With eyes upraised, as one inspired,
Pale Melancholy sat retired;
And, from her wild, sequestered seat,
In notes, by distance made more sweet,
Poured through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And, dashing soft from rocks around
Bubbling runnels joined the sound;
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole,
Or, o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay,
Round a holy calm diffusing,
Love of peace, and lonely musing,
In hollow murmurs died away.
But O! how altered was its sprightlier tone,
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue,
Her bow across her shoulder flung,
Her buskins gemmed with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung!—
The hunter's call to Faun and Dryad known!
The oak-crowned Sisters and their chaste-eyed Queen,
Satyrs and Sylvan Boys, were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys green:
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear;
And Sport leaped up, and seized his beechen spear.
Last came Joy's ecstatic trial:
He, with viny crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand addrest:
But soon he saw the brisk, awakening viol,
Whose sweet, entrancing voice he loved the best.
They would have thought, who heard the strain,
They saw, in Tempé's vale, her native maids,
Amidst the festal-sounding shades,
To some unworried minstrel dancing;
While, as his flying fingers kissed the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round:—
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound;—
And he, amidst his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odors from his dewy wings.
W. Collins.
CCIII.
NEW ENGLAND.
Hail to the land whereon we tread,
Our fondest boast;
The sepulchre of mighty dead,
The truest hearts that ever bled,
Who sleep on glory's brightest bed,
A fearless host:
No slave is here—our unchained feet
Walk freely, as the waves that beat
Our coast.
Our fathers crossed the ocean's wave
To seek this shore;
They left behind the coward slave
To welter in his living grave;—
With hearts unbent, and spirits brave,
They sternly bore
Such toils as meaner souls had quelled;
But souls like these, such toils impelled
To soar.
Hail to the acorn, when first they stood.
On Bunker's height,
And, fearless stemmed the invading flood,
And wrote our dearest rights in blood,
And mowed in ranks the hireling brood,
In desperate fight!
O! 't was a proud, exulting day,
For even our fallen fortunes lay
In light.
There is no other land like thee,
No dearer shore;
Thou art the shelter of the free;
The home, the port of liberty
Thou hast been, and shalt ever be,
Till time is o'er.
Ere I forget to think upon
Thy land, shall mother curse the son
She bore.
Thou art the firm unshaken rock,
On which we rest;
And rising from thy hardy stock,
Thy sons the tyrant's frown shall mock,
And slavery's galling chains unlock,
And free the oppressed:
All, who the wreath of freedom twine,
Beneath the shadow of their vine
Are blest.