THE CONSTITUTION AND THE UNION.

21

Thy human children shall restore thy grace

Gone with thy fallen pines ;
The wild, barbaric beauty of thy face

Shall round to classic lines !

And Order, Justice, Social Law shall curb

Thy untamed energies ;
And Art and Science, with their dreams superb,

Replace thine ancient ease.

The marble sleeping in thy mountains now,

Shall live in sculpture rare;
Thy native oak shall crown the sago's brow-

Thy bay, the poet's hair.

Thy tawny hills shall bleed their purple wine,

Thy valleys yield their oil ;
And Music, with her eloquence divine,

Persuade thy sons to toil;

Till Hesper, as he trims his silver beam,

No happier land shall see,
And earth shall find her old Arcadian dream

Restored again in thee!

THE CONSTITUTION AND THE UNION.- DANIEL WEBSTER.

For myself, I propose, Sir, to abide by the principles and the purposes which I have avowed, I shall stand by the Union, and by all who stand by it. I shall do justice to the whole country, according to the best of my ability, in all I say, and act for the good of the whole country in all I do. I mean to stand upon the Constitution. I need no other platform. I shall know but one country.

The ends I aim at shall be my country's, my God's, and Truth's. I was born an American; I will live an American; I shall die an American; and I intend to perform the duties incumbent upon me in that character to the end of my career. I mean to do this, with the absolute disregard of personal consequences.

What are personal consequences? What is the individual man, with all the good or evil that may betide him, in comparison with the good or evil which may befall a great country in a crisis like this, and in the midst of great transactions which concern that country's fate? Let the consequences be what they will. I am careless. · No man can suffer too much, and no man can fall too soon, if he suffer or if he fall in defense of the liberties and Constitution of his country.

OUR COUNTRY-E. D. BAKER.

[Extract from the speech of Senator Baker, at the great Union Mass Meeting in New York City, after the fall of Fort Sumter.]

The majesty of the people is here to-day to sustain the majesty of the Constitution, and I come, a wanderer from the far Pacific, to record my oath along with yours of the great Empire State. The hour for conciliation has passed, the gathering for battle is at hand; and the country requires that every man shall do his duty. Fellow-citizens, what is that country? Is it the soil on which we tread ? Is it the gathering of familiar faces? Is it our luxury and pomp and pride? Nay, more than these, is it power and inight and majesty alone? No, our country is more, far more than all these. The country which demands our love, our courage, our devotion, our hearts' blood, is more than all these—our country is the history of our fathers—our country is the tradition of our mothers-our country is past renown-our country is present pride and power-our country is future hope and destiny --our country is greatness, glory, truth, constitutional libertyabove all, freedom forever! These are the watchwords under which we fight; and we will shout them out till the stars appear in the sky, in the stormiest hour of battle. I have said that the hour for conciliation is past. It may return; but not to-morrow, nor next week. It will return when that tattered flag is avenged. It will return when the rebel traitors are taught obedience and submission. It will return when the rebellious Confederates are taught that the North, though peaceable, are not cowardly

THE REVEILLE.

23

though forbearing, are not fearful. That hour of conciliation will come back when again the ensign of the Republic will stream over every rebellious fort of every Confederate State. Then, as of old, the ensign of the pride and power, and dignity and majesty, and the peace of the Republic will return.

THE UNION.-OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

Has our love all died out? Have its altars grown cold?
Has the curse come at last which the fathers foretold ?
Then nature must teach us the strength of the chain,
That her petulant children would sever in vain.
They may fight till the buzzards are gorged with their spoil,
Till the harvest grows black as it rots in the soil,
Till the wolves and the catamounts troop from their caves,
And the shark tracks the pirate, the lord of the waves;
In vain is the strifel When its fury is past,
Their fortunes must flow in one channel at last;
As the torrents, that rush from the mountains of snow,
Roll mingled in peace through the valleys below.
Our Union is river, lake, ocean, and sky,
Man breaks not the medal when God cuts the die!
Though darkened with sulphur, though cloven with steel,
The blue arch will brighten, the waters will heal!

THE REVEILLE.FRANK BRET HARTE,

HARK! I hear the tramp of thousands,

And of armed men the hum;
Lo, a nation's hosts have gathered
Round the quick alarming drum-

Saying " Come,

Freemen, come!
"Ere your heritage be wasted," said

The quick alarming drum.

"Let me of my heart take counsel;

War is not of Life the sum;
Who shall stay and reap the harvest
When the autumn days shall come ?"

But the drum

Echoed “Come! Death shall reap the braver harvest," said

The solemn-sounding drum.

“But when won the coming battle,

What of profit springs therefrom! What if conquest—subjugationEven greater ills become ?

But the drum

Answered “Come!
You must do the sum to prove it!" said

The Yankee-answering drum.

“What if, mid the cannon's thunder,

Whistling shot and bursting bombWhen my brothers fall around meShould my heart grow cold and numbļu

But the drum

Answered " Come,
Better then in death united, than in

Life a recreant-Come !"

Thus they answered-hoping, fearing,

Some in faith, and doubting some,
Till a trumpet-voice proclaiming,
Said, “My chosen people, come !"

Then the drum

Lol was dumb,
For the great heart of the nation,

Throbbing, answered, “Lord, we come !"

THE OLD CONTINENTALS.

25

THE OLD CONTINENTALS.--GUY HUMPHREY MCMASTER

In their ragged regimentals
Stood the old Continentals,

Yielding not,
When the Grenadiers were lunging,
And like hail fell the plunging

Cannon-shot;
When the files

Of the isles,
From the smoky night encampment, bore the banner of the rampant

Unicorn,
And grummer, grummer, grummer rolled the roll of the drummer,

Through the morn!

Then with eyes to the front all,
And with gụns horizontal,

Stood our sires;
And the balls whistled deadly,
And in streams flashing redly

Blazed the fires;
As the roar

On the sliore,
Swept the strong battle-breakers o'er the green-sodded acres

of the plain;
And louder, louder, louder, cracked the black gunpowder,

Cracking amain!

Now like smiths at their forges
Worked the red St. George's

Cannoniers;
And the "villainous saltpetre”
Rang a fierce, discordant metre

Round their ears;
As the swift

Storm-drift,
With hot sweeping anger, came the horse-guards' clangor

On our flanks.
Then higher, higher, higher, burned the old-fashioned fire

Through the ranks!