Cleveland morning leader. [volume] (Cleveland [Ohio]) 1854-1865, 1859-01-15

Green the memory forever be r
Of the Judge of the old Theocracy, ais b.
Whom even his errors glori6ed,
Like far-seen, sunlit mountain side,
By the cloudy shadows which o'er it glide
Honor and praise 10 the Puritan
Who the halting step of his age outran,
And, seeing the infinite worth of man
In the priceless gift the Father gave,
In the infinite love that stopped to save,
Dared not brand his brother slave
Who doth such wrong he w6s wont to say
In his own quaint picture loving way,
Filings up to Heaven hand-grenade
Which God shall cast down upon his head"
Widely as Heaven and Hell contrast I'D.
That brave old jurist of the past
And the curDing trickster and knaye Of courts .
Who the holy features of Truth distorts,
Ruling as right the will of the strong,
Poverty, crime, and weakness wrong;
Wide-eared 10 power to the wronged and weak
Deaf as Egypt's gods of leek;
Scof6ng aside, at party s nod,
Order of Nature and law of God; y
For whose dsbbled ermine respect were waste,
Reverence folly, and awe misplaced ~
Justice of whom 'twere vain to seek
As IRON Koordish robber or Syrian Sheik
Oh leave the wretch to his bribes and sins,
Let him rot in the web of lies he spins -
To the sanity soul fthe early dag,
To the Christian judge let us turn and say:
Glory to God for the Puritan!" ,,
see, far southward, this quiet day,
The bills OF Newbury rolling away
With the many tints of the season gay,
Dreamily blending, in autumn mist,
Umber, and gold, and amethyst
Long and low with dwarf trees crowned,
Plum Island lies like a whale aground,
A stones toss over the narrow sound.
Inland as far as the eve can 20,
The hills curve round like bended bow
silver arrow from out them sprung
l see the shine of the QuasycuDg;
And round aud round, our valley and hill,
Old roads winding, as old roads will,
Here to ferry, and there to mill. f
And, gimpses of chimneys and gabled caves
Through green elm arches and maple leaves
Old homesteats, sacred to all that can
GLADDEN. or sadden the heart of man,
Over whose thresholds of oak and stone
Life and death have come and gone
There pictured tiles in the fireplace show,
Great beams sag from the ceiling low,
The dresser glitters with polished wares,
The long clock ticks on the foot-Worn stairs -a1
And the low, broad chimney shows the crack
By the earthquake made century back.
Up from their midst springs the village spire
With the crest of its cock in the snn afire;
Beyond are orchards and planting lands,
And great salt marshes and glimmeIing sands,
And, where North and South the coast-lines run
The blink of the sea, in breeze and SUM-
see it aIllike chart unrolled,
But my thoughts are full of the past and old
bear the tales OF my bOyhcod told
And the shadows and shapes of early days l
Fit dimly by in the vailing haze tnl
With measured movement and rhythmic chime,
Weaving. ike shuttles my web Of rhyme.
think of the old man, wise and good,
Who once on yOn misty hillsides stood,
"a poet who never measured rhyme,
A seer unknown to his dull-eared time,)
And, propped on his staff of age, looked down,
With his boyhood's love, on his native town.
Where, written as if on its hills and plains, 5a
His burden OF prophecy yet remains,
For the voices of wood, and wave and wind,
To read in the ear of the musing mind
"As long as Plum Island, to guard the coast,
As God appointed, shall keep its post
As long as a salmon shall haunt the deep @
OF Merrimac river, or sturgeon leapi 1ia
As long as pickerel, swift and SLIM
Or red backed perch, In Crane Pond swim;
As long as the animal sea fowl know 5a
Their time to come and their time to go;
As long as cattle shall roam at will
The green grass meadows by Turkey hill;
As long as sheep shall look from the side
Of 0ldtoWn hill on marshes wide,
And Parker river, and salt sea tide; 11
As long as a wandering pigeon shall search
The field below from his white-osk perch,
Where the barley harvest is ripe and shorn,
And the dry husks fall from the standing corn d.
As long as Nature shall not grow old,
Nor drop her work from her doting hold,
And her care for the Indian corn forget,
And the yellow rows in pairs TO SET
So long shall Christians here be born,
Grow up and ripen as Gods sweet corn - led
By the beak of bird. by the breath of frost
Shall never holy ear be lost.
But, husked by Death inthe Planters sight,
Be sown again in the fields Of light :"
The island still is purple with plums,
Up the river the salmon comes,
The sturgeon leaps, and the wild fowl feeds
On hillside berries and marish seeds
All the beautiful signs remain; 4
From spring g-tine sowing to autumn rain
The good mans vision returns again
And let Us hope, as well we can,
That7he Silent gel who garners man,
May find some grain as Of old be found
In the human corniield ripe and sound,
That still, with sunshine, and rain, and dew,
Forever old and forever new, rrerrtrr f-rrs-
The Lord Of the Harvest deigps to own
seed by the fathers soWn 81 |
81 a. JOIN g. WHITTIER.