網頁圖片
PDF
ePub 版

Irish and Scotch, German, Italian, and French, — the common emigrant, and those who have stood nearest to a throne, brave and devoted men from almost every nation under heaven, men who have measured the value 5 of our country to the world by a nobler standard than the

cotton crop, and who realize that other and more momentous destinies are at stake upon our struggle than such as can be wrought upon any mere material looms and shuttles, — all, all are seen rallying beneath a common flag, 10 and exclaiming with one heart and voice: The American Union, it must be and shall be preserved!"

66

And we owe it, sir, to the memory of our fathers, we owe it to the hopes of our children, we owe it to the cause of free institutions, and of good government of every sort 15 throughout the world, to make the effort, cost what it may of treasure or of blood, and, with God's help, to accomplish the result.

I have said enough, and more than enough, to manifest the spirit in which this flag is now committed to your 20 charge. It is the national ensign, pure and simple, dearer to all our hearts at this moment, as we lift it to the gale, and see no other sign of hope upon the storm-cloud which rolls and rattles above it save that which is reflected from its own radiant hues, - dearer, a thousand fold dear25 er to us all, than ever it was before, while gilded by the sunshine of prosperity and playing with the zephyrs of peace. It will speak for itself far more eloquently than I can speak for it.

Behold it! Listen to it! Every star has a tongue; 30 every stripe is articulate. There is no language nor speech where their voices are not heard. There is magic in the web of it. It has an answer for every question of duty. It has a solution for every doubt and every perplexity. It has a word of good cheer for every hour of gloom or 35 of despondency.

Behold it! Listen to it! It speaks of earlier and of

66

later struggles. It speaks of victories, and sometimes of reverses, on the sea and on the land. It speaks of patriots and heroes among the living and among the dead; and of him, the first and greatest of them all, around whose 5 consecrated ashes this unnatural and abhorrent strife has so long been raging, - the abomination of desolation, standing where it ought not." But before all and above all other associations and memories, whether of glorious men, or glorious deeds, or glorious places, its voice is 10 ever of Union and Liberty, of the Constitution and the Laws.

-

Behold it! Listen to it! Let it tell the story of its birth to these gallant volunteers. as they march beneath its folds by day, or repose beneath its sentinel stars by 15 night.

Let it recall to them the strange, eventful history of its rise and progress; let it rehearse to them the wondrous tale of its trials and its triumphs, in peace as well as in war; and whatever else may happen to it, or to them, it 20 will never be surrendered to rebels, never be ignominiously struck to treason, nor ever be prostituted to any unworthy and unchristian purpose of revenge, depredation, or rapine. And may a merciful God cover the head of each one of its brave defenders in the hour of battle!

A FOREST SCENE.

LONGFELLOW.

THIS is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlock Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight, Stand like Druids of eld with voices sad and prophetic,

Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms. Loud from its rocky caverns the deep-voiced neighboring ocean Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.

CXLIII. - RICHELIEU'S VINDICATION.

BULWER.

(SIR EDWARD GEORGE EARLE BULWER-LYTTON, (generally known by his original name of Bulwer,) one of the most popular and distinguished of the living writers of England, was born at Haydon Hall, in the county of Norfolk, in 1805, and educated at the University of Cambridge. He is the author of a large number of novels, as well as of plays, poems, and miscellanies. He is a writer of various and versatile power, and his novels are remarkable for brilliant description, startling adventures, sharp delineation of character, and -especially the later ones-a vein of philosophical reflection. The moral tone of his carlier works is not always to be commended, but in this respect, as well as in substantial literary merit, there is a marked improvement in those of later date.

The following scene is from "Richelieu," a play founded upon certain incidents in the life of the great French statesman of that name.]

RICHELIEU. Room, my Lords, room!

France

Can need no intercession with the King.

The minister of

[They fall back. LOUIS. What means this false report of death, Lord

Cardinal?

RICHELIEU. Are you then angered, sire, that I live still ?

5 LOUIS. No; but such artifice

RICHELIEU. Not mine:- look elsewhere!

Louis

my castle swarmed with the assassins.

BARADAS [advancing]. We have punished them already.
Huguet is now

In the Bastile.

10 To avenge you

15

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

RICHELIEU. WE? Ha! ha! you hear,

My liege! What page, man, in the last court grammar
Made you a plural? Count, you have seized the hireling:
Sire, shall I name the master?

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

Service to France? I have none! Lives the man
Whom Europe, paled before your glory, deems
Rival to Armand Richelieu ?

LOUIS. What! so haughty!

5 Remember, he who made can unmake.

RICHELIEU. Never!

Never! Your anger can recall your trust,
Annul my office, spoil me of my lands,

Rifle my coffers, but my name. - my deeds, 10 Are royal in a land beyond your sceptre! Pass sentence on me, if you will; from Kings, Lo, I appeal to Time! Be just, my liege— I found your kingdom rent with heresies And bristling with rebellion; lawless nobles 15 And breadless serfs; England fomenting discord: Austria- her clutch on your dominion; Spain

[ocr errors]

Forging the prodigal gold of either Ind

To arméd thunder-bolts. The Arts lay dead,
Trade rotted in your marts, your Armies mutinous,
20 Your Treasury bankrupt. Would you now revoke
Your trust, so be it! and I leave you, sole,
Supremest monarch of the mightiest realm,
From Ganges to the Icebergs:- Look without;
No foe not humbled! Look within; the Arts
25 Quit for your schools their old Hesperides-
The golden Italy! while through the veins
Of your vast empire flows in strengthening tides,
Trade, the calm health of nations!

Sire, I know

[ocr errors]

nor measure

30 Your smoother courtiers please you best
Myself with them, yet sometimes I would doubt
If statesmen, rocked and dandled into power?
Could leave such legacies to kings!

[Louis appears irresolute.

BARADAS [passing him, whispers]. But Julie,

Shall I not summon her to court?

5

LOUIS [motions to Baradas, and turns haughtily to the

Cardinal]. Enough!

Your Eminence must excuse a longer audience.

- For our conference, this

To your own palace:
Nor place- nor season.

RICHELIEU. Good my liege! for Justice
All place a temple, and all season, summer!
Do you deny me justice? Saints of heaven,
He turns from me! Do
you deny me justice?

For fifteen years, while in these hands dwelt empire, 10 The humblest craftsman - the obscurest vassal

[ocr errors]

The very leper shrinking from the sun,

Though loathed by Charity, might ask for justice!
Not with the fawning tone and crawling mien
Of some I see around you- Counts and Princes—
15 Kneeling for favors; — but, erect and loud,

As men who ask man's rights! my liege, my Lord,
Do you refuse me justice audience even —

In the pale presence of the baffled Murther?

[merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

You find me now amidst my trustiest friends,

My closest kindred; you would tear them from me;
They murder you, forsooth, since me they love.

25 Enough of plots and treasons for one reign!
Home Home! and sleep away these phantoms!
RICHELIEU. Sire!

I - patience, heaven! sweet heaven! Sire, from the foot Of that Great Throne, these hands have raised aloft

30 On an Olympus, looking down on mortals

And worshipped by their awe - before the foot
Of that high throne- spurn you the gray-haired man,
Who gave you empire—and now sues for safety!
LOUIS. No: - when we see your Eminence in truth
At the foot of the throne-we'll listen to you.

« 上一頁繼續 »