Thou hast it. At thy bidding men have crowded And minstrel minds, without a blush, have shrouded Lies the dear charm of life's delightful dream; I cannot spare the luxury of believing That all things beautiful are what they seem. Who will believe that, with a smile whose blessing Would, like the patriarch's, soothe a dying hour; With voice as low, as gentle, and caressing As e'er won maiden's lip in moonlight bower; With look, like patient JoB's, eschewing evil; With motions graceful as a bird's in air; Thou art, in sober truth, the veriest devil That e'er clinch'd fingers in a captive's hair? That in thy veins there springs a poison fountain, Deadlier than that which bathes the upas-tree; And in thy wrath, a nursing cat o' mountain Is calm as her babe's sleep compared with thee? And underneath that face like summer's ocean's, Its lip as moveless, and its cheek as clear, Slumbers a whirlwind of the heart's emotions, Love, hatred, pride, hope, sorrow-all, save fear. Love for thy land, as if she were thy daughter, Her pipes in peace, her tomahawk in wars; Hatred of missionaries and cold water; Pride—in thy rifle-trophies and thy scars; Hope that thy wrongs will be by the Great Spirit Remember'd and revenged when thou art gone; Sorrow-that none are left thee to inherit Thy name, thy fame, thy passions, and thy throne. CONNECTICUT. AND still her gray rocks tower above the sea That murmurs at their feet, a conquer'd wave; 'Tis a rough land of earth, and stone, and tree, Where breathes no castled lord or cabin'd slave; Where thoughts, and tongues, and hands are bold and free, And friends will find a welcome, foes a grave; And where none kneel, save when to Heaven they Nor even then, unless in their own way. [pray, Theirs is a pure republic, wild, yet strong, A❝fierce democracie," where all are true To what themselves have voted-right or wrongAnd to their laws, denominated blue; (If red, they might to DRACO's code belong ;) A vestal state, which power could not subdue, Nor promise win-like her own eagle's nest, Sacred-the San Marino of the west. A justice of the peace, for the time being, They bow to, but may turn him out next year: They reverence their priest, but, disagreeing In price or creed, dismiss him without fear; They have a natural talent for foreseeing And knowing all things; and should PARK appear From his long tour in Africa, to show [know. The Niger's source, they'd meet him with-We They love their land, because it is their own, A stubborn race, fearing and flattering none. Such are they nurtured, such they live and die: All-but a few apostates, who are meddling With merchandise, pounds, shillings, pence, and peddling; Or, wandering through the southern countries, teaching The A B C from WEBSTER'S spelling-book; Gallant and godly, making love and preaching, And gaining, by what they call "hook and crook," And what the moralists call overreaching, A decent living. The Virginians look Upon them with as favourable eyes As GABRIEL on the devil in Paradise. But these are but their outcasts. View them near At home, where all their worth and pride is placed; And there their hospitable fires burn clear, Faithful in love, in honour stern and chaste, And minds have there been nurtured, whose control Hers are not Tempe's nor Arcadia's spring, Of life's best angel, health, is on her gales Through sun and snow-and, in the autumn time, Earth has no purer and no lovelier clime. Her clear, warm heaven at noon,-the mist that shrouds Her twilight hills,-her cool and starry eves, The glorious splendour of her sunset clouds, The rainbow beauty of her forest leaves, Come o'er the eye, in solitude and crowds, Where'er his web of song her poet weaves; And his mind's brightest vision but displays The autumn scenery of his boyhood's days. And when you dream of woman, and her love; Her truth, her tenderness, her gentle power; The maiden, listening in the moonlight grove; The mother, smiling in her infant's bower; Forms, features, worshipp'd while we breathe or move, Be, by some spirit of your dreaming hour, Borne, like Loretto's chapel, through the air To the green land I sing, then wake; you'll find them there. MARCO BOZZARIS.* AT midnight, in his guarded tent, The Turk was dreaming of the hour In dreams, through camp and court, he bore In dreams his song of triumph heard; At midnight, in the forest shades, BOZZARIS ranged his Suliote band, There had the Persian's thousands stood, And now there breathed that haunted air An hour pass'd on-the Turk awoke; And death-shots falling thick and fast BOZZARIS cheer his band: "Strike-till the last arm'd foe expires; They fought-like brave men, long and well; Bleeding at every vein. His few surviving comrades saw And the red field was won: Then saw in death his eyelids close Like flowers at set of sun. Come to the bridal chamber, Death! He fell in an attack upon the Turkish camp at Laspi, the site of the ancient Platæa, August 20, 1823, and expired in the moment of victory. His last words were: "To die for liberty is a pleasure, not a pain." Come in consumption's ghastly form, With banquet-song, and dance, and wine; And thou art terrible-the tear, The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier; Of agony, are thine. But to the hero, when his sword Has won the battle for the free, Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word; And in its hollow tones are heard The thanks of millions yet to be. Come, when his task of fame is wroughtCome, with her laurel-leaf, blood-bought— Come in her crowning hour-and then Thy sunken eye's unearthly light To him is welcome as the sight Of sky and stars to prison'd men: Thy grasp is welcome as the hand Of brother in a foreign land; Thy summons welcome as the cry That told the Indian isles were nigh To the world-seeking Genoese, When the land-wind, from woods of palm, And orange-groves, and fields of balm, Blew o'er the Haytian seas. BOZZARIS! with the storied brave Greece nurtured in her glory's time, Rest thee-there is no prouder grave, Even in her own proud clime. She wore no funeral weeds for thee, Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume, Like torn branch from death's leafless tree, In sorrow's pomp and pageantry, The heartless luxury of the tomb: But she remembers thee as one Long loved, and for a season gone; For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed, Her marble wrought, her music breathed; For thee she rings the birthday bells; Of thee her babes' first lisping tells: For thine her evening prayer is said At palace couch, and cottage bed; Her soldier, closing with the foe, Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow; His plighted maiden, when she fears For him, the joy of her young years, Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears: And she, the mother of thy boys, Though in her eye and faded cheek Is read the grief she will not speak, The memory of her buried joys, And even she who gave thee birth, Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth, Talk of thy doom without a sigh: For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's, One of the few, the immortal names, That were not born to die. JOHN G. C. BRAINARD. [Born, 1796. Died, 1828.] DURING the present century many persons in this country, whose early productions gave promise of brilliant achievements in maturity, have died young. It has been said that the history of American genius might be written in a series of obituaries of youthful authors. Were DRAKE, SANDS, GRIFFIN, ROCKWELL, WILCOX, PINKNEY, CLARKE, the DAVIDSONS, and BRAINARD now alive, there would be no scarcity of American writers, nor would any of them have passed the ordinary meridian of existence. What they have left us must be regarded as the first-fruits of minds whose full powers were to the last undeveloped, and which were never tasked to their full capacity. JOHN GARDNER CALKINS BRAINARD was a son of the Honourable J. G. BRAINARD, one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of Connecticut. He was born at New London, in that State, on the twenty-first day of October, 1796. After finishing his preparatory studies, which were pursued under the direction of an elder brother, he entered Yale College, in 1811, being then in the fifteenth year of his age. At this immature period, before the mind is fully awake to the nature and importance of moral and intellectual discipline, severe application to study is unusual. BRAINARD's books were neglected for communion with his own thoughts and "thick-coming fancies," or for the society of his fellows. His college career was marked by nothing peculiar: he was distinguished for the fine powers he evinced whenever he chose to exert them, for the uniform modesty of his deportment, the kindness which characterized his intercourse with those about him, and a remarkable degree of sensitiveness, which caused him to shrink from every harsh collision, and to court retirement. On leaving college, in 1815, he commenced the study of law, in his native place, and on his admission to the bar, he removed to the city of Middletown, intending to practise there his profession. His success was less than he anticipated; perhaps because of his too great modesty-an unfortunate quality in lawyers—or, it may be, in consequence of his indolence and convivial propensities. One of his biographers remarks that his friends were always welcome, save when they came as clients. Wearied with the vexations and dry formalities of his profession, he relinquished it in the winter of 1822, to undertake the editorship of the Connecticut Mirror, a weekly political and literary gazette, published in Hartford. But here he found as little to please him as in the business he had deserted. He was too indolent to prepare every week articles of a serious, argumentative character, and gave in their place, graceful or humorous paragraphs, and the occasional pieces of verse on which rests his reputation as a poet. These, at the time, were republished in many periodicals, and much praised. In the departments of poetry and criticism, the Mirror acquired a high reputation; but in others, while under his direction, it hardly rose to mediocrity.* His first volume of poetry,† containing his contributions to the Mirror, and some other pieces, was published early in 1825. It was favourably received by the public, and its success induced his friends to urge him to undertake the composition of a larger and more important work than he had yet attempted. His constitutional lassitude and aversion to high and continued effort deterred him from beginning the task, until 1827, when his health began to wane, and it was no longer in his power. He then relinquished the editorship of the Mirror, and sought for restoring quiet, and the gentle ministrations of affection, the home of his childhood. His illness soon assumed the character of consumption, and he saw that he had but a brief time to live. A few weeks were passed on the eastern shore of Long Island, in the hope of deriving benefit from a change of air; but nothing could arrest the progress of the fatal malady; and he returned to New London, to prepare for the The editor of the last edition of his works, of which I have received a copy since the above was written, and while this volume is passing through the press, speaks as follows of his editorial career :-" We are assured by competent testimony, that laboured and able political articles were withheld from publication, owing to causes over which he had little control. It is not, perhaps, necessary to detail the facts, but they certainly go far to exculpate him from the charge of levity, or weakness, in conducting the editorial department of his paper. Prudential considerations were suffered to have sway, at the expense of his reputation for political tact and foresight. The only substitutes for the articles referred to, were such brief and tame pieces as he could prepare, after the best and almost only hours for composition had passed by. This circumstance, together with the consciousness that the paper was ill sustained in respect to its patronage, was sufficiently discouraging to a person whose sensibilities were as acute as those of BRAINARD. It accounts, also, for the frequent turns of mental depression which marked his latter years,-heightened, indeed, by that frequent and mortifying concomitant of genius,-slender pecuniary means." The volume was introduced by the following characteristic address to the reader :-" The author of the following pieces has been induced to publish them in a book, from considerations which cannot be interesting to the public. Many of these little poems have been printed in the Connecticut Mirror; and others are just fit to keep them company. No apologies are made, and no criticisms deprecated. The commonplace story of the importunities of friends, though it had its share in the publication, is not insisted upon; but the vanity of the author, if others choose to call it such, is a natural motive, and the hope of making a little something by it,' is an honest acknowledgment, if it is a poor excuse." The motto of the title-page was as quaint: "Some said, 'John, print it;' others said 'Not so ;' Some said 'It might do good;' others said, 'No.'" Bunyan's Apology. MARCO BOZZARIS.* AT midnight, in his guarded tent, The Turk was dreaming of the hour In dreams, through camp and court, he bore In dreams his song of triumph heard; At midnight, in the forest shades, BOZZARIS ranged his Suliote band, There had the Persian's thousands stood, And now there breathed that haunted air An hour pass'd on-the Turk awoke; "To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!" And death-shots falling thick and fast As lightnings from the mountain-cloud; And heard, with voice as trumpet loud, BOZZARIS cheer his band: "Strike-till the last arm'd foe expires; They fought-like brave men, long and well; Bleeding at every vein. His few surviving comrades saw His smile when rang their proud hurrah, Then saw in death his eyelids close Like flowers at set of sun. Come to the bridal chamber, Death! He fell in an attack upon the Turkish camp at Laspi, the site of the ancient Platea, August 20, 1823, and expired in the moment of victory. His last words were: "To die for liberty is a pleasure, not a pain." Come in consumption's ghastly form, With banquet-song, and dance, and wine; And thou art terrible-the tear, The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier; Of agony, are thine. But to the hero, when his sword Has won the battle for the free, The thanks of millions yet to be. Of sky and stars to prison'd men: Thy grasp is welcome as the hand Of brother in a foreign land; Thy summons welcome as the cry That told the Indian isles were nigh To the world-seeking Genoese, When the land-wind, from woods of palm, And orange-groves, and fields of balm, Blew o'er the Haytian seas. BOZZARIS! with the storied brave Greece nurtured in her glory's time, Rest thee-there is no prouder grave, Even in her own proud clime. She wore no funeral weeds for thee, Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume, Like torn branch from death's leafless tree, In sorrow's pomp and pageantry, The heartless luxury of the tomb: But she remembers thee as one Long loved, and for a season gone; For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed, Her marble wrought, her music breathed; For thee she rings the birthday bells; Of thee her babes' first lisping tells: For thine her evening prayer is said At palace couch, and cottage bed; Her soldier, closing with the foe, Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow; His plighted maiden, when she fears For him, the joy of her young years, Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears: And she, the mother of thy boys, Though in her eye and faded cheek Is read the grief she will not speak, The memory of her buried joys, And even she who gave thee birth, Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth, Talk of thy doom without a sigh: For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's, One of the few, the immortal names, That were not born to die. JOHN G. C. BRAINARD. [Born, 1796. Died, 1828.] DURING the present century many persons in this country, whose early productions gave promise of brilliant achievements in maturity, have died young. It has been said that the history of American genius might be written in a series of obituaries of youthful authors. Were DRAKE, SANDS, GRIFFIN, ROCKWELL, WILCOX, PINKNEY, CLARKE, the DAVIDSONS, and BRAINARD now alive, there would be no scarcity of American writers, nor would any of them have passed the ordinary meridian of existence. What they have left us must be regarded as the first-fruits of minds whose full powers were to the last undeveloped, and which were never tasked to their full capacity. JOHN GARDNER CALKINS BRAINARD was a son of the Honourable J. G. BRAINARD, one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of Connecticut. He was born at New London, in that State, on the twenty-first day of October, 1796. After finishing his preparatory studies, which were pursued under the direction of an elder brother, he entered Yale College, in 1811, being then in the fifteenth year of his age. At this immature period, before the mind is fully awake to the nature and importance of moral and intellectual discipline, severe application to study is unusual. BRAIN ARD's books were neglected for communion with his own thoughts and "thick-coming fancies," or for the society of his fellows. His college career was marked by nothing peculiar: he was distinguished for the fine powers he evinced whenever he chose to exert them, for the uniform modesty of his deportment, the kindness which characterized his intercourse with those about him, and a remarkable degree of sensitiveness, which caused him to shrink from every harsh collision, and to court retirement. On leaving college, in 1815, he commenced the study of law, in his native place, and on his admission to the bar, he removed to the city of Middletown, intending to practise there his profession. His success was less than he anticipated; perhaps because of his too great modesty-an unfortunate quality in lawyers—or, it may be, in consequence of his indolence and convivial propensities. One of his biographers remarks that his friends were always welcome, save when they came as clients. Wearied with the vexations and dry formalities of his profession, he relinquished it in the winter of 1822, to undertake the editorship of the Connecticut Mirror, a weekly political and literary gazette, published in Hartford. But here he found as little to please him as in the business he had deserted. He was too indolent to prepare every week articles of a serious, argumentative character, and gave in their place, graceful or humorous paragraphs, and the occasional pieces of verse on which rests his reputation as a poet. These, at the time, were republished in many periodicals, and much praised. In the departments of poetry and criticism, the Mirror acquired a high reputation; but in others, while under his direction, it hardly rose to mediocrity.* His first volume of poetry,† containing his contributions to the Mirror, and some other pieces, was published early in 1825. It was favourably received by the public, and its success induced his friends to urge him to undertake the composition of a larger and more important work than he had yet attempted. His constitutional lassitude and aversion to high and continued effort deterred him from beginning the task, until 1827, when his health began to wane, and it was no longer in his power. He then relinquished the editorship of the Mirror, and sought for restoring quiet, and the gentle ministrations of affection, the home of his childhood. His illness soon assumed the character of consumption, and he saw that he had but a brief time to live. A few weeks were passed on the eastern shore of Long Island, in the hope of deriving benefit from a change of air; but nothing could arrest the progress of the fatal malady; and he returned to New London, to prepare for the The editor of the last edition of his works, of which I have received a copy since the above was written, and while this volume is passing through the press, speaks as follows of his editorial career:-"We are assured by competent testimony, that laboured and able political articles were withheld from publication, owing to causes over which he had little control. It is not, perhaps, necessary to detail the facts, but they certainly go far to exculpate him from the charge of levity, or weakness, in conducting the editorial department of his paper. Prudential considerations were suffered to have sway, at the expense of his reputation for political tact and foresight. The only substitutes for the articles referred to, were such brief and tame pieces as he could prepare, after the best and almost only hours for composition had passed by. This circumstance, together with the consciousness that the paper was ill sustained in respect to its patronage, was sufficiently discouraging to a person whose sensibilities were as acute as those of BRAINARD. It accounts, also, for the frequent turns of mental depression which marked his latter years,-heightened, indeed, by that frequent and mortifying concomitant of genius,-slender pecuniary means." The volume was introduced by the following characteristic address to the reader :-"The author of the following pieces has been induced to publish them in a book, from considerations which cannot be interesting to the public. Many of these little poems have been printed in the Connecticut Mirror; and others are just fit to keep them company. No apologies are made, and no criticisms deprecated. The commonplace story of the importunities of friends, though it had its share in the publication, is not insisted upon; but the vanity of the author, if others choose to call it such, is a natural motive, and the hope of making a little something by it,' is an honest acknowledgment, if it is a poor excuse." The motto of the title-page was as quaint: "Some said, 'John, print it ;' others said 'Not so ;' Some said 'It might do good;' others said, 'No.'" Bunyan's Apology. |