Strike-for your altars and your fires Strike for the green graves of your sires; They fought-like brave men, long and well; Bleeding at every vein. His few surviving comrades saw Like flowers at set of sun. Come to the bridal chamber, Death! That close the pestilence are broke, With banquet-song, and dance, and wine;And thou art terrible,-the tear, The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier; But to the hero, when his sword Has won the battle for the free, The thanks of millions yet to be. Of sky and stars to prison'd men; Thy grasp is welcome as the hand When the land-wind, from woods of palm, Bozzaris! with the storied brave She wore no funeral weeds for thee, Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume, Like torn branch from death's leafless tree, In sorrow's pomp and pageantry, The heartless luxury of the tomb. But she remembers thee as one Long loved, and for a season gone; For thee her poet's lyre is wreath'd, Her marble wrought, her music breath'd; For thee she rings the birth-day bells; Of thee her babes' first lisping tells; For thine her evening prayer is said At palace couch, and cottage bed; Her soldier, closing with the foe, Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow; His plighted maiden, when she fears For him, the joy of her young years, Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears. And she, the mother of thy boys, Though in her eye and faded cheek Is read the grief she will not speak, The memory of her buried joys,And even she who gave thee birth,Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth, Talk of thy doom without a sigh: For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's,One of the few, the immortal names That were not born to die. JAMES GATES PERCIVAL. Born at Berlin, Conn: 1795-died 1856. IT IS GREAT FOR OUR COUNTRY TO DIE. O! IT is great for our country to die, where ranks are contending: Bright is the wreath of our fame; glory awaits us for aye, Glory, that never is dim, shining on with light never ending Glory that never shall fade, never, O! never away. O! it is sweet for our country to die! How softly reposes Warrior youth on his bier, wet by the tears of his love, Wet by a mother's warm tears; they crown him with garlands of roses, Weep, and then joyously turn, bright where he triumphs above. Not to the shades shall the youth descend who for country hath perish'd; Hebe awaits him in heaven, welcomes him there with her smile; There, at the banquet divine, the patriot spirit is cherish'd; Gods love the young who ascend pure from the funeral pile. Not to Elysian fields, by the still, oblivious river; Not to the isles of the blest, over the blue, rolling sea; But on Olympian heights shall dwell the devoted for ever; There shall assemble the good, there the wise, valiant, and free. O! then, how great for our country to die, in the front rank to perish, Firm with our breast to the foe, Victory's shout in our ear! Long they our statues shall crown, in songs our memory cherish; We shall look forth from our heaven, pleased the sweet music to hear. THE CORAL GROVE. DEEP in the wave is a coral grove, Where the purple mullet and gold-fish rove; Their boughs, where the tides and billows flow; For the winds and waves are absent there, The fan-coral sweeps through the clear, deep sea, And is safe, when the wrathful spirit of storms When the wind-god frowns in the murky skies, Through the bending twigs of the coral grove. MARIA GOWEN BROOKS. Born at Medford, Mass: 1795-died 1845. SONG. DAY, in melting purple dying! Thou, to whom I love to hearken, Save thy toiling! spare thy treasure! Tell to thee the high-wrought feeling, Paint to thee the deep sensation, Yet but torture, if comprest In a lone, unfriended breast. Absent still! Ah! come and bless me! |