely routed by the Indians who were concealed in the woods and ravines of the other bank, as Boone had feared. Boone's son was killed, and he himself narrowly escaped by dashing through one of the ravines and swimming the river lower down. The slaughter in the river was great, and the pursuit was continued for twenty miles. Never had Kentucky experienced so fatal a blow as that at the Blue Licks.--L. M.]

FOOTNOTE:

[41] By permission of J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia.

JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS.

~1848=----.~

JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS was born in Eatonton, Georgia, and is a lawyer: but he has devoted much time of late years to literature, and is now one of the editors of the "Atlanta Constitution."

His dialect stories of "Uncle Remus" are a faithful reproduction of the popular tales of the old negroes of South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama; for the negro dialect varies in the different States. Mr. Harris' books have made these tales known in England.

"On the Plantation" is said to be autobiographical; it is a story of a boy's life during the war, well and simply told.

WORKS.

Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings. Nights with Uncle Remus. On the Plantation. Little Mr. Thimblefinger. Mingo, and other Sketches. Free Joe, and other Georgian Sketches. Daddy Jake, the Runaway, and Short Stories Told after Dark.

THE TAR-BABY.

(_From Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings._[42])

"Didn't the fox _never_ catch the rabbit, Uncle Remus?" asked the little boy the next evening.

"He come mighty nigh it, honey, sho's you bawn--Brer Fox did. One day atter Brer Rabbit fool 'im wid dat calamus root, Brer Fox went ter wuk en got 'im some tar, en mix it wid some turkentine, en fix up a contrapshun w'at he call a Tar-Baby, en he tuk dish yer Tar-Baby en he sot 'er in de big road, en den he lay off in de bushes fer to see w'at de news wuz gwineter be. En he didn't hatter wait long, nudder, kaze bimeby here come Brer Rabbit pacin' down de road--lippity-clippity, clippity-lippity--dez ez sassy ez a jay-bird. Brer Fox, he lay low. Brer Rabbit come prancin' 'long twel he spy de Tar-Baby, en den he fotch up on his behine legs like he wuz 'stonished. De Tar-Baby, she sot dar, she did, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

"'Mawnin'!' says Brer Rabbit, sezee--'nice wedder dis mawnin',' sezee.

"Tar-Baby ain't sayin' nuthin', en Brer Fox, he lay low.

"'How duz yo' sym'tums seem ter segashuate?' sez Brer Rabbit, sezee.

"Brer Fox, he wink his eye slow, en lay low, en de Tar-Baby, she ain't sayin' nuthin'.

"'How you come on, den? Is you deaf?' sez Brer Rabbit, sezee. 'Kaze if you is, I kin holler louder,' sezee.

"Tar-Baby stay still, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

"'Youer stuck up, dat's w'at you is,' says Brer Rabbit, sezee, 'en I'm gwineter kyore you, dat's w'at I'm a gwineter do,' sezee.

"Brer Fox, he sorter chuckle in his stummuck, he did, but Tar-Baby ain't sayin' nuthin'.

"'I'm gwineter larn you howter talk ter 'specttubble fokes ef hit's de las' ack,' sez Brer Rabbit, sezee. 'Ef you don't take off dat hat en tell me howdy, I'm gwineter bus' you wide open,' sezee.

"Tar-Baby stay still, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

"Brer Rabbit keep on axin' 'im, en de Tar-Baby, she keep on sayin' nuthin', twel present'y Brer Rabbit draw back wid his fis', he did, en blip he tuck 'er side er de head. Right dar's where he broke his merlasses jug. His fis' stuck, en he can't pull loose. De tar hilt 'im. But Tar-Baby, she stay still, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

"'Ef you don't lemme loose, I'll knock you agin,' sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, en wid dat he fotch 'er a wipe wid de udder han', en dat stuck. Tar-Baby, she ain't sayin' nuthin', en Brer Fox, he lay low.

"'Tu'n me loose, fo' I kick de nat'al stuffin' outen you,' sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, but de Tar-Baby, she ain't sayin' nuthin'. She des hilt on, en den Brer Rabbit lose de use er his feet in de same way. Brer Fox, he lay low. Den Brer Rabbit squall out dat ef de Tar-Baby don't tu'n 'im loose he butt 'er cranksided. En den he butted, en his head got stuck. Den Brer Fox, he sa'ntered fort', lookin' dez ez innercent ez wunner yo' mammy's mockin'-birds.

"'Howdy, Brer Rabbit,' sez Brer Fox, sezee. 'You look sorter stuck up dis mawnin',' sezee, en den he rolled on de groun', en laft en laft twel he couldn't laff no mo'. 'I speck you'll take dinner wid me dis time, Brer Rabbit. I done laid in some calamus root, en I ain't gwineter take no skuse,' sez Brer Fox, sezee."

Here Uncle Remus paused, and drew a two-pound yam out of the ashes.

"Did the fox eat the rabbit?" asked the little boy to whom the story had been told.

"Dat's all de fur de tale goes," replied the old man. "He mout, en den agin he moutent. Some say Jedge B'ar come 'long en loosed 'im,--some say he didn't. I hear Miss Sally callin'. You better run 'long."

FOOTNOTE:

[42] By permission of D. Appleton & Co, N. Y.

ROBERT BURNS WILSON.

~1850=----.~

ROBERT BURNS WILSON was born in Washington County, Pennsylvania, but removed early to Frankfort, Kentucky, where he devoted himself to landscape painting. Some of his pictures attracted attention at the New Orleans Exposition, 1884. His poems have appeared in magazines and have been much admired for their musical flow of deep feeling and fancy.

WORKS.

Life And Love: Poems.

FAIR DAUGHTER OF THE SUN.

(_From Life and Love._[43])

Hail! daughter of the sun! White-robed and fair to see, where goest thou now In haste from thy spiced garden? Hath thy brow, Crowned with white blooms, begun To grow a-weary of its flagrant wreath, And do thy temples long to ache beneath A gilded, iron crown? Tak'st thou the glint of Mammon's glittering car To be the gleam of some new-risen star-- Yond clamor, for renown?

Stay, lovely one, oh stay! Within thy gates, love-garlanded, remain: For love this Mammon seeks not, but for gain-- He is the same alway. This god in burnished tinsel, as of old, Cares for no music save of clinking gold-- All else to him is vain: His heart is flint, his ears are dull as lead; A crown of care he bringeth for thy head, And for thy wrists a chain.

Bide thou, oh goddess, stay! Even in the gateway turn! The orange tree Keeps still her snowy wreath of love for thee; The jasmine's starry spray Still waves thee back: O South! thy glory lies In thine own sacred fields. There shall arise Thy day, which fadeth not: There--patient hands shall fill thy cup with wine, There--hearts devoted, make thy name divine, Their own hard fate forgot.

DEDICATION.--SONNET.

TO ELIZABETH, MY MOTHER.

The green Virginian hills were blithe in May, And we were plucking violets--thou and I. A transient gladness flooded earth and sky; Thy fading strength seemed to return that day, And I was mad with hope that God would stay Death's pale approach--Oh! all hath long passed by! Long years! long years! and now, I well know why Thine eyes, quick-filled with tears, were turned away. First loved; first lost; my mother: time must still Leave my soul's debt uncancelled. All that's best In me and in my art is thine:--Me-seems Even now, we walk afield. Through good and ill, My sorrowing heart forgets not, and in dreams, I see thee, in the sun-lands of the blest.

FOOTNOTE:

[43] By permission of the author, and publishers, the Cassell Publishing Co., N. Y.

"CHRISTIAN REID."

FRANCES C. TIERNAN.