“The hour of freedom! come it must.
O, hasten it in mercy, Heaven!
When all who grovel in the dust
Shall stand erect, their fetters riven.”
Or the 7th, by Mrs. Follen:—
“‘What mean ye, that ye bruise and bind
My people,’ saith the Lord;
‘And starve your craving brother’s mind,
That asks to hear my word?’”
Or the 102d, by Mrs. Chapman:—
“Hark! hark! to the trumpet call,—
‘Arise in the name of God most high!’
On ready hearts the deep notes fall,
And firm and full is the strong reply:
‘The hour is at hand to do and dare!
Bound with the bondmen now are we!
We may not utter the patriot’s prayer,
Or bend in the house of God the knee!’”
Or that stirring song, by Mr. Garrison:—
“I am an Abolitionist;
I glory in the name.”
The singing of such hymns and songs as these was like the bugle’s blast to an army ready for battle. No one seemed unmoved. If there were any faint hearts amongst us, they were hidden by the flush of excitement and sympathy.
In 1838 or 1839 Mrs. Chapman, assisted by her sisters, the Misses Weston, and Mrs. Child, commenced the publication of The Liberty Bell. A volume with this title was issued annually by them for ten or twelve years, especially for sale at the yearly antislavery fair. These volumes were full of poetry in prose and verse. The editors levied contributions upon the true-hearted of other countries besides our own, and enriched their pages with articles from the pens of all the above-named, and from Whittier, Pierpont, Lowell, Longfellow, Phillips, Quincy, Clarke, Sewall, Adams, Channing, Bradburn, Pillsbury, Rogers, Wright, Parker, Stowe, Emerson, Furness, Higginson, Sargent, Jackson, Stone, Whipple, our own countrymen and women; and Bowring, Martineau, Thompson, Browning, Combe, Sturge, Webb, Lady Byron, and others, of England; and Arago, Michelet, Monod, Beaumont, Souvestre, Paschoud, and others, of France. It would not be easy to find elsewhere so full a treasury of mental and moral jewels.
The names of most of our illustrious American poets appear in The Liberty Bell more or less frequently. To all of them we were and are much indebted. James Russell Lowell was never, I believe, a member of the Antislavery Society. He was seldom seen at our meetings. But his muse rendered us essential services. His poems—“The Present Crisis,” “On the Capture of Fugitive Slaves near Washington,” “On the Death of Charles T. Torrey,” “To John G. Palfrey,” and especially his “Lines to William L. Garrison,” and his “Stanzas sung at the Antislavery Picnic in Dedham, August 1, 1843”—committed him fully to the cause of freedom,—the cause of our enslaved countrymen.