Where lies the land to which the ship would go?
Far, far ahead, is all her seamen know.
And where the land she travels from? Away,
Far, far behind, is all that they can say.
Arthur Hugh Clough.
INTERLEAVES
For Home and Country
"Such is the patriot's boast, where'er we roam?
His first, best country ever is at home."
This is the proud claim of Goldsmith's "Traveller," and the same passionate loyalty to the soil inspires all these poems of Fatherland. The Scotsman's heart is in the Highlands, the birthplace of valor, the country of worth; the English warrior boasts of his country:
"And o'er one-sixth of all the earth, and over all the main,
Like some good Fairy, Freedom marks and blesses her domain;"
the Irish Minstrel-boy tears the chords of his faithful harp asunder lest they sound in the service of the foe, while the quick, alarming Yankee drum in Bret Harte's "Reveille" calls upon each freeman to defend the land of the pilgrim's pride, land where his fathers died.
Religion, war, and glory were the three souls of a perfect Christian knight, says Lamartine, and if Death's couriers, Fame and Honor, summon us to the field,