Anti Slavery Poems II, vol 3, part 2 | Page 5

to?the Slave!"?Hold up its fire-wrought language, that whoso?reads may feel?His heart swell strong within him, his sinews?change to steel.
Hold it up before our sunshine, up against our?Northern air;?Ho! men of Massachusetts, for the love of God,?look there!?Take it henceforth for your standard, like the?Bruce's heart of yore,?In the dark strife closing round ye, let that hand?be seen before!
And the masters of the slave-land shall tremble at?that sign,?When it points its finger Southward along the?Puritan line?Can the craft of State avail them? Can a Christless?church withstand,?In the van of Freedom's onset, the coming of that?band??1846.
THE FREED ISLANDS.?Written for the anniversary celebration of the first of August, at Milton, 7846.
A FEW brief years have passed away?Since Britain drove her million slaves?Beneath the tropic's fiery ray?God willed their freedom; and to-day?Life blooms above those island graves!
He spoke! across the Carib Sea,?We heard the clash of breaking chains,?And felt the heart-throb of the free,?The first, strong pulse of liberty?Which thrilled along the bondman's veins.
Though long delayed, and far, and slow,?The Briton's triumph shall be ours?Wears slavery here a prouder brow?Than that which twelve short years ago?Scowled darkly from her island bowers?
Mighty alike for good or ill?With mother-land, we fully share?The Saxon strength, the nerve of steel,?The tireless energy of will,?The power to do, the pride to dare.
What she has done can we not do??Our hour and men are both at hand;?The blast which Freedom's angel blew?O'er her green islands, echoes through?Each valley of our forest land.
Hear it, old Europe! we have sworn?The death of slavery. When it falls,?Look to your vassals in their turn,?Your poor dumb millions, crushed and worn,?Your prisons and your palace walls!
O kingly mockers! scoffing show?What deeds in Freedom's name we do;?Yet know that every taunt ye throw?Across the waters, goads our slow?Progression towards the right and true.
Not always shall your outraged poor,?Appalled by democratic crime,?Grind as their fathers ground before;?The hour which sees our prison door?Swing wide shall be their triumph time.
On then, my brothers! every blow?Ye deal is felt the wide earth through;?Whatever here uplifts the low?Or humbles Freedom's hateful foe,?Blesses the Old World through the New.
Take heart! The promised hour draws near;?I hear the downward beat of wings,?And Freedom's trumpet sounding clear?"Joy to the people! woe and fear?To new-world tyrants, old-world kings!"
A LETTER.
Supposed to be written by the chairman of the "Central Clique" at Concord, N. H., to the Hon. M. N., Jr., at Washington, giving the result of the election. The following verses were published in the Boston Chronotype in 1846. They refer to the contest in New Hampshire, which resulted in the defeat of the pro-slavery Democracy, and in the election of John P. Hale to the United States Senate. Although their authorship was not acknowledged, it was strongly suspected. They furnish a specimen of the way, on the whole rather good-natured, in which the?liberty-lovers of half a century ago answered the social and political outlawry and mob violence to which they were subjected.
'T is over, Moses! All is lost?I hear the bells a-ringing;?Of Pharaoh and his Red Sea host?I hear the Free-Wills singing [4]?We're routed, Moses, horse and foot,?If there be truth in figures,?With Federal Whigs in hot pursuit,?And Hale, and all the "niggers."
Alack! alas! this month or more?We've felt a sad foreboding;?Our very dreams the burden bore?Of central cliques exploding;?Before our eyes a furnace shone,?Where heads of dough were roasting,?And one we took to be your own?The traitor Hale was toasting!
Our Belknap brother [5] heard with awe?The Congo minstrels playing;?At Pittsfield Reuben Leavitt [6] saw?The ghost of Storrs a-praying;?And Calroll's woods were sad to see,?With black-winged crows a-darting;?And Black Snout looked on Ossipee,?New-glossed with Day and Martin.
We thought the "Old Man of the Notch"?His face seemed changing wholly--?His lips seemed thick; his nose seemed flat;?His misty hair looked woolly;?And Coos teamsters, shrieking, fled?From the metamorphosed figure.?"Look there!" they said, "the Old Stone Head?Himself is turning nigger!"
The schoolhouse, out of Canaan hauled?Seemed turning on its track again,?And like a great swamp-turtle crawled?To Canaan village back again,?Shook off the mud and settled flat?Upon its underpinning;?A nigger on its ridge-pole sat,?From ear to ear a-grinning.
Gray H----d heard o' nights the sound?Of rail-cars onward faring;?Right over Democratic ground?The iron horse came tearing.?A flag waved o'er that spectral train,?As high as Pittsfield steeple;?Its emblem was a broken chain;?Its motto: "To the people!"
I dreamed that Charley took his bed,?With Hale for his physician;?His daily dose an old "unread?And unreferred" petition. [8]?There Hayes and Tuck as nurses sat,?As near as near could be, man;?They leeched him with the "Democrat;"?They blistered with the "Freeman."
Ah! grisly portents! What avail?Your terrors of forewarning??We wake to find the nightmare Hale?Astride our breasts at morning!?From Portsmouth lights to Indian stream?Our foes their throats are trying;?The very factory-spindles seem?To mock us while they're flying.
The hills have bonfires; in our streets?Flags flout us in our faces;?The newsboys, peddling