New England's Dead
New England's dead! New England's dead!
On every hill they lie;
On every field of strife, made red
By bloody victory.
Each valley, where the battle poured
Its red and awful tide,
Beheld the brave New England sword
With slaughter deeply dyed.
Their bones are on the northern hill,
And on the southern plain,
By brook and river, lake and rill,
And by the roaring main.
The land is holy where they fought,
And holy where they fell;
For by their blood that land was bought,
The land they loved so well,
Then glory to that valiant band,
The honored saviours of the land!
O, few and weak their numbers were,--
A handful of brave men;
But to their God they gave their prayer,
And rushed to battle then.
The God of battles heard their cry,
And sent to them the victory.
They left the ploughshare in the mold,
Their flocks and herds without a fold,
The sickle in the unshorn grain,
The corn, half-garnered, on the plain,
And mustered, in their simple dress,
For wrongs to seek a stern redress,
To right those wrongs, come weal, come woe,
To perish, or o'ercome their foe.
And where are ye, O fearless men?
And where are ye to-day?
I call:--the hills reply again
That ye have passed away;
That on old Bunker's lonely height,
In Trenton, and in Monmouth ground,
The grass grows green, the harvest bright
Above each soldier's mound.
The bugle's wild and warlike blast
Shall muster them no more;
An army now might thunder past,
And they heed not its roar.
The starry flag, 'neath which they fought
In many a bloody day,
From their old graves shall rouse them not,
For they have passed away.
The Lion
In the Mahouna mountain, in the Haracta glen,
The summons of the Sheik is out- Come forth, ye bearded men!
In African defiles, in jungle, in ravine,
Shadow'd by cork-tree forests and by the olives green,
The torrent-brook of Ouled is bare with torrid heat-
Its gravelly bed is trampled by the lion's mighty feet.
Come forth, ye Arab tribesmen, the hunter and the scout!
The signal-fires are blazing o'er all the cliffs about;
Put off the sandals from the feet, the bournous from the limb,
For silent must your pathway be, thro' dell and desert grim.
Stand fast together, side by side, with levell'd gun and lance;
The foe lurks in the thickest shade, where never sunbeams glance.
This slope upon the mountain-side leads precipitously down-
Leads down to where the brook pours out its waves of turbid brown;
It is the lion's pathway, and here he comes to drink,
With bristling mane and tawny hide, along the grassy brink,
See! all around the trees are torn, and seam'd and scarr'd the bark;
'Tis here his angry iron claws leave their terrific mark;
Here, in the yellow sand, he wallow'd in the heat,
And here upon the pebbles, the impress of his feet,
Then let the bravest and the best, in compact order stand.
The weak may hide where forests their spreading boughs expand.
Here in these desert places no other life may be,
The wild boar and the jackal turn from the haunt and flee;
The panther in the thicket feeds on jackal and the hare;
This desert is the lion's home, the monarch's royal lair;
From hence, when stars are out, he gallops to the plain,
Beneath the herdsman's very beard the cattle spoil to gain.
Stand fast, it is the midnight; the earth is hid in gloom;
No howls of wolves, no low of ox across the silence boom;
No flash of watch-fire, and no light from distant shepherd's tent
To scare the prowling monster, in lurid gleams are sent.
Stand fast! There is a sound! Is it the rising breeze
That murmureth complainingly far thro' the bending trees?
It is the lion's trample, and see, in single file
The tawny beasts! And as they come they lash their flanks the while:
Their luminous bright eyes are of a fiery red;
They snuff the tainted air, they stride with heavy tread.
Now firm your arm and true your aim, for life is on the cast,
Nor break your ranks to flee, for that moment were your last;
Full on the shaggy head discharge the leaden hail;
Alas! it glances harmless, as from a coat of mail.
One roar, one hollow roar! as from a thunderous sky;
The raging beast is on them now- they tremble and they fly.
He snaps the bone, he tears the flesh, and many a victim dies,
Ere, pierc'd with balls, upon the earth the bleeding monarch lies!
Long Island in Late October
October's flaming banners, of purple and of gold,
O'er all the bowery woodland, are flauntingly unroll'd;
From his o'er-brimming urn red Autumn pours his dyes
O'er all thy realm, Long Island, from clouds that sail the skies.
They woods of elm and chestnut, so emerald-green ere-while,
Now glow with brightest blushes, suffus'd with Autumn's smile.
The maples of the uplands are flush'd with royal red,
And robes and garlands golden o'er the pasture-oaks are spread;
The sumacs by the roadside now wear a scarlet crown,
The bayberry bushes by the beach are clad in russet brown;
The apple orchards, late despoil'd of all their ruddy globes,
Tinet with the frost are all array'd in varicolor'd robes;
And low in swamps and thickets of cedar and of pine
The woodbines redden, and the lithe, high-clambering grape-vine.
And there the village children come, the purpling grapes to glean,
Whose clusters load the alders that o'er the streamlets lean.
The grass of summer uplands, where far the sheep-flock strays,
The bush-grass of the meadows, where wading cattle graze,
So green erewhile, are wither'd now, and thro' their thin brown leaves
The sorrowful breeze is sighing, like one in pain that grieves.
The bubbling brook, whose currents glide through banks of living green,
So clear that in the crystal depths the spotted trout were seen,
Creeps brown and turbid now, all chok'd with foliage sere-
A clouded mirror now, erewhile transparent clear;
Nor more the angler comes with tapering rod to sweep
The brook or limpid pond where dark tree-shadows creep.
I stand high up a hillside, where, far as eye may reach,
Stretch out fair woods and fields, and the sandy yellow beach;
The harvest crops are garner'd, the fields lie brown and bare,
The thresher's flail in distant barns resounds upon the air;
I hear the cowboy's call, the whistle of the bird,
And all the joyous sounds of rural life are heard.
I hear the piping quail and the gunner's weapon ring,
And see the startled coveys burst forth upon the wing;
I hear far overhead, in the upper realms of air,
The honking of wild geese, as onward swift they fare;
And in the salt bay meadows I see the fowler's boat,
I hear his gun, I see the smoke above his ambush float;
I see the platoons of the coot, the squadrons of the brant,
And hovering black-ducks, the shallow coves that haunt,
The shelldrake and the broad-bill, and all the feather'd flocks
Which haunt the open bays and wheel o'er ocean rocks.
Fair scenes, bright scenes, enchanting scenes! that fill
The heart with o'erflowing joy, and all the life pulses thrill,
So fair in all your autumn pomp, in all your summer green,
When woods are bright, skies full of light, and waters smile serene!
