Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1867-03-06
loHN q. WHITTIER


And one there was. dreamer born,
" ho. with mission to fulfil,
Had left the MUSES. haunts to turn
The crank of an opinion-mil,
Making hi~ rustic reed of song
\ weapon in the war with wrong,
l"kIng his fancy to the brcaking-plough
That heam-dcep turned the soil for truth to
spring and grow
Too quiet seemed the man 10 ride
The winged Hippogriff Reform
Vas hi- voice from side to side
f. pierce the tumult Of the storm
silent, shy, peace loving man.
He seemed no fiery partisan
T. hold has way against the public frown,
The tan OF church and state. the fierce mob's
bounding down.
For while he wrought with strenuous will
The work his hands had found to do,
Tie heard the ftful music still
of winds that out of drcam-land blew
Tie lin about him could not drown
What the strange voices whispered down;
NI"ns his task-fied weird professions swept
The visionary pomp of stately phantoms step
ped
The common air was thick with dreams,-
He told them u the toiling crowd
Sang in his ear he sang aloud
In still shut bays, on windy capes,
He heard the call Of beckoning shapes
And, a. the gray old shadows prompted him
70 homelv moulds Of rhyme he shaped their
legends grim.
He rested now his weary hands,
And lightly moraIized and laughed,
A., tracing on the shifting sands
\ burlcSquc of his paper craft,
IIt saw the careless waves o'errun
His words as time before had done,
Each day. tide-water washing clean away,
Like letters from the sand. the work of YES
terday.
The third fricnd-it may be Bayard Tay-
ior-is thus introduced
And one whose Arab face was tanned
By tropic sun and boreal frost,
- travelled there was scarce a land
or people left him to exhaust,
In idling mood had from him hurled
The poor squeezed orange of the world,
md in the tent-shade, as beneath palm,
Smoked. cross-legged like a Turk, in Oriental
Having placed these characters in his tent
the poet. with interludes of song and dia
Iogue- then reads these poems. :" The Wreck
If Rivermouth, q The Grave by the Lake, .
- The Brother ofMcrcv. 1.-THE Changeling .
.. The Maid Of Attitash,'' Kallundbore
Church. = q The Dead Ship of Harpswell, .
. The Palatine.'' and abraham . Daven
port"
\ fair lady Is introduced.
And she, with lips to which belong
Sweet intuiti)ns Of all art.
Gave to the winds of night strain
Which they who heard would hear again
And T. her voice the solemn ocean lent,
Touching its harp of sand, deep accompan
ment
And this was her
The harp at Nature IS advent strung
Has never ceased to play:
The song the stars Of morning sung
Has never died away
And prayer is made, and praise is given,
BY all things near and far
The ocean looketh up to heaven.
And mirrors every star.
Its waves are kneeling on the strand.
As kneels the human knee,
Their white locks bowling to the sand,
The priesthood of the sea-
They pour their glittering treasures forth
Their gifts of pearl they bring,
And all the listening hills of earth
Take up the song they sing.
Tho green earth sends her incense up
From many a mountain shrine
From folded leaf and dewy cup
She pours her sacred wine.
The mists above the morning rills
Rise white wings of prayer;
The altar curtains of the hills
Are sunsets purple air.