Labor and Reform, vol 3, part 5 | Page 6

the autumn tempests blow;?Where, through gray and rolling vapor,?From evening unto morn,?A thousand boats are hailing,?Horn answering unto horn.
Hurrah! for the Red Island,?With the white cross on its crown?Hurrah! for Meccatina,?And its mountains bare and brown!?Where the Caribou's tall antlers?O'er the dwarf-wood freely toss,?And the footstep of the Mickmack?Has no sound upon the moss.
There we'll drop our lines, and gather?Old Ocean's treasures in,?Where'er the mottled mackerel?Turns up a steel-dark fin.?The sea's our field of harvest,?Its scaly tribes our grain;?We'll reap the teeming waters?As at home they reap the plain.
Our wet hands spread the carpet,?And light the hearth of home;?From our fish, as in the old time,?The silver coin shall come.?As the demon fled the chamber?Where the fish of Tobit lay,?So ours from all our dwellings?Shall frighten Want away.
Though the mist upon our jackets?In the bitter air congeals,?And our lines wind stiff and slowly?From off the frozen reels;?Though the fog be dark around us,?And the storm blow high and loud,?We will whistle down the wild wind,?And laugh beneath the cloud!
In the darkness as in daylight,?On the water as on land,?God's eye is looking on us,?And beneath us is His hand!?Death will find us soon or later,?On the deck or in the cot;?And we cannot meet him better?Than in working out our lot.
Hurrah! hurrah! the west-wind?Comes freshening down the bay,?The rising sails are filling;?Give way, my lads, give way!?Leave the coward landsman clinging?To the dull earth, like a weed;?The stars of heaven shall guide us,?The breath of heaven shall speed!?1845.
THE LUMBERMEN.
WILDLY round our woodland quarters?Sad-voiced Autumn grieves;?Thickly down these swelling waters?Float his fallen leaves.?Through the tall and naked timber,?Column-like and old,?Gleam the sunsets of November,?From their skies of gold.
O'er us, to the southland heading,?Screams the gray wild-goose;?On the night-frost sounds the treading?Of the brindled moose.?Noiseless creeping, while we're sleeping,?Frost his task-work plies;?Soon, his icy bridges heaping,?Shall our log-piles rise.
When, with sounds of smothered thunder,?On some night of rain,?Lake and river break asunder?Winter's weakened chain,?Down the wild March flood shall bear them?To the saw-mill's wheel,?Or where Steam, the slave, shall tear them?With his teeth of steel.
Be it starlight, be it moonlight,?In these vales below,?When the earliest beams of sunlight?Streak the mountain's snow,?Crisps the boar-frost, keen and early,?To our hurrying feet,?And the forest echoes clearly?All our blows repeat.
Where the crystal Ambijejis?Stretches broad and clear,?And Millnoket's pine-black ridges?Hide the browsing deer?Where, through lakes and wide morasses,?Or through rocky walls,?Swift and strong, Penobscot passes?White with foamy falls;
Where, through clouds, are glimpses given?Of Katahdin's sides,--?Rock and forest piled to heaven,?Torn and ploughed by slides!?Far below, the Indian trapping,?In the sunshine warm;?Far above, the snow-cloud wrapping?Half the peak in storm!
Where are mossy carpets better?Than the Persian weaves,?And than Eastern perfumes sweeter?Seem the fading leaves;?And a music wild and solemn,?From the pine-tree's height,?Rolls its vast and sea-like volume?On the wind of night;
Make we here our camp of winter;?And, through sleet and snow,?Pitchy knot and beechen splinter?On our hearth shall glow.?Here, with mirth to lighten duty,?We shall lack alone?Woman's smile and girlhood's beauty,?Childhood's lisping tone.
But their hearth is brighter burning?For our toil to-day;?And the welcome of returning?Shall our loss repay,?When, like seamen from the waters,?From the woods we come,?Greeting sisters, wives, and daughters,?Angels of our home!
Not for us the measured ringing?From the village spire,?Not for us the Sabbath singing?Of the sweet-voiced choir,?Ours the old, majestic temple,?Where God's brightness shines?Down the dome so grand and ample,?Propped by lofty pines!
Through each branch-enwoven skylight,?Speaks He in the breeze,?As of old beneath the twilight?Of lost Eden's trees!?For His ear, the inward feeling?Needs no outward tongue;?He can see the spirit kneeling?While the axe is swung.
Heeding truth alone, and turning?From the false and dim,?Lamp of toil or altar burning?Are alike to Him.?Strike, then, comrades! Trade is waiting?On our rugged toil;?Far ships waiting for the freighting?Of our woodland spoil.
Ships, whose traffic links these highlands,?Bleak and cold, of ours,?With the citron-planted islands?Of a clime of flowers;?To our frosts the tribute bringing?Of eternal heats;?In our lap of winter flinging?Tropic fruits and sweets.
Cheerly, on the axe of labor,?Let the sunbeams dance,?Better than the flash of sabre?Or the gleam of lance!?Strike! With every blow is given?Freer sun and sky,?And the long-hid earth to heaven?Looks, with wondering eye!
Loud behind us grow the murmurs?Of the age to come;?Clang of smiths, and tread of farmers,?Bearing harvest home!?Here her virgin lap with treasures?Shall the green earth fill;?Waving wheat and golden maize-ears?Crown each beechen hill.
Keep who will the city's alleys?Take the smooth-shorn plain';?Give to us the cedarn valleys,?Rocks and hills of Maine!?In our North-land, wild and woody,?Let us still have part?Rugged nurse and mother sturdy,?Hold us to thy heart!
Oh, our free hearts beat the warmer?For thy breath of snow;?And our tread is all the firmer?For thy rocks below.?Freedom, hand in hand with labor,?Walketh strong and brave;?On the forehead of his neighbor?No man writeth Slave!
Lo, the day breaks! old Katahdin's?Pine-trees show its fires,?While from these dim forest