A poem delivered in the first congregational church in the town of Quincy, May 25, 1840 the two hundredth anniversary of the incorporation of the town |
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 | A poem delivered in the first congregational church in the town of Quincy, May 25, 1840 |  |
No mines of gold, no power, no office fat,
No boyish sighings for a general's hat,
No vision of wild lands and mushroom wealth,
No whims dyspeptic about air and health,
No Eldorado shining o'er the seas
Tempted their barks to steer for shores like these.
It seems reserved for our enlightened days,
To see the folly of our fathers' ways;
Those tedious modes of settling we've outran,
We modern pilgrims know a simpler plan.
We emigrate to wilderness dreary,
For what? Because of staying still we're weary;
Or sojourn in some land of milk and honey,
With this one noble purpose—to make money.
We go to speculate—not till the sod;
We go to worship Mammon and not God.
Some of us migrate, lest the law should vex us,
And go by night—to Iowa or Texas;
While some, with silent scorn for jails and halters,
March proudly off, before they're found defaulters.
I've seen all sorts of pilgrims in the west,
The oddest, wildest, laziest, and the best;
From those who go to raise the wind, or work,
To those who roam with Bowie knife and dirk:
Thus none can prophesy the coming weather—
For wheat and tares seem growing there together.
No boyish sighings for a general's hat,
No vision of wild lands and mushroom wealth,
No whims dyspeptic about air and health,
No Eldorado shining o'er the seas
Tempted their barks to steer for shores like these.
It seems reserved for our enlightened days,
To see the folly of our fathers' ways;
Those tedious modes of settling we've outran,
We modern pilgrims know a simpler plan.
We emigrate to wilderness dreary,
For what? Because of staying still we're weary;
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With this one noble purpose—to make money.
We go to speculate—not till the sod;
We go to worship Mammon and not God.
Some of us migrate, lest the law should vex us,
And go by night—to Iowa or Texas;
While some, with silent scorn for jails and halters,
March proudly off, before they're found defaulters.
I've seen all sorts of pilgrims in the west,
The oddest, wildest, laziest, and the best;
From those who go to raise the wind, or work,
To those who roam with Bowie knife and dirk:
Thus none can prophesy the coming weather—
For wheat and tares seem growing there together.
| A poem delivered in the first congregational church in the town of Quincy, May 25, 1840 | |