“Read it out, daddy; read the piece. Why, it was written just for us, I do declare. It is called ‘The Kansas Emigrants.’ We are Kansas Emigrants, aren’t we?”
The father smiled kindly as he looked at the flushed face and bright eyes of his boy, and took from him the paper folded to show the verses. As he read, his eyes, too, flashed and his lip trembled.
“Listen to this!” he cried. “Listen to this! It is like a trumpet call!” And with a voice quivering with emotion, he began the poem,––
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“We cross the prairie as of old The pilgrims crossed the sea, To make the West, as they the East, The homestead of the free!” |
“Something has got into my eyes,” said Mr. Howell, as the last stanza was read. “Great Scott! though, how that does stir a man’s blood!” And he furtively wiped the moisture from his eyes. It was time to put out the light and go to sleep, for the night now was well advanced. But Mr. Bryant, thoroughly aroused, read and re-read the lines aloud.
In Camp at Quindaro. The Poem of “The Kansas Emigrants.”
“Sing ’em,” said his brother-in-law, jokingly. Bryant was a good singer, and he at once tuned up with a fine baritone voice, recalling a familiar tune that fitted the measure of the poem.