Specimens of American poetry :: :: University of Virginia Library

Ye sons of Columbia, who bravely have fought
For those rights, which unstained from your sires had descended,
May you long taste the blessings your valor has bought,
And your sons reap the soil which their fathers defended.
'Mid the reign of mild peace,
May your nation increase,
With the glory of Rome, and the wisdom of Greece;
And ne'er shall the sons of Columbia be slaves,
While the earth bears a plant, or the sea rolls its waves.

In a clime, whose rich vales feed the marts of the world,
Whose shores are unshaken by Europe's commotion,

The trident of commerce should never be hurl'd,
To incense the legitimate powers of the ocean.
But should pirates invade,
Though in thunder array'd,
Let your cannon declare the free charter of trade.
For ne'er shall the sons, &c.

The fame of our arms, of our laws the mild sway,
Had justly ennobled our nation in story,
Till the dark clouds of faction obscured our young day,
And enveloped the sun of American glory.
But let traitors be told,
Who their country have sold,
And barter'd their God for his image in gold,
That ne'er will the sons, &c.

While France her huge limbs bathes recumbent in blood,
And society's base threats with wide dissolution;
May peace, like the dove who returned from the flood,
Find an ark of abode in our mild constitution.
But though peace is our aim,
Yet the boon we disdain,
If bought by our sovereignty, justice, or fame.
For ne'er shall the sons, &c.

'T is the fire of the flint, each American warms
Let Rome's haughty victors beware of collision,
Let them bring all the vassals of Europe in arms,
We 're a world by ourselves, and disdain a division.
While with patriot pride,
To our laws we 're allied,
No foe can subdue us, no faction divide.
For ne'er shall the sons, &c.

Our mountains are crown'd with imperial oak;
Whose roots, like our liberties, ages have nourish'd;
But long e'er our nation submits to the yoke,
Not a tree shall be left on the field where it flourished.
Should invasion impend,
Every grove would descend.
From the hill-tops, they shaded, our shores to defend.
For ne'er shall the sons, &c.

Let our patriots destroy Anarch's pestilent worm;
Lest our liberty's growth should be check'd by corrosion;

Then let clouds thicken round us; we heed not the storm;
Our realms fear no shock, but the earth's own explosion.
Foes assail us in vain,
Though their fleets bridge the main,
For our altars and laws with our lives we 'll maintain.
For ne'er shall the sons, &c.

Should the tempest of war overshadow our land,
Its bolts could ne'er rend freedom's temple asunder;
For, unmoved, at its portal, would Washington stand,
And repulse, with his breast, the assaults of the thunder!
His sword from the sleep
Of its scabbard would leap,
And conduct, with its point, every flash to the deep!
For ne'er shall the sons, &c.

Let fame to the world sound America's voice;
No intrigues can her sons from their governments sever;
Her pride is her Adams; her laws are his choice,
And shall flourish, till liberty slumbers for ever.
Then unite heart and hand,
Like Leonidas' band,
And swear to the God of the ocean and land,
That ne'er shall the sons of Columbia be slaves,
While the earth bears a plant, or the sea rolls its waves.

THE STREET WAS A RUIN.

The street was a ruin, and night's horrid glare
Illumined with terror the face of despair;
While houseless, bewailing,
Mute pity assailing,
A mother's wild shrieks pierced the merciless air.
Beside her stood Edward, imploring each wind,
To wake his loved sister, who linger'd behind;
Awake, my poor Mary,
Oh! fly to me, Mary;
In the arms of your Edward, a pillow you 'll find.

In vain he call'd, for now the volumed smoke,
Crackling, between the parting rafters broke;
Through the rent seams the forked flames aspire,
All, all, is lost; the roof, the roof 's on fire!

A flash from the window brought Mary to view,
She scream'd as around her the flames fiercely blew;
Where art thou, mother?
Oh! fly to me, brother!
Ah! save your poor Mary, who lives but for you!
Leave not poor Mary,
Ah! save your poor Mary!
Her vision'd form descrying,
On wings of horror flying,
The youth erects his frantic gaze,
Then plunges in the maddening blaze!
Aloft he dauntless soars,
The flaming room explores;
The roof in cinders crushes,
Through tumbling walls he rushes!
She 's safe from fear's alarms;
She faints in Edward's arms!

Oh! nature, such thy triumphs are,
Thy simplest child can bravely dare.

ODE SUNG AT THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE FAUSTUS ASSOCIATION.

On the tent-plains of Shinah, truth's mystical clime,
When the impious turret of Babel was shatter'd,
Lest the tracks of our race, in the sand-rift of time,
Should be buried, when Shem, Ham and Japheth were scattered,
Rose the genius of art,
Man to man to impart,
By a language, that speaks, through the eye, to the heart.

CHORUS.
Yet rude was invention, when art she reveal'd,
For a block stamp'd the page, and a tree plough'd the field.

As time swept his pennons, art sigh'd, as she view'd
How dim was the image, her emblem reflected;
When, inspired, father Faust broke her table of wood,
Wrought its parts into shape, and the whole reconnected,
Art with mind now could rove,
For her symbols could move,
Ever casting new shades, like the leaves of a grove.

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CHORUS.
And the colors of thought in their elements run,
As the prismatic glass shows the hues of the sun.

In the morn of the west, as the light roll'd away
From the grey eve of regions, by bigotry clouded,
With the dawn woke our Franklin, and, glancing the day,
Turn'd its beams through the mist, with which art was enshrouded;
To kindle her shrine,
His Promethean line
Drew a spark from the clouds, and made printing divine!

CHORUS.
When the fire by his rod was attracted from heaven,
Its flash by the type, his conductor, was given.

Ancient wisdom may boast of the spice and the weed,
Which embalm'd the cold form of its heroes and sages;
But their fame lives alone on the leaf of the reed,
Which has grown through the clefts in the ruins of ages;
Could they rise, they would shed,
Like Cicero's head,
Tears of blood on the spot, where the world they had led.

CHORUS.
Of Pompey and Cæsar unknown is the tomb,
But the type is their forum, the page is their Rome.

Blest genius of type! down the vista of time
As thy flight leaves behind thee this vex'd generation,
Oh! transmit on thy scroll, this bequest from our clime,
The press can cement, or dismember a nation.
Be thy temple the mind!
There, like Vesta, enshrined,
Watch and foster the flame, which inspires human kind!

CHORUS.
Preserving all arts, may all arts cherish thee;
And thy science and virtue teach man to be free!