Choice Specimens of American Literature, and Literary Reader Part 47

From "The Powers of Genius."

=_323._= WRETCHEDNESS OF SAVAGE LIFE.

The human fabric early from its birth, Feels some fond influence from its parent earth; In different regions different forms we trace, Here dwells a feeble, there an iron race; Here genius lives, and wakeful fancies play, Here noiseless stupor sleeps its life away.

Chill through his trackless pines the hunter pa.s.sed, His yell arose upon the howling blast; Before him fled, with all the speed of fear, His wealth--and victim, yonder helpless deer.

Saw you the savage man, how fell and wild, With what grim pleasure, as he pa.s.sed, he smiled?

Unhappy man! a wretched wigwam's shed Is his poor shelter, some dry skins his bed; Sometimes alone upon the woodless height He strikes his fire, and spends his watchful night; His dog with howling bays the moon's red beam, And starts the wild deer in his nightly dream.

Poor savage man! for him no yellow grain Waves its bright billows o'er the fruitful plain; For him no harvest yields its full supply, When winter hurls his tempest through the sky.

No joys he knows but those which spring from strife, Unknown to him the charms of social life.

Rage, malice, envy, all his thoughts control, And every dreadful pa.s.sion burns his soul.

Should culture meliorate his darksome home, And cheer those wilds where he is wont to roam; * * * * *

Should fields of tillage yield their rich increase, And through his wastes walk forth the arts of peace, His sullen soul would feel a genial glow, Joy would break in upon the night of woe; Knowledge would spread her mild, reviving ray, And on his wigwam rise the dawn of day.

[Footnote 78: A Presbyterian clergyman, who died prematurely; an a.s.sociate and connection of Charles Brockden Brown. Has left several poems of merit. A native of Pennsylvania.]

=_Francis S. Key, 1779-1843._= (Manual, p. 523.)

=_324._= THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER.

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light, What so proudly we hailed, at the twilight's last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming; And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there:

On that sh.o.r.e, dimly seen through the mist of the deep, Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes, What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep, As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses?

Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam, In full glory reflected now s.h.i.+nes in the stream: 'Tis the Star-Spangled Banner; O, long may it wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where are the foes who so vauntingly swore That the havoc of war, and the battle's confusion, A home and a country should leave us no more?

Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.

No refuge could save the hireling and slave From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave; And the Star-Spangled Banner in triumph doth wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand Between their loved homes and the war's desolation; Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just; And this be our motto, "In G.o.d is our trust;"

And the Star-Spangled Banner in triumph shall wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

=_Was.h.i.+ngton Alston, 1779-1843._= (Manual, pp. 504. 510.)

From the "Sylphs of the Seasons."

=_325._=

Methought, within a desert cave, Cold, dark, and solemn as the grave, I suddenly awoke.

It seemed of sable night the cell Where, save when from the ceiling fell An oozing drop, her silent spell No sound had ever broke.

There motionless I stood alone, Like some strange monument of stone Upon a barren wild; Or like (so solid and profound The darkness seemed that walled me round) A man that's buried under ground, Where pyramids are piled.

Then spake the Sylph of Spring serene, "'Tis I thy joyous heart, I ween.

With sympathy shall move: For I with living melody Of birds in choral symphony, First waked thy soul to poesy, To piety and love.

"When thou, at call of vernal breeze, And beckoning bough of budding trees, Hast left thy sullen fire; And stretched thee in some mossy dell, And heard the browsing wether's bell, Blithe echoes rousing from their cell To swell the tinkling choir:

"Or lured by some fresh-scented gale That wooed the moored fisher's sail To tempt the mighty main, Hast watched the dim, receding sh.o.r.e, Now faintly seen the ocean o'er, Like hanging cloud, and now no more To bound the sapphire plain.

"Then, wrapped in night, the scudding bark, (That seemed, self-poised amid the dark, Through upper air to leap,) Beheld, from thy most fearful height, The rapid dolphin's azure light Cleave, like a living meteor bright, The darkness of the deep."

=_John Pierpont, 1785-1866._= (Manual, p. 513.)

=_326._= A TEMPERANCE SONG.

In Eden's green retreats, A water-brook--that played Between soft, mossy seats, Beneath a plane tree's shade, Whose rustling leaves Danced o'er its brink-- Was Adam's drink, And also Eve's.

And, when the man of G.o.d From Egypt led his flock, They thirsted, and his rod Smote the Arabian rock, And forth a rill Of water gushed, And on they rushed, And drank their fill.

Had Moses built a still, And dealt out to that host To every man his gill, And pledged him in a toast, Would cooler brains, Or stronger hands, Have braved the sands Of those hot plains?

If Eden's strength and bloom, Gold water thus hath given, If e'en beyond the tomb, It is the drink of heaven, Are not good wells And crystal springs _The very things for our Hotels?_

=_327._= THE PILGRIM FATHERS.

The Pilgrim Fathers,--where are they?

The waves that brought them o'er Still roll in the bay, and throw their spray, As they break along the sh.o.r.e: Still roll in the bay, as they roll'd that day When the Mayflower moor'd below, When the sea around was black with storms, And white the sh.o.r.e with snow.

The mists, that wrapp'd the Pilgrim's sleep, Still brood upon the tide; And his rocks yet keep their watch by the deep, To stay its waves of pride.

But the snow-white sail, that he gave to the gale When the heavens look'd dark, is gone;-- As an angel's wing, through an opening cloud, Is seen, and then withdrawn.

The Pilgrim exile,--sainted name!

The hill, whose icy brow Rejoiced when he came, in the morning's flame, In the morning's flame burns now.

And the moon's cold light, as it lay that night On the hill-side and the sea, Still lies where he laid his houseless head;-- But the Pilgrim,--where is he?

The Pilgrim Fathers are at rest.

When summer's throned on high, And the world's warm breast is in verdure dress'd Go, stand on the hill where they lie.

The earliest ray of the golden day On that hallow'd spot is cast; And the evening sun, as he leaves the world, Looks kindly on that spot last.

The Pilgrim _spirit_ has not fled; It walks in the noon's broad light; And it watches the bed of the glorious dead, With their holy stars, by night.

It watches the bed of the brave who have bled, And shall guard this ice-bound sh.o.r.e, Till the waves of the bay, where the Mayflower lay, Shall foam and freeze no more.