 | The poetical writings of Fitz-Greene Halleck, with extracts from those of Joseph Rodman Drake |  |
315
AN ODE TO SIMEON DE WITT, ESQ.,
SURVEYOR-GENERAL OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.
[_]
When the Western District was surveyed, the power of naming its townships was intrusted to the Surveyor-General. Fancying the Indian appellations too sonorous and poetical, and conscious that his own ear was not altogether adapted for the musical combination of syllables, this gentleman hit upon a plan which for laughable absurdity has never been paralleled, except by the “Philosophy,” “Philanthropy,” and “Big Little Dry” system of Lewis and Clarke. It was no other than selecting from Lemprière and the “British Plutarch,” the great names which these works commemorate. This plan he executed with the most ridiculous fidelity, and reared for himself an everlasting monument of pedantry and folly.
If, on the deathless page of Fame,
The warrior's deeds are writ,
If that bright record bear the name
Of each whose hallowed brow might claim
The wreath of wisdom or of wit;
If even they, whose cash and care
Have nursed the infant arts, be there,
What place remains for thee,
Who, neither warrior, bard, nor sage,
Has poured on this benighted age
The blended light of all the three?
The warrior's deeds are writ,
If that bright record bear the name
Of each whose hallowed brow might claim
The wreath of wisdom or of wit;
If even they, whose cash and care
Have nursed the infant arts, be there,
What place remains for thee,
Who, neither warrior, bard, nor sage,
Has poured on this benighted age
The blended light of all the three?
Godfather of the christened West!
Thy wonder-working power
Has called from their eternal rest
The poets and the chiefs who blest
Old Europe in her happier hour:
Thou givest to the buried great
A citizen's certificate;
And, aliens now no more,
The children of each classic town
Shall emulate their sires' renown
In science, wisdom, or in war.
Thy wonder-working power
316
The poets and the chiefs who blest
Old Europe in her happier hour:
Thou givest to the buried great
A citizen's certificate;
And, aliens now no more,
The children of each classic town
Shall emulate their sires' renown
In science, wisdom, or in war.
The bard who treads on Homer's earth
Shall mount the epic throne,
And pour, like breezes of the north,
Such spirit-stirring stanzas forth
As Paulding would not blush to own.
And he, who casts around his eyes
Where Hampden's bright stone-fences rise,
Shall swear with thrilling joint,
As German did—“We yet are free,
And this accursed tax should be
Resisted at the bayonet's point!”
Shall mount the epic throne,
And pour, like breezes of the north,
Such spirit-stirring stanzas forth
As Paulding would not blush to own.
And he, who casts around his eyes
Where Hampden's bright stone-fences rise,
Shall swear with thrilling joint,
As German did—“We yet are free,
And this accursed tax should be
Resisted at the bayonet's point!”
What man, where Scipio's praises skip
From every rustling leaf,
But girds cold iron on his hip,
With “Shoulder firelock!” arms his lip
And struts a bold militia chief!
And who that breathes where Cato lies,
But feels the Censor spirit rise
At folly's idle pranks?
With voice that fills the Congress halls,
“Domestic manufactures” bawls,
And damns the Dandies and the Banks!
From every rustling leaf,
But girds cold iron on his hip,
With “Shoulder firelock!” arms his lip
And struts a bold militia chief!
And who that breathes where Cato lies,
317
At folly's idle pranks?
With voice that fills the Congress halls,
“Domestic manufactures” bawls,
And damns the Dandies and the Banks!
Behold! where Junius town is set,
A Brutus is the judge;
'Tis true he serves the Tarquin yet,
Still winds his limbs in folly's net,
And seems a very patient drudge.
But let the Despot fall, and bright
As morning from the shades of night,
Forth in his pride he'll stand,
The guard and glory of our soil,
A head for thought, a hand for toil,
A tongue to warn, persuade, command.
A Brutus is the judge;
'Tis true he serves the Tarquin yet,
Still winds his limbs in folly's net,
And seems a very patient drudge.
But let the Despot fall, and bright
As morning from the shades of night,
Forth in his pride he'll stand,
The guard and glory of our soil,
A head for thought, a hand for toil,
A tongue to warn, persuade, command.
Lo! Galen sends her Doctors round,
Proficients in their trade;
Historians are in Livy found,
Ulysses, from her teeming ground
Pours politicians ready made;
Fresh orators in Tully rise,
Nestor our counsellors supplies,
Wise, vigilant, and close;
Gracchus our tavern-statesmen rears,
And Milton finds us pamphleteers,
As well as poets, by the gross.
Proficients in their trade;
Historians are in Livy found,
Ulysses, from her teeming ground
Pours politicians ready made;
Fresh orators in Tully rise,
Nestor our counsellors supplies,
Wise, vigilant, and close;
Gracchus our tavern-statesmen rears,
And Milton finds us pamphleteers,
As well as poets, by the gross.
318
Surveyor of the Western plains!
The sapient work is thine;
Full-fledged, it sprang from out thy brains,—
One added touch alone remains
To consummate the grand design:
Select a town—and christen it
With thy unrivalled name De Witt!
Soon shall the glorious bantling bless us
With a fair progeny of Fools,
To fill our colleges and schools
With tutors, regents, and professors.
The sapient work is thine;
Full-fledged, it sprang from out thy brains,—
One added touch alone remains
To consummate the grand design:
Select a town—and christen it
With thy unrivalled name De Witt!
Soon shall the glorious bantling bless us
With a fair progeny of Fools,
To fill our colleges and schools
With tutors, regents, and professors.
H. and D.
| The poetical writings of Fitz-Greene Halleck, with extracts from those of Joseph Rodman Drake | |