| |
| O MOTHER EARTH! upon thy lap | |
| Thy weary ones receiving, | |
| And o’er them, silent as a dream, | |
| Thy grassy mantle weaving, | |
| Fold softly in thy long embrace | 5 |
| That heart so worn and broken, | |
| And cool its pulse of fire beneath | |
| Thy shadows old and oaken. | |
| |
| Shut out from him the bitter word | |
| And serpent hiss of scorning; | 10 |
| Nor let the storms of yesterday | |
| Disturb his quiet morning. | |
| Breathe over him forgetfulness | |
| Of all save deeds of kindness, | |
| And, save to smiles of grateful eyes, | 15 |
| Press down his lids in blindness. | |
| |
| There, where with living ear and eye | |
| He heard Potomac’s flowing, | |
| And, through his tall ancestral trees, | |
| Saw autumn’s sunset glowing, | 20 |
| He sleeps, still looking to the west, | |
| Beneath the dark wood shadow, | |
| As if he still would see the sun | |
| Sink down on wave and meadow. | |
| |
| Bard, Sage, and Tribune! in himself | 25 |
| All moods of mind contrasting,— | |
| The tenderest wail of human woe, | |
| The scorn like lightning blasting; | |
| The pathos which from rival eyes | |
| Unwilling tears could summon, | 30 |
| The stinging taunt, the fiery burst | |
| Of hatred scarcely human! | |
| |
| Mirth, sparkling like a diamond shower, | |
| From lips of life-long sadness; | |
| Clear picturings of majestic thought | 35 |
| Upon a ground of madness; | |
| And over all Romance and Song | |
| A classic beauty throwing, | |
| And laurelled Clio at his side | |
| Her storied pages showing. | 40 |
| |
| All parties feared him: each in turn | |
| Beheld its schemes disjointed, | |
| As right or left his fatal glance | |
| And spectral finger pointed. | |
| Sworn foe of Cant, he smote it down | 45 |
| With trenchant wit unsparing, | |
| And, mocking, rent with ruthless hand | |
| The robe Pretence was wearing. | |
| |
| Too honest or too proud to feign | |
| A love he never cherished, | 50 |
| Beyond Virginia’s border line | |
| His patriotism perished. | |
| While others hailed in distant skies | |
| Our eagle’s dusky pinion, | |
| He only saw the mountain bird | 55 |
| Stoop o’er his Old Dominion! | |
| |
| Still through each change of fortune strange | |
| Racked nerve, and brain all burning, | |
| His loving faith in Mother-land | |
| Knew never shade of turning; | 60 |
| By Britain’s lakes, by Neva’s tide, | |
| Whatever sky was o’er him, | |
| He heard her rivers’ rushing sound, | |
| Her blue peaks rose before him. | |
| |
| He held his slaves, yet made withal | 65 |
| No false and vain pretences, | |
| Nor paid a lying priest to seek | |
| For Scriptural defences. | |
| His harshest words of proud rebuke, | |
| His bitterest taunt and scorning, | 70 |
| Fell fire-like on the Northern brow | |
| That bent to him in fawning. | |
| |
| He held his slaves; yet kept the while | |
| His reverence for the Human; | |
| In the dark vassals of his will | 75 |
| He saw but Man and Woman! | |
| No hunter of God’s outraged poor | |
| His Roanoke valley entered; | |
| No trader in the souls of men | |
| Across his threshold ventured. | 80 |
| |
| And when the old and wearied man | |
| Lay down for his last sleeping, | |
| And at his side, a slave no more, | |
| His brother-man stood weeping, | |
| His latest thought, his latest breath, | 85 |
| To Freedom’s duty giving, | |
| With failing tongue and trembling hand | |
| The dying blest the living. | |
| |
| Oh, never bore his ancient State | |
| A truer son or braver! | 90 |
| None trampling with a calmer scorn | |
| On foreign hate or favor. | |
| He knew her faults, yet never stooped | |
| His proud and manly feeling | |
| To poor excuses of the wrong | 95 |
| Or meanness of concealing. | |
| |
| But none beheld with clearer eye | |
| The plague-spot o’er her spreading, | |
| None heard more sure the steps of Doom | |
| Along her future treading. | 100 |
| For her as for himself he spake, | |
| When, his gaunt frame upbracing, | |
| He traced with dying hand ‘Remorse!’ | |
| And perished in the tracing. | |
| |
| As from the grave where Henry sleeps, | 105 |
| From Vernon’s weeping willow, | |
| And from the grassy pall which hides | |
| The Sage of Monticello, | |
| So from the leaf-strewn burial-stone | |
| Of Randolph’s lowly dwelling, | 110 |
| Virginia! o’er thy land of slaves | |
| A warning voice is swelling! | |
| |
| And hark! from thy deserted fields | |
| Are sadder warnings spoken, | |
| From quenched hearths, where thy exiled sons | 115 |
| Their household gods have broken. | |
| The curse is on thee,—wolves for men, | |
| And briers for corn-sheaves giving! | |
| Oh, more than all thy dead renown | |
| Were now one hero living! | 120 |
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