| |
| AND still her gray rocks tower above the sea | |
| That murmurs at their feet, a conquered wave; | |
| ’T is a rough land of earth and stone and tree, | |
| Where breathes no castled lord or cabined slave; | |
| Where thoughts and tongues and hands are bold and free, | 5 |
| And friends will find a welcome, foes a grave; | |
| And where none kneel, save when to Heaven they pray, | |
| Nor even then, unless in their own way. | |
| |
| Theirs is a pure republic, wild, yet strong, | |
| A “fierce democracie,” where all are true | 10 |
| To what themselves have voted—right or wrong— | |
| And to their laws, denominated blue | |
| (If red, they might to Draco’s code belong); | |
| A vestal state, which power could not subdue, | |
| Nor promise win,—like her own eagle’s nest, | 15 |
| Sacred,—the San Marino of the west. | |
| |
| A justice of the peace, for the time being, | |
| They bow to, but may turn him out next year: | |
| They reverence their priest, but, disagreeing | |
| In price or creed, dismiss him without fear: | 20 |
| They have a natural talent for foreseeing | |
| And knowing all things; and should Park appear | |
| From his long tour in Africa, to show | |
| The Niger’s source, they ’d meet him with—We know. | |
| |
| They love their land, because it is their own, | 25 |
| And scorn to give aught other reason why; | |
| Would shake hands with a king upon his throne, | |
| And think it kindness to his majesty; | |
| A stubborn race, fearing and flattering none. | |
| Such are they nurtured, such they live and die: | 30 |
| All—but a few apostates, who are meddling | |
| With merchandise, pounds, shillings, pence, and peddling. * * * * * | |
| Hers is not Tempe’s nor Arcadia’s spring, | |
| Nor the long summer of Cathayan vales, | |
| The vines, the flowers, the air, the skies, that fling | 35 |
| Such wild enchantment o’er Boccaccio’s tales | |
| Of Florence and the Arno; yet the wing | |
| Of life’s best angel, Health, is on her gales | |
| Through sun and snow, and in the autumn time | |
| Earth has no purer and no lovelier clime. | 40 |
| |
| Her clear, warm heaven at noon,—the mist that shrouds | |
| Her twilight hills,—her cool and starry eves, | |
| The glorious splendor of her sunset clouds, | |
| The rainbow beauty of her forest leaves, | |
| Come o’er the eye, in solitude and crowds, | 45 |
| Where’er his web of song her poet weaves; | |
| And his mind’s brightest vision but displays | |
| The autumn scenery of his boyhood’s days. | |
| |
| And when you dream of woman, and her love, | |
| Her truth, her tenderness, her gentle power; | 50 |
| The maiden, listening in the moonlight grove; | |
| The mother, smiling in her infant’s bower; | |
| Forms, features, worshipped while we breathe or move, | |
| Be, by some spirit of your dreaming hour, | |
| Borne, like Loretto’s chapel, through the air | 55 |
| To the green land I sing, then wake; you ’ll find them there. * * * * * | |
| |
