WITH A COPY OF "SUPERNATURALISM OF NEW ENGLAND.”
DEAR SISTER!-while the wise and sage
Turn coldly from my playful page,
And count it strange that ripened age
Should stoop to boyhood's folly;
I know that thou wilt judge aright
Of all which makes the heart more light,
Or lends one star-gleam to the night
Of clouded Melancholy.
Away with weary cares and themes !—
Swing wide the moonlit gate of dreams!
Leave free once more the land which teems
With wonders and romances !
Where thou, with clear discerning eyes,
Shalt rightly read the truth which lies
Beneath the quaintly masking guise
Of wild and wizard fancies.
Lo! once again our feet we set
On still green wood-paths, twilight wet,
By lonely brooks, whose waters fret
The roots of spectral beeches;
Again the hearth-fire glimmers o'er
Home's white-washed wall and painted floor,
And young eyes widening to the lore
Of faery-folks and witches.
Dear heart-the legend is not vain
Which lights that holy hearth again,
And, calling back from care and pain,
And death's funereal sadness,
Draws round its old familiar blaze
The clustering groups of happier days,
And lends to sober manhood's gaze
A glimpse of childish gladness.
And, knowing how my life hath been
A weary work of tongue and pen,
A long, harsh strife, with strong-willed men,
Thou wilt not chide my turning,
To con, at times, an idle rhyme,
To pluck a flower from childhood's clime,
Or listen, at Life's noonday chime,
For the sweet bells of Morning!
GONE hath the Spring, with all its flowers,
And gone the Summer's pomp and show,
And Autumn, in his leafless bowers,
Is waiting for the Winter's snow.
I said to Earth, so cold and gray,
"An emblem of myself thou art:
"Not so," the Earth did seem to say,
"For Spring shall warm my frozen heart.”
I soothe my wintry sleep with dreams
Of warmer sun and softer rain,
And wait to hear the sound of streams
And songs of merry birds again.
But thou, from whom the Spring hath gone,
For whom the flowers no longer blow,
Who standest blighted and forlorn,
Like Autumn waiting for the snow :
No hope is thine of sunnier hours,
Thy Winter shall no more depart;
No Spring revive thy wasted flowers,
Nor Summer warm thy frozen heart.
In the solemn days of old,
Two men met in Boston town-
One a tradesman frank and bold,
One a preacher of renown.
Cried the last, in bitter tone-
"Poisoner of the wells of truth!
Satan's hireling, thou hast sown
With his tares the heart of youth !*
Spake the simple tradesman then-
"God be judge 'twixt thou and I;
All thou knowest of truth hath been
Unto men like thee a lie.
"Falsehoods which we spurn to-day
Were the truths of long ago;
Let the dead boughs fall away,
Fresher shall the living grow.
"God is good and God is light,
In this faith I rest secure;
Evil can but serve the right,
Over all shall love endure.
"Of your spectral puppet play
I have traced the cunning wires ; Come what will, I needs must say, God is true, and ye are liars.”
When the thought of man is free,
Error fears its lightest tones;
So the priest cried," Sadducee!"
And the people took up stones.
In the ancient burying-ground,
Side by side the twain now lie-
One with humble grassy mound,
One with marbles pale and high.
But the Lord hath blest the seed
Which that tradesman scattered then,
And the preacher's spectral creed
Chills no more the blood of men.
Let us trust, to one is known
Perfect love which casts out fear,
While the other's joys atone
For the wrong he suffered here.
THE cannon's brazen lips are cold;
No red shell blazes down the air;
And street and tower, and temple old,
Are silent as despair.
The Lombard stands no more at bay-Rome's fresh young life has bled in vain; The ravens scattered by the day
Come back with night again.
Now, while the fratricides of France
Are treading on the neck of Rome,
Hider at Gaeta-seize thy chance!
Coward and cruel, come !
Creep now from Naples' bloody skirt,
Thy mummer's part was acted well,
While Rome, with steel and fire begirt,
Before thy crusade fell!
Her death-groans answered to thy prayer;
Thy chant, the drum and bugle-call;
Thy lights, the burning villa's glare;
Thy beads, the shell and ball!
Let Austria clear thy way, with hands
Foul from Ancona's cruel sack,
And Naples, with his dastard bands
Of murderers, lead thee back!
Rome's lips are dumb; the orphan's wail,
The mother's shriek, thou may'st not hear
Above the faithless Frenchman's hail,
The unsexed shaveling's cheer!
Go, bind on Rome her cast-off weight,
The double curse of crook and crown,
Though woman's scorn and manhood's hats
From wall and roof flash down!
Nor heed those blood-stains on the wall,
Not Tiber's flood can wash away,
Where, in thy stately Quirinal,
Thy mangled victims lay!
Let the world murmur; let its cry
Of horror and disgust be heard;-
Truth stands alone; thy coward lie
Is backed by lance and sword!
The cannon of St. Angelo,
And chanting priest and clanging bell,
And beat of drum and bugle blow,
Shall greet thy coming well!
|