No dangerous tale of Him who came to save
The outcast and the poor.

But wisely shut the ray

Of God's free Gospel from her simple heart,
And to her darkened mind alone impart
One stern command-" OBEY."

So shalt thou deftly raise

The market price of human flesh; and while
On thee, their pampered guest, the planters smile,
Thy church shall praise.

Grave reverend men shall tell

From Northern pulpits how thy work was blest, While in that vile South Sodom, first and best, Thy poor disciples sell!

Oh, shame! the Moslem thrall,

Who, with his master, to the Prophet kneels,
While turning to the sacred Kebla, feels
His fetters break and fall.

Cheers for the turbaned Bey

Of robber-peopled Tunis! he hath torn
The dark slave dungeons open, and hath borne
Their inmates into day.

But our poor slave in vain

Turns to the Christian shrine his aching eyes-
Its rites will only swell his market-price,

And rivet on his chain.

God of all right! how long

Shall priestly robbers at Thine altar stand,
Lifting in prayer to Thee, the bloody hand
And haughty brow of wrong?

Oh, from the fields of cane,

From the low rice-swamp, from the trader's cellFrom the black slave-ship's foul and loathsome hell, And coffle's weary chain,—

Hoarse, horrible, and strong

Rises to Heaven that agonizing cry,
Filling the arches of the hollow sky,

HOW LONG-OH, GOD, HOW LONG!

WHITTIER.

OUR COUNTRYMEN IN CHAINS.

OUR fellow-countrymen in chains!
Slaves-in a land of light and law!
Slaves-crouching on the very plains

Where rolled the storm of Freedom's war!

A groan from Eutaw's haunted wood

A wail where Camden's martyrs fell

By every shrine of patriot blood,

From Moultrie's wall and Jasper's well!

By storied hill and hallowed grot,
By mossy wood and marshy glen,
Whence rang of old the rifle-shot,
And hurrying shout of Marion's men.

The groan of breaking hearts is there-
The falling lash-the fetter's clank!
Slaves-SLAVES are breathing in that air
Which old De Kalb and Sumter drank!

What, ho!-our countrymen in chains!
The whip on WOMAN'S shrinking flesh!
Our soil yet reddening with the stains

Caught from her scourging, warm and fresh! What! mothers from their children riven ! What! God's own image bought and sold! AMERICANS to market driven,

And bartered as the brute for gold!

Speak! shall their agony of prayer
Come thrilling to our hearts in vain?
To us, whose fathers scorned to bear
The paltry menace of a chain;
To us, whose boast is loud and long
Of holy Liberty and Light—

Say, shall these writhing slaves of Wrong,
Plead vainly for their plundered Right?

What! shall we send, with lavish breath,
Our sympathies across the wave
Where Manhood, on the field of death,

Strikes for his freedom, or a grave?
Shall prayers go up, and hymns be sung
For Greece, the Moslem fetter spurning,
And millions hail with pen and tongue

Our light on all her altars burning?

Shall Belgium feel, and gallant France,

By Vendome's pile and Schoenbrun's wall,

And Poland, gasping on her lance,

The impulse of our cheering call? And shall the SLAVE, beneath our eye, Clank o'er our fields his hateful chain? And toss his fettered arms on high,

And groan for Freedom's gift in vain?

Oh, say, shall Prussia's banner be
A refuge for the stricken slave?
And shall the Russian serf go free

By Baikal's lake and Neva's wave?
And shall the wintry-bosomed Dane
Relax the iron hand of pride,

And bid his bondmen cast the chain,

From fettered soul and limb, aside?

Shall every flap of England's flag

Proclaim that all around are free,

From "farthest Ind" to each blue crag
That beetles o'er the Western Sea?
And shall we scoff at Europe's kings,
When Freedom's fire is dim with us,
And round our country's altar clings
The damning shade of Slavery's curse?

Go-let us ask of Constantine

To loose his grasp on Poland's throat; And beg the lord of Mahmoud's line To spare the struggling SulioteWill not the scorching answer come From turbaned Turk, and fiery Russ: "Go, loose your fettered slaves at home, Then turn, and ask the like of us!"

Just God! and shall we calmly rest,

The Christian's scorn-the Heathen's mirth

Content to live the lingering jest

And by-word of a mocking Earth? Shall our own glorious land retain

That curse which Europe scorns to bear? Shall our own brethren drag the chain Which not even Russia's menials wear?

Up, then, in Freedom's manly part,
From graybeard eld to fiery youth,
And on the nation's naked heart

Scatter the living coals of Truth!
Up-while ye slumber, deeper yet

The shadow of our fame is growing! Up-while ye pause, our sun may set In blood, around our altars flowing!

Oh! rouse ye, ere the storm comes forth-
The gathered wrath of God and man-
Like that which wasted Egypt's earth,
When hail and fire above it ran.
Hear ye no warnings in the air?

Feel ye no earthquake underneath?
Up-up-why will ye slumber where
The sleeper only wakes in death?

Up now for Freedom!-not in strife
Like that your sterner fathers saw-

The awful waste of human life

The glory and the guilt of war:
But break the chain-the yoke remove,
And smite to earth Oppression's rod,