Burlington free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1827-1865, 1844-09-20
ii O NJ Z

There is something in the word home, that
wakes the kindlicst feelings of the heart 1t is
not merely friends and kindred that render that
place SO dear, but the very hills and rocks and
rivulets throw a charm around the place of ones
nativity. 1t is TO wonder that the ofiest harps
have been tuned to sing of home, sweet home.'
The rose that doomed in the garden where one
has wandered in early years, a thoughtless
child, careless in innocence, is lovely in its
bloom, and oveler in its decay. No songs are
sweet like those we heard among the boughs
that shade a parents dwelling, when the morn
ing or the evening hour found US gay as the
birds that warblcd over us. No waters are
bright like the clear silver streams that wind
among the tlower-decked knobs where IN child.
hood we have often strayed TO pluck the violet,
or the lilly, or to Irvine garland for some loved
school-mate. We may wander away, and min
gle in the worlds fierce strife and form new
associations anG friendships, and fancy we have
almost forgotten the land of our birth; but at
some evening hour, as we listen perchance to
the autumn winds, the remembrance of other
days comes over the soul, and fancy bears us
back to chiIdhoods scenes, and We roam arain
the old familiar haunts, and press the hands of
companions long since cold in the grave-and
listen to voices we shall hear on earth no more.
1t is then feeling of melancholy steals over us,
which, like Ossian's music, is pleasant, though
mournful to the soul. The Swiss General
who leads his army into a foreign land, must
not suffer the sweet airs Of Switzerland to be
sung in the hearing of his soldiers for at the
thrilling sound they would leave the camp, and
fly away to their own green hills. The Ari.
can torn from his wiIow-braided hut, and
borne away to the land of charters and of chains,
weeps as he thinks of home, and signs and pines
tor the cocoa land beyond the waters of the sea.
Years may have passed over him, and strfes
and toll may have crushed his spirits-all his
kindred may have found graves upon the coras
OF the ocean; yet were he free, how soon would
he seek the shores and skies of his boyhood
dreams. The New England mariner-amid
the lcebergs of the northern seas, or breathing
the spicy gales of the evergreen Isles, or coast.
ing along the shore of the Pacific, though the
hand of time may have blanched his raven locks,
and care have ploughed deep burrows on his
brow, and his heart have been chilled by the
storms of ocean, till the fountains of his love
had almost ceased to gush with the heavenly
current-yet, upon some summers evening, as
he looks out upon the sun sinking behind the
western wave, he will think of home, and his
heart will yearn for the loved of other DAYS, and
his tears flow like the summer rain. How does
the heart of the wanderer, after long years OF
absence, beat, and his eyes fill, as he catches a
glimpse OF the hills of his nativity and when
he has pressed the lip of a mother or a sister,
how soon does he hasten to see if the garden,
and the orchard and the stream, look as in DAYS
gone by! We may find climes as beautiful,
and skies as bright, and friends as devoted but
that will not usurp the place of Home.
There is one spot where none will sigh for
home. The flowers that blossom there will
never fade the crystal waters that wind along
those verdant wales will never cease to send up
their heavenly music; the clusters hanging
from trees overshadowing its banks will be i'm
mortal clusters and the friends that meet, will
meet forever