Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

THE EDGE OF THE SWAMP.

'Tis a wild spot, and hath a gloomy look;
The bird sings never merrily in the trees,
And the young leaves seem blighted. A rank growth
Spreads poisonously round, with power to taint
With blistering dews the thoughtless hand that dares
To penetrate the covert. Cypresses [length,
Crowd on the dank, wet earth; and, stretch'd at
The cayman-a fit dweller in such home-
Slumbers, half-buried in the sedgy grass.
Beside the green ooze where he shelters him,
A whooping crane erects his skeleton form,
And shrieks in flight. Two summer ducks, aroused
To apprehension, as they hear his cry,
Dash up from the lagoon, with marvellous haste,
Following his guidance. Meetly taught by these,
And startled at our rapid, near approach,
The steel-jaw'd monster, from his grassy bed,
Crawls slowly to his slimy, green abode,
Which straight receives him. You behold him now,
His ridgy back uprising as he speeds,
In silence, to the centre of the stream,
Whence his head peers alone. A butterfly,
That, travelling all the day, has counted climes
Only by flowers, to rest himself a while,
Lights on the monster's brow. The surly mute
Straightway goes down, so suddenly, that he,
The dandy of the summer flowers and woods,
Dips his light wings, and spoils his golden coat,
With the rank water of that turbid pond.
Wondering and vex'd, the plumed citizen
Flies, with a hurried effort, to the shore,
Seeking his kindred flowers:-but seeks in vain-
Nothing of genial growth may there be seen,
Nothing of beautiful! Wild, ragged trees,
That look like felon spectres-fetid shrubs,
That taint the gloomy atmosphere-dusk shades,
That gather, half a cloud, and half a fiend
In aspect, lurking on the swamp's wild edge,-
Gloom with their sternness and forbidding frowns
The general prospect. The sad butterfly,
Waving his lacker'd wings, darts quickly on,
And, by his free flight, counsels us to speed
For better lodgings, and a scene more sweet,
Than these drear borders offer us to-night.

CHANGES OF HOME.
WELL may we sing her beauties,
This pleasant land of ours,
Her sunny smiles, her golden fruits,
And all her world of flowers;
The young birds of her forest-groves,
The blue folds of her sky,

And all those airs of gentleness,
That never seem to fly;

They wind about our forms at noon,
They woo us in the shade,

When panting, from the summer's heats,
The woodman seeks the glade;
They win us with a song of love,

They cheer us with a dream,

That gilds our passing thoughts of life, As sunlight does the stream;

And well would they persuade us now,

In moments all too dear,

That, sinful though our hearts may be,
We have our Eden here.

Ah, well has lavish nature,
From out her boundless store,
Spread wealth and loveliness around,
On river, rock, and shore:

No sweeter stream than Ashley glides-
And, what of southern France ?-
She boasts no brighter fields than ours,
Within her matron glance;
Our skies look down in tenderness
From out their realms of blue,
The fairest of Italian climes

May claim no softer hue;
And let them sing of fruits of Spain,
And let them boast the flowers,
The Moors' own culture they may claim,
No dearer sweet than ours-
Perchance the dark-hair'd maiden
Is a glory in your eye,
But the blue-eyed Carolinian rules,
When all the rest are nigh.

And none may say, it is not true,

The burden of my lay, "Tis written, in the sight of all,

In flower and fruit and ray;
Look on the scene around us now,

And say if sung amiss,
The song that pictures to your eye
A spot so fair as this:
Gay springs the merry mocking-bird
Around the cottage pale,-
And, scarcely taught by hunter's aim,
The rabbit down the vale;
Each boon of kindly nature,

Her buds, her blooms, her flowers,
And, more than all, the maidens fair
That fill this land of ours,

Are still in rich perfection,

As our fathers found them first,
But our sons are gentle now no more,
And all the land is cursed.

Wild thoughts are in our bosoms

And a savage discontent;
We love no more the life we led,
The music, nor the scent;

The merry dance delights us not,
As in that better time,

When, glad, in happy bands we met,
With spirits like our clime.
And all the social loveliness,

And all the smile is gone,

That link'd the spirits of our youth,
And made our people one.
They smile no more together,
As in that earlier day,
Our maidens sigh in loneliness,
Who once were always gay;
And though our skies are bright,
And our sun looks down as then-
Ah, me! the thought is sad I feel,
We shall never smile again.

GEORGE LUNT.

[Born about 1807.]

MR. LUNT is a native of the pleasant village of Newburyport, near Boston, from which, for a long period, his ancestors and relatives "followed the sea." He was educated at Cambridge, and soon after leaving the university entered as a student the law-office of the present Chief Justice of Massachusetts. From the time of his admission to the bar he has pursued the practice of his profession in Newburyport. He has for several years represented the people of that town in the State Senate and House of Assembly, and has held various other honourable offices.

When he was about nineteen years of age, he

wrote "The Grave of Byron," a poem in the Spenserian measure, which has considerable merit; and, in 1839, appeared a collection of his later productions, of which the largest is a metrical essay entitled "Life," in which he has attempted to show, by reference to the condition of society in different ages, that Christianity is necessary to the developement of man's moral nature. His minor pieces please by their general vigour and sprightliness, and by that purity of thought which distinguishes the writings of all Christian bards. His versification is smooth, and his rhymes, with few exceptions, exact.

AUTUMN MUSINGS.

COME thou with me! If thou hast worn away All this most glorious summer in the crowd, Amid the dust of cities, and the din,

While birds were carolling on every spray;
If, from gray dawn to solemn night's approach,
Thy soul hath wasted all its better thoughts,
Toiling and panting for a little gold;
Drudging amid the very lees of life

For this accursed slave that makes men slaves;
Come thou with me into the pleasant fields:
Let Nature breathe on us and make us free!
For thou shalt hold communion, pure and high,
With the great Spirit of the Universe;
It shall pervade thy soul; it shall renew
The fancies of thy boyhood; thou shalt know
Tears, most unwonted tears dimming thine eyes;
Thou shalt forget, under the old brown oak,
That the good south wind and the liberal west
Have other tidings than the songs of birds,
Or the soft news wafted from fragrant flowers.
Look out on Nature's face, and what hath she
In common with thy feelings? That brown hill,
Upon whose sides, from the gray mountain-ash,
We gather'd crimson berries, look'd as brown
When the leaves fell twelve autumn suns ago;
This pleasant stream, with the well-shaded verge,
On whose fair surface have our buoyant limbs
So often play'd, caressing and caress'd;
Its verdant banks are green as then they were;
So went its bubbling murmur down the tide.
Yes, and the very trees, those ancient oaks,
The crimson-crested maple, feathery elm,
And fair, smooth ash, with leaves of graceful gold,
Look like familiar faces of old friends.
From their broad branches drop the wither'd leaves,
Drop, one by one, without a single breath,
Save when some eddying curl round the old roots
Twirls them about in merry sport a while.
They are not changed; their office is not done;

The first soft breeze of spring shall see them fresh
With sprouting twigs bursting from every branch,
As should fresh feelings from our wither'd hearts.
Scorn not the moral; for, while these have warm'd
To annual beauty, gladdening the fields
With new and ever-glorious garniture,
Thou hast grown worn and wasted, almost gray
Even in thy very summer. "Tis for this
We have neglected nature! Wearing out
Our hearts and all our life's dearest charities
In the perpetual turmoil, when we need
To strengthen and to purify our minds
Amid the venerable woods; to hold
Chaste converse with the fountains and the winds!
So should we elevate our souls; so be
Ready to stand and act a nobler part
In the hard, heartless struggles of the world.

Day wanes; 'tis autumn eventide again;
And, sinking on the blue hills' breast, the sun
Spreads the large bounty of his level blaze,
Lengthening the shades of mountains and tall trees,
And throwing blacker shadows o'er the sheet
Of this dark stream, in whose unruffled tide
Waver the bank-shrub and the graceful elm,
As the gay branches and their trembling leaves
Catch the soft whisper of the coming air:
So doth it mirror every passing cloud,
And those which fill the chambers of the west
With such strange beauty, fairer than all thrones,
Blazon'd with orient gems and barbarous gold.
I see thy full heart gathering in thine eyes;
I see those eyes swelling with precious tears;
But, if thou couldst have look'd upon this scene
With a cold brow, and then turn'd back to thoughts
Of traffic in thy fellow's wretchedness,
Thou wert not fit to gaze upon the face
Of Nature's naked beauty; most unfit
To look on fairer things, the loveliness
Of earth's most lovely daughters, whose glad forms
And glancing eyes do kindle the great souls
Of better men to emulate pure thoughts,
And, in high action, all ennobling deeds.

But lo! the harvest moon! She climbs as fair
Among the cluster'd jewels of the sky,
As, mid the rosy bowers of paradise,
Her soft light, trembling upon leaf and flower,
Smiled o'er the slumbers of the first-born man.
And, while her beauty is upon our hearts,
Now let us seek our quiet home, that sleep
May come without bad dreams; may come as light
As to that yellow-headed cottage-boy,
Whose serious musings, as he homeward drives
His sober herd, are of the frosty dawn,

And the ripe nuts which his own hand shall pluck.
Then, when the bird, high-courier of the morn,
Looks from his airy vantage over the world,
And, by the music of his mounting flight,
Tells many blessed things of gushing gold,
Coming in floods o'er the eastern wave,
Will we arise, and our pure orisons
Shall keep us in the trials of the day.

JEWISH BATTLE-SONG.

Ho! Princes of Jacob! the strength and the stay
Of the daughter of Zion,-now up, and array;
Lo, the hunters have struck her, and bleeding alone
Like a pard in the desert she maketh her moan:
Up, with war-horse and banner, with spear and
with sword,

On the spoiler go down in the might of the Lord!

She lay sleeping in beauty, more fair than the moon, With her children about her, like stars in night's

noon,

When they came to her covert, these spoilers of Rome,

And are trampling her children and rifling her home:
O, up, noble chiefs! would you leave her forlorn,
To be crush'd by the Gentile, a mock and a scorn?

Their legions and cohorts are fair to behold,
With their iron-clad bosoms, and helmets of gold;
But, gorgeous and glorious in pride though they be,
Their avarice is broad as the grasp of the sea;
They talk not of pity; the mercies they feel
Are cruel and fierce as their death-doing steel.

Will they laugh at the hind they have struck to the earth,

When the bold stag of Naphtali bursts on their mirth?

Will they dare to deride and insult, when in wrath
The lion of Judah glares wild in their path?
O, say, will they mock us, when down on the plain
The hoofs of our steeds thunder over their slain?
They come with their plumes tossing haughty and
free,

And white as the crest of the old hoary sea;
Yet they float not so fierce as the wild lion's mane,
To whose lair ye have track'd him, whose whelps
ye have slain;

But, dark mountain-archer! your sinews to-day
Must be strong as the spear-shaft to drive in the prey.
And the tribes are all gathering; the valleys ring out
To the peal of the trumpet-the timbrel-the shout:

Lo, Zebulon comes; he remembers the day
When they perill'd their lives to the death in the fray;
And the riders of Naphtali burst from the hills
Like a mountain-swollen stream in the pride of
its rills.

Like Sisera's rolls the foe's chariot-wheel,
And he comes, like the Philistine, girded in steel;
Like both shall he perish, if ye are but men,
If your javelins and hearts are as mighty as then;
He trusts in his buckler, his spear, and his sword;
His strength is but weakness;-we trust in the
LORD!

"PASS ON, RELENTLESS WORLD."

SWIFTER and swifter, day by day,

Down Time's unquiet current hurl'd,
Thou passest on thy restless way,

Tumultuous and unstable world!
Thou passest on! Time hath not seen
Delay upon thy hurried path;
And prayers and tears alike have been

In vain to stay thy course of wrath!
Thou passest on, and with thee go

The loves of youth, the cares of age;
And smiles and tears, and joy and wo,
Are on thy history's troubled page!
There, every day, like yesterday,
Writes hopes that end in mockery;
But who shall tear the veil away
Before the abyss of things to be?
Thou passest on, and at thy side,

Even as a shade, Oblivion treads,
And o'er the dreams of human pride

His misty shroud forever spreads; Where all thine iron hand hath traced Upon that gloomy scroll to-day, With records ages since effaced,

Like them shall live, like them decay.
Thou passest on, with thee the vain,

Who sport upon thy flaunting blaze,
Pride, framed of dust and folly's train,
Who court thy love, and run thy ways:
But thou and I,-and be it so,-
Press onward to eternity;
Yet not together let us go

To that deep-voiced but shoreless sea.
Thou hast thy friends,-I would have mine;
Thou hast thy thoughts,-leave me my own;
I kneel not at thy gilded shrine,
I bow not at thy slavish throne;

I see them pass without a sigh,-
They wake no swelling raptures now,
The fierce delights that fire thine eye,
The triumphs of thy haughty brow.
Pass on, relentless world! I grieve

No more for all that thou hast riven;
Pass on, in Gon's name,-only leave
The things thou never yet hast given—
A heart at ease, a mind at home,

Affections fixed above thy sway,
Faith set upon a world to come,
And patience through life's little day.

HAMPTON BEACH.

AGAIN upon the sounding shore, And, O how bless'd, again alone! I could not bear to hear thy roar, Thy deep, thy long, majestic tone; I could not bear to think that one

Could view with me thy swelling might,

And, like a very stock or stone,

Turn coldly from the glorious sight,

But where thy many voices sing

Their endless song, the deep, deep tone
Calls back his spirit's airy wing,

He shrinks into himself, where God alone is king!

PILGRIM SONG.

OVER the mountain wave, see where they come; Storm-cloud and wintry wind welcome them home; Yet, where the sounding gale howls to the sea,

And seek the idle world, to hate and fear and fight. There their song peals along, deep-toned and free:

Thou art the same, eternal sea!

The earth hath many shapes and forms,
Of hill and valley, flower and tree;
Fields that the fervid noontide warms,
Or winter's rugged grasp deforms,
Or bright with autumn's golden store;
Thou coverest up thy face with storms,
Or smilest serene,-but still thy roar

And dashing foam go up to vex the sea-beat shore.

I see thy heaving waters roll,
I hear thy stern, uplifted voice,
And trumpet-like upon my soul
Falls the deep music of that noise
Wherewith thou dost thyself rejoice;
The ships, that on thy bosom play,
Thou dashest them about like toys,
And stranded navies are thy prey,
Strown on thy rock-bound coast, torn by the
whirling spray.

As summer twilight, soft and calm,
Or when in stormy grandeur drest,
Peals up to heaven the eternal psalm,
That swells within thy boundless breast;
Thy curling waters have no rest;
But day and night the ceaseless throng
Of waves that wait thy high behest,
Speak out in utterance deep and strong,

And loud the craggy beach howls back their savage song.

Terrible art thou in thy wrath,-
Terrible in thine hour of glee,

When the strong winds, upon their path,
Bound o'er thy breast tumultuously,
And shout their chorus loud and free
To the sad sea-bird's mournful wail,
As, heaving with the heaving sea,
The broken mast and shatter'd sail
Tell of thy cruel strength the lamentable tale.

Ay, 'tis indeed a glorious sight
To gaze upon thine ample face;
An awful joy,-a deep delight!
I see thy laughing waves embrace
Each other in their frolic race;
I sit above the flashing spray,
That foams around this rocky base,

And, as the bright blue waters play, [as they. Feel that my thoughts, my life, perchance, are vain

This is thy lesson, mighty sea!
Man calls the dimpled earth his own,
The flowery vale, the golden lea;
And on the wild, gray mountain-stone
Claims nature's temple for his throne!

"Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come; Where the free dare to be-this is our home!" England hath sunny dales, dearly they bloom; Scotia hath heather-hills, sweet their perfume: Yet through the wilderness cheerful we stray, Native land, native land-home far away!

"Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come ; Where the free dare to be-this is our home!" Dim grew the forest-path: onward they trod; Firm beat their noble hearts, trusting in God! Gray men and blooming maids, high rose their song; Hear it sweep, clear and deep, ever along:

Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come; Where the free dare to be-this is our home!" Not theirs the glory-wreath, torn by the blast; Heavenward their holy steps, heavenward they past! Green be their mossy graves! ours be their fame, While their song peals along, ever the same:

"Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come; Where the free dare to be-this is our home!"

THE LYRE AND SWORD.

THE freeman's glittering sword be blest,-
Forever blest the freeman's lyre,—
That rings upon the tyrant's crest;

This stirs the heart like living fire:
Well can he wield the shining brand,
Who battles for his native land;

But when his fingers sweep the chords,
That summon heroes to the fray,
They gather at the feast of swords,

Like mountain-eagles to their prey!
And mid the vales and swelling hills,
That sweetly bloom in Freedom's land,
A living spirit breathes and fills

The freeman's heart and nerves his hand; For the bright soil that gave him birth, The home of all he loves on earth,For this, when Freedom's trumpet calls, He waves on high his sword of fire,For this, amidst his country's halls Forever strikes the freeman's lyre! His burning heart he may not lend To serve a doting despot's sway,— A suppliant knee he will not bend, Before these things of "brass and clay:" When wrong and ruin call to war, He knows the summons from afar; On high his glittering sword he waves, And myriads feel the freeman's fire, While he, around their fathers' graves, Strikes to old strains the freeman's lyre!

BLOODY BROOK.*

By Bloody Brook, at break of day,
When glanced the morn on scene more fair?
Rich pearl-dew on the greensward lay,
And many a bright flower flourish'd there:
The holy forest, all around,

Was hush as summer's sabbath noon,
And through its arches breathed no sound
But Bloody Brook's low bubbling tune.

And, rich with every gallant hue,

The old trees stretch their leafy arms, And o'er them all the morning threw

A tenderer glow of blushing charms; And varying gold, and softest green,

And crimson like the summer rose, And deeper, through the foliage screen, The mellow purple lives and glows. By night-alas, that fearful night!

How sinks my heart the tale to tell-
All, all was gone, that morning light

Saw blooming there so passing well:
Those cluster'd flowers, o'er all their pride
A thousand furious steps had trod,
And many a brave heart's ebbing tide
For pearly dew-drops stain'd the sod.

But, hark! that sound you scarce may hear,
Amidst the dry leaves scatter'd there,-
Is it the wild-wolf's step of fear?

Or fell snake, stealing to his lair?
Ah me, it is the wild-wolf's heart,

With more than wolfish vengeance warm; Ah me, it is the serpent's art

Incarnate in the human form!

And now 'tis still! No sound to wake
The primal forest's awful shade;
And breathless lies the covert brake,
Where many an ambush'd form is laid:
I see the red man's gleaming eye;

Yet all so hush'd the gloom profound,
The summer birds flit heedless by,
And mocking nature smiles around.

Yet hark, again! a merry note

Comes pealing up the quiet stream;

September 18th, 1674, Captain LATHROP, with a number of teams and eighty young men, the flower of Essex county, went to bring a quantity of grain from Deerfield; on their return they stopped to gather grapes at the place afterwards known as Bloody Brook. They were assailed by a body of Indians, amounting to seven or eight hundred, who were lying in wait for their approach. Seventy of their number were slain and afterwards buried in one grave: never had the country seen such a bloody hour. It is said that there was scarcely a family in Essex which did not feel the blow.

And nearer still the echoes float

The rolling drum, the fife's loud scream! Yet careless was their march, the whileThey deem no danger hovering near, And oft the weary way beguile

With sportive laugh and friendly jeer. Pride of their wild, romantic land, In the first flush of manhood's day, It was a bright and gallant band, Which trod that morn the venturous way. Long was the toilsome march, and now They pause along the shelter'd tide, And pluck from many a cluster'd bough The wild fruits by the pathway side.

How gay! Alas, that direful yell!

So loud, so wild, so shrill, so clear, As if the very fiends of hell,

Burst from the wild-wood depths, were here! The flame, the shot, the deadly gasp,

The shout, the shriek, the panting breath, The struggle of that fearful clasp,

When man meets man for life or death!

All, all were here! No manlier forms
Than theirs, the young, the brave, the fair;
No bolder hearts life's current warms

Than those that pour'd it nobly there!
In the dim forest's deep recess,

From hope, from friends, from succour far, Fresh from home's smile and dear caress, They stood to dare the unequal war!

Ah, gallant few! No generous foe

Had met you by that crimson tide; Vain even despair's resistless blow

As brave men do and die, they died! Yet not in vain-a cry, that shook

The inmost forest's desert glooms, Swell'd o'er their graves, until it broke In storm around the red men's homes!

But beating hearts, far, far away,

Broke, at their story's fearful truth; And maidens sweet, for many a day, Wept o'er the vanish'd dreams of youth: By the blue, distant ocean-tide,

Wept, years, long years, to hear them tell, How, by the forest's lonely side

The flower of Essex fell!

And that sweet, nameless stream, whose flood Grew dark with battle's ruddy stain, Threw off the tinge of murder's blood,

And flow'd as bright and pure again: But that wild day-its hour of fameStamp'd deep its history's crimson tears, Till Bloody Brook became a name

To stir the hearts of after years!

« AnteriorContinuar »