The Poetical Works of Ebenezer Elliott Edited by his Son Edwin Elliott ... A New and Revised Edition: Two Volumes |
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 | The Poetical Works of Ebenezer Elliott |  |
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THE EMIGRANT'S FAREWELL.
England, farewell! we quit thee—never moreTo drink thy dewy light, or hear the thrush
Sing to thy fountain'd vales. Farewell! thy shore
Sinks—it is gone! and in our souls the rush
Of billows soundeth, like the crash and crush
Of hope and life. No land! all sky and sea!
For ever then farewell! But may we blush
To hear thy language, if thy wrongs or thee
Our hearts forget, where screams o'er rock and tree
The Washingtonian eagle! In our prayers,
If we forget our wrongers, may we be
Vile as their virtues, hopeless as their heirs,
And sires of sons whom scorn shall nickname theirs!—
And to such wolves leave we our country? Oh
The heart that quits thee, e'en in hope, despairs!
Yet from our fathers' graves thy children go
To houseless wilds, where nameless rivers flow,
Lest, when our children pass our graves, they hear
The clank of chains, and shrieks of servile woe
From coward bones, that, e'en though lifeless, fear
Cold Rapine's icy fang, cold Havock's dastard spear.
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