Or, raining in the summer's wind
In flakes of burning red,
The wild rose sprinkles with its leaves
The turf where ounce they bled!
Yea, when the frowning bulwarks
That guard this holy strand
Have sunk beneath the trampling surge
In beds of sparkling sand,
While in the waste of ocean
One hoary rock shall stand,
Be this its tstest legyend,—
HERE Was THE PILGRIW’s LAND!
THE STEAMBOAT
See how yon flaming herald treads
The ridged and rolling waves,
As, crashing o'er their crested heads,
She bows her surly slaves!
With foam before and fire behind,
She rends the clinging sea,
That flies before the roaring wind,
Beneath her hissing lee.
The morning spray, like sea-born flowers,
With heaped and glistening bells,
Falls round her fast, in ringing showers,
With every wave that swells;
And, burning o'er the midnight deep,
In lurid fringes thrown,
The living gems of ocean sweep
Along her flashing zone.
With clashing wheel and lifting keel,
And smoking torch on high,
When winds are loud and billows reel,
She thunders foaming by;
When seas are silent and serene,
With even beam she glides,
The sunshine glimmering through the ocean green
That skirts her gleaming sides.
Now, like a wild nymph, far apart
She veils her shadowy form,
The beating of her restless heart
Still sounding through the storm;
Now answers, like a courtly dame,
The reddening surges o'er,
With flaying scarf of spangled flame,
The Pharos of the shore.
To-night you pilot shall not sleep,
Who trims his narrowed sail;
To-night you frigate scarce shall keep
Her broad breast to the gale;
And many a foresail, scooped and strained,
Shall break from yard and stay,
Before this smoky wreath has stained
The rising mist of day.
Hark! hark! I hear you whistling shroud,
I see you quivering mast;
The black throat of the hunted cloud
Is panting forth the blast!
An hour, and, whirled like winnowing chaff,
The giant surge shall fling
His tresses o'er yon pennon staff,
White as the sea-bird's wing!
Yet rest, ye wanderers of the deep;
Nor wind nor wave shall tire
Those fleshless arms, whose pulses leap
With floods of living fire;
Sleep on, and, when the morning light
Streams o'er the shining bay,
Oh think of those for whom the night
Shall never wake in day!
LEXINGTON
SLtowny the mist o’er the meadow was
creeping,
Bright on the dewy buds glistened the
sun,
When from his couch, while his children
were sleeping,
Rose the bold rebel and shouldered his
gun,
Waving her golden veil
Over the silent dale,
Blithe looked the morning on cottage and
aspire;
Hushed was his parting sigh,
While from his noble eye
Flashed the last sparkle of liberty’s fire.
On the smooth green where the fresh leaf
is springing
Calmly the first-born of glory have met;
Hark! the death-yolley around them is
ringing }
Look! with their life-blood the young
grass is wet!
Faint is the feeble breath,
Murmuring low in death,
- Tell to our sons how their fathers have
died;”
