A Poem

Written for the Celebration of the Fourth Anniversary of President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation

To P. A. BELL, Esq., A PIONEER IN THE INTELLECTUAL ELEVATION OF HIS RACE, THESE LINES ARE RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR



More than two centuries have passed
 Since, holding on their stormy way,
Before the furious wintry blast,
 Upon a dark December day,
Two sails, with different intent,
 Approached the Western Continent.
One vessel bore as rich a freight
 As ever yet has crossed the wave;
The living germs to form a State
 That knows no master, owns no slave.
She bore the pilgrims to that strand
 Which since is rendered classic soil,
Where all the honors of the land
 May reach the hardy sons of toil.
The other bore the baleful seeds
 Of future fratricidal strife,
The germ of dark and bloody deeds,
 Which prey upon a nation's life.
The trafficker in human souls
 Had gathered up and chained his prey,
And stood prepared to call the rolls,
 When, anchored in Virginia's Bay —
 His captives landed on her soil,
Defied the power of the throne,
 And bravely proved the people's might,
   When banded in a righteous cause,
   To overthrow oppressive laws.
'Twas then, when struggling at its birth,
 To take its proper place beside
The other Nations of the earth,
 The rule of justice was applied;
 And all mankind declared to be
 Inheritors of Liberty;
 With right to make their freedom known,
 By choosing rulers of their own.
But when it came t' enforce the right,
 Gained on the well-contested field,
Slavery's dark intrigues won the fight,
 And made victorious Freedom yield;
 Giving each place of power and trust,
 To those who, groveling in the dust,
 Seek to extend the giant crime
 Of Slavery through all coming time.
 The victory won at fearful cost,
 Over a mighty monarch's host,
 By which oppression's power seem'd foiled
   On the Atlantic's western shore,
 And those who through long years had toiled,
   The burden of the battle bore,
 In order that this land might be
 A home and refuge for the free,
 Were doomed to see their labor lost —
 Their victory won at fearful cost,
 Over oppression's mighty power,
 Surrendered in the trying hour;
 And made to strengthen slavery's hand,
 Ruling with iron rod the land.
 The power the warrior's hand had lost,
   The politician's skill restored;
 And slavery's votaries could boast
   Intrigue was mightier than the sword.
 But fraud and force in vain combined
 To check the progress of the mind;
 And every effort proved in vain
 T' enslave the cultivated brain.
 The same ideas the pilgrim's brought
   When first they crossed the wintry wave,
 Spreading throughout the land were fraught
   With light and freedom to the slave:
 And hence where slavery bore the rule,
 It labored to suppress the school,
 Muzzle the tongue, the press, the pen,
 As means by which the rights of men
 Might be discussed, and Freedom's light
 Break up the gloom of slavery's night.
 Efforts which, in a better cause
   Had brought their authors deathless fame,
 Were made to frame oppressive laws,
   And to arouse, excite, inflame,
 The vilest passions of the throng,
   And stir that bitter prejudice
 Which makes men blind to right and wrong,
   And opens wide that deep abyss
 Where pride of rank, and caste, and race,
   Have left such marks of bitter hate,
 As nought but time can e'er efface,
   To foment discord in the State.
   But vain their efforts to control
   The aspirations of the soul;
 For still a faithful few were found
   Who would not bend the servile knee,
 But in each conflict stood their ground,
   And boldly struck for Liberty.
 From year to year the contest grew,
   Till slavery, glorying in her strength,
 Again war's bloody falchion drew,
   And sluggish freedom, roused at length,
 Waked from her stupor, seized the shield,
 And called her followers to the field.
 And at that call they thronging came,
 With arms of strength, and hearts on flame;
 Answering the nation's call to arms,
 The northern hive poured forth its swarms;
 The lumbermen of Maine threw down
   The axe, and seized the bayonet;
 The Bay State's sons from every town,
   Left loom and anvil, forge and net;
 The Granite State sent forth its sons,
   With hearts as steadfast as her rocks;
 The stern Vermonters took their guns,
   And left to others' care their flocks;
 Rhode Island and Connecticut
   Helped to fill up New England's roll,
 And showed the pilgrim spirit yet
   Could animate the Yankee soul.
 The Empire State sent forth a host,
   Such as might seal an empire's fate;
 Even New Jersey held her post,
   And proved herself a Union State.
 The Key-Stone of the Union arch
   Sent forth an army true and tried;
Ohio joined the Union march,
 And added to the Nation's side
 A force three hundred thousand strong,
 While Michigan took up the song;
 Wisconsin also, like the lakes,
 When the autumnal gale awakes,
 And rolls its surges on the shore,
 Poured forth its sons to battle's roar.
 The gallant State of Illinois
 Sent forth in swarms its warlike boys.
 On Indiana's teeming plain,
 Thick as the sheaves of ripened grain,
 Were soldiers hurrying to the wars
 To battle for the Stripes and Stars.
From Iowa fresh numbers came,
 While Minnesota joined the tide,
And Kansas helped to spread the flame,
 And carry o'er the border side
 The torch the ruffians once applied
 When fiercely, but in vain, they tried
 The people of their rights to spoil,
 And fasten slavery on her soil.
From East unto remotest West,
 From every portion of the North,
The true, the bravest, and the best,
 Forsook their homes and sallied forth;
 And men from every foreign land
 Were also reckoned in that band.
 The Scandinavians swelled the train,
 The brave Norwegian, Swede, and Dane,
 And struck as though Thor rained his blows
 Upon the heads of haughty foes;
 Or Odin's self had sought the field
 To make all opposition yield.
Italia's sons, who once had cried
 Loud for united Italy,
And struck by Garibaldi's side
 For union and equality —
 Obtained another chance to fight
 For nationality and right.
The Germans came, a sturdy throng,
 And to the bleeding country brought
Friends of the right, foes of the wrong,
 Heroes in action as in thought,
Sigel, and Schurz, and many others,
 Whose names shall live among the brave,
Till all men are acknowledged brothers,
 Without a master or a slave.
Ireland's sons, as usual, came
 To battle strife with shouts of joy,
With Meagher and Corcoran won such fame
 As well might rival Fontenoy.
Briton and Frank, for centuries foes,
 Forgot their struggles, veiled their scars,
To deal on slavery's head their blows,
 Fighting beneath the Stripes and Stars.
From the Atlantic's stormy coast,
 Unto the broad Pacific's strand,
Came pouring forth a martial host,
 From every portion of the land.
They came, as flocking sea birds swarm,
 Whene'er the cloud-king mounts his throne
And calls the warriors of the storm
 To sweep the earth from zone to zone.
They came as come the rushing waves
 When o'er the sea the tempest raves.
 They came as storm clouds quickly fly
 When lightnings flash along the sky,
 And on the Southern plains afar
 Soon burst the thunderbolts of war.
 In quick and fierce succession fell
 The furious showers of shot and shell.
Though East, and West, and North combined,
 And foreigners from every land
With all that art and skill could find,
 They could not crush the rebel band.
They clung unto th' accursed thing,
 That which they knew accursed of God,
Nor strength, nor skill could victory bring
 With that accursed thing abroad.
When Abraham, the poor man's friend,
 Assumed the power to break the chain.
Shall have the shield of equal laws.
Wipe out the errors of the past,
Nursed by the barbarous pride of caste,
And o'er the nation's wide domain,
Where once was heard the clanking chain,
And timorous bondmen crouched in fear,
Before the brutal overseer,
Proclaim the truth that equal laws
Can best sustain the righteous cause;
And let this nation henceforth be
In truth the country of the free.