SONG OF A THOUSAND YEARS. Lift up your eyes, desponding freemen! Fling to the winds your needless fears! He who unfurl'd your beauteous banner, Says it shall wave a thousand years! A thousand years!" my own Columbia, What if the clouds, one little moment, Hide the blue sky where morn appears— When the bright sun, that tints them crimson, Rises to shine a thousand years? Tell the great world these blessed tidings! Tell the oppressed of every nation, Envious foes, beyond the ocean! Little we heed your threat'ning sneers; Little will they — our children's children When you are gone a thousand years. Rebels at home! go hide your faces Weep for your crimes with bitter tears; -- You could not bind the blessed daylight, Back to your dens, ye secret traitors! Down to your own degraded spheres! Haste thee along, thou glorious noonday! -Henry Clay Work. Henry Clay Work was born in Middletown, Connecticut, October 1, 1832. The family came originally from Scotland, and the name is thought to have come from a castle, "Auld Wark, upon the Tweed," famed in the border wars in the times made immortal by Sir Walter Scott. He inherited his love of liberty and hatred of slavery from his father, who suffered much for conscience' sake. While quite young, his family moved to Illinois, near Quincy, and he passed his boyhood in the most abject poverty, his father having been taken from home and imprisoned because of his strong antislavery views and active work in the struggles of those enthusiastic and devoted reformers. In 1845, Henry's father was pardoned on condition that he would leave the State of Illinois. The family then returned to Connecticut. After a few months' attendance at school in Middletown, our future song writer was apprenticed to Elisha Geer, of Hartford, to learn the printer's trade. He learned to write over the printer's case in much the same way as did Benjamin Franklin. He never had any music lessons except a short term of instruction in a church singing school. The poetic temperament, and his He be musical gifts as well, were his inheritance. Work's first song was written in Hartford and entitled, We're coming, Sister Mary. He sold this song to George Christie, of Christie's minstrels, and it made a decided hit. In 1855 he removed to Chicago, where he continued his trade as a printer. The following year he married Miss Sarah Parker, of Hubbardston, Massachusetts, and settled at Hyde Park. In 1860 he wrote Lost on the "Lady Elgin," a song commemorating the terrible disaster to a Lake Michigan steamer, which became widely known. Kingdom Coming was Work's first war song, and was written in 1861. Now that it has been so successful, it seems strange that he should have had trouble to find a publisher for it; yet such was the case. But its success was immediate as soon as published. It is perhaps the most popular of all the darkey songs which deal directly with the question レレレ of the freedom of the slaves. It set the whole world laughing, but there was about it a vein of political wisdom as well as of poetic justice that commended it to strong men. The music is full of life and is as popular as the words. It became the song of the newsboys of the home towns and cities as well as of the soldiers in the camp and on the march. It portrays the practical situation on the Southern plantation as perhaps no other poem brought out by the war: "Say, darkies, hab you seen de massa, Wid de muffstash on his face, Go long de road some time dis mornin', De massa run? ha, ha! De darkey stay? ho, ho! It mus' be now de kingdom comin', "He's six feet one way, two foot tudder, He drill so much dey call him cap'an, An' he get so drefful tann'd, |