Freemen, on! The drums are beating!
Will you shrink from such a meeting?
Forward! Give them hero greeting!
From your hearths, and homes, and altars,
Backward hurl your proud assaulters.
He is not a man that falters.
Hush! The hour of fate is nigh,
On the help of God rely!
Forward! We will do or die.
G. Hamilton.
CCCXXX.
THE VOICE OF THE NORTH.
Up the hill-side, down the glen,
Rouse the sleeping citizen:
Summon out the might of men!
Like a lion growling low-Like
a night-storm rising slow-Like
the tread of unseen foe—
It is coming—it if nigh!
Stand your homes and altars by,
On your own free threshold die.
Clang the bells in all your spires,
On the gray hills of your sires
Fling to heaven your signal-fires.
Oh! for God and duty stand,
Heart to heart and hand to hand,
Round the old grates of the land.