The lips which should have kiss'd away
Her daughter's tears, dealt curses forth;
The hand which should have been her stay,
Was but the minister of wrath;
Blind to her wants, deaf to her prayers,
Regardless of the driving storm,
To open streets and midnight airs,
She drove that little shrinking form,
To earn a dram! In shame and scorn
With famished lips to cry, "Hot corn!"
"Hot corn, hot corn!"—night after night,
More faint and feeble grew that voice—
Still fiercely burned each glaring light,
Still music bade the town rejoice;
The ceaseless footsteps passed along,
Up came the wild discordant tones,
The voices of the thoughtless throng,—
The bounding wheels rolled o'er the stones,—
But midst the din, the rush, the roar,
Poor Katy's cry is heard no more.
In one of those dark, noisome cells,
The wretched call their home, she lies
All motionless; the icy spells
Of death, have closed those weary eyes;
She speaks not now. Alas! how dread!
That calm reproachful silence, when
Beside the wronged and injured dead,
We kneel in vain! Low in that den
Behold the stricken mother cower;
Grown sober in one fearful hour.
She calls her, "Katy, darling!"—peers
Into that pale and sunken face,
She bathes her senseless brow with tears,
Sees on those bruised limbs, the trace
Of her own cruelty;—again
She calls, and prays for one last word,
Of blest forgiveness;—all in vain,
The answering voice no more is heard,
The soulless clay alone is there,
And fell remorse, and dark despair.
Weep, wretched woman, weep! That face
Shall haunt thee to thy dying day;
Nor time from memory erase
Thy child's deep wrongs; for they
Shall scorch into thy guilty breast;
In mad excitement thou shalt hear
Her cries; and midst thy fitful rest,
Shall that pale phantom form appear,
And o'er thy drunken moping, stand
To curse thee with an outstretched hand.
Yet not alone with thee, abides
That curse. Oh, Men, and Christians! can
Ye robe yourself in god-like pride,
And boast your land, the one where man
Is most exalted; yet permit
The Demon Drunkenness to roam
Unfettered through your streets; to sit
By ev'ry corner, ev'ry home—
The weak and wretched to allure
To drink, to suffer, and endure?
In mercy, then, arrest the reign
Of this dread fiend; and Oh! protect
Man from his self-inflicted pain.
Spare the young wife, whose hopes are wreck'd,
Whose heart is crushed, whose home forsaken,
Whose life's a desolated wild.
To infant prayers and tears awaken,
And from the mother save the child.
Hark to that echo!—"Save, oh, save!"
Pleads a sad voice from Katy's grave.
"Pleads a sad voice from Katy's grave—
Save, oh, save!"
Fathers! mothers! sons! daughters! husbands! wives! Christians! philanthropists! All—brothers and sisters!—hear ye that voice? If ye do not, then, indeed, are ye deaf. Then have I cried in vain. In vain I have visited the abodes of wretchedness and sin, to draw materials for my panorama of "Life Scenes in New York." In vain I have painted you dark scenes of life, instead of those which shine out in the noonday sun.