II
Whence comes this cold to Freedom's claim? we know
Only too well,—from creatures of the King,
Who had dragged Hell of every poisonous thing
And, through our country, had spread waste and woe.
Beaten at last, they flocked like carion crow,
On the dead body of their will to sting,
Which drifting Northward, and enlargening,
Loomed Dante's Nimrod, 'mid the Arctic snow.
There, with the reptile's hate of Man Upright,
As God created him, and reptiles veins,
Aflow with deaths cold blood—for that sustains
The life of tyrant and of parasite—
This monster, though half sunk in Hell, remains
High, still, above the Arctic's shuddering night.