368 CLIFTON.
These well repay me to have dared the deep, That I might look upon them.
So farewell !
I give thee thanks for all thy kindly words, And deeds of hospitality to me, A simple stranger. Thou art wonderful, With thy few leagues of billow-beaten rock, Lifting thy trident o er the farthest seas, And making to thyself in every zone Some tributary. Thou, whose power hath struck The rusted links from drooping Afric s neck, And bade thy winged ships in utmost seas Be strong to rescue all her kidnapped race, Bend the same eagle eye and lion heart To mercy s work beneath thine Indian skies, And in the bowels of thine own dark mines, And where the thunder of the loom is fed By childhood s misery, and where the moan Of him, who fain would labor if he might, Swells into madness for his famished babes, Bow down thy coronet and search for them, Healing their ailments with an angel s zeal ; Till all, who own thy sceptre s sway, be known By the free smile upon their open brow, And on their fervent lip a Christian s praise.
And now, farewell, Old England,
I should grieve
Much at the thought to see thy face no more, But that my beckoning home doth seem so near
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