JAMES GATES PERCIVAL
[Born in 1795, died towards 1865. A physician, and a man of extensive scientific and linguistic acquirements].
HAIL to the land whereon we tread, Our fondest boast;
The sepulchre of mighty dead, The truest hearts that ever bled, Who sleep on Glory's brightest bed, A fearless host:
No slave is here; our unchained feet Walk freely as the waves that beat Our coast.
Our fathers crossed the ocean's wave To seek this shore;
They left behind the coward slave To welter in his living grave; With hearts unbent and spirits brave, They sternly bore
Such toils as meaner souls had quelled; But souls like these such toils impelled To soar.
Hail to the morn when first they stood On Bunker's height,
And fearless stemmed the invading flood, And wrote our dearest rights in blood, And mowed in ranks the hireling brood In desperate fight!
Oh 'twas a proud, exulting day, For even our fallen fortunes lay In light.
There is no other land like thee, No dearer shore;
Thou art the shelter of the free; The home, the port of Liberty, Thou hast been, and shalt ever be,
Till time is o'er.
Ere I forget to think upon
My land, shall mother curse the son She bore.
Thou art the firm unshaken rock On which we rest;
And, rising from thy hardy stock, Thy sons the tyrant's frown shall mock, And slavery's galling chains unlock, And free the oppressed:
All who the wreath of Freedom twine Beneath the shadow of their vine Are blessed.
We love thy rude and rocky shore, And here we stand!-
Let foreign navies hasten o'er, And on our heads their fury pour, And peal their cannon's loudest roar, And storm our land;
They still shall find our lives are given To die for home,—and leant on Heaven Our hand.
Aм I not all alone?-The world is still In passionless slumber,-not a tree but feels The far-pervading hush, and softer steals The misty river by. Yon broad bare hill Looks coldly up to heaven, and all the stars Seem eyes deep-fixed in silence, as if bound By some unearthly spell,-no other sound
But the owl's unfrequent moan.-Their airy cars The winds have stationed on the mountain peaks. Am I not all alone?-A spirit speaks
From the abyss of night, "Not all alone: Nature is round thee with her banded powers, And ancient genius haunts thee in these hours; Mind and its kingdom now are all thine own.'
THE blue heaven spreads before me with its kcen And countless eyes of brightness,-worlds are there,— The boldest spirit cannot spring, and dare The peopled universe that burns between This earth and nothing. Thought can wing its way Swifter than lightning-flashes, or the beam That hastens on the pinions of the morn; But, quicker than the glowing dart of day, It tires and faints along the starry stream,- A wave of suns through countless ether borne, Though infinite, eternal! Yet one power Sits on the Almighty Centre, whither tend All worlds and beings from time's natal hour, Till suns and all their satellites shall end.
SAMUEL GRISWOLD GOODRICH.
[Born about 1796.1 A publisher, and author of the once immensely popular juvenile books issued under the pseudonym of "Peter Parley"].
"FATHER OF LAKES!" thy waters bend Beyond the eagle's utmost view,
When, throned in heaven, he sees thee send Back to the sky its world of blue.
Boundless and deep, the forests weave Their twilight shade thy borders o'er, And threatening cliffs, like giants, heave Their rugged forms along thy shore.
Pale Silence, 'mid thy hollow caves, With listening ear, in sadness broods;
Or startled Echo, o'er thy waves,
Sends the hoarse wolf-notes of thy woods.
It has been stated to me (but not as a certainty) that Mr. Goodrich died in some recent year in Parls.
Nor can the light canoes, that glide Across thy breast like things of air, Chase from thy lone and level tide
The spell of stillness reigning there.
Yet round this waste of wood and wave, Unheard, unseen, a spirit lives, That, breathing o'er each rock and cave, To all a wild, strange aspect gives.
The thunder-riven oak, that flings Its grisly arms athwart the sky, A sudden, startling image brings To the lone traveller's kindled eye.
The gnarled and braided boughs, that show Their dim forms in the forest shade, Like wrestling serpents seem, and throw Fantastic horrors through the glade.
The very echoes round this shore
Have caught a strange and gibbering tone; For they have told the war-whoop o'er, Till the wild chorus is their own.
Wave of the wilderness, adieu ! Adieu, ye rocks, ye wilds and woods! Roll on, thou element of blue,
And fill these awful solitudes !
Thou hast no tale to tell of man
God is thy theme. Ye sounding caves,
Whisper of Him, whose mighty plan Deems as a bubble all your waves!
JOHN GARDNER CALKINS BRAINARD.
Born in 1796, died in 1828. In his brief career he was first called to the bar; then undertook the editorship of a weekly ga. zette; and consumption closed a somewhat desultory and melancholy life].
THE dead leaves strew the forest walk, And withered are the pale wild flowers; The frost hangs blackening on the stalk, The dew-drops fall in frozen showers. Gone are the spring's green sprouting bowers, Gone summer's rich and mantling vines, And autumn, with her yellow hours, On hill and plain no longer shines. I learned a clear and wild-toned note, That rose and swelled from yonder tree- A gay bird, with too sweet a throat,
There perched, and raised her song for me. The winter comes, and where is she? Away-where summer wings will rove, Where buds are fresh, and every tree Is vocal with the notes of love.
Too mild the breath of southern sky,
Too fresh the flower that blushes there;
The northern breeze that rustles by
Finds leaves too green, and buds too fair; No forest-tree stands stripped and bare, No stream beneath the ice is dead,
No mountain-top, with sleety hair, Bends o'er the snows its reverend head.
Go there, with all the birds, and seek
A happier clime, with livelier flight; Kiss, with the sun, the evening's cheek, And leave me lonely with the night. I'll gaze upon the cold north light, And mark where all its glories shone,- See that it all is fair and bright, Feel that it all is cold and gone.
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