Narrative Poems, part 7, Bay of Seven Islands | Page 7

still the same.?If my young friends doubt that this?Is the robin's genesis,?Not in vain is still the myth?If a truth be found therewith?Unto gentleness belong?Gifts unknown to pride and wrong;?Happier far than hate is praise,--?He who sings than he who slays.
BANISHED FROM MASSACHUSETTS.
1660.
On a painting by E. A. Abbey. The General Court of Massachusetts enacted Oct. 19, 1658, that "any person or persons of the cursed sect of Quakers" should, on conviction of the same, be banished, on pain of death, from the jurisdiction of the common-wealth.
OVER the threshold of his pleasant home?Set in green clearings passed the exiled Friend,?In simple trust, misdoubting not the end.?"Dear heart of mine!" he said, "the time has come?To trust the Lord for shelter." One long gaze?The goodwife turned on each familiar thing,--?The lowing kine, the orchard blossoming,?The open door that showed the hearth-fire's blaze,--?And calmly answered, "Yes, He will provide."?Silent and slow they crossed the homestead's bound,?Lingering the longest by their child's grave-mound.?"Move on, or stay and hang!" the sheriff cried.?They left behind them more than home or land,?And set sad faces to an alien strand.
Safer with winds and waves than human wrath,?With ravening wolves than those whose zeal for God?Was cruelty to man, the exiles trod?Drear leagues of forest without guide or path,?Or launching frail boats on the uncharted sea,?Round storm-vexed capes, whose teeth of granite ground?The waves to foam, their perilous way they wound,?Enduring all things so their souls were free.?Oh, true confessors, shaming them who did?Anew the wrong their Pilgrim Fathers bore?For you the Mayflower spread her sail once more,?Freighted with souls, to all that duty bid?Faithful as they who sought an unknown land,?O'er wintry seas, from Holland's Hook of Sand!
So from his lost home to the darkening main,?Bodeful of storm, stout Macy held his way,?And, when the green shore blended with the gray,?His poor wife moaned: "Let us turn back again."?"Nay, woman, weak of faith, kneel down," said he,?And say thy prayers: the Lord himself will steer;?And led by Him, nor man nor devils I fear!?So the gray Southwicks, from a rainy sea,?Saw, far and faint, the loom of land, and gave?With feeble voices thanks for friendly ground?Whereon to rest their weary feet, and found?A peaceful death-bed and a quiet grave?Where, ocean-walled, and wiser than his age,?The lord of Shelter scorned the bigot's rage.?Aquidneck's isle, Nantucket's lonely shores,?And Indian-haunted Narragansett saw?The way-worn travellers round their camp-fire draw,?Or heard the plashing of their weary oars.?And every place whereon they rested grew?Happier for pure and gracious womanhood,?And men whose names for stainless honor stood,?Founders of States and rulers wise and true.?The Muse of history yet shall make amends?To those who freedom, peace, and justice taught,?Beyond their dark age led the van of thought,?And left unforfeited the name of Friends.?O mother State, how foiled was thy design?The gain was theirs, the loss alone was thine.
THE BROWN DWARF OF RUGEN.
The hint of this ballad is found in Arndt's Miirchen, Berlin, 1816. The ballad appeared first in St. Nicholas, whose young readers were advised, while smiling at the absurd superstition, to remember that bad companionship and evil habits, desires, and passions are more to be dreaded now than the Elves and Trolls who frightened the children of past ages.
THE pleasant isle of Rugen looks the Baltic water o'er,?To the silver-sanded beaches of the Pomeranian?shore;
And in the town of Rambin a little boy and maid?Plucked the meadow-flowers together and in the?sea-surf played.
Alike were they in beauty if not in their degree?He was the Amptman's first-born, the miller's?child was she.
Now of old the isle of Rugen was full of Dwarfs?and Trolls,?The brown-faced little Earth-men, the people without?souls;
And for every man and woman in Rugen's island?found?Walking in air and sunshine, a Troll was?underground.
It chanced the little maiden, one morning, strolled?away?Among the haunted Nine Hills, where the elves?and goblins play.
That day, in barley-fields below, the harvesters had?known?Of evil voices in the air, and heard the small horns?blown.
She came not back; the search for her in field and?wood was vain?They cried her east, they cried her west, but she?came not again.
"She's down among the Brown Dwarfs," said the?dream-wives wise and old,?And prayers were made, and masses said, and?Rambin's church bell tolled.
Five years her father mourned her; and then John?Deitrich said?"I will find my little playmate, be she alive or?dead."
He watched among the Nine Hills, he heard the?Brown Dwarfs sing,?And saw them dance by moonlight merrily in a?ring.
And when their gay-robed leader tossed up his cap?of red,?Young Deitrich caught it as it fell, and thrust it?on his head.
The Troll came crouching at his feet and wept for?lack of it.?"Oh, give me back my magic cap, for your great?head unfit!"
"Nay," Deitrich said; "the Dwarf who throws his?charmed cap away,?Must serve its finder at his will, and for his folly?pay.
"You stole my pretty Lisbeth, and hid her in the?earth;?And you shall ope