"Yet all its sad recollections suppressing, One dying wish my lone bosom can draw;— Erin! an exile bequeaths thee his blessing! Land of my forefathers! Erin go bragh! Buried and cold, when my heart stills her motion, Green be thy fields, sweetest isle of the ocean! And thy harp-striking bards sing aloud with devotion, 'Erin mavournin—Erin go bragh!'" T. Campbell.

CCXIII.

LORD ULLIN'S DAUGHTER.

A chieftain to the Highlands bound, Cries, "Boatman, do not tarry! And I'll give thee a silver pound To row us o'er the ferry!"

"Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle, This dark and stormy water?" "O I'm the chief of Ulva's isle. And this, Lord Ullin's daughter.

"And fast before her father's men Three days we've fled together, For should he find us in the glen, My blood would stain the heather.

"His horsemen hard behind us ride— Should they our steps discover, Then who will cheer my bonny bride, When they have slain her lover!"

Out spoke the hardy highland wight, "I'll go, my chief, I'm ready: It is not for your silver bright, But for your winsome lady:—

"And by my word! the bonny bird In danger shall not tarry; So, though the waves are raging white, I'll row you o'er the ferry."

By this the storm grew loud apace, The water-wraith was shrieking; And, in the scowl of heaven, each face Grew dark as they were speaking.

But still as wilder blew the wind, And as the night grew drearer, Adown the glen rode armed men,— Their trampling sounded nearer.

"O haste thee, haste!" the lady cries, "Though tempests round us gather; I'll meet the raging of the skies, But not an angry father."

The boat has left a stormy land, A stormy sea before her,— When O! too strong for human hand, The tempest gathered o'er her.

And still they rowed amidst the roar Of waters fast prevailing: Lord Ullin reached that fatal shore,— His wrath was changed to wailing!

For, sore dismayed, through storm and shade His child he did discover:— One lovely hand she stretched for aid, And one was round her lover.

"Come back! Come back!" he cried in grief, "Across this stormy water: And I'll forgive your Highland chief, My daughter!—O my daughter!"

'T was vain: the loud waves lashed the shore, Return or aid preventing: The wafers wild went o'er his child, And he was left lamenting. T. Campbell.

CCXIV.

FALL OF WARSAW.

O! sacred Truth! thy triumph ceased awhile, And Hope, thy sister, ceased with thee to smile, When leagued Oppression poured to Northern wars Her whiskered pandours and her fierce hussars, Waved her dread standard to the breeze of morn, Pealed her loud drum, and twanged her trumpet horn; Tumultuous horror brooded o'er her van, Presaging wrath to Poland—and to man! Warsaw's last champion from her heights surveyed, Wide o'er the fields a waste of ruin laid— O Heaven! he cried, my bleeding country save! Is there no hand on high to shield the brave? Yet, though destruction sweep these lovely plains, Rise, fellow-men! our country yet remains! By that dread name, we wave the sword on high, And swear for her to live!—with her to die! He said; and on the rampart heights arrayed His trusty warriors, few, but undismayed; Firm paced and slow, a horrid front they form, Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm; Low, murmuring sounds along their banners fly,— "Revenge, or death!"—the watchword and reply; Then pealed the notes, omnipotent to charm, And the loud tocsin tolled their last alarm! In vain, alas! in vain, ye gallant few! From rank to rank your volleyed thunder flew;— O! bloodiest picture in the book of Time, Sarmatia fell, unwept, without a crime; Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe, Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her woe! Dropped from her nerveless grasp the shattered spear, Closed her bright eye, and curbed her high career. Hope for a season bade the world farewell, And Freedom shrieked, as Kosciusko fell! 0 righteous Heaven! ere Freedom found a grave, Why slept the sword, omnipotent to save? Where was thine arm, O vengeance! where thy rod, That smote the foes of Sion and of God? Departed spirits of the mighty dead! Ye that at Marathon and Leuctra bled! Friends of the world! restore your swords to man, Fight in his sacred cause, and lead the van! Yet for Sarmatia's tears of blood atone, And make her arm puissant as your own! O! once again to Freedom's cause return The patriot Tell,—the Bruce of Bannockburn! Yes, thy proud lords, unpitied land! shall see that man hath yet a soul,—and dare be free! A little while, along thy saddening plains, The starless night of Desolation reigns; Truth shall restore the light by Nature given, And, like Prometheus, bring the fire of Heaven! Prone to the dust Oppression shall be hurled, Her name, her nature, withered from the world! T. Campbell.

CCXV.

HOHENLINDEN.

On Linden, when the sun was low, All bloodless lay the untrodden snow; And dark as winter was the flow Of Iser, rolling rapidly.

But Linden saw another sight, When the drum beat at dead of night, Commanding fires of death to light The darkness of her scenery.

By torch and trumpet fast arrayed, Each horseman drew his battle-blade, And furious every charger neighed To join the dreadful revelry.

Then shook the hills with thunder riven; Then rushed the steed, to battle driven; And louder than the bolts of Heaven Far flashed the red artillery.

But redder yet that light shall glow, On Linden's hills of staind snow; And bloodier yet the torrent flow Of Iser, rolling rapidly.

'T is morn; but scarce yon level sun Can pierce the war-clouds, rolling dun, Where furious Frank and fiery Hun Shout in their sulphurous canopy.

The combat deepens. On, ye Brave Who rush to glory, or the grave! Wave, Munich, all thy banners wave, And charge with all thy chivalry!

Few, few shall part, where many meet! The snow shall be their winding-sheet, And every turf beneath their feet Shall be a soldier's sepulchre. T. Campbell.

CCXVI.

WAR-SONG OF THE GREEKS, 1822.

Again to the battle Achaians! Our hearts bid the tyrants defiance; Our land,—the first garden of Liberty's tree— It has been, and shall yet be, the land of the free; For the cross of our faith is replanted, The pale, dying crescent is daunted, And we march that the footprints of Mahomet's slaves May be washed out in blood from our forefather's graves. Their spirits are hovering o'er us, And the sword shall to glory restore us.

Ah! what though no succor advances, Nor Christendom's chivalrous lances Are stretched in our aid?—Be the combat our own! And we'll perish or conquer more proudly alone; For we've sworn by our country's assaulters, By the virgins they've dragged from our altars, By our massacred patriots, our children in chains, By our heroes of old, and their blood in our veins,— That living we will be victorious, Or that dying, our deaths shall be glorious.

A breath of submission we breathe not; The sword that we've drawn we will sheathe not; Its scabbard is left where our martyrs are laid, And the vengeance of ages has whetted its blade. Earth may hide—waves engulf—fire consume us, But they shall not to slavery doom us: If they rule, it shall be o'er our ashes and graves,— But we've smote them already with fire on the waves, And new triumphs on land are before us. To the charge!—Heaven's banner is o'er us!

This day—shall ye blush for its story? Or brighten your lives with its glory?— Our women—O say, shall they shriek in despair, Or embrace us from conquest, with wreaths in their hair? Accursed may his memory blacken, If a coward there be that would slacken, Till we've trampled the turban, and shown ourselves worth Being sprung from, and named for, the godlike of earth. Strike home!—and the world shall revere us As heroes descended from heroes.

Old Greece lightens up with emotion Her inlands, her isles of the ocean: Fanes rebuilt, and fair towns, shall with jubilee sing, And the Nine shall new-hallow their Helicon's spring. Our hearths shall be kindled with gladness, That were cold, and extinguished in sadness; Whilst our maidens shall dance with their white waving arms, Singing joy to the brave that delivered their charms,— When the blood of you Mussulman cravens Shall have crimsoned the beaks of our ravens. T. Campbell.

CCXVII.

THE FLIGHT OF XERXES.

I saw him on the battle-eve When like a king he bore him; Proud hosts in glittering helm and greave, And prouder chiefs, before him. The warrior and the warrior's deeds, The morrow and the morrow's meeds,— No daunting thought came o'er him; He looked around him, and his eye Defiance flashed to earth and sky.

He looked on ocean,—its broad breast Was covered with his fleet: On earth,—and saw from east to west His bannered millions meet; While rock, and glen, and cave, and coast, Shook with the war-cry of that host, The thunder of their feet! He heard the imperial echoes ring,— He heard, and felt himself a king.

I saw him next alone;—nor camp Nor chief his steps attended; Nor banner blazed, nor courser's tramp With war-cries proudly blended. He stood alone, whom Fortune high So lately seemed to deify, He, who with Heaven contended, Fled like a fugitive and slave!— Behind, the foe; before, the wave!

He stood—fleet, army, treasure, gone— Alone, and in despair! But wave and wind swept ruthless on, For they were monarchs there; And Xerxes, in a single bark, Where late his thousand ships were dark Must all their fury dare. What a revenge, a trophy, this, For thee, immortal Salamis! Miss Jewsbury.

CCXVIII.

OLD IRONSIDES.

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down! Long has it waved on high, And many an eye has danced to see That banner in the sky;— Beneath it rung the battle shout, And burst the cannon's roar; The meteor of the ocean air Shall sweep the clouds no more.

Her deck, once red with heroes' blood, Where knelt the vanquished foe, When winds were hurrying o'er the flood, And waves were white below, No more shall feel the victor's tread, Or know the conquered knee; The harpies of the shore shall pluck The eagle of the sea!

O, better that her shattered hulk Should sink beneath the wave! Her thunders shook the mighty deep, And there should be her grave! Nail to the mast her holy flag, Set every threadbare sail, And give her to the god of storms— The lightning and the gale! O. W. Holmes.

CCXIX.

CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.

Half a league, half a league, Half a league onward, All in the valley of Death Rode the six hundred. "Forward, the Light Brigade! Charge for the guns!" he said. Into the valley of Death, Rode the six hundred.

"Forward, the Light Brigade!" Was there a man dismayed? Not though the soldier knew Some one had blundered; Theirs not to make reply Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die: Into the valley of death Rode the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them, Cannon to left of them, Cannon in front of them Volleyed and thundered: Stormed at with shot and shell, Boldly they rode and well, Into the jaws of Death, Into the mouth of hell, Rode the six hundred.

Flashed all their sabres bare, Flashed as they turned in air, Sabring the gunners there, Charging an army, while All the world wondered: Plunged in the battery smoke, Right through the line they broke Cossack and Russian Reeled from the sabre stroke, Shattered and sundered; Then they rode back, but not— Not the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them, Cannon to left of them, Cannon behind them, Volleyed and thundered: Stormed at with shot and shell, While horse and hero fell, They that had fought so well, Came through the jaws of hell, All that was left of them, Left of six hundred.

When can their glory fade? O, the wild charge they made! All the world wondered. Honor the charge they made! Honor the Light Brigade, Noble six hundred! A. Tennyson.

CCXX.

ARNOLD WINKELREID.

"Make way for liberty!"—he cried; Made way for liberty, and died!— It must not be: this day, this hour, Annihilates the oppressor's power! All Switzerland is in the field, She will not fly, she cannot yield,— She must not fall; her better fate Here gives her an immortal date. Few were the numbers she could boast; But every freeman was a host, And felt as though himself were he, On whose sole arm clung victory.

It did depend on one indeed; Behold him,—Arnold Winkelreid! There sounds not to the trump of fame The echo of a nobler name. Unmarked he stood among the throng, In rumination deep and long, Till you might see, with sudden grace, The very thought come o'er his face; And, by the motion of his form, Anticipate the bursting storm; And, by the uplifting of his brow, Tell where the bolt would strike, and how.

But 't was no sooner thought than done,— The field was in a moment won! "Make way for liberty!" he cried, Then ran, with arms extended wide, As if his dearest friend to clasp; Ten spears he swept within his grasp: "Make way for liberty!" he cried— Their keen points met from side to side; He bowed amongst them like a tree, And thus made way for liberty.

Swift to the breach his comrades fly: "Make way for liberty!" they cry, And through the Austrian phalanx dart, As rushed the spears through Arnold's heart; While, instantaneous as his fall, Rout, ruin, panic, scattered all: An earthquake could not overthrow. A city with a surer blow.

Thus Switzerland again was free; Thus Death made way for liberty! J. Montgomery.

CCXXI.

NEW ENGLAND'S DEAD.

New England's dead!—New England's dead! On every hill they lie; On every field of strife made red By bloody victory. Each valley, where the battle poured Its red and awful tide, Beheld the brave New England sword, With slaughter deeply dyed. Their bones are on the northern hill, And on the southern plain, By brook and river, lake and rill, And by the roaring main. The land is holy where they fought, And holy where they fell; For by their blood that land was bought, The land they loved so well. Then glory to that valiant band, The honored saviours of the land! O! few and weak their numbers were,— A handful of brave men; But to their God they gave their prayer, And rushed to battle then. The God of battles heard their cry, And sent to them the victory. They left the ploughshare in the mould, Their flocks and herds without a fold, The sickle in the unshorn grain, The corn, half-garnered on the plain, And mustered in their simple dress, For wrongs to seek a stern redress; To right those wrongs, come weal, come woe,— To perish or o'ercome their foe. And where are ye, O fearless men? And where are ye to-day? I call:—the hills reply again That ye have passed away; That on old Bunker's lonely height, In Trenton, and in Monmouth ground, The grass grows green, the harvest bright, Above each soldier's mound. The bugle's wild and warlike blast Shall muster them no more; An army now might thunder past, And they not heed its roar. The starry flag 'neath which they fought, In many a bloody day, From their old graves shall rouse them not; For they have passed away. I. M'Lellan.

CCXXII.

NEVER GIVE UP.

Never give up! it is wiser and better Always to hope, than once to despair;— Fling off the load of doubt's cankering fetters, And break the dark spell of tyrannical care.

Never give up, or the burden may sink you,— Providence kindly has mingled the cup; And in all trials and troubles bethink you, The watchword of life must be, "Never give up!"

Never give up; there are chances and changes, Helping the hopeful, a hundred to one, And through the chaos, High wisdom arranges Ever success, if you'll only hold on.

Never give up; for the wisest is boldest, Knowing that Providence mingles the cup, And of all maxims, the best, as the oldest, Is the stern watchword of "Never give up!"

Never give up, though the grape-shot may rattle, Or the full thunder-cloud over you burst; Stand like a rock, and the storm or the battle Little shall harm you, though doing their worst.

Never give up; if adversity presses, Providence wisely has mingled the cup; And the best counsel in all your distresses Is the brave watchword of "Never give up!" Anonymous.

CCXXIII.

MARCO BOZZARIS.

At midnight, in his guarded tent, The Turk was dreaming of the hour, When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent, Should tremble at his power: In dreams, through camp and court he bore The trophies of a conqueror; In dreams his song of triumph heard; Then wore his monarch's signet ring; Then pressed that monarch's throne—a king;— As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing, As Eden's garden bird.

At midnight, in the forest shades, Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band, True as the steel of their tried blades, Heroes in heart and hand. There had the Persian's thousands stood,— There had the glad earth drunk their blood, On old Plata's day; And now there breathed that haunted air The sons of sires who conquered there, With arm to strike, and soul to dare, As quick, as far as they.

An hour passed on—the Turk awoke; That bright dream was his last; He woke to hear his sentries shriek, "To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!" He woke—to die midst flame and smoke, And shout, and groan, and sabre-stroke, And death-shots falling thick and fast As lightnings from the mountain-cloud; And heard, with voice as trumpet-loud, Bozzaris cheer his band: "Strike—till the last armed foe expires; Strike—for your altars and your fires; Strike—for the green graves of your sires,— God—and your native land!"

They fought—like brave men, long and well; They piled that ground with Moslem slain; They conquered—but Bozzaris fell, Bleeding at every vein. His few surviving comrades saw His smile when rang their proud hurrah, And the red field was won: Then saw in death his eyelids close Calmly, as to a night's repose, Like flowers at set of sun.

Come to the bridal-chamber, Death! Come to the mother, when she feels, For the first time, her first-born's breath; Come when the blessed seals That close the pestilence are broke, And crowded cities wail its stroke; Come in Consumption's ghastly form, The earthquake shock, the ocean storm; Come when the heart beats high and warm, With banquet-song, and dance, and wine,— And thou art terrible!—The tear, The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier, And all we know, or dream, or fear Of agony, are thine.

But to the hero, when his sword Has won the battle for the free, Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word; And in its hollow tones are heard The thanks of millions yet to be.

Bozzaris! with the storied brave, Greece nurtured in her glory's time, Rest thee—there is no prouder grave, Even in her own proud clime.

We tell thy doom without a sigh; For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's,— One of the few, the immortal names That were not born to die! F. G. Halleck.

CCXXIV.

THE AMERICAN FLAG.

When freedom, from her mountain height, Unfurled her standard to the air, She tore the azure robe of night, And set the stars of glory there! She mingled with its gorgeous dyes The milky baldric of the skies, And striped its pure celestial white With streakings of the morning light; Then, from his mansion in the sun, She called her eagle bearer downy And gave into his mighty hand The symbol of her chosen land!

Majestic monarch of the cloud! Who rear'st aloft thy regal form, To hear the tempest-trumpings loud, And see the lightning's lances driven, When strive the warriors of the storm, And rolls the thunder-drum of heaven! Child of the sun! to thee 't is given To guard the banner of the free, To hover in the sulphur smoke, To ward away the battle stroke,— And bid its blendings shine afar, Like rainbows on the cloud of war,— The harbingers of victory!

Flag of the brave! thy folds shall fly, The sign of hope and triumph high, When speaks the signal trumpet tone, And the long line comes gleaming on. Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet, Has dimmed the glistening bayonet, Each soldier's eye shall brightly turn To where thy sky-born glories burn; And as his springing steps advance, Catch war and vengeance from the glance. And when the cannon-mouthings loud Heave in wild wreaths the battle-shroud, And gory sabres rise and fall, Like shoots of flame on midnights pall; Then shall thy meteor-glances glow, And cowering foes shall sink beneath Each gallant arm that strikes below That lovely messenger of death.

Flag of the seas! on ocean wave Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave; When death, careering on the gale, Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail, And frighted waves rush wildly back Before the broadside's reeling rack, Each dying wanderer of the sea Shall look at once to heaven and thee, And smile to see thy splendors fly In triumph o'er his closing eye.

Flag of the free heart's hope and home! By angel hands to valor given; Thy stars have lit the welkin dome, And all thy hues were born in heaven. Forever float, that standard sheet! Where breathes the foe but falls before us, With freedom's soil beneath our feet, And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us! J. R. Drake.

CCXXV.

THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE.

Do not lift him from the bracken, leave him lying where he fell— Better bier ye cannot fashion: none beseems him half so well As the bare and broken heather, and the hard and broken sod, Whence his angry soul ascended to the judgment-seat of God! Winding-sheet we cannot give him—seek no mantle for the dead, Save the cold and spotless covering showered from heaven upon his head. Leave his broadsword as we found it, rent and broken with the blow, That, before he died, avenged him on the foremost of the foe. Leave the blood upon the bosom—wash not off that sacred stain; Let it stiffen on the tartan, let his wounds unclosed remain, Till the day when he shall show them at the throne of God on high, When the murderer and the murdered meet before their Judge's eye. Nay—ye should not weep, my children! leave it to the faint and weak; Sobs are but a woman's weapons—tears befit a maiden's cheek. Weep not, children of Macdonald! weep not thou, his orphan heir; Not in shame, but stainless honor, lies thy slaughtered father there; Weep not—but when years are over, and thine arm is strong and sure, And thy foot is swift and steady on the mountain and the muir, Let thy heart be hard as iron, and thy wrath as fierce as fire, Till the hour when vengeance cometh for the race that slew thy sire! Till in deep and dark Glenlyon rise a louder shriek of woe, Than at midnight, from their eyry, scared the eagles of Glencoe; Louder than the screams that mingled with the howling of the blast, When the murderers' steel was clashing, and the fires were rising fast; When thy noble father bounded to the rescue of his men, And the slogan of our kindred pealed throughout the startled glen; When the herd of frantic women stumbled through the midnight snow, With their fathers' houses blazing, and their dearest dead below! Oh, the horror of the tempest, as the flashing drift was blown, Crimsoned with the conflagration, and the roofs went thundering down! Oh, the prayers, the prayers and curses, that together winged their flight From the maddened hearts of many, through that long and woful night!— Till the fires began to dwindle, and the shots grew faint and few, And we heard the foeman's challenge only in a far halloo: Till the silence once more settled o'er the gorges of the glen, Broken only by the Cona plunging through its naked den. Slowly from the mountain summit was the drifting veil withdrawn, And the ghastly valley glimmered in the gray December dawn. Better had the morning never dawned upon our dark despair! Black amidst the common whiteness rose the spectral ruins there: But the sight of these was nothing more than wrings the wild dove's breast, When she searches for her offspring round the relics of her nest. For in many a spot the tartan peered above the wintry heap, Marking where a dead Macdonald lay within his frozen sleep. Tremblingly we scooped the covering from each kindred victim's head, And the living lips were burning on the cold ones of the dead. And I left them with their dearest—dearest charge had every one— Left the maiden with her lover, left the mother with her son. I alone of all was mateless—far more wretched I than they, For the snow would not discover where my lord and husband lay. But I wandered up the valley, till I found him lying low, With the gash upon his bosom, and the frown upon his brow— Till I found him lying murdered where he wooed me long ago.

Woman's weakness shall not shame me—why should I have tears to shed? Could I rain them down like water, O my hero! on thy head— Could the cry of lamentation wake thee from thy silent sleep, Could it set thy heart a-throbbing, it were mine to wail and weep! But I will not waste my sorrow, lest the Campbell women say That the daughters of Clanranald are as weak and frail as they. I had wept thee, hadst thou fallen, like our fathers, on thy shield, When a host of English foemen camped upon a Scottish field. I had mourned thee, hadst thou perished with the foremost of his name, When the valiant and the noble died around the dauntless Grme! But I will not wrong thee, husband, with my unavailing cries, Whilst thy cold and mangled body, stricken by the traitor, lies; Whilst he counts the gold and glory that this hideous night has won, And his heart is big with triumph at the murder he has done. Other eyes than mine shall glisten, other hearts be rent in twain, Ere the heath-bells on thy hillock wither in the autumn rain. Then I'll seek thee where thou sleepest, and I'll veil my weary head, Praying for a place beside thee, dearer than my bridal-bed: And I'll give thee tears, my husband, if the tears remain to me, When the widows of the foeman cry the coronach for thee! W. E. Aytoun.

CCXXVI.

BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, As his corpse to the rampart we hurried; Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot O'er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly, at dead of night, The sods with our bayonets turning; By the struggling moonbeam's misty light, And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin enclosed his breast, Not in sheet nor in shroud we wound him; But he lay like a warrior taking his rest With his martial cloak around him. Few and short were the prayers we said, And we spoke not a word of sorrow, But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead, And we bitterly thought of the morrow. We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed,

And smoothed down his lonely pillow, That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head, And we far away on the billow! Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,

And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,— But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on In the grave where a Briton has laid him. But half of our heavy task was done

When the clock struck the hour for retiring; And we heard the distant and random gun That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down, From the field of his false fresh and gory; We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone— But we left him alone with his glory. C. Wolfe.

CCXXVII.

THE MANIAC.

Stay, jailer, stay, and hear my woe! She is not mad who kneels to thee, For what I'm now, too well I know, And what I was, and what should be. I'll rave no more in proud despair; My language shall be mild, though sad: But yet I firmly, truly swear, I am not mad, I am not mad.

My tyrant husband forged the tale Which chains me in this dismal cell; My fate unknown my friends bewail— Oh! jailer, haste that fate to tell; Oh! haste my father's heart to cheer: His heart at once 't will grieve and glad To know though kept a captive here, I am not mad, I am not mad.

He smiles in scorn, and turns the key; He quits the grate; I knelt in vain; His glimmering lamp still, still I see— 'T is gone! and all is gloom again. Cold, bitter cold!—No warmth! no light!— Life, all thy comforts once I had; Yet here I'm chained, this freezing night, Although not mad; no, no, not mad.

'Tis sure some dream—some vision vain! What! I—the child of rank and wealth,— Am I the wretch who clanks this chain, Bereft of freedom, friends, and health? Ah! while I dwell on blessings fled, Which never more my heart must glad, How aches my heart, how burns my head; But 'tis not mad; no, 'tis not mad.

Hast thou, my child, forgot, ere this, A mother's face, a mother's tongue? She'll never forget your parting kiss, Nor round her neck how fast you clung; Nor how with her you sued to stay; Nor how that suit your sire forbade; Nor how—I'll drive such thoughts away! They'll make me mad, they'll make me mad.

His rosy lips, how sweet they smiled! His mild blue eyes, how bright they shone! None ever bore a lovelier child: And art thou now forever gone? And must I never see thee more, My pretty, pretty, pretty lad? I will be free! unbar the door! I am not mad, I am not mad.

Oh! hark! what mean those yells and cries? His chain some furious madman breaks; He comes!—I see his glaring eyes; Now, now, my dungeon-grate he shakes— Help! help!—He's gone!—Oh! fearful woe, Such screams to hear, such sights to see! My brain, my brain,—I know, I know, I am not mad, but soon shall be.

Yes, soon; for lo you!—while I speak— Mark how yon demon's eyeballs glare! He sees me; now, with dreadful shriek, He whirls a serpent high in air. Horror!—the reptile strikes his tooth Deep in my heart, so crushed and sad;— Ay, laugh, ye fiends;—I feel the truth; Your task is done—I'm mad! I'm mad! Lewis.

CCXXVIII.

RIENZI TO THE ROMANS.

Friends! I come not here to talk. Ye know too well The story of our thraldom. We are slaves! The bright sun rises to his course, and lights A race of slaves! He sets, and his last beam Falls on a slave; not such, as swept along By the full tide of power, the conqueror leads To crimson glory and undying fame,— But base, ignoble slaves!—slaves to a horde Of petty tyrants, feudal despots; lords, Rich in some dozen paltry villages; Strong in some hundred spearmen; only great In that strange spell—a name! Each hour, dark fraud Or open rapine, or protected murder, Cries out against them. But this very day, An honest man, my neighbor,—there he stands— Was struck—struck like a dog, by one who wore The badge of Ursini! because, forsooth, He tossed not high his ready cap in air, Nor lifted up his voice in servile shouts, At sight of that great ruffian! Be we men, And suffer such dishonor?—men, and wash not The stain away in blood? Such shames are common. I have known deeper wrongs. I, that speak to ye, I had a brother once, a gracious boy, Full of all gentleness, of calmest hope, Of sweet and quiet joy; there was the look Of Heaven upon his face, which limners give To the beloved disciple. How I loved That gracious boy! Younger by fifteen years, Brother at once and son! He left my side, A summer bloom on his fair cheeks a smile Parting his innocent lips. In one short hour, The pretty, harmless boy was slain! I saw The corse, the mangled corse, and then I cried For vengeance! Rouse, ye Romans! Rouse, ye slaves! Have ye brave sons?—Look in the next fierce brawl To see them die! Have ye fair daughters?—Look To see them live, torn from your arms, distained, Dishonored; and, if ye dare call for justice, Be answered by the lash! Yet, this is Rome, That sate on her seven hills, and from her throne Of beauty ruled the world! Yet, we are Romans. Why in that elder day to be a Roman Was greater than a King! And once again— Hear me, ye walls that echoed to the tread Of either Brutus!—once again I swear The Eternal City shall be free! Miss Mitford.

CCXXIX.

THE BELL OF THE "ATLANTIC."

Toll, toll, toll! Thou bell by billows swung, And, night and day, thy warning words Repeat with mournful tongue! Toll for the queenly boat, Wrecked on yon rocky shore! Sea-weed is in her palace halls,— She rides the surge no more.

Toll for the master bold, The high-souled and the brave, Who ruled her like a thing of life Amid the crested wave! Toll for the hardy crew, Sons of the storm and blast, Who long the tyrant ocean dared; But it vanquished them at last.

Toll for the man of God, Whose hallowed voice of prayer Rose calm above the stifled groan Of that intense despair! How precious were those tones, On that sad verge of life, Amid the fierce and freezing storm, And the mountain billows' strife!

Toll for the lover, lost To the summoned bridal train! Bright glows a picture on his breast, Beneath th' unfathomed main. One from her casement gazeth Long o'er the misty sea:

He cometh not, pale maiden,— His heart is cold to thee! Toll for the absent sire, Who to his home drew near, To bless a glad, expecting group,— Fond wife, and children dear! They heap the blazing hearth, The festal board is spread, But a fearful guest is at the gate;— Room for the sheeted dead!

Toll for the loved and fair, The whelmed beneath the tide,— The broken harps around whose strings The dull sea-monsters glide! Mother and nursling sweet, Reft from the household throng; There's bitter weeping in the nest Where breathed their soul of song.

Toll for the hearts that bleed 'Neath misery's furrowing trace; Toll for the hapless orphan left, The last of all his race! Yea, with thy heaviest knell, From surge to rocky shore, Toll for the living,—not the dead, Whose mortal woes are o'er.

Toll, toll, toll! O'er breeze and billow free; And with thy startling lore instruct Each rover of the sea. Tell how o'er proudest joys May swift destruction sweep, And bid him build his hopes on high,— Lone teacher of the deep! Mrs. Sigourney.

CCXXX.

THE STRUGGLE FOR FAME.

If thou wouldst win a lasting fame,— If thou the immortal wreath wouldst claim, And make the future bless thy name,—

Begin thy perilous career, Keep high thy heart, thy conscience clear, And walk thy way without a fear.

And if thou hast a voice within, That ever whispers, "Work and win," And keeps thy soul from sloth and sin;—

If thou canst plan a noble deed, And never flag till it succeed, Though in the strife thy heart should bleed;—

If thou canst struggle day and night, And, in the envious world's despite, Still keep thy cynosure in sight;—

If thou canst bear the rich man's scorn, Nor curse the day that thou wert born To feed on husks, and he on corn;—

If thou canst dine upon a crust, And still hold on with patient trust, Nor pine that fortune is unjust;—

If thou canst see, with tranquil breast, The knave or fool in purple dressed, Whilst thou must walk in tattered vest;—

If thou canst rise ere break of day, And toil and moil till evening gray, At thankless work, for scanty pay;—

If in thy progress to renown Thou canst endure the scoff and frown Of those who strive to pull thee down;—

If thou canst bear the averted face, The gibe, or treacherous embrace, Of those who run the self-same race;—

If thou in darkest days canst find An inner brightness in thy mind, To reconcile thee to thy kind:—

Whatever obstacles control, Thine hour will come—go on—true soul! Thou'lt win the prize, thou'lt reach the goal.

If not—what matters? Tried by fire, And purified from low desire, Thy spirit shall but soar the higher.

Content and hope thy heart shall buoy, And men's neglect shall ne'er destroy Thy secret peace, thy inward joy! C. Mackay.

CCXXXI.

THE SAILOR-BOY'S DREAM.

In slumbers of midnight, the sailor-boy lay; His hammock swung loose at the sport of the wind; But watch-worn and weary his cares flew away, And visions of happiness danced o'er his mind.

He dreamt of his home, of his dear native bowers, And pleasures that waited on life's merry morn; While memory stood sideways, half covered with flowers And restored every rose, but secreted its thorn.

Then fancy her magical pinions spread wide, And bade the young dreamer in ecstasy rise— Now, far, far behind him the green waters glide, And the cot of his forefathers blesses his eyes.

The jessamine clambers in flower o'er the thatch, And the swallow sings sweet from her nest in the wall; All trembling with transport he raises the latch, And the voices of loved ones reply to his call.

A father bends o'er him with looks of delight; His cheek is impearled with a mother's warm tear, And the lips of the boy in a love-kiss unite With the lips of the maid whom his bosom holds dear.

The heart of the sleeper beats high in his breast; Joy quickens his pulse—all hardships seem o'er, And a murmur of happiness steals through his rest— "O God, thou hast blest me—I ask for no more."

Ah! what is that flame, which now bursts on his eye? Ah! what is that sound which now larums his ear? 'T is the lightning's red glare painting hell on the sky! 'T is the crash of the thunder, the groan of the sphere!

He springs from his hammock—he flies to the deck; Amazement confronts him with images dire— Wild winds and mad waves drive the vessel a wreck— The masts fly in splinters—the shrouds are on fire!

O! sailor-boy! woe to thy dream of delight! In darkness dissolves the gay frostwork of bliss— Where now is the picture that fancy touched bright, Thy parents' fond pressure, and love's honeyed kiss!

O! sailor-boy! sailor-boy! never again Shall home, love, or kindred thy wishes repay; Unblessed and unhonored, down deep in the main, Full many a score fathom, thy frame shall decay.

No tomb shall e'er plead to remembrance for thee, Or redeem form or frame from the merciless surge; But the white foam of waves shall thy winding-sheet be, And winds in the midnight of winter thy dirge.

On beds of green sea-flower thy limbs shall be laid; Around thy white bones the red coral shall grow; Of thy fair yellow locks threads of amber be made, And every part suit to thy mansion below.

Days, months, years, and ages shall circle away, And still the vast waters above thee shall roll; Earth loses thy pattern forever and aye— O sailor-boy! sailor-boy! peace to thy soul! Dimond.

CCXXXII.

ON THE ENTRY OF THE AUSTRIANS INTO NAPLES.

Ay, down to the dust with them, slaves as they are! From this hour let the blood in their dastardly veins, That shrunk from the first touch of Liberty's war, Be sucked out by tyrants or stagnate in chains!

On—on, like a cloud, through their beautiful vales, Ye locusts of tyranny!—blasting them o'er: Fill—fill up their wide, sunny waters, ye sails, From each slave-mart in Europe, and poison their shore.

May their fate be a mockword—may men of all lands Laugh out with a scorn that shall ring to the poles, When each sword that the cowards let fall from their hands, Shall be forged into fetters to enter their souls!

And deep, and more deep, as the iron is driven, Base slaves! may the whet of their agony be, To think—as the damned haply think of the heaven They had once in their reach,—that they might have been free.

Shame! shame! when there was not a bosom whose heat Ever rose o'er the zero of Castlereagh's heart, That did not, like Echo, your war-hymn repeat, And send back its prayers with your Liberty's start!

Good God! that in such a proud moment of life, Worth ages of history—when, had you but hurled One bolt at your bloody invader, that strife Between freemen and tyrants had spread through the world!

That then—O, disgrace upon manhood! e'en then You should falter—should cling to your pitiful breath, Cower down into beasts, when you might have stood men, And prefer a slave's life to a glorious death!

It is strange!—it is dreadful! Shout, Tyranny, shout Through your dungeons and palaces, "Freedom is o'er"— If there lingers one spark of her fire, tread it out, And return to your empire of darkness once more.

For if such are the braggarts that claim to be free, Come, Despot of Russia, thy feet let me kiss, Far nobler to live the brute-bondman of thee, Than sully even chains by a struggle like this. T. Moore.

CCXXXIII.

THE BATTLE HYMN OF THE BERLIN LANDSTURM.

Father of earth and heaven! I call thy name! Round me the smoke and shout of battle roll; Mine eyes are dazzled with the rustling flame; Father, sustain an untried soldier's soul. Or life, or death, whatever be the goal That crowns or closes round this struggling hour, Thou knowest, if ever from my spirit stole One deeper prayer, 't was that no cloud might lower On my young fame!—O hear! God of eternal power! Now for the fight—now for the cannon-peal— Forward—through blood, and toils and cloud, and fire! Glorious the shout, the shock, the crash of steel, The volley's roll, the rocket's blasting spire; They shake—like broken waves their squares retire,— On, hussars!—Now give them rein and heel; Think of the orphaned child, the murdered sire;— Earth cries for blood—in thunder on them wheel! This hour to Europe's fate shall set the triumph-seal! Krner.

CCXXXIV.

THE MAIN TRUCK, OR A LEAP FOR LIFE.

Old Ironsides at anchor lay In the harbor of Mahon; A dead calm rested on take bay,— The waves to sleep had gone; When little Hal, the Captain's son, A lad both brave and good, In sport, up shroud and rigging ran, And on the main truck stood!

A shudder shot through every vein,— All eyes were turned on high! There stood the bop with dizzy brain, Between the sea and sky; No hold had he above, below; Alone he stood in air: To that far height none dared to go;— No aid could reach him there.

We gazed,—but not a man could speak! With horror all aghast, In groups, with pallid brow and cheek, We watched the quivering mast. The atmosphere grew thick and hot, And of a lurid hue;— As riveted unto the spot, Stood officers and crew.

The father came on deck:—he gasped, "Oh God! Thy will be done!" Then suddenly a rifle grasped, And aimed it at his son: "Jump, far out, boy into the wave! Jump, or I fire!" he said; "That only chance your life can save! Jump, jump, boy!" He obeyed.

He sunk, he rose, he lived,—he moved,— And for the ship struck out. On board, we hailed the lad beloved, With many a manly shout. His father drew, in silent joy, Those wet arms round his neck— Then folded to his heart his boy, And fainted on the deck. G. P. Morris.

CCXXXV.

CATILINE ON HIS BANISHMENT FROM ROME.

Banished from Rome! What's banished, but set free, From daily contact of the things I loathe? "Tried and convicted traitor!"—Who says this? Who'll prove it, at his peril, on my head? Banished?—I thank you for 't. It breaks my chain! I held some slack allegiance till this hour; But now my sword's my own. Smile on, my lords; I scorn to count what feelings, withered hopes, Strong provocations, bitter, burning wrongs, I have within my heart's hot cells shut up, To leave you in your lazy dignities. But here I stand and scoff you: here I fling Hatred and full defiance in your face. Your consul's merciful. For this all thanks. He dares not touch a hair of Catiline. "Traitor!" I go but I return. This trial!— Here I devote your senate! I've had wrongs, To stir a fever in the blood of age, Or make the infant's sinews strong as steel. This day's the birth of sorrows!—This hour's work Will breed proscriptions. Look to your hearths, my lords; For there henceforth shall sit, for household gods, Shapes hot from Tartarus!—all shapes and crimes; Wan Treachery, with his thirsty dagger drawn; Suspicion, poisoning his brother's cup; Naked Rebellion, with the torch and axe, Making his wild sport of your blazing thrones; Till anarchy comes down on you like Night, And massacre seals Rome's eternal grave! G. Croly.

CCXXXVI.

APOSTROPHE TO THE OCEAN.

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar; I love not Man the less, but Nature more, From these our interviews, in which I steal From all I may be or have been before, To mingle with the Universe and feel What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal.

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean—roll! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; Man marks the earth with ruin—his control Stops with the shore!—upon the watery plain The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown.

His steps are not upon thy paths,—thy fields Are not a spoil for him,—thou dost arise And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields For earth's destruction, thou dost all despise, Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray And howling, to his gods, where haply lies His petty hope in some near port or bay, And dashest him again to earth:—there let him lay.

The armaments which thunderstrike the walls Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake, And monarchs tremble in their capitals, The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make Their clay creator the vain title take Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war; These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, They melt into the yeast of waves, which mar Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar.

Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee— Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they? Thy watery wasted them while they were free, And many a tyrant since; their shores obey The stranger, slave or savage; their decay Has dried up realms to deserts:—not so thou, Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play— Time writes no wrinkle on thy azure brow— Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now.

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form Glasses itself in tempests: in all time, Calm or convulsed—in breeze, or gale or storm, Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime Dark-heaving;—boundless, endless, and sublime— The image of Eternity—the throne Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime The monsters of the deep are made; each zone Obeys thee; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. Lord Byron.

CCXXXVII.

BATTLE OF WATERLOO.

There was a sound of revelry by night; And Belgium's capital had gathered then Her Beauty and her Chivalry; and bright The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men; A thousand hearts beat happily; and when Music arose with its voluptuous swell, Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again, And all went merry as a marriage bell;— But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell!

Did ye not hear it?—No: 't was but the wind, Or the car rattling o'er the stony street: On with the dance! let joy be unconfined; No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet— But, hark!—that heavy sound breaks in once more, As if the clouds its echo would repeat; And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before! Arm! Arm! it is—it is—the cannon's opening roar!

Ah! then and there was hurrying to and fro, And gathering tears, and crumblings of distress, And cheeks all pale, which but an hour ago Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness; And there were sudden partings, such as press The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs Which never might be repeated. Who could guess If ever more should meet those mutual eyes, Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could rise?

And there was mounting in hot haste: the steed, The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, And swiftly forming in the ranks of war; And the deep thunder, peal on peal, afar— And near, the beat of the alarming drum, Roused up the soldier ere the morning star;— While thronged the citizens with terror dumb, Or whispering, with white lips—"The foe! they come! they come!"

And wild and high the "Cameron's gathering" rose! The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn's hills Have heard—and heard, too, have her Saxon foes:— How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills, Savage and shrill! But with the breath which fills Their mountain-pipe, so fill the mountaineers With the fierce native daring, which instils The stirring memory of a thousand years: And Evan's, Donald's fame rings in each clansman's ears!

And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves, Dewy with Nature's tear-drops, as they pass, Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves,— Over the unreasoning brave,—alas! Ere evening to be trodden like the grass Which now beneath them, but above shall grow, In its next verdure; when this fiery mass Of living valor, rolling on the foe, And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low!

Last noon beheld them full of lusty life; Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay; The midnight brought the signal-sound of strife; The morn, the marshalling in arms; the day, Battle's magnificently-stern array! The thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when rent, The earth is covered thick with other clay, Which her own clay shall cover,—heaped and pent, Rider and horse,—friend, foe,—in one red burial blent! Lord Byron.

CCXXXVIII.

THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB.

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold; And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green, That host with their banners at sunset were seen: Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown, That host on the morrow lay withered and strewn.

For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, And breathed in the face of the foe as he pass'd; And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill, And their hearts but once heaved, and forever grew still.

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride; And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf, And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.

And there lay the rider distorted and pale, With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail; And the tents were all silent, the banners alone, The lances uplifted, the trumpet unknown.

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal; And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord! Lord Byron.

CCXXXIX.

SPEECH OF MOLOCH.

My sentence is for open war. Of wiles, More inexpert, I boast not; them let those Contrive who need, or when they need, not now; For, while they sit contriving, shall the rest, Millions that stand in arms, and longing wait The signal to ascend, sit lingering here, Heaven's fugitives, and for their dwelling-place Accept this dark, opprobrious den of shame, The prison of his tyranny, who reigns By our delay? No; let us rather choose, Armed with hell-flames and fury, all at once, O'er heaven's high towers to force resistless way, Turning our tortures into horrid arms Against the torturer; when, to meet the noise Of his almighty engine, he shall hear Infernal thunder, and for lightning, see Black fire and horror shot with equal rage Among his angels,—and his throne itself, Mixed with Tartarean sulphur and strange fire, His own invented torments. But, perhaps, The way seems difficult and steep to scale, With upright wing, against a higher foe. Let such bethink them, if the sleepy drench Of that forgetful lake benumb not still, That in our proper motion we ascend Up to our native seat; descent and fall To us adverse. Who but felt of late, When the fierce foe hung on our broken rear Insulting, and pursued us through the deep, With what compulsion and laborious flight, We sunk thus low? The ascent is easy then; The event is feared. Should we again provoke Our stronger, some worse way his wrath may find To our destruction; if there be in hell, Fear to be worse destroyed. What can be worse Than to dwell here, driven out from bliss, condemned In this abhorred deep to utter woe; Where pain of unextinguishable fire Must exercise us without hope of end, The vassals of his anger, when the scourge Inexorable, and the torturing hour Calls us to penance? More destroyed than thus We should be quite abolished and expire. What fear we then? what doubt we to incense His utmost ire? which to the height enraged, Will either quite consume us, and reduce To nothing this essential (happier far, Than miserable, to have eternal being,) Or, if our substance be indeed divine, And cannot cease to be, we are at worst On this side nothing; and by proof we feel Our power sufficient to disturb his heaven, And with perpetual inroads to alarm, Though inaccessible, his fatal throne; Which, if not victory—is yet Revenge. Milton.

CCXL.

ANTONY'S ADDRESS TO THE ROMANS.

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears: I come to bury Csar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interrd with their bones: So let it be with Csar, The noble Brutus Hath told you, Csar, was ambitious: If it were so, it was a grievous fault, And grievously hath Csar, answered it. Here, under leave of Brutus, and the rest, (For Brutus is an honorable man; So are they all, all honorable men), Come I to speak in Csar's funeral.

He was my friend, faithful and just to me: But Brutus says he was ambitious, And Brutus is an honorable man. He hath brought many captives home to Rome, Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill: Did this in Csar, seem ambitious? When that the poor have cried, Csar, hath wept: Ambition should be made of sterner stuff: Yet Brutus says he was ambitious, And Brutus is an honorable man. You all did see, that, on the Lupercal, I thrice presented him a kingly crown, Which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition? Yet Brutus says he was ambitious, And, sure, he is an honorable man. I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke, But here I am to speak what I do know. You all did love him once, not without cause: What cause withholds you then to mourn for him? O judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts, And men have lost their reason! Bear with me: My heart is in the coffin there with Csar, And I must pause till it come back to me.

But yesterday the word of Csar, might Have stood against the world; now lies he there, And none so poor to do him reverence. O Masters! if I were disposed to stir Your hearts and minds to mutiny and rage, I should do Brutus wrong, and Cassius wrong, Who, you all know, are honorable men. I will not do them wrong; I rather choose To wrong the dead, to wrong myself and you, Than I will wrong such honorable men: But here's a parchment, with the seal of Csar,— I found it in his closet; 't is his will. Let but the commons hear this testament (Which, pardon me, I do not mean to read), And they, would go and kiss dead Csar's, wounds, And dip their napkins in his sacred blood; Yea, beg a hair of him for memory, And, dying, mention it within their wills, Bequeathing it, as a rich legacy, Unto their issue.—

If you have tears, prepare to shed them now. You all do know this mantle; I remember The first time ever Csar, ever put it on; 'T was on a summer's evening in his tent; That day he overcame the Nervii.— Look! In this place ran Cassius's dagger through: See what a rent the envious Casca made: Through this, the well-belovd Brutus stabbed; And as he plucked his cursd steel away, Mark, how the blood of Csar, followed it!— This was the most unkindest cut of all! For when the noble Csar, saw him stab, Ingratitude, more strong than traitors' arms, Quite vanquished him! Then burst his mighty heart; And, in his mantle muffling up his face, Even at the base of Pompey's statue, Which all the while ran blood, great Csar, fell. O, what a fall was there, my countrymen! Then I and you, and all of us, fell down, Whilst bloody treason flourished over us. O, now you weep; and I perceive you feel

The dint of pity:—these are gracious drops. Kind souls! what, weep you when you but behold Our Csar, vesture wounded? Look ye here! Here is himself—marred, as you see, by traitors. Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir you up To such a sudden flood of mutiny! They that have done this deed are honorable! What private griefs they have, alas, I know not, That made them do it! They are wise and honorable, And will, no doubt, with reasons answer you. I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts: I am no orator, as Brutus is; But as you all know me, a plain, blunt man, That love my friend; and that they know full well That gave me public leave to speak of him. For I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth, Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech, To stir men's blood:—I only speak right on; I tell you that which you yourselves do know; Show you sweet Csar's wounds, poor, poor, dumb mouths, And bid them speak for me. But, were I Brutus, And Brutus, Antony, there were an Antony, Would ruffle up your spirits, and put a tongue In every wound of Csar, that should move The stones of Rome to rise and mutiny! Shakespeare.

CCXLI.

HAMLETS SOLILOQUY.

To be,—or not to be;—that is the question:— Whether 't is nobler in the mind, to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous Fortune; Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And, by opposing, end them?—To die,—to sleep,— No more; and, by a sleep, to say we end The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to,—'t is a consummation Devoutly to be wished. To die,—to sleep;— To sleep! perchance to dream;—ay, there's the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause. There's the respect That makes calamity of so long life; For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The pangs of despisd love, the law's delay, The insolence of office, and the spurns That patient merit of the unworthy takes, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear, To grunt and sweat under a weary life; But that the dread of something after death,— The undiscovered country, from whose bourn No traveller returns,—puzzles the will, And makes us rather bear those ills we have, Than fly to others that we know not of? Thus conscience does make cowards of us all; And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with pale cast of thought; And enterprises of great pith and moment, with this regard, their currents turn awry, And lose the name of action. Shakespeare.

CCXLII.

SOLILOQUY OF HAMLET'S UNCLE.

Oh! my offence is rank; it smells to heaven; It hath the primal, eldest curse upon 't, A brother's murder! Pray I cannot, Though inclination be as sharp as 't will: My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent; And like a man to double business bound, I stand in pause where I shall first begin, And both neglect. What if this cursd hand Were thicker than itself with brother's blood; Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy, But to confront the visage of offence? And what's in prayer, but this twofold force,— To be forestalled, ere we come to fall, Or pardoned being down? Then I'll look up; My fault is past.—But, O, what form of prayer Can serve my turn? "Forgive me my foul murder!" That cannot be; since I am still possessed Of those effects for which I did the murder,— My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen. May one be pardoned, and retain the offence? In the corrupted currents of this world, Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice; And oft 't is seen, the wicked prize itself Buys out the law: but 't is not so above; There is no shuffling; there the action lies In his true nature; and we ourselves compell'd, Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults, To give in evidence. What then? What rests? Try what repentance can: what can it not? Yet what can it, when one can not repent? O wretched state! O bosom, black as death! O limed soul, that, struggling to be free, Art more engag'd! Help, angels! make assay! Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart, with strings of steel, Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe! All may be well. Shakespeare.

CCXLIII.

PERSEVERANCE KEEPS HONOR BRIGHT.

Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back, Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, A great-sized monster of ingratitudes. Those scraps are good deeds past, which are devoured As fast as they are made, forgot as soon As done, Perseverance, dear my lord, Keeps honor bright. To have done, is to hang Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail In monumental mockery. Take the instant way; For Honor travels in a strait so narrow, Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path; For Emulation hath a thousand sons, That one by one pursue: if you give way, Or hedge aside from the direct forthright, Like to an entered tide, they all rush by, And leave you hindmost;— Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first rank, Lie there for pavement to the abject rear, O'errun and trampled on. Then what they do in present, Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours: For Time is like a fashionable host, That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand; And with his arms outstretched, as he would fly, Grasps-in the comer: Welcome ever smiles, And Farewell goes out sighing. O, let not Virtue seek Remuneration for the thing it was; For beauty, wit, High birth, vigor of bone, desert in service, Love, friendship, alacrity, are subjects all To envious and calumniating Time. One touch of Nature makes the whole world kin,— That all, with one consent, praise new-born gauds, Though they are made and moulded of things past; And give to dust, that is a little gilt, More land than gilt o'erdusted. The present eye praises the present object: Then marvel not, thou great and complete man, That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax; Since things in motion sooner catch the eye Than what not stirs: The cry went once on thee, And still it might, and yet it may again, If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive, And case thy reputation in thy tent; Whose glorious deeds, did but in these fields of late, Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods themselves, And drave great Mars to faction. Shakespeare.

CCXLIV.

MACBETH'S SOLILOQUY.

Is this a dagger, which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? come, let me clutch thee:— I have thee not; and yet I see thee still. Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible To feeling as to sight, or art thou but A dagger of the mind—a false creation, Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain? I see thee yet, in form as palpable As this which now I draw. Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going; And such an instrument I was to use. Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses, Or else worth all the rest: I see thee still; And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood, Which was not so before. There's no such thing: It is the bloody business, which informs Thus to mine eyes.—Know, o'er the one half world Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse The curtained sleep; now Witchcraft celebrates Pale Hecate's offerings; and withered Murder, Alarum'd by his sentinel, the wolf, Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy pace, With Tarquin's ravishing strides, towards his design Moves like a ghost. Thou sure and firm-set earth, Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear Thy very stones prate of my where-about, And take the present horror from the time, Which now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives; Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives. I go, and it is done; the bell invites me. [A bell rings.] Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell, That summons thee to heaven or to hell. Shakespeare.

CCXLV.

ROMEO IN THE GARDEN.

But soft! what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!— Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, Who is already sick and pale with grief, That thou her maid, art far more fair than she. Be not her maid, since she is envious: Her vestal livery is but sick and green, And none but fools do wear it; cast it off. It is my lady: O, it is my love! O, that she knew she were!— She speaks, yet she says nothing: what of that? Her eye discourses; I will answer it. I am too bold; 't is not to me she speaks: Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven, Having some business, do entreat her eyes To twinkle in their spheres till they return. What if her eyes were there, they in her head? The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars, As daylight doth a lamp; her eye in heaven Would through the airy region stream so bright, That birds would sing, and think it were not night. See how she leans her cheek upon her hand! O, that I were a glove upon that hand, That I might touch that cheek! She speaks:— O, speak again, bright angel! for thou art As glorious to this night, being o'er my head, As is a winged messenger of heaven Unto the white-upturned wondering eyes Of mortals, that fall back to gaze on him, When he bestrides the lazy-pacing clouds, And sails upon the bosom of the air. Shakespeare.

CCXLVI.

POLONIUS TO LAERTES.

My blessing with you! And these few precepts in thy memory, Look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportioned thought his act. Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar: The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel; But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade: beware Of entrance to a quarrel; but, being in, Bear it, that the opposed may beware of thee. Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice; Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment. Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, But not expressed in fancy; rich not gaudy; For the apparel oft proclaims the man; And they in France, of the best rank and station, Are most select and generous chief in that. Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft, loses both itself and friend; And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. This above all,—to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man! Shakespeare.

CCXLVII.

WOLSEY, ON BEING CAST OFF BY THE KING.

Nay, then, farewell! I have touched the highest point of all my greatness; And, from that full meridian of my glory I haste now to my setting: I shall fall Like a bright exhalation in the evening, And no man see me more. Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness! This is the state of man: to-day he puts forth The tender leaves of hope; to-morrow, blossoms, And bears his blushing honors thick upon him: The third day comes a frost, a killing frost; And, when he thinks,—good easy man,—full surely His greatness is a ripening,—nips his root, And then he falls, as I do. I have ventured, Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, These many summers in a sea of glory; But far beyond my depth: my high-blown pride At length broke under me; and now has left me, Weary and old with service, to the mercy Of a rude stream, that must forever hide me. Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye! I feel my heart new opened. O, how wretched Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favors! There is, betwixt that smile he would aspire to, That sweet aspect of princes, and his ruin, More pangs and fears than wars or women have. And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer, Never to hope again! Shakespeare.

CCXLVIII.

WOLSEY TO CROMWELL.

Cromwell, I did not think to shed a tear In all my miseries; but thou hast forced me Out of thy honest truth, to play the woman. Let's dry our eyes: and thus far hear me, Cromwell; And, when I am forgotten, as I shall be, And sleep in dull cold marble, where no mention Of me more must be heard of,—say, I taught thee,— Say, Wolsey,—that once trod the ways of glory, And sounded all the depths and shoals of honor,— Found thee away, out of his wreck, to rise in; A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it.— Mark but my fall, and that which ruined me! Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition! By that sin fell the angels: how can man, then, The image of his Maker, hope to win by 't? Love thyself last; cherish those hearts that hate thee: Corruption wins not more than honesty; Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace, To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not. Let all the ends thou aim'st at, be thy country's, Thy God's, and truth's; then if thou fallest, O Cromwell, Thou fallest a blessd martyr! Serve the king; And—Prithee, lead me in: There, take an inventory of all I have, To the last penny; 't is the king's; my robe, And my integrity to Heaven, is all I dare now call mine own. O Cromwell, Cromwell! Had I but served my God with half the zeal I served my king, He would not, in mine age, Have left me naked to mine enemies! Shakespeare.

CCXLIX.

GRIFFITH'S DESCRIPTION OF CARDINAL WOLSEY.

Men's evil manners live in brass; their virtues We write in water. May it please your highness To hear me speak his good now? This Cardinal, Though from an humble stock, undoubtedly Was fashioned to much honor. From his cradle, He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one: Exceeding wise, fair spoken, and persuading; Lofty and sour to them that lov'd him not, But to those men that sought him, sweet as summer; And though he were unsatisfied in getting, (Which was a sin), yet in bestowing, madam, He was most princely; ever witness for him Those twins of learning that he raised in you, Ipswich and Oxford! one of which fell with him, Unwilling to outlive the good he did it; The other, though unfinish'd, yet so famous, So excellent in art, and still so rising, That Christendom shall ever speak his virtue. His overthrow heaped happiness upon him; For then and not till then, he felt himself, And found the blessedness of being little: And to add greater honors to his age Than man could give him, he died fearing God. Shakespeare.



BOOK SECOND.

RECENT SELECTIONS

FOR

RECITATION AND DECLAMATION

IN PROSE AND POETRY.



BOOK SECOND.

RECENT SELECTIONS.

PROSE.

CCL.

THE ORATORS OF REVOLUTIONS.

And then and thus comes the orator of that time, kindling with their fire; sympathizing with that great beating heart; penetrated, not subdued; lifted up rather by a sublime and rare moment of history made real to his consciousness; charged with the very mission of life, yet unassured whether they will hear or will forbear; transcendent good within their grasp, yet a possibility that the fatal and critical opportunity of salvation will be wasted; the last evil of nations and of men overhanging, yet the siren song of peace—peace when there is no peace—chanted madly by some voice of sloth or fear,—there and thus the orators of revolutions come to work their work! And what then is demanded, and how it is to be done, you all see; and that in some of the characteristics of their eloquence they must all be alike. Actions, not law or policy: whose growth and fruits are to be slowly evolved by time and calm; actions daring, doubtful but instant; the new things of a new world,—these are what the speaker counsels; large, elementary, gorgeous ideas of right, of equality, of independence, of liberty, of progress through convulsion,—these are the principles from which he reasons, when he reasons,—these are the pinions of the thought on which he soars and stays; and then the primeval and indestructible sentiments of the breast of man,—his sense of right, his estimation of himself, his sense of honor, his love of fame, his triumph and his joy in the dear name of country, the trophies that tell of the past, the hopes that gild and herald her dawn,—these are the springs of action to which he appeals,—these are the chords his fingers sweep, and from which he draws out the troubled music, "solemn as death, serene as the undying confidence of patriotism," to which he would have the battalions of the people march! Directness, plainness, a narrow range of topics, few details, few but grand ideas, a headlong tide of sentiment and feeling; vehement, indignant, and reproachful reasonings,—winged general maxims of wisdom and life; an example from Plutarch; a pregnant sentence of Tacitus; thoughts going forth as ministers of nature in robes of light, and with arms in their hands; thoughts that breathe and words that burn,—these vaguely, approximately, express the general type of all this speech. R. Choate.

CCLI.

THE ELOQUENCE OF REVOLUTIONS

The capital peculiarity of the eloquence of all times of revolution, is that the actions it persuades to are the highest and most heroic which men can do, and the passions it would inspire, in order to persuade to them, are the most lofty which man can feel. "High actions and high passions"—such are Milton's words, high actions through and by high passions; these are the end and these the means of the orator of the revolution. Hence are his topics large, simple, intelligible, affecting. Hence are his views broad, impressive, popular; no trivial details, no wire-woven developments, no subtle distinctions and drawing of fine lines about the boundaries of ideas, no speculation, no ingenuity; all is elemental, comprehensive, intense, practical, unqualified, undoubting. It is not of the small things of minor and instrumental politics he comes to speak, or men come to hear. It is not to speak or to hear about permitting an Athenian citizen to change his tribe; about permitting the Roman knights to have jurisdiction of trials equally with the Senate; it is not about allowing a 10 householder to vote for a member of Parliament; about duties on indigo, or onion-seed, or even tea.

"That strain you hear is of an higher mood."

It is the rallying-cry of patriotism, of liberty, in the sublimest crisis of the State,—of man. It is a deliberation of empire, of glory, of existence, on which they come together. To be or not to be, that is the question. Shall the children of the men of Marathon become slaves of Philip? Shall the majesty of the Senate and people of Rome stoop to wear the chains forging by the military executors of the will of Julius Csar? Shall the assembled representatives of France, just waking from her sleep of ages to claim the rights of man,—shall they disperse, their work undone, their work just commencing; and shall they disperse at the order of the king? or shall the messenger be bid to go, in the thunder-tones of Mirabeau,—and tell his master that "we sit here to do the will of our constituents, and that we will not be moved from those seats but by the point of the bayonet?" Shall Ireland bound upward from her long prostration, and cast from her the last links of the British chain, and shall she advance "from injuries to arms, from arms to liberty," from liberty to glory? Shall the thirteen Colonies become, and be free and independent States, and come unabashed, unterrified, an equal, into the majestic assembly of the nations?

These are the thoughts with which all bosoms are distended and oppressed. Filled with these, and with these flashing in every eye, swelling every heart, pervading electric all ages, all orders, like a visitation, "an unquenchable public fire," men come together,—the thousands of Athens around the Bema, or in the Temple of Dionysus,—the people of Rome in the forum, the Senate in that council-chamber of the world,—the masses of France, as the spring-tide, into her gardens of the Tuileries, her club-rooms, her hall of the convention,—the representatives, the genius, the grace, the beauty of Ireland into the Tuscan Gallery of her House of Commons,—the delegates of the Colonies into the Hall of Independence at Philadelphia,—thus men come in an hour of revolution, to hang upon the lips from which they hope, they need, they demand, to hear the things which belong to their national salvation, hungering for the bread of life. R. Choate.

CCLII.

AMERICAN NATIONALITY.

By the side of all antagonisms, higher than they, stronger than they, there rises colossal the fine sweet spirit of nationality, the nationality of America! See there the pillar of fire which God has kindled and lifted and moved for our hosts and our ages. Gaze on that, worship that, worship the highest in that. Between that light and our eyes a cloud for a time may seem to gather; chariots, armed men on foot, the troops of kings may march on us, and our fears may make us for a moment turn from it; a sea may spread before us, and waves seem to hedge us up; dark idolatries may alienate some hearts for a season from that worship; revolt, rebellion, may break out in the camp, and the waters of our springs may run bitter to the taste and mock it; between us and that Canaan a great river may seem to be rolling; but beneath that high guidance our way is onward, ever onward; those waters shall part, and stand on either hand in heaps; that idolatry shall repent; that rebellion shall be crushed; that stream shall be sweetened; that overflowing river shall be passed on foot dryshod, in harvest time; and from that promised land of flocks, fields, tents, mountains, coasts, and ships, from north and south, and east and west, there shall swell one cry yet, of victory, peace, and thanksgiving! R. Choate.

CCLII.

THE SAME CONTINUED.

Think of this nationality first as a state of consciousness, as a spring of feeling, as a motive to exertion, as blessing your country, and as reacting on you. Think of it as it fills your mind and quickens your heart, and as it fills the mind and quickens the heart of millions around you. Instantly, under such an influence, you ascend above the smoke and stir of this small local strife; you tread upon the high places of the earth and of history; you think and feel as an American for America; her power, her eminence, her consideration, her honor, are yours; your competitors, like hers, are kings; your home, like hers, is the world; your path, like hers, is on the highway of empires; our charge, her charge, is of generations and ages; your record, her record, is of treaties, battles, voyages, beneath all the constellations; her image, one, immortal, golden, rises on your eye as our western star at evening rises on the traveller from his home; no lowering cloud, no angry river, no lingering spring, no broken crevasse, no inundated city or plantation, no tracts of sand, arid and burning, on that surface, but all blended and softened into one beam of kindred rays, the image, harbinger, and promiser of love, hope, and a brighter day!

But if you would contemplate nationality as an active virtue, look around you. Is not our own history one witness and one record of what it can do? This day and all which it stands for,—did it not give us these? This glory of the fields of that war, this eloquence of that revolution, this one wide sheet of flame which wrapped tyrant and tyranny and swept all that escaped from it away, forever and forever; the courage to fight, to retreat, to rally, to advance, to guard the young flag by the young arm and the young heart's blood, to hold up and hold on till the magnificent consummation crowned the work,—were not all these imparted or inspired by this imperial sentiment? Has it not here begun the master-work of man, the creation of a national life? Did it not call out that prodigious development of wisdom, the wisdom of constructiveness which illustrated the years after the war, and the framing and adopting of the Constitution? Has it not, in general, contributed to the administering of that government wisely and well since? R. Choate.

CCLIV.

THE SAME CONCLUDED.

Look at it! It has kindled us to no aims of conquest. It has involved us in no entangling alliances. It has kept our neutrality dignified and just. The victories of peace have been our prized victories. But the larger and truer grandeur of the nations, for which they are created, and for which they must one day, before some tribunal, give an account, what a measure of these it has enabled us already to fulfil! It has lifted us to the throne, and has set on our brow the name of the Great Republic. It has taught us to demand nothing wrong, and to submit to nothing wrong; it has made our diplomacy sagacious, wary, accomplished; it has opened the iron gate of the mountains and planted our ensign on the great, tranquil sea.

It has made the desert to bud and blossom as the rose; it has quickened to life the giant brood of useful arts; it has whitened lake and ocean with the sails of a daring, new, and lawful trade; it has extended to exiles, flying as clouds, the asylum of our better liberty.

It has kept us at rest within all our borders; it has repressed without blood the intemperance of local insubordination; it has scattered the seeds of liberty, under law and under order, broadcast; it has seen and helped American feeling to swell into a fuller flood; from many a field and many a deck, though it seeks not war, makes not war, and fears not war, it has borne the radiant flag, all unstained; it has opened our age of lettered glory; it has opened and honored the age of the industry of the people! R. Choate.

CCLV.

THE NATIONAL ENSIGN.

Sir, I must detain you no longer. I have said enough, and more than enough, to manifest the spirit in which this flag is now committed to your charge. It is the national ensign, pure and simple; dearer to all our hearts at this moment, as we lift it to the gale, and see no other sign of hope upon the storm-cloud which rolls and rattles above it, save that which is reflected from its own radiant hues; dearer, a thousand-fold dearer to us all, than ever it was before, while gilded by the sunshine of prosperity and playing with the zephyrs of peace. It will speak for itself far more eloquently than I can speak for it.

Behold it! Listen to it! Every star has a tongue; every stripe is articulate. There is no language or speech where their voices are not heard. There's magic in the web of it. It has an answer for every question of duty. It has a solution for every doubt and perplexity. It has a word of good cheer for every hour of gloom or of despondency.

Behold it! Listen to it! It speaks of earlier and of later struggles. It speaks of victories, and sometimes of reverses, on the sea and on the land. It speaks of patriots and heroes among the living and the dead: and of him, the first and greatest of them all, around whose consecrated ashes this unnatural and abhorrent strife has so long been raging—"the abomination of desolation standing where it ought not." But before all and above all other associations and memories—whether of glorious men, or glorious deeds, or glorious places—its voice is ever of Union and Liberty, of the Constitution and the Laws.

Behold it! Listen to it! Let it tell the story of its birth to these gallant volunteers, as they march beneath its folds by day, or repose beneath its sentinel stars by night. Let it recall to them the strange, eventful history of its rise and progress; let it rehearse to them the wondrous tale of its trials and its triumphs, in peace as well as in war; and, whatever else may happen to it or to them, it will never be surrendered to rebels; never be ignominiously struck to treason; nor be prostituted to any unworthy or unchristian purpose of revenge, depredation, or rapine. And may a merciful God cover the head of each one of its brave defenders in the hour of battle. R. C. Winthrop.

CCLVI.

THE CAUSE.

"Union for the sake of the Union"; "our country, our whole country, and nothing but our country";—these are the mottoes, old, stale, hackneyed, and threadbare as they may have seemed when employed as the watchwords of an electioneering campaign, but clothed with a new power, a new significance, a new gloss, and a new glory, when uttered as the battlecries of a nation struggling for existence; these are the mottoes which can give a just and adequate expression to the Cause in which you have enlisted. Sir, I thank Heaven that the trumpet has given no uncertain sound, while you have been preparing yourselves for the battle.

This is the Cause which has been solemnly proclaimed by both branches of Congress, in resolutions passed at the instance of those true-hearted sons of Tennessee and Kentucky—Johnson and Crittenden—and which, I rejoice to remember at this hour, received your own official sanction as a Senator of the United States.

This is the Cause which has been recognized and avowed by the President of the United States, with a frankness and fearlessness which have won the respect and admiration of all.

This is the Cause which has been so fervently commended to us from the dying lips of a Douglas, and by the matchless living voices of a Holt and an Everett.

This is the Cause in which the heroic Anderson, lifting his banner upon the wings of prayer,—and looking to the guidance and guardianship of the God in whom he trusted, went through that fiery furnace unharmed, and came forth, not indeed without the smell of fire and smoke upon his garments, but with an undimmed and undying lustre of piety and patriotism on his brow.

This is the Cause in which the lamented Lyon bequeathed all that he had of earthly treasure to his country, and then laid down a life in her defense, whose value no millions could measure.

This is the Cause in which the veteran chief of our armies crowned with the laurels which Washington alone had worn before him, and renouncing all inferior allegiance at the loss of fortune and of friends, has tasked, and is still tasking to the utmost the energies of a soul whose patriotism no age could chill. This is the Cause to which the young and noble McClellan, under whose lead it is your privilege to serve, has brought that matchless combination of sagacity and science, of endurance modesty, caution, and courage, which have made him the hope of the hour, the bright particular star of our immediate destiny.

And this, finally, is the Cause which has obliterated, as no other cause could have done, all divisions and distinction of party, nationality, and creed; which has appealed alike to Republican, Democrat, and Union Whig, to native citizen and to adopted citizen; and in which not the sons of Massachusetts or of New England or of the North alone, not the dwellers on the Hudson, the Delaware, and the Susquehanna only, but so many of those, also, on the Potomac and the Ohio, the Mississippi and the Missouri, on all the lakes, and in all the vast Mesopotamia of the mighty West—yes, and strangers from beyond the seas, Irish and Scotch, German, Italian, and French—the common emigrant and those who have stood nearest to a throne—brave and devoted men from almost every nation under heaven—men who have measured the value of our country to the world by a nobler standard than the cotton crop; and who realize that other and momentous destinies are at stake upon our struggle than such as can be wrought upon any mere material looms and shuttles—all, all are seen rallying beneath a common flag, and, exclaiming with one heart and voice: "The American Union—it must be, and shall be preserved." R. C. Winthrop.

CCLVII.

THE ASSAULT ON CHARLES SUMNER.

On the 22d of May, when the Senate and House had clothed themselves in mourning for a brother fallen in the battle of life, in the distant State of Missouri, the Senator from Massachusetts sat in the silence of the Senate chamber, engaged in employments appertaining to his office, when a member from this House, who had taken an oath to sustain the Constitution, stole into the Senate, that place which had hitherto been held sacred against violence, and smote him as Cain smote his brother. One blow was enough; but it did not satiate the wrath of that spirit which had pursued him through two days. Again, and again, and again, quicker and faster fell the leaden blows, until he was torn away from his victim, when the Senator from Massachusetts fell into the arms of his friends, and his blood ran down the floor of the Senate.

Sir, the act was brief and my comments on it shall be brief also. I denounce it in the name of the Constitution which it violated. I denounce it in the name of the sovereignty of Massachusetts, which was stricken down by the blow. I denounce it in the name of humanity. I denounce it in the name of civilization, which it outraged. I denounce it in the name of that fair play, which bullies and prize-fighters respect. What, strike a man when he is pinioned, when he cannot respond to a blow! Call you that chivalry? In what code of honor did you get your authority for that? God knows my heart. I desire to speak with kindness. I speak in no spirit of revenge. I do not believe the member has a friend who must not in his heart of hearts condemn the act. Even the member himself—if he has left a spark of that chivalry and gallantry attributed to him—must loathe and scorn the act. But much as I reprobate the act, much more do I reprobate the conduct of those who stood by and saw the outrage perpetrated. O, magnanimous Slidell! O, prudent Douglas! O, audacious Toombs!

Sir, there are questions arising out of this, which are far more important than those of a mere personal nature. Of these personal considerations I shall speak when the question comes properly before us, if I am permitted to do so. The higher question involves the very existence of the government itself. If, sir, freedom of speech is not to remain to us, what is the government worth? If we from Massachusetts, or any other State,—senators or members of the House, are to be called to account by some "gallant uncle," when we utter something which does not suit their sensitive nature, we desire to know it.

If the conflict is to be transferred from the peaceful, intellectual field to one where, it is said, "honors are easy and responsibilities equal," then we desire to know it. Massachusetts, if her sons and representatives are to have the rod held over them,—though she utters no threats,—may be called upon to withdraw them to her own bosom, where she can furnish to them that protection which is not vouchsafed to them under the flag of their common country. But while she permits us to remain, we shall do our duty; we shall speak whatever we choose to speak, whatever we will, and however we will, regardless of the consequences.

Sir, the sons of Massachusetts are educated, at the knees of their mothers, in the doctrines of peace and good-will, and God knows we desire to cultivate those feelings,—feelings of social kindness, and public kindness.

The House will bear witness that we have not violated or trespassed upon any of them; but, sir, if we are pushed too long and too far, there are men from the old Commonwealth of Massachusetts who will not shrink from a defence of freedom of speech, and the State they represent: in any field where they may be assailed. A. Burlingame.

CCLVIII.

STRENGTH OF THE GOVERNMENT.

I know that I may be met at once by the objection that our general government is, after all, but a qualified and imperfect government. I may be reminded that it was from Massachusetts that the amendment came which expressly declares that all powers not given, are withheld. And then it may be asked, is there not here a manifest division of sovereignty and of power, and does not this show that much is wanting—that all which is retained at home is wanting—to constitute the full strength of a national government? My answer is twofold. First, I say, the national government has at this moment, by force of the Constitution, all the strength—absolutely all—which it needs, or could profitably use, as a central national government. I answer next, that by the admirable provisions of our Constitution, the reserved powers of every State may be, and, so far as that State does its duty, will be, prepared and developed to their utmost efficiency, and then imparted to the nation in its need.

Do we want a proof and illustration of all this? Very recent events have supplied one, which history will not forget, if we do. How happened it that, a few weeks since, when the general government seemed to be feeble, and was in peril, and the demand—I may as well say the cry for help came forth—why was it that Massachusetts was the first to spring to the rescue? Why was it that she was able, in four days from that in which this cry reached her, to add a new glory to the day of Lexington? Why was it that she could begin that offering of needed aid which has since poured itself in a full, and swollen, and rushing stream, into the war power of the national government? Even as I ask the question, the answer is in all your minds. It is, that Massachusetts could do this because she had done her own duty beforehand. She could do this because, within her own bounds, she had prepared and organized her own strength, and stood ready for the moment when she could place it in the outstretched hands of the government. And other States followed, offering their contributions with no interval—with almost too little of delay; with a haste which was sometimes precipitation; with an importunate begging for acceptance—all of it yet far behind the earnest desire and demand of the people of these States, until at length we stood before an astonished world the strongest government on the face of the earth.

Stronger, therefore, for all the purposes to which our national government should apply its strengths stronger for all the good it can do and all the harm it can prevent, that government is, as it is now constructed, and because it is so constructed, than it could be if it were the single, central, consolidated power of other nations. And it will show its strength, not by preventing all checks and reverses, for that is impossible; but, as I believe, in prompt and thorough recovery from them. T. Parsons.

CCLIX.

THE HIGHER LAW.

In the whole political history of our own country, there has been no sin so atrocious as the repudiation of a higher than human law. It is stark atheism; for, with the law, this position virtually denies also the providence of God, and makes men and nations sole arbiters of their own fortunes. But "the Heavens do rule." If there be institutions or measures inconsistent with immutable rectitude, they are fostered only under the ban of a righteous God; they inwrap the germs of their own harvest of shame, disorder, vice, and wretchedness; nay, their very prosperity is but the verdure and blossoming which shall mature the apples of Sodom. O, how often have our legislators had reason to recall those pregnant words of Jefferson,—sad indeed is it that they should have become almost too trite for repetition, without having worked their way into the national conscience,—"I tremble for my country, when I consider that God is just!" The nations that have passed away, the decaying nations, the convulsed thrones, the smouldering rebellion-fires of the Old World, reveal the elements of national decline and ruin, and hold out baleful signals over the career on which our republic is hurrying; assuring us, by the experience of all climes and ages, that slavery, the unprincipled lust of power and territory official corruption and venality, aggressive war, partisan legislation, are but "sowing the wind to reap the whirlwind."

Our statesmen of the "manifest destiny" type seem to imagine oar country necessary to the designs of Providence. So thought the Hebrews, and on far more plausible grounds, of their commonwealth; but, rather than fulfil to such degenerate descendants the promise made to their great ancestor, "God is able," said the divine Teacher. "of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham."

Our destiny must be evolved, not from the blending of the world's noblest races in our ancestral stock; not from a position in which we hold the keys of the world's commerce, and can say to the North, "Give up," and to the South, "Keep not back;" not from our capacity to absorb and assimilate immigrant millions. Destiny is but the concrete of character. God needs no man or nation. He will bring in the reign of everlasting righteousness; and as a people, we must stand or fall as we accept or spurn that reign. Brethren, scholars, patriots also, I trust,—you whose generous nurture gives you large and enduring influence,—seek for the country of your pride and love, above all things else, her establishment on the eternal right as on the Rock of Ages. Thus shall there be no spot on her fame, no limit to her growth, no waning to her glory. A. P. Peabody.

CCLX.

"STEP TO THE CAPTAINS OFFICE AND SETTLE."

This old watchword, so often heard by travellers in the early stages of steam-navigation, is now and then ringing in our ears with a very pointed and pertinent application. It is a note that belongs to all the responsibilities of this life for eternity. There is a day of reckoning, a day for the settlement of accounts. All unpaid bills will then have to be paid; all unbalanced books will have to be settled. There will be no loose memorandums forgotten; there will be no heedless commissioners for the convenience of careless consciences; there will be no proxies; there will be no bribed auditors. Neither will there be such a thing as a hesitating conscience; but the inward monitor, so often drugged and silenced on earth, will speak out. There will be no doubt nor question as to the right and wrong. There will be no vain excuses! nor any attempt to make them. There will be no more sophistry, no more considerations of expediency, no more pleading of the laws of men and the customs of society, no more talk about organic sins being converted into constructive righteousness, or collective and corporate frauds releasing men from individual responsibilities.

When we see a man, a professed Christian, running a race with the worshippers of wealth and fashion, absorbed in the vanities of the world, or endeavoring to serve both God and mammon, we hear the voice, Step to the captain's office and settle! When we see editors and politicians setting power in the place of goodness, and expediency in the place of justice and law in the place of equity, and custom in the place of right, putting darkness for light, and evil for good, and tyranny for general benevolence, we think of the day when the issuers of such counterfeit money will be brought to light, and their sophistries and lies exposed,—for among the whole tribe of unprincipled politicians there will be great consternation when the call comes to step to the captain's office and settle. When we see unjust rulers in their pride of power fastening chains upon the bondmen, oppressing the poor, and playing their pranks of defiant tyranny before high heaven, then also come these words to mind, like a blast from the last trumpet, Step to the captain's office and settle! G. B. Cheever