An' God wun't leave us yit to sink or swim, Ef we don't fail to du wut's right by him. This land o' ourn, I tell ye, 's gut to be A better country than man ever see. I feel my sperit swellin' with a cry Thet seems to say, "Break forth an' prophesy!" O strange New World, thet yit wast never young, Whose youth from thee by gripin' need was wrung, Brown foundlin' o' the woods, whose baby-bed Was prowled roun' by the Injuns' cracklin' tread, An' who grew'st strong thru shifts an' wants an' pains, Nussed by stern men with empires in their brains, Who saw in vision their young Ishmel strain With each hard hand a vassal ocean's I put some thoughts thet bothered me in rhyme: I hain't hed time to fairly try 'em on, But here they be—it's JONATHAN TO JOHN. IT don't seem hardly right, John, Thet's fit for you an' me!" Blood ain't so cool as ink, John; It's likely you'd ha' wrote, An' stopped a spell to think, John, Arter they'd cut your throat? Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess He'd b'longed to ole J. B., Ef I turned mad dogs loose, John, Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess, "Thet, ef Vattell on his toes 'Twould kind o' rile J. B., Who made the law thet hurts, John, "J. B." was on his shirts, John, Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess, For ganders with J. B., No more than you or me!" When your rights was our wrong, John, You didn't stop for fuss, Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess, We ain't so weak an' poor, John, "The surest plan to make a Man Our folks believe in Law, John: Ole Uncle S. sez he, "I guess, But now should my guests be merry, the house is in holiday guise, Looking out, through its burnished windows like a score of welcoming eyes. Come hither, my brothers who wander in saintliness and in sin! Come hither, ye pilgrims of Nature! my heart doth invite you in. My wine is not of the choicest, yet bears it an honest brand; And the bread that I bid you lighten I break with no sparing hand; But pause, ere you pass to taste it, one act must accomplished be: Salute the flag in its virtue, before ye sit down with me. The flag of our stately battles, not struggles of wrath and greed: Its stripes were a holy lesson, its spangles a deathless creed; 'Twas red with the blood of freemen, and white with the fear of the foe, And the stars that fight in their courses 'gainst tyrants its symbols know. Come hither, thou son of my mother! we were reared in the selfsame arms; Thou hast many a pleasant gesture, thy mind hath its gifts and charms, But my heart is as stern to question as mine eyes are of sorrows full: Salute the flag in its virtue, or pass on where others rule. Thou lord of a thousand acres, with heaps of uncounted gold, The steeds of thy stall are haughty, thy lackeys cunning and bold: I envy no jot of thy splendor, I rail at thy follies none: Salute the flag in its virtue, or leave my poor house alone. Fair lady with silken trappings, high waving thy stainless plume, We welcome thee to our numbers, a flower of costliest bloom: Let a hundred maids live widowed to furnish thy bridal bed; But pause where the flag doth question, and bend thy triumphant head. Take down now your flaunting banner, for a scout comes breathless and pale, With the terror of death upon him; of failure is all his tale: "They have fled while the flag waved o'er them! they have turned to the foe their back! They are scattered, pursued, and slaughtered! the fields are all rout and wrack!" Pass hence, then, the friends I gathered, a goodly company! All ye that have manhood in you, go, perish for Liberty! But I and the babes God gave me will wait with uplifted hearts, With the firm smile ready to kindle, and the will to perform our parts. When the last true heart lies bloodless, when the fierce and the false have won, I'll press in turn to my bosom each daughter and either son; Bid them loose the flag from its bearings, and we'll lay us down to rest With the glory of home about us, and its freedom locked in our breast. JULIA WARD HOWE. THE WASHERS OF THE SHROUD. ALONG a river-side, I know not where, I walked one night in mystery of dream; A chill creeps curdling yet beneath my hair, To think what chanced me by the pallid gleam Of a moor-wraith that waned through haunted air. Pale fire-flies pulsed within the meadow mist Their halos, wavering thistle-downs of light; The loon, that seemed to mock some goblin tryst, No wrinkled crones were they, as I had deemed, But fair as yesterday, to-day, to-morrow, To mourner, seemed: lover, poet, ever Something too high for joy, too deep for sorrow, Thrilled in their tones, and from their faces gleamed. "Still men and nations reap as they have strawn;" So sang they, working at their task the while; "The fatal raiment must be cleansed ere dawn; For Austria? Italy? the Sea-Queen's Isle ? O'er what quenched grandeur must our shroud be drawn? "Or is it for a younger, fairer corse, That gathered States for children round his knees, That tamed the wave to be his posting-horse, Feller of forests, linker of the seas, Bridge-builder, hammerer, youngest son of Thor's? "What make we, murmur'st thou, and what are we? When empires must be wound, we bring the shroud, The time-old web of the implacable Three: Is it too coarse for him, the young and proud? Earth's mightiest deigned to wear it; why not he?" "Is there no hope?" I moaned. "So strong, so fair! Our Fowler, whose proud bird would brook erewhile No rival's swoop in all our western air! Gather the ravens, then, in funeral file For him, life's morn-gold bright yet in his hair! "Three roots bear up dominion: Knowledge, Will; These twain are strong, but stronger yet the third — Obedience, 'tis the great tap-root, that still, Knit round the rock of Duty, is not stirred, Though Heaven - loosed tempests spend their utmost skill. "Is the doom sealed for Hesper? 'Tis not we Denounce it, but the Law before all time: |