Page images
PDF
EPUB

Fall the keen and burning lashes, never on his back

or limb;

Scarce with look or word of censure, turns the driver unto him.

Yet, his brow is always thoughtful, and his eye is hard and stern;

Slavery's last and humblest lesson, he has never deigned to learn.

And, at evening, when his comrades dance before their master's door,

Folding arms and knitting forehead, stands he silent evermore.

God be praised for every instinct which rebels against a lot,

Where the brute survives the human, and man's upright form is not!

As the serpent-like bejuco winds his spiral fold on fold,

Round the tall and stately ceiba, till it withers in his hold;

Slow decays the forest monarch, closer girds the fell embrace,

Till the tree is seen no longer, and the vine is in its place

So a base and bestial nature, round the vassal's manhood twines,

And the spirit wastes beneath it, like the ceiba choked with vines.

God is Love, saith the Evangel; and our world of woe and sin

Is made light and happy only, when a Love is shining in.

Ye whose lives are free as sunshine, finding where soe'er ye roam,

Smiles of welcome, looks of kindness, making all the world like home;

In the veins of whose affections, kindred blood is but a part,

Of one kindly current throbbing from the universal heart;

Can ye know the deeper meaning of a lore in Slavery nursed,

Last flower of a lost Eden, blooming in that Soil accursed?

Love of Home, and Love of Woman !--dear to all, but doubly dear

To the heart whose pulses elsewhere measure only

hate and fear.

All around the desert circles, underneath a brazen

sky,

Only one green spot remaining where the dew is never dry!

From the horror of that desert, from its atmosphere of hell,

Turns the fainting spirit thither, as the diver seeks his bell.

"Tis the fervid tropic noontime; faint and low the sea-waves beat;

Hazy rise the inland mountains through the glimmer of the heat,—

Where, through mingled leaves and blossoms ar rowy sunbeams flash and glisten,

Speaks her lover to the slave girl, and she lifts her head to listen ::

"We shall live as slaves no longer! Freedom's hour is close at hand!

Rocks her bark upon the waters, rests the boat upon the strand!

"I have seen the Haytien Captain; I have seen his swarthy crew,

Haters of the pallid faces, to their race and color

true.

"They have sworn to wait our coming till the night has passed its noon,

And the gray and darkening waters roll above the sunken moon!"

Oh! the blessed hope of freedom! how with joy and glad surprise,

For an instant throbs her bosom, for an instant beam her eyes!

But she looks across the valley, where her mother's hut is seen,

Through the snowy bloom of coffee, and the lemon leaves so green.

And she answers, sad and earnest: "It were wrong for thee to stay;

God hath heard thy prayer for freedom, and his finger points the way.

"Well I know with what endurance, for the sake of me and mine,

Thou hast borne too long a burden, never meant for souls like thine.

"Go; and at the hour of midnight, when our last farewell is o'er,

Kneeling on our place of parting, I will bless thee from the shore.

"But for me, my mother, lying on her sick bed all the day,

Lifts her weary head to watch me, coming through the twilight gray.

"Should I leave her sick and helpless, even free. dom, shared with thee,

Would be sadder far than bondage, lonely toil, and stripes to me.

"For my heart would die within me, and my brain would soon be wild:

I should hear my mother calling through the twilight for her child!"

Blazing upward from the ocean, shines the sun of morning time,

Through the coffee-trees in blossom, and green hedges of the lime.

Side by side, amidst the slave gang, toil the lover and the maid;

Wherefore looks he o'er the waters, leaning for ward on his spade?

Sadly looks he, deeply sighs he: 'tis the Haytien's sail he sees,

Like a white cloud of the mountains, driven sea ward by the breeze!

But his arm a light hand presses, and he hears a low voice call:

Hate of Slavery, hope of Freedom, Love is mightier than all.

THE CRISIS.

WRITTEN ON LEARNING THE TERMS OF THE TREATY WITH MEXICO.

ACROSS the Stony Mountains, o'er the desert's drouth and sand,

The circles of our empire touch the Western Ocean's strand;

From slumberous Timpanogos, to Gila, wild and free,

Flowing down from Neuva Leon to California's

sea;

And from the mountains of the East, to Santa Rosa's shore,

[ocr errors]

The eagles of Mexitli shall beat the air no more.

O Vale of Rio Bravo! Let thy simple children weep;

Close watch about their holy fire let maids of Pecos keep;

Let Taos send her cry across Sierra Madre's pines, And Algodones toll her bells amidst her corn and vines;

For lo! the pale land-seekers come, with eager eyes of gain,

Wide scattering, like the bison herds on broad Salada's plain.

Let Sacramento's herdsmen heed what sound, the winds bring down,

Of footsteps on the crisping snow, from cold Neveda's crown!

Full hot and fast the Saxon rides, with rein of travel slack,

And, bending o'er his saddle, leaves the sunrise at his back;

« PreviousContinue »