The poetical works of John Greenleaf Whittier in four volumes |
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2. | II. POEMS PRINTED IN THE “LIFE OF WHITTIER.” |
The poetical works of John Greenleaf Whittier | ||
II. POEMS PRINTED IN THE “LIFE OF WHITTIER.”
THE HOME-COMING OF THE BRIDE.
Stepped lightly her bridegroom's boat within,
Waving mid-river, through smiles and tears,
A farewell back to her kith and kin.
With her sweet blue eyes and her new gold gown,
She sat by her stalwart lover's side—
Oh, never was brought to Haverhill town
By land or water so fair a bride.
Glad as the glad autumnal weather,
The Indian summer so soft and warm,
They walked through the golden woods together,
His arm the girdle about her form.
Whose walls with the jar of grinding shook,
And crossed, for the moment awed and still,
The haunted bridge of the Country Brook.
The great oaks seemed on Job's Hill crown
To wave in welcome their branches strong,
And an upland streamlet came rippling down
Over root and rock, like a bridal song.
And lo! in the midst of a clearing stood
The rough-built farmhouse, low and lone,
While all about it the unhewn wood
Seemed drawing closer to claim its own.
The red cock crowed on the low fence rail,
From the garden hives came the sound of bees,
On the barn floor pealed the smiting flail.
[OMITTED]
THE SONG OF THE VERMONTERS, 1779.
With your breeches of deerskin and jackets of brown;
With your red woollen caps, and your moccasins, come,
To the gathering summons of trumpet and drum.
Howl on in the shade of their primitive rocks;
Let the bear feed securely from pig-pen and stall;
Here's two-legged game for your powder and ball.
And arming for battle while canting of peace;
On our east, crafty Meshech has gathered his band
To hang up our leaders and eat up our land.
No gain for his legions of Hampshire and York!
They claim our possessions—the pitiful knaves—
The tribute we pay shall be prisons and graves!
Still seek to divide and parcel our lands;
We 've coats for our traitors, whoever they are;
The warp is of feathers—the filling of tar.
Swarms Hampshire in arms on our borders again?
Bark the war-dogs of Britain aloud on the lake—
Let 'em come; what they can they are welcome to take.
Is comfort, contentment, and labor, and health,
And lands which, as Freemen, we only have trod,
Independent of all, save the mercies of God.
Our ruler is law, and the law is our own;
Our leaders themselves are our own fellow-men,
Who can handle the sword, or the scythe, or the pen.
With their blue eyes of smiles and their light flowing hair,
All brisk at their wheels till the dark even-fall,
Then blithe at the sleigh-ride, the husking, and ball!
And gay-tasselled corn-fields and rank-growing grain;
There are deer on the mountains, and wood-pigeons fly
From the crack of our muskets, like clouds on the sky.
Their course from the hills to our broad-bosomed lake;
Through rock-arched Winooski the salmon leaps free,
And the portly shad follows all fresh from the sea.
And the spotted trout sleeps where the water is cool,
Or darts from his shelter of rock and of root
At the beaver's quick plunge, or the angler's pursuit.
Till they rest their green heads on the blue of the skies;
And ours are the forests unwasted, unshorn,
Save where the wild path of the tempest is torn.
And brief be our season of fruits and of flowers,
Far dearer the blast round our mountains which raves,
Than the sweet summer zephyr which breathes over slaves!
Must have sons to defend her from valley and hill;
Leave the harvest to rot on the fields where it grows,
And the reaping of wheat for the reaping of foes.
Poosoonsuck steals down from his wood-circled lair,
From Shocticook River to Lutterlock town—
Ho—all to the rescue! Vermonters, come down!
If ye rule o'er our land, ye shall rule o'er our graves;
Our vow is recorded—our banner unfurled,
In the name of Vermont we defy all the world!
TO A POETICAL TRIO IN THE CITY OF GOTHAM.
Went to sea in a bowl.
The Dutchman smoked beneath his favorite tree,
And the wild eyes of Indian hunters rolled
On Hudson plunging in the Tappaan Zee,
Scene of Stuyvesant's might and chivalry,
And Knickerbocker's fame,—I have made bold
To come before ye, at the present time,
And reason with ye in the way of rhyme.
Of their green pathway through th' Arcadian vale,—
Chiming their music in the low sweet manner
Of song-birds warbling to the “Soft South” gale;
Wooing the Muse where gentle zephyrs fan her,
Where all is peace and earth may not assail;
Telling of lutes and flowers, of love and fear,
Of shepherds, sheep and lambs, and “such small deer.”
And pleasant vista of your early time,
With broken lutes and crownless skulls—are seen
Spattering your neighbors with abhorrent slime
Of the low world's pollution Ye have been
So long apostates from the Heaven of rhyme,
That of the Muses, every mother's daughter
Blushes to own such graceless bards e'er sought her.
Which your cracked lutes have learned alone to utter,
As, crouching in Corruption's shadow low,
Ye daily sweep them for your bread and butter,
Their heads above the offal of the gutter,
And, like the trees which Orpheus moved at will,
Reel, as in token of your matchless skill!
Of the proud peasant-minstrel, and to whom
The wild muse of thy mountain-dwelling gave
A portion of its spirit,—if the tomb
Could burst its silence, o'er the Atlantic's wave
To thee his voice of stern rebuke would come,
Who dared to waken with a master's hand
The lyre of freedom in a fettered land.
O'er which thy country's honored flag was sleeping,
Calmly in peace, or to the hostile beck
Of coming foes in starry splendor sweeping,—
Thy graphic tales of battle or of wreck,
Or lone night-watch in middle ocean keeping,
Have made thy “Leisure Hours” more prized by far
Than those now spent in Party's wordy war.
Where thy bold-hearted fathers long ago
Rocked Freedom's cradle, till its infant hand
Strangled the serpent fierceness of its foe,—
Thou, whose clear brow in early time was fanned
By the soft airs which from Castalia flow! —
Where art thou now? feeding with hickory ladle
The curs of Faction with thy daily twaddle!
A portion of our glory; and the light
And fairy hands of woman beckoned thee
On to thy laurel guerdon; and those bright
And gifted spirits, whom the broad blue sea
Hath shut from thy communion, bid thee, “Write,”
Like John of Patmos. Is all this forgotten,
For Yankee brawls and Carolina cotton?
Flows the “Green River” through its vale no more?
Steals not thy “Rivulet” by its banks of green?
Wheels upward from its dark and sedgy shore
Thy “Water Fowl” no longer?—that the mean
And vulgar strife, the ranting and the roar
Extempore, like Bottom's should be thine,—
Thou feeblest truck-horse in the Hero's line!
Of classic Britain. Even effeminate Moore
Has cast the wine-cup and the lute aside
For Erin and O'Connell; and before
His country's altar, Bulwer breasts the tide
Of old oppression. Sadly brooding o'er
The fate of heroes struggling to be free,
Even Campbell speaks for Poland. Where are ye?
Are rousing up around ye to retrieve
Our country's honor, which too long has been
Debased by those for whom ye daily weave
Your web of fustian; that from tongue and pen
Of those who o'er our tarnished honor grieve,
Of the pure-hearted and the gifted, come
Hourly the tokens of your master's doom?
Stand up like men for Liberty and Law,
And free opinion. Check Corruption's pride,
Soothe the loud storm of fratricidal war,—
And the bright honors of your eventide
Shall share the glory which your morning saw;
The patriot's heart shall gladden at your name,
Ye shall be blessed with, and not “damned to fame”!
Editors of the Mercantile Advertiser and the Evening Post in New York,—the present organs of Jacksonism.
Perhaps, after all, they get something better; inasmuch as the Heroites have for some time had exclusive possession of the Hall of St. Tammany, and we have the authority of Halleck that
“There 's a barrel of porter in Tammany Hall,And the Bucktails are swigging it all the night long.”
James Lawson, Esq., of the Mercantile. A fine, warm-hearted Scotchman, who, having unfortunately blundered into Jacksonism, is wondering “how i' the Deil's name” he got there. He is the author of a volume entitled Tales and Sketches, and of the tragedy of Giordano.
William Leggett, Esq., of the Post, a gentleman of good talents, favorably known as the editor of the New York Critic, etc.
William C. Bryant, Esq., well known to the public at large as a poet of acknowledged excellence; and as a very dull editor to the people of New York.
ALBUM VERSES.
Pardon a stranger hand that givesIts impress to these gilded leaves.
An idler's name on rock or wood,
So in a careless hour I claim
A page to leave my humble name.
Accept it; and when o'er my head
A Pennyslvanian sky is spread,
And but in dreams my eye looks back
On broad and lovely Merrimac,
And on my ear no longer breaks
The murmuring music which it makes,
When but in dreams I look again
On Salisbury beach—Grasshopper plain—
Or Powow stream—or Amesbury mills,
Or old Crane neck, or Pipestave hills,
Think of me then as one who keeps,
Where Delaware's broad current sweeps,
And down its rugged limestone-bed
The Schuylkill's arrowy flight is sped,
Deep in his heart the scenes which grace
And glorify his “native place;”
Loves every spot to childhood dear,
And leaves his heart “untravelled” here;
Longs, midst the Dutchman's kraut and greens,
For pumpkin-pie and pork and beans,
And sighs to think when, sweetly near,
The soft piano greets his ear,
That the fair hands which, small and white,
Glance on its ivory polished light,
Have ne'er an Indian pudding made,
Nor fashioned rye and Indian bread.
And oh! where'er his footsteps turn,
Whatever stars above him burn,
Though dwelling where a Yankee's name
Is coupled with reproach or shame,
Still true to his New England birth,
Still faithful to his home and hearth,
Even 'midst the scornful stranger band
His boast shall be of Yankee Land.
WHAT STATE STREET SAID TO SOUTH CAROLINA, AND WHAT SOUTH CAROLINA SAID TO STATE STREET.
With cotton bales pictured on either retina,
“We feel and acknowledge your laws are diviner
Than any promulgated by the thunders of Sinai!
Sorely pricked in the sensitive conscience of business
We own and repent of our sins of remissness:
Our honor we 've yielded, our words we have swallowed;
And quenching the lights which our forefathers followed,
And turning from graves by their memories hallowed,
With teeth on ball-cartridge, and finger on trigger,
Reversed Boston Notions, and sent back a nigger!”
And fifing and drilling, and such Quattle-bumming;
“With your April-fool slave hunt! Just wait till December
Shall see your new Senator stalk through the Chamber,
And Puritan heresy prove neither dumb nor
Blind in that pestilent Anakim, Sumner!”
A FRÉMONT CAMPAIGN SONG.
The storm is rolling nearer,
The hour is striking clearer,
In the dusky dome of sky.
If dark and wild the morning be,
A darker morn before us
Shall fling its shadows o'er us
If we let the hour go by.
Sound we then the trumpet chorus!
Sound the onset wild and high!
Country and Liberty!
Freedom and Victory!
These words shall be our cry,—
Frémont and Victory!
Each arm its vigor lending,
Bravely with wrong contending,
And shouting Freedom's cry!
The Kansas homes stand cheerlessly,
The sky with flame is ruddy,
The prairie turf is bloody,
Where the brave and gentle die.
Sound the trumpet stern and steady!
Sound the trumpet strong and high!
Country and Liberty!
Freedom and Victory!
Frémont and Victory!
Nor dream of Heaven's forsaking
The issue of its making,
That Right with Wrong must try.
The cloud that hung so drearily
The Northern winds are breaking;
The Northern Lights are shaking
Their fire-flags in the sky.
Sound the signal of awaking;
Sound the onset wild and high!
Country and Liberty!
Freedom and Victory!
These words shall be our cry,—
Frémont and Victory!
THE QUAKERS ARE OUT.
The buds of our hope have all burst into flowers.
No room for misgiving—no loop-hole of doubt,—
We 've heard from the Keystone! The Quakers are out.
The bribe goes a-begging; the fusion won't stick.
When the Wide-awake lanterns are shining about,
The rogues stay at home, and the true men are out!
Her oil-springs and water won't fuse into one;
The Dutchman has seasoned with Freedom his kraut,
And slow, late, but certain, the Quakers are out!
Make way for the man with the Patriarch's name!
Away with misgiving—away with all doubt,
For Lincoln goes in, when the Quakers are out!
A LEGEND OF THE LAKE.
As haply you sometime may,
Sailing up the Winnepesaukee
From the hills of Alton Bay,—
Into the north wind free,
Through the rising and vanishing islands,
Over the mountain sea,—
White in its mountain fold,
Asleep by the lake and dreaming
A dream that is never told,—
Your pilgrim home you make,
Where the chambers open to sunrise,
The mountains, and the lake,—
As the fairest sometimes will,
And the weight of the hills lies on you
And the water is all too still,—
Redden with sunrise fire,
And the sky and the purple mountains
And the sunset islands tire,—
And the clatter of bowls without,
And the folly that goes on its travels
Bearing the city about,—
Come hunting along your track,
Rode on the traveller's pack,—
Of one who is now no more,
A tale to haunt like a spirit
The Winnepesaukee shore,—
And strong for manly strife,
Riding with cheering and music
Into the tourney of life.
In the Tempter's subtle snare,
The chains of an evil habit
He bowed himself to bear.
The bestial veil was flung,—
The curse of the wine of Circe,
The spell her weavers sung.
Their summer idyls frame;
Alone in his darkened dwelling
He hid his face for shame.
Sounded for him in vain;
The voices of human duty
Smote on his ear like pain.
The curtains of sunset swung;
In vain on the beautiful mountains
The pictures of God were hung.
Each sadder than the last;
All the bloom of life fell from him,
All the freshness and greenness past.
And unprofaned he kept
The love of his saintly mother,
Who in the graveyard slept.
Its comfortless walls were bare:
But the riches of earth and ocean
Could not purchase his mother's chair.
With oaken arms outspread,
Whereby, in the long gone twilights,
His childish prayers were said.
By moon or starlight dim,
A face full of love and pity
And tenderness looked on him.
Sat in his mother's chair,
The groan of his self-upbraiding
Grew into wordless prayer.
The summoning angel came,
Severe in his pity, touching
The house with fingers of flame.
And flared from its sinking roof;
And baffled and awed before it
The villagers stood aloof.
They turned from the furnace glare;
But its tenant cried, “God help me!
I must save my mother's chair.”
Over the floor of fire,
He seemed, in the terrible splendor,
A martyr on his pyre.
And stung him on either side;
But he clung to the sacred relic,—
By his mother's chair he died!
O saint, by the altar stairs!
The child of thy many prayers?
Though erring, are forgiven,
Hast thou for him no refuge,
No quiet place in heaven?
And crown thy saints with gold,
But let the mother welcome
Her lost one to thy fold!
LETTER TO LUCY LARCOM.
That I cannot take my carpet-bag and go to town to-morrow;
But I'm “snow-bound,” and cold on cold, like layers of an onion,
Have piled my back and weighed me down as with the pack of Bunyan.
The north-east wind is damper and the north-west wind is colder,
Or else the matter simply is that I am growing older.
And then I dare not trust a moon seen over one's left shoulder,
As I saw this with slender horns caught in a west hill pine,
As on a Stamboul minaret curves the arch-impostor's sign,—
So I must stay in Amesbury, and let you go your way,
And guess what colors greet your eyes, what shapes your steps delay;
What pictured forms of heathen lore, of god and goddess please you,
What idol graven images you bend your wicked knees to.
But why should I of evil dream, well knowing at your head goes
That flower of Christian womanhood, our dear good Anna Meadows.
She'll be discreet, I'm sure, although once, in a freak romantic,
She flung the Doge's bridal ring, and married “The Atlantic”!
And spite of all appearances, like the woman in a shoe,
She 's got so many “Young Folks” now, she don't know what to do.
But I must say I think it strange that thee and Mrs. Spaulding,
Whose lives with Calvin's five-railed creed have been so tightly walled in
Should quit your Puritan homes, and take the pains to go
So far, with malice aforethought, to “walk in a vain show”!
Did Emmons hunt for pictures? Was Jonathan Edwards peeping
Into the chambers of imagery, with maids for Tammuz weeping?
Ah well! the times are sadly changed, and I myself am feeling
The wicked world my Quaker coat from off my shoulders peeling.
God grant that in the strange new sea of change wherein we swim,
We still may keep the good old plank, of simple faith in Him!
LINES ON LEAVING APPLEDORE.
Under the shadow of a cloud, the lightDied out upon the waters, like a smile
Chased from a face by grief. Following the flight
Of a lone bird that, scudding with the breeze,
Dipped its crank wing in leaden-colored seas,
I saw in sunshine lifted, clear and bright,
On the horizon's rim the Fortunate Isle
That claims thee as its fair inhabitant,
And glad of heart I whispered, “Be to her,
Bird of the summer sea, my messenger;
Tell her, if Heaven a fervent prayer will grant,
This light that falls her island home above,
Making its slopes of rock and greenness gay,
A partial glory midst surrounding gray,
Shall prove an earnest of our Father's love,
More and more shining to the perfect day.”
MRS. CHOATE'S HOUSE-WARMING.
Let the feminine tongues
Talk on—none forbid it.
What her hands found to do,
Asked no questions, but DID IT.
Which so many folks shirk,
Is so plain all may learn it;
Each brick in this dwelling,
Each timber is telling,
If you want a home, EARN IT.
Is solved by our neighbor,
The old riddle guessed out:
The wisdom sore needed,
The truth long unheeded,
Her flat-iron 's pressed out!
Let the idle take note
What their fingers were made for;
She, cheerful and jolly,
Worked on late and early,
And bought—what she paid for!
Nor begging, nor whining;
The morning-star twinkles
On no heart that 's lighter
As she makes the world whiter
And smoothes out its wrinkles.
May her heirs have to wait
Till they 're gray in attendance;
And her flat-iron press on,
Still teaching its lesson
Of brave independence!
AN AUTOGRAPH.
The years that since we met have flownLeave as they found me, still alone:
Are mine the heart of age to cheer.
More favored thou, with hair less gray
Than mine, canst let thy fancy stray
To where thy little Constance sees
The prairie ripple in the breeze;
For one like her to lisp thy name
Is better than the voice of fame.
TO LUCY LARCOM.
Pray give the “Atlantic”
A brief unpedantic
Review of Miss Phelps' book,
Which teaches and helps folk
To deal with the offenders
In love which surrenders
All pride unforgiving,
The lost one receiving
With truthful believing
That she like all others,
Our sisters and brothers,
Is only a sinner
Whom God's love within her
Can change to the whiteness
Of heaven's own brightness.
For who shall see tarnish
If He sweep and garnish?
When He is the cleanser
Shall we dare to censure?
Say to Fields, if he ask of it,
I can't take the task of it.
[OMITTED]
P. S.—For myself, if I'm able,
And half comfortable,
I shall run for the seashore
To some place as before,
Where blunt we at least find
The teeth of the East wind,
And spring does not tarry
As it does at Amesbury;
But where it will be to
I cannot yet see to.
A FAREWELL.
What shall I say, dear friends, to whom I oweThe choicest blessings, dropping from the hands
Of trustful love and friendship, as you go
Forth on your journey to those older lands,
By saint and sage and bard and hero trod?
Scarcely the simple farewell of the Friends
Sufficeth; after you my full heart sends
Such benediction as the pilgrim hears
Where the Greek faith its golden dome uprears,
From Crimea's roses to Archangel snows,
The fittest prayer of parting: “Go with God!”
ON A FLY-LEAF OF LONGFELLOW'S POEMS.
Of him whose lyre the Muses strung;
His last low swan-song has been sung!
As clouds that rake the mountains here,
We too shall pass and disappear.
Not even a wreath of mist is lost,
No atom can itself exhaust.
Live on and run its endless course
In God's unlimited universe.
To fade like clouds from lake and stream,
Shall brighten in a holier beam.
SAMUEL E. SEWALL.
Faithful to Freedom and to Truth, he gave,
When all the air was hot with wrath and blame,
His youth and manhood to the fettered slave.
A helper tender, wise, and brave as he;
Lifting her burden of unrighteous law,
He shamed the boast of ancient chivalry.
He wrought as duty led and honor bid,
No trumpet heralds victories like his,—
The unselfish worker in his work is hid.
LINES WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM.
May be abused, and so may wealth.
Even fame itself may come to be
But wearying notoriety.
A life of brave unselfishness,
Wisdom for council, eloquence
For Freedom's need, for Truth's defence,
The championship of all that 's good,
The manliest faith in womanhood,
The steadfast friendship, changing not
With change of time or place or lot,
Hatred of sin, but not the less
A heart of pitying tenderness
Shames the wrong-doer from his wrong:
One wish expresses all—that he
May even as his grandsire be!
A DAY'S JOURNEY.
You pause as at a wayside inn,
And take with grateful hearts your breakfast
Though served in dishes all of TIN.
Until the dial's hand at noon
Invites you to a dinner table
Garnished with SILVER fork and spoon.
Is calling, and the day is old,
May love transmute the tin of morning
And noonday's silver into GOLD.
A FRAGMENT.
The pain of wounds which Thou alone canst heal,
To whom our weakness is our strong appeal.
Of our waste lives, we reach out to Thy cross,
And by its fullness measure all our loss!
No Moloch sits, no false, vindictive Jove—
Thou art our Father, and Thy name is Love!
The poetical works of John Greenleaf Whittier | ||