ON THE PROSPECT OF PEACE. E'Ex now, from half the threaten'd horrors freed, Hail, heaven-born peace! thy grateful blessings pour Then, O blest land! with genius unconfined, WESTERN EMIGRATION. WITH all that's ours, together let us rise, Seek brighter plains, and more indulgent skies; Where fair Ohio rolls his amber tide, And nature blossoms in her virgin pride; Where all that Beauty's hand can form to please Shall crown the toils of war with rural ease. The shady coverts and the sunny hills, The gentle lapse of ever-murmuring rills, The soft repose amid the noontide bowers, The evening walk among the blushing flowers, The fragrant groves, that yield a sweet perfume, And vernal glories in perpetual bloom Await you there; and heaven shall bless the toil: Your own the produce, and your own the soil. There, free from envy, cankering care and strife, Flow the calm pleasures of domestic life; There mutual friendship soothes each placid breast: Blest in themselves, and in each other blest. From house to house the social glee extends, For friends in war in peace are doubly friends. There cities rise, and spiry towns increase, With gilded domes and every art of peace. There Cultivation shall extend his power, Rear the green blade, and nurse the tender flower; Make the fair villa in full splendours smile, And robe with verdure all the genial soil. There shallrich Commerce court the favouring gales, And wondering wilds admire the passing sails, Where the bold ships the stormy Huron brave, Where wild Ontario rolls the whitening wave, Where fair Ohio his pure current pours, And Mississippi laves the extended shores. And thou Supreme! whose hand sustains this ball, Before whose nod the nations rise and fall, Propitious smile, and shed diviner charms On this blest land, the queen of arts and arms; Make the great empire rise on wisdom's plan, The seat of bliss, and last retreat of man. AMERICAN WINTER. THEN doubling clouds the wintry skies deform, And, wrapt in vapour, comes the roaring storm; With snows surcharged, from tops of mountains sails, Loads leafless trees, and fills the whiten'd vales. REVOLUTIONARY SOLDIERS. O, WHAT avails to trace the fate of war Through fields of blood, and paint each glorious scar! Why should the strain your former woes recall, JOEL BARLOW. [Born 1755. Died 1812.] THE author of the "Columbiad" was born in the village of Reading, in Connecticut, in 1755. He was the youngest in a family of ten, and his father died while he was yet a child, leaving to him property sufficient only to defray the costs of his education. On the completion of his preparatory studies he was placed by his guardians at Dartmouth College, but was soon induced to remove to New Haven, where he was graduated, in 1778. Among his friends here were DWIGHT, then a college tutor, Colonel HUMPHREYS, a revolutionary bard of some reputation, and TRUMBULL, the author of "McFingal." recited an original poem, on taking his bachelor's degree, which is preserved in the "American Poems," printed at Litchfield in 1793. It was his first attempt of so ambitious a character, and possesses little merit. During the vacations of the college he had on several occasions joined the army, in which four of his brothers were serving; and he participated in the conflict at White Plains, and a number of minor engagements, in which he is said to have displayed much intrepidity. BARLOW For a short time after completing his academic course, BARLOW devoted his attention chiefly to the law; but being urged by his friends to qualify himself for the office of chaplain, he undertook the study of theology, and in six weeks became a licensed minister. He joined the army immediately, and remained with it until the establishment of peace, cultivating the while his taste for poetry, by writing patriotic songs and ballads, and composing, in part, his "Vision of Columbus," afterward expanded into the "Columbiad." When the army was disbanded, in 1783, he removed to Hartford, to resume his legal studies; and to add to his revenue established The Mercury," a weekly gazette, to which his writings gave reputation and an immediate circulation. He had previously married at New Haven a daughter of the Honourable ABRAHAM BALDWIN, and had lost his early patron and friend, the Honourable TITUS HOSMER, on whom he wrote an elegant elegy. In 1785 he was admitted to the bar, and in the same year, in compliance with the request of an association of Congregational ministers, he prepared and published an enlarged and improved edition of WATTS'S version of the Psalms, to which were appended a Of the psalms omitted by WATTS and included in this edition, only the eighty-eighth and one hundred and thirty-seventh were paraphrased by BARLOW. His version of the latter added much to his reputation, and has been considered the finest translation of the words of DAVID that has been written, though they have received a metrical dress from some of the best poets of England and America. Recently the origin of this paraphrase has been a subject of controversy, but a memorandum found among the papers of the late Judge TRUMBULL, 24 collection of hymns, several of which were written by himself. "The Vision of Columbus" was published in 1787. It was dedicated to Louis XVI., with strong expressions of admiration and gratitude, and in the poem were corresponding passages of applause; but BARLOW's feelings toward the amiable and unfortunate monarch appear to have changed in after time, for in the "Columbiad" he is coldly alluded to, and the adulatory lines are suppressed. The "Vision of Columbus" was reprinted in London and Paris, and was generally noticed favourably in the reviews. After its publication the author relinquished his newspaper and established a bookstore, principally to sell the poem and his edition of the Psalms, and as soon as this end was attained, resumed the practice of the law. In this he was, however, unfortunate, for his forensic abilities were not of the most popular description, and his mind was too much devoted to political and literary subjects to admit of the application to study and attention to business necessary to secure success. He was engaged with Colonel HUMPHREYS, JOHN TRUMBULL, and Dr. LEMUEL HOPKINS, a man of some wit, of the coarser kind, in the "Anarchiad," a satirical poem published at Hartford, which had considerable political influence, and in some other works of a similar description; but, obtaining slight pecuniary advantage from his literary labours, he was induced to accept a foreign agency from the "Sciota Land Company," and sailed for Europe, with his family, in 1788. In France he sold some of the lands held by this association, but deriving little or no personal benefit from the transactions, and becoming aware of the fraudulent character of the company, he relinquished his agency and determined to rely on his pen for support.| who aided in the preparation of the Connecticut edition In 1791, BARLOW published in London " Advice to the Privileged Orders," a work directed against the distinguishing features of kingly and aristocratic governments; and in the early part of the succeeding year, "The Conspiracy of Kings," a poem of about four hundred lines, educed by the first coalition of the continental sovereigns against republican France. In the autumn of 1792, he wrote a letter to the French National Convention, recommending the abolition of the union between the church and the state, and other reforms; and was soon after chosen by the "London Constitutional Society," of which he was a member, to present in person an address to that body. On his arrival in Paris he was complimented with the rights of citizenship, an "honour" which had been previously conferred on WASHINGTON and HAMILTON. From this time he made France his home. In the summer of 1793, a deputation, of which his friend GREGORIE, who before the Revolution had been Bishop of Blois, was a member, was sent into Savoy, to organize it as a department of the republic. He accompanied it to Chamberry, the capital, where, at the request of its president, he wrote an address to the inhabitants of Piedmont, inciting them to throw off allegiance to "the man of Turin who called himself their king." Here too he wrote "Hasty Pudding," the most popular of his poems. On his return to Paris, BARLOW's time was principally devoted to commercial pursuits, by which, in a few years, he obtained a considerable fortune. The atrocities which marked the progress of the Revolution prevented his active participation in political controversies, though he continued under all circumstances an ardent republican. Toward the close of 1795, he visited the North of Europe, on some private business, and on his return to Paris was appointed by WASHINGTON consul to Algiers, with power to negotiate a commercial treaty with the dey, and to ransom all the Americans held in slavery on the coast of Barbary. He accepted and fulfilled the mission to the satisfaction of the American Government, concluding treaties with Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli, and liberating more than one hundred Americans, who were in prisons or in slavery to the Mohammedans. He then returned to Paris, where he purchased the splendid hotel of the Count CLERMONT DE TONNERE, and lived several years in a fashionable and costly manner, pursuing still his fortunate mercantile speculations, revising his "great epic," and writing occasionally for the political gazettes. Finally, after an absence of nearly seventeen years, the poet, statesman, and philosopher returned to his native country. He was received with kindness by many old friends, who had corresponded with him while abroad or been remembered in all his wanderings; and after spending a few months in travel, marking, with patriotic pride, the rapid progress which the nation had made in greatness, he fixed his home on the banks of the Potomac, near the city of Washington, where he built the splendid mansion, known afterward as Kalorama," and expressed an intention to spend there the remainder of his life. In 1806, he published a prospectus of a National Institution, at Washington, to combine a university with a naval and military school, academy of fine arts, and learned society. A bill to carry his plan into effect was introduced into Congress, but never became a law. In the summer of 1808, appeared the "Columbiad," in a splendid quarto volume, surpassing in the beauty of its typography and embellishments any work before that time printed in America. From his earliest years BARLOW had been ambitious to raise the epic song of his nation. The "Vision of Columbus," in which the most brilliant events in American history had been described, occupied his leisure hours when in college, and afterward, when, as a chaplain, he followed the standard of the liberating army. That work was executed too hastily and imperfectly, and for twenty years after its appearance, through every variety of fortune, its enlargement and improvement engaged his attention. The events of the Revolution were so recent and so universally known, as to be inflexible to the hand of fiction; and the poem could not therefore be modelled after the regular epic form, which would otherwise have been chosen. It is a series of visions, presented by HESPER, the genius of the western continent, to COLUMBUS, while in the prison at Valladolid, where he is introduced to the reader uttering a monologue on his ill-requited services to Spain. These visions embrace a vast variety of scenes, circumstances, and characters: Europe in the middle ages, with her political and religious reformers; Mexico and the South American nations, and their imagined history; the progress of discovery; the settlement of the states now composing the federation; the war of the Revolution, and establishment of republicanism; and the chief actors in the great dramas which he attempts to present. The poem, having no unity of fable, no regular succession of incidents, no strong exhibition of varied character, lacks the most powerful charms of a narrative; and has, besides, many dull and spiritless passages, that would make unpopular a work of much more faultless general design. The versification is generally harmonious, but mechanical and passionless, the language sometimes incorrect, and the similes often inappropriate and inelegant. Yet there are in it many bursts of eloquence and patriotism, which should preserve it from oblivion. The descriptions of nature and of personal character are frequently condensed and forceful; and passages of invective, indignant and full of energy. In his narrative of the expedition against Quebec, under ARNOLD, the poet exclaims: Ah, gallant troop! deprived of half the praise That deeds like yours in other times repays, Since your prime chief (the favourite erst of Fame,) Hath sunk so deep his hateful, hideous name, That every honest muse with horror flings It forth unsounded from her sacred strings; Else what high tones of rapture must have told The first great actions of a chief so bold! These lines are characteristic of his manner. The "Columbiad" was reprinted in Paris and London, and noticed in the leading critical gazettes, but generally with little praise. The London "Monthly Magazine" attempted in an elaborate article to prove its title to a place in the first class of epics, and expressed a belief that it was surpassed only by the "Illiad," the "Eneid" and "Paradise Lost." In America, however, it was regarded by the judicious as a failure, and reviewed with even more wit and severity than in England. Indeed, the poet did not in his own country receive the praise which he really merited; and faults were imputed to his work which it did not possess. Its sentiments were said to be hostile to Christianity,* and the author was declared an infidel; but there is no line in the "Columbiad" unfavourable to the religion of New England, the Puritan faith which is the basis of the national greatness; and there is no good reason for believing that BARLow at the time of his death doubted the creed of which in his early manhood he had been a minister. After the publication of the "Columbiad," BARLow made a collection of documents, with an intention to write a history of the United States; but, in 1811, he was unexpectedly appointed minister plenipotentiary to the French government, and immediately sailed for Europe. His attempts to negotiate a treaty of commerce and indemnification for spoliations were unsuccessful at Paris; and in the autumn of 1812 he was invited by the Duke of BASSANO to a conference with NAPOLEON at Wilna, in Poland. He started from Paris, and travelled without intermission until he reached Zarnowitch, an obscure village near Cracow, where he died, from an inflammation of the lungs, induced by fatigue and exposure in an inhospitable country, in an inclement season, on the twentysecond day of December, in the fifty-fourth year of his age. In Paris, honours were paid to his memory as an important public functionary and a man of letters; his eulogy was written by DUPONT DE NEMOURS, and an account of his life and writings was drawn up and published, accompanied by a canto of the "Columbiad," translated into French heroic verse. In America, too, his death was generally lamented, though without any public exhibition of mourning. BARLOW was much respected in private life for his many excellent social qualities. His manners were usually grave and dignified, though when with his intimate friends he was easy and familiar. He was an honest and patient investigator, and would doubtless have been much more successful as a metaphysical or historical writer than as a poet. As an author he belonged to the first class of his time in America; and for his ardent patriotism, his public services, and the purity of his life, he deserves a distinguished rank among the men of our golden age. THE HASTY PUDDING. CANTO I. YE Alps audacious, through the heavens that rise, To cramp the day and hide me from the skies; Ye Gallic flags, that, o'er their heights unfurl'd, Bear death to kings and freedom to the world, I sing not you. A softer theme I choose, A virgin theme, unconscious of the muse, But fruitful, rich, well suited to inspire The purest frenzy of poetic fire. Despise it not, ye bards to terror steel'd, Who hurl your thunders round the epic field; Nor ye who strain your midnight throats to sing Joys that the vineyard and the stillhouse bring; Or on some distant fair your notes employ, And speak of raptures that you ne'er enjoy. *It is now generally believed that BARLOW, while in France, abjured the Christian religion. The Reverend THOMAS ROBBINS, a venerable clergyman of Rochester, Massachusetts, in a letter written in 1840, remarks that "BARLOW's deistical opinions were not suspected previous to the publication of his Vision of Columbus,' in 1787;" and further, that "when at a later period he lost his character, and became an open and bitter reviler of Christianity, his psalm-book was laid aside; but for that cause only, as competent judges still maintained that no revision of WATTS possesses as much poetic merit as BARLOW'S." I have seen two letters written by BARLOW during the last year of his life, in which he declares himself "a sincere believer of Christianity, divested of its I sing the sweets I know, the charms I feel, O! could the smooth, the emblematic song corruptions." In a letter to M. GREGORIE, published in the second volume of DENNIE'S "Port Folio," pages 471 to 479, he says, "the sect of Puritans, in which I was born and educated, and to which I still adhere, for the same reason that you adhere to the Catholics, a conviction that they are right," etc. The idea that BARLOW disbelieved in his later years the religion of his youth, was probably first derived from an engraving in the "Vision of Columbus," in which the cross, by which he intended to represent monkish superstition, is placed among the "symbols of prejudice." He never "lost his character" as a man of honourable sentiments and blameless life; and I could present numerous other evidences that he did not abandon his religion, were not the above apparently conclusive. Declare what lovely squaw, in days of yore, First learn'd with stones to crack the well-dried maize, Through the rough sieve to shake the golden shower, In boiling water stir the yellow flour: roam, Each clime my country, and each house my home, My soul is soothed, my cares have found an end: I greet my long-lost, unforgotten friend. For thee through Paris, that corrupted town, How long in vain I wander'd up and down, Where shameless Bacchus, with his drenching hoard, Cold from his cave usurps the morning board. But here, though distant from our native shore, But man, more fickle, the bold license claims, And while they argued in thy just defence There are who strive to stamp with disrepute The milk nutritious; am I then a calf? Sure the sweet song I fashion to thy praise, My song, resounding in its grateful glee, No merit claims: I praise myself in thee. My father loved thee through his length of days! For thee his fields were shaded o'er with maize; From thee what health, what vigour he possess'd, Ten sturdy freemen from his loins attest; Thy constellation ruled my natal morn, And all my bones were made of Indian corn. Delicious grain! whatever form it take, To roast or boil, to smother or to bake, In every dish 'tis welcome still to me, But most, my Hasty Pudding, most in thee. Let the green succotash with thee contend; Let beans and corn their sweetest juices blend; Let butter drench them in its yellow tide, And a long slice of bacon grace their side; Not all the plate, how famed soe'er it be, Can please my palate like a bowl of thee. Some talk of Hoe-Cake, fair Virginia's pride! Rich Johnny-Cake this mouth hath often tried; Both please me well, their virtues much the same, Alike their fabric, as allied their fame, Except in dear New England, where the last Receives a dash of pumpkin in the paste, To give it sweetness and improve the taste. But place them all before me, smoking hot, The big, round dumpling, rolling from the pot; The pudding of the bag, whose quivering breast, With suet lined, leads on the Yankee feast; The Charlotte brown, within whose crusty sides A belly soft the pulpy apple hides; The yellow bread, whose face like amber glows, And all of Indian that the bakepan knows,You tempt me not; my favourite greets my eyes, To that loved bowl my spoon by instinct flies. |