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And to the quarry of the slave Went hawking with our symbol-bird. On the oppressor's side was power; And yet I knew that every wrong. However old, however strong, But waited God's avenging hour.

I knew that truth would crush the lie,Somehow, some time, the end would be;

Yet scarcely dared I hope to see The triumph with my mortal eye.

But now I see it! In the sun

A free flag floats from yonder dome, And at the nation's hearth and home The justice long delayed is done.

Not as we hoped, in calm of prayer,

The message of deliverance comes, But heralded by roll of drums On waves of battle-troubled air!

'And still she walks in golden hours

Through harvest-happy farms,
And still she wears her fruits and flowers
Like jewels on her arms.

What mean the gladness of the plain,
This joy of eve and morn,
The mirth that shakes the beard of grain
And yellow locks of corn?

Ah! eyes may well be full of tears,
And hearts with hate are hot;
But even-paced come round the years,
And Nature changes not.

She meets with smiles our bitter grief,
With songs our groans of pain;
She mocks with tint of flower and leaf
The war-field's crimson stain.

Glad as a soul in pain, who hears from heaven

The angels singing of his sins forgiven, And, wondering, sees

His prison opening to their golden keys,

He rose a man who laid him down a slave,

Shook from his locks the ashes of the grave,

And outward trod
Into the glorious liberty of God.

He cast the symbols of his shame away; And, passing where the sleeping Milcho lay,

Though back and limb Smarted with wrong, he prayed, "God pardon him!"

So went he forth; but in God's time he came

To light on Uilline's hills a holy flame; And, dying, gave

The land a saint that lost him as a slave.

325

O dark, sad millions, patiently and dumb Waiting for God, your hour, at last, has

come,

And freedom's song

Breaks the long silence of your night of wrong!

Arise and flee! shake off the vile restraint

Of ages; but, like Ballymena's saint, The oppressor spare,

Heap only on his head the coals of prayer.

Go forth, like him! like him return again,

To bless the land whereon in bitter

pain

Ye toiled at first,

And heal with freedom what

ery cursed.

your slav

ANNIVERSARY POEM.

[Read before the Alumni of the Friends" Yearly Meeting School, at the Annual Meeting at Newport, R. I., 15th 6th mo., 1863.]

ONCE more, dear friends, you meet beneath

Already, on the sable ground

Of man's despair

Is Freedom's glorious picture found, With all its dusky hands unbound Upraised in prayer.

O, small shall seem all sacrifice

And pain and loss,

When God shall wipe the weeping eyes, For suffering give the victor's prize, The crown for cross!

AT PORT ROYAL.

THE tent-lights glimmer on the land,
The ship-lights on the sea;
The night-wind smooths with drifting
sand

Our track on lone Tybee.

At last our grating keels outslide,

Our good boats forward swing;
And while we ride the land-locked tide,
Our negroes row and sing.

For dear the bondman holds his gifts
Of music and of song:
The gold that kindly Nature sifts
Among his sands of wrong;

The power to make his toiling days

And poor home-comforts please; The quaint relief of mirth that plays With sorrow's minor keys.

Another glow than sunset's fire

Has filled the West with light, Where field and garner, barn and byre Are blazing through the night.

The land is wild with fear and hate,
The rout runs mad and fast;
From hand to hand, from gate to gate,
The flaming brand is passed.

The lurid glow falls strong across

Dark faces broad with smiles: Not theirs the terror, hate, and loss That fire yon blazing piles.

With oar-strokes timing to their song, They weave in simple lays

The pathos of remembered wrong, The hope of better days,

327

The triumph-note that Miriam sung, The joy of uncaged birds: Softening with Afric's mellow tongue Their broken Saxon words.

SONG OF THE NEGRO BOATMEN.

O, praise an' tanks! De Lord he come
To set de people free;

An' massa tink it day ob doom,
An' we ob jubilee.

De Lord dat heap de Red Sea waves
He jus’ as ’trong as den ;

He say de word: we las' night slaves;
To-day, de Lord's freemen.

De yam will grow, de cotton blow,
We'll hab de rice an' corn;
O nebber you fear, if nebber you
hear

De driver blow his horn!

Ole massa on he trabbels gone;
He leaf de land behind:
De Lord's breff blow him furder on,
Like corn-shuck in de wind.
We own de hoe, we own de plough,
We own de hands dat hold;
We sell de pig, we sell de cow,

But nebber chile be sold.

De yam will grow, de cotton blow,
We'll hab de rice an' corn:
O nebber you fear, if nebber you
hear

De driver blow his horn!

We pray de Lord: he gib us signs
Dat some day we be free;
De norf-wind tell it to de pines,

De wild-duck to de sea;
We tink it when de church-bell ring,
We dream it in de dream;

De rice-bird mean it when he sing,
De eagle when he scream.

De yam will grow, de cotton blow,
We'll hab de rice an' corn:
O nebber you fear, if nebber you
hear

De driver blow his horn!