Empire unsceptred! what foe shall assail thee,
Bearing the standard of Liberty's van?
Think not the God of thy fathers shall fail thee,
Striving with men for the birthright of man!
Up with our banner bright, etc.

Yet if, by madness and treachery blighted,
Dawns the dark hour when the sword thou must

draw,

Then with the arms to thy millions united,
Smite the bold traitors to Freedom and Law!
Up with our banner bright, etc.

Lord of the Universe! shield us and guide us,
Trusting thee always, through shadow and sun!
Thou hast united us, who shall divide us?
Keep us, O keep us the MANY IN ONE!
Up with our banner bright,

Sprinkled with starry light,

Spread its fair emblems from mountain to shore,
While through the sounding sky

Loud rings the Nation's cry,

UNION AND LIBERTY! ONE EVERMORE!

NOTES.

火燒

NOTES.

Note 1. Page 5.

"Scenes of my youth."

This poem was commenced a few months subsequently to the author's return to his native village, after an absence of nearly three years.

Note 2. Page 10.

A few lines, perhaps deficient in dignity, were introduced at this point, in delivering the poem, and are appended in this clandestine manner for the gratification of some of my audience.

How many a stanza, blushing like the rose,
Would turn to fustian if resolved to prose
How many an epic, like a gilded crown,
If some cold critic dared to melt it down,
Roll in his crucible a shapeless mass,
A grain of gold-leaf to a pound of brass!
Shorn of their plumes, our moonstruck sonneteers
Would seem but jackdaws croaking to the spheres ;
Our gay Lotharios, with their Byron curls,
Would pine like oysters cheated of their pearls!

Woe to the spectres of Parnassus' shade,
If truth should mingle in the masquerade.
Lo, as the songster's pale creations pass,
Off come at once the "Dearest" and "Alas!"
Crack go the lines and levers used to prop
Top-heavy thoughts, and down at once they drop.
Flowers weep for hours; Love, shrieking for his dove,
Finds not the solace that he seeks-above.

Fast in the mire, through which in happier time
He ambled dryshod on the stilts of rhyme,
The prostrate poet finds at length a tongue
To curse in prose the thankless stars he sung.

And though, perchance, the haughty Muse it shames,
How deep the magic of harmonious names!
How sure the story of romance to please,
Whose rounded stanza ends with Heloise!
How rich and full our intonations ride
"On Torno's cliffs, or Pam bamarca's side "!
But were her name some vulgar "proper noun,'
And Pambamarca changed to Belchertown,
She might be pilloried for her doubtful fame,
And no enthusiast would arise to blame;
And he who outraged the poetic sense
Might find a home at Belchertown's expense!

The harmless boys, scarce knowing right from wrong, Who libel others and themselves in song,

When their first pothooks of poetic rage

Slant down the corners of an album's page,

(Where crippled couplets spread their sprawling charms,
As half-taught swimmers move their legs and arms,)
Will talk of "Hesper on the brow of eve,"

And call their cousins "lovely Genevieve" ;-
While thus transformed, each dear deluded maid,
Pleased with herself in novel grace arrayed,
Smiles on the Paris who has come to crown
This new-born Helen in a gingham gown!

Note 3. Page 16.

"Or gaze upon yon pillared stone."

The tomb of the VASSALL family is marked by a freestone tablet, supported by five pillars, and bearing nothing but the sculptured reliefs of the Goblet and the Sun, Vas- Sol, which designated a powerful family, now almost forgotten. The exile referred to in the next stanza was a native of Honfleur in Normandy.

Note 4. Page 20.

"Swept through the world the war-song of Marseilles."

The music and words of the Marseilles Hymn were com posed in one night.