NEW ENGLAND'S DEAD.

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over our boyish heads, except that its mighty folds are wider, and its glittering stars increased in number.

The sons of New England are found in every State of the broad republic! In the East, the South, and the unbounded West, their blood mingles freely with every kindred current. We have but changed our chamber in the paternal mansion. In all its rooms we are at home, and all who inhabit it are our brothers. To us the Union has but one domestic hearth. Its household's gods are all the same. Upon us, then, peculiarly devolves the duty of feeding the fires upon that kindly hearth; of guarding with pious care those sacred household gods.

We can not do with less than the whole Union. To us it admits of no division. In the veins of our children flow Northern and Southern blood. How shall it be separated? Who shall put asunder the best affections of the heart, the noblest instincts of our nature? We love the land of our adoption; so do we that of our birth. Let us ever be true to both; and ever exert ourselves in maintaining the unity of our country, the integrity of the republic.

Accursed, then, be the hand put forth to loosen the golden cord of union! Thrice accursed the traitorous lips that shall propose its severance! But no! the Union can not be dissolved. Its fortunes are too brilliant to be marred; its destinies too powerful to be resisted. And when, a century hence, this city shall have filled her golden horns— when within her broad-armed port shall be gathered the products of the industry of freemen,-when galleries of art and halls of learning shall have made classic this mart of trade, -then may the sons of the Pilgrims, still wandering from the bleak hills of the North, stand upon the banks of the Great River and exclaim, with mingled pride and wonder, Lo! this is our country. When did the world ever behold

so great and glorious a republic?

Ex. CXXXVIII.-NEW ENGLAND'S DEAD.

ISAAC MCLELLAN.

NEW England's dead! New England's dead!

On every hill they lie;

On every field of strife, made red

By bloody victory.

Each valley where the battle poured
Its red and awful tide,

Beheld the brave New England sword
With slaughter deeply dyed.
Their bones are on the northern hill,
And on the southern plain;
By brook and river, lake and rill,
And by the roaring main.

The land is holy where they fought,
And holy where they fell;

For by their blood that land was bought-
The land they loved so well.
Then glory to that gallant band,
The honored saviours of the land.

Ob, few and weak their numbers were,—
A handful of brave men;

But to their God they gave their prayer,
And rushed to battle then:
The God of battles heard their cry,
And sent to them the victory.

They left the ploughshare in the mould,
Their flocks and herds without a fold,
The sickle in the unshorn grain,
The corn, half-garnered, on the plain,
And mustered in their simple dress,
For wrongs to seek a stern redress;

To right those wrongs, come weal, come woe;
To perish, or o'ercome their foe.

And where are ye, oh fearless men?
And where are ye to-day?

I call the hills reply again

That ye have passed away.

That on old Bunker's lonely height,

In Trenton and on Monmouth's ground,

The grass grows green, the harvest bright,
Above each soldier's mound!

The bugle's wild and warlike blast
Shall muster them no more;

An army now might thunder past,
And they not heed its roar.

APPEAL TO THE REPUBLIC.

The starry flag 'neath which they fought
In many a bloody day,

From their old graves shall rouse them not,
For they have passed away.

217

Ex. CXXXIX.-APPEAL TO THE REPUBLIC.

JOSEPH STORY.*

WHEN we reflect on what has been, and is now, is it possible not to feel a profound sense of the responsibleness of this republic to all future ages? What vast motives press upon us for lofty efforts! What brilliant prospects invite

our enthusiasm! What solemn warnings at once demand our vigilance, and moderate our confidence!

We stand the latest, and, if we fail, probably the last experiment of self-government by the people. We have begun it under circumstances of the most auspicious nature. We are in the vigor of youth. Our growth has never been checked by the oppressions of tyranny. Our constitutions have never been enfeebled by the vices or luxuries of the old world. Such as we are, we have been from the beginning; simple, hardy, intelligent, accustomed to self-government and self-respect.

The Atlantic rolls between us and any formidable foe. Within our own territory, stretching through many degrees of latitude and longitude, we have the choice of many products, and many means of independence. The government is mild. The press is free. Religion is free. Knowledge reaches, or may reach, every home. What fairer prospect of success could be presented? What means more adequate to accomplish the sublime end? What more is necessary than for the people to preserve what they themselves have created? Already has the age caught the spirit of our institutions. It has already ascended the Andes, and snuffed the breezes of both oceans. It has infused itself into the life-blood of Europe, and warmed the sunny plains of France, and the low lands of Holland. It has touched the philosophy of Ger

*Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States; a distinguished jurist and writer on jurisprudence. Judge Story was a native of Massachusetts.

many and the North, and, moving onward to the South, has opened to Greece the lessons of her better days.

Can it be that America, under such circumstances, can betray herself? that she is to be added to the catalogue of republics, the inscription of whose ruins is, "They were, but they are not!" Forbid it, my countrymen; forbid it,

Heaven!

I call upon you, fathers, by the shades of your ancestors, by the dear ashes which repose in this precious soil, by all you are, and all you hope to be; resist every project of disunion; resist every encroachment upon your liberties; resist every attempt to fetter your consciences, or smother your public schools, or extinguish your system of public instruction.

I call upon you, mothers, by that which never fails in woman-the love of your offspring; teach them, as they climb your knees or lean upon your bosom, the blessing of liberty. Swear them at the altar, as with their baptismal vows, to be true to their country, and never to forget or forsake her.

I call upon you, young men, to remember whose sons you are-whose inheritance you possess. Life can never be too short, which brings nothing but disgrace and oppression. Death can never come too soon, if necessary in defence of the liberties of your country.

I call upon you, old men, for your counsel, your prayers and your benedictions. May your gray hairs not go down in sorrow to the grave, with the recollection that you have lived in vain. May your last sun not sink in the west upon a nation of slaves.

No! I read in the destiny of my country far better hopes, far brighter visions. We who are now assembled here, must soon be gathered to the congregation of other days. The time for our departure is at hand, to make way for our children upon the theatre of life. May God speed them and theirs. May he who at the distance of another century shall stand here to celebrate this day, still look round upon a free, happy and virtuous people. May he have reason to exult as we do! May he, with all the enthusiasm of truth as well as of poetry, exclaim that here is still his country

"Zealous, yet modest; innocent, though free;

Patient of toil; serene amidst alarms;
Inflexible in faith; invincible in arms.' "

THE FOUNDATION OF NATIONAL CHARACTER.

• 219

Ex. CXL.-NATIONAL RECOLLECTIONS THE FOUNDATION

OF NATIONAL CHARACTER.

EDWARD EVERETT.*

How is the spirit of a free people to be formed, and animated, and cheered, but out of the store-house of its historic recollections? Are we to be eternally ringing the changes upon Marathon and Thermopyla; and going back to read, in obscure texts of Greek and Latin, of the exemplars of patriotic virtue? I thank God that we can find them nearer home, in our own country, on our own soil; that strains of the noblest sentiment that ever swelled in the breast of man are breathing to us out of every page of our country's history, in the native eloquence of our mother tongue; that the colonial and provincial councils of America exhibit to us models of the spirit and character which gave Greece and Rome their name and their praise among nations. Here we ought to go for our instruction; the lesson is plain, it is clear, it is applicable. When we go to ancient history, we are bewildered with the difference of manners and institutions. We are willing to pay our tribute of applause to the memory of Leonidas, who fell nobly for his country in the face of his foe. But when we trace him to his home, we are confounded at the reflection, that the same Spartan heroism to which he sacrificed himself at Thermopylæ, would have led him to tear his own child, if it happened to be a sickly babe, the very object for which all that is kind and good in man rises up to plead, from the bosom of its mother, and carry it out to be eaten by the wolves of Taygetus. We feel a glow of admiration at the heroism displayed at Marathon, by the ten thousand champions of invaded Greece; but we can not forget that the tenth part of the number were slaves, unchained from the work-shops and door-posts of their masters, to go out and fight the battles of freedom. I do not mean that these examples are to destroy the interest with

* For many years Mr. Everett was best known among us as the statesman, the orator and the man of letters; but during the latter part of his life he added to these titles the far nobler one of a disinterested patriot. He contributed nearly one hundred thousand dollars, the proceeds of lectures and other literary labors, towards purchasing Washington's estate of Mount Vernon, together with the family tomb upon it, as a gift to the nation; and throughout the war of the Rebellion devoted his best energies and efforts to the advancement of the Union cause. He died in 1864, deeply lamented,