Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1860-12-25
4QtOrtestGr Duly Spp.
a NEW POEM BY LoNGFEILow.
From the January Atlantic Monthly.
PAUL REVERE'S RIDE.

PAUL REVEBES RIDE.
Listen, my children, ami you shall hear
VI the midnight ride Of Paul Revere
On the eighteenth Of April, Seventy-fye.
Hardly man is now alive
W no remembers that famous day and year
He said to his friend-''If the British march
By land or sea from the town tonight
d lang a lantern aloit in the belfry-arch
Of the North Church tower, as a sigma l-Iight-
One II by land, and two by sea;
Ana on the opposite shore will be
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm
FOR the country-tolk to be up and to arm
Then he said goodnight and with inufHed oar
silently rowed to the Charlestown shore
JusJ as the moon rose over the bav
" mere swinging wide at her moorinps Law
Inc Somerset, British man-u f-war:
phantom ship, with each mast and spar
Across the moon, like prison-bar.
ANA huge, black hulk, that was magnifed
By Its own reflection in the tide.
Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street
Manders and watches with eager ears
III IL the silence around him he hears
Inc muster of men at the barrack-door
l ne sound OF arms, aud the tramp of feet
ANA the measured tread of the gIenadiers
Marching down to their boats on the shore.
Then he climbed to the tower of the church
Up the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread
10 the beliry chamber overhead
And startled the pigeons from their perch
On the sombre raltcrs, that round him made
Masses and moving shapes Of shade
Up the lgnt ladder, slender and tall.
10 the highest window in the wall
Where he paused to listen and look down
moment on the roofs of the town,
And the moonlight flowing over all
Beneath in the churchyard, lay the dead
In their night encampment on the hill
wrapped III silence deepand still.
That he could hear, like sentine's tread
The watchtul night-wind, as il went
Creeping along from tent to tent,
And seeming TO whisper, "All is Well"
moment only he feels the spell
fthe place and the hour, and the secret dread
Ofthe lonely belfry and the dead;
For suddenly all his thoughts are bent
on a shadOwy something far away,
Where the river widens to meet the bay
line of black that bends and floats
On the rising tide, like bridge ofboats.
Meanwhile impatient to mount and ride,
Booted and spurred with heavy stride,
On the opposite SIDE walked Paul Revere
Now be pated his horses side,
Now he gazed on the landscape far and near
Then lmpetuons stamped the earth,
And turned and frightened his saddle-girth;
But mostly he watched with eager search
The belfry-tower of the old North Church,
AS 1t rose above the graves the hill,
Lonely and spectral, sombre and still.
And 10! as he looks, on the befry's height
a glimmer, and then CLEAN Of light!
lie springs to the saddle, the bride he turns,
But fingers and gazes, till full on his sight
second lamp in the belfry burns.
a hurry of hoofs in village street,
A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark
And beneath from the pebbles in passing, a spark
Struck out by steed that flies fearless and fleet:
That was all! And yet through the gloom and the
light,
The fate of nation was riding that night:
And the spark struck out by that eteed, in his
flight,
Kindled the land into flame with its heat
1t was twelve by the village clock,
When he crossed the bridge into AIedford town.
He heard the growing of the cock.
And the barking of the farmers dog,
And felt the damp of the riyer-fOg,
mat rises when the sun goes down.
1t was one by the village clock.
When he rode into Lexington.
He saw the gilded weathefcock
Swim in the moonlight as he passed,
And the meeting house windows, blank and bare,
Gaze at him with spectral glare
AS II they already stood aghast
AT the bloody work they would look upon
1t was two by the village clock.
When he came to the bridge in Concord town
He heard the bleatiug of the flock,
And the twitter of birds among the trees,
And felt the breath of the morning breeze
Blowing over the meadows brown.
And one was safe and asleep in his bed
Who at the bridge would be first to fall,
Who that day would be lying dead,
Pierced by British musket ball.
You know the rest. In the books you have read
How the British regulars fired and fled
How the farmers gave them ball for ball,
From behind each fence and fanny ard wall
Chasing the redcoatS down the lane,
Then crossing the fields to emerge again
Under the trees at the turn OF the road,
And only pausing to fire'and load.
So through the night rode Paul Revere;
And so through tile night went his cry Of alarm
To every MddleseX village and farm
A cry of defiance. and not Of fear
A voice in the darkness, and knock at the door,
And a word that shall echo foreycrmore!
For, borne on the night-wind OF the Past,
Through all our history, to the last,
In the hour OF darkness and peril and need,
The people will Wakeu and listen to hear
The hurrying hootbeat of that steed,
And the midnight message OF Paul Revere.